Efficiency Methods
An Introduction to Scientific Management

REMUNERATION I4I is at first very small, but increases rapidly. At 90 per cent, efficiency the bonus is 10 per cent, of the ordinary wage , after that it increases 1 per cent, for every unit per cent, increase of efficiency, so that the standard, 100 per cent, efficiency, has a 20 per cent, bonus, and the increase above 100 is paid by the same increase in rate. There is no abrupt change. The actual percentage of bonus is subject to a little variation, but the figures stated are the most usual. The variables in these two forms of bargains are : the average minimum day-wage, which forms the basis, and the amount of the bonus. Before discussing these more fully, we may repeat the remark made by Hoxie, that both plans mean a distinct lowering of piece-rate—of the actual sum paid per piece. He works out a hypothetical case on the Emerson system and shows that the piece- rate itself falls gradually as the output gets larger, although the actual sum received in wages grows also larger. In the Taylor and the Gantt systems the actual piece-rates are constant, but Taylor began with an openly acknowledged “ cut ” in rates, because the production of the article was made much easier ; and Gantt makes what is, in effect, a cut in rates, if he fixes his standard task as any accomplishment higher than the workers achieved under old conditions at their day wage. The fact that the effect of the bonus is to lower the price paid to the workers per unit or piece is a very damaging one in their eyes, even when they know that they are receiving a greater sum for