Portal:Capitalism/Selected quote/29

“ The most melancholy feature in all the disputes between labour and capital is that it is scarcely ever capital that succeeds in breaking down the price of labour, but, alas, it is labour which stabs labour. Look around you and see labour working for 10, 20 and even 30 per cent, less in some mills, and at Johnstown and Harrisburg for less than one-half what we pay for skilled labour in this district; and then in your hearts blame not capital, but consider employers who regret those reductions in wages, who stand out against them and run for years at higher prices, as the best friends of labour, even although at last they must frankly confess that if they are to give their men steady employment and save their capital and works, they are forced to ask them to work at the rates obtained by their competitors. The first employer who reduces labour is labour's enemy; but the last employer to reduce labour may be labour's staunchest friend. The fatal enemy of labour is labour, not capital. ” — Andrew Carnegie (1835 – 1919)
The Empire of Business , 1902