At the honourable shops, from
36s. to 24s. is paid for a piece of work for which the dishonourable shop
pays from 22s. to 9s. But not to the workmen; happy is he if he really
gets two-thirds, or half of that. For at the honourable shops, the master
deals directly with his workmen; while at the dishonourable ones, the
greater part of the work, if not the whole, is let out to contractors, or
middle-men--"_sweaters_," as their victims significantly call them--who, in
their turn, let it out again, sometimes to the workmen, sometimes to fresh
middlemen; so that out of the price paid for labour on each article, not
only the workmen, but the sweater, and perhaps the sweater's sweater, and a
third, and a fourth, and a fifth, have to draw their profit. And when the
labour price has been already beaten down to the lowest possible, how much
remains for the workmen after all these deductions, let the poor fellows
themselves say!
One working tailor (at the Hanover Square Rooms Meeting) "mentioned a
number of shops, both at the east and west ends, whose work was all
taken by sweaters; and several of these shops were under royal and noble
patronage.
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