Helper Filene

Last week Automan Henry Ford got the League of Nations into a predicament and Merchant Edward A. Filene got it out again.

The predicament arose when Mr. Ford asked the League's International Labor Office to collect statistics on real wages in various European countries. Mr. Ford wanted to pay workmen in his foreign plants the same real wages that he pays his U. S. workmen. So he asked the Labor Office to determine what wages he should pay Englishmen, Frenchmen, Russians, Germans, so that they should be on equal terms with each other and with U. S. Ford employes.

Willing was the Labor Office to collect this information--willing, but not able. It had for some time been working on wage statistics, but needed from $20,000 to $30,000 to collect figures on the scale Mr. Ford requested.

Then came forward Mr. Filene. Information on European wages, said he, would be valuable to all U. S. businessmen. U. S. Prosperity would increase if European wages rose. Therefore he would guarantee the Labor Office $25,000 to conduct its research. A good cause should not suffer from lack of funds.

"Extremely welcome and gratifying . . . permit us to do a service of greatest importance ... a service we have long wanted to perform," said Albert Thomas, the League's Labor Office Director.

It was not the first time far-sighted Merchant Filene had helped the League. He has outstanding another $25,000 offer to the Labor Office's Scientific Management Institute, conditional upon the Rockefeller Institute's donating a like amount. And the International Labor Conference which last week opened at Geneva is using a telephonic translation system for which Mr. Filene paid. This translation system is a device which records speeches in six languages, thus enabling most of the delegates to follow proceedings without the delay of interpreters.