The purpose of this book is to present to students who have
already obtained some slight background in the concepts and
terminology of economics, a more intimate consideration of the
worker in society. It is an attempt to understand the worker
from an economic standpoint; what he does, how he lives, what
he thinks--in brief to get at his attitudes.

The book is addressed primarily to students of the junior
college. The authors believe, however, that since the mode
of approach is quite different from that of the current books on
"labor problems," the present work will adapt itself to the
needs of various other student groups. Prospective engineers,
for example, whose profession is sure to force them into the
thick of the problems of capital and labor, should find the
material here presented both interesting and profitable.

For, as it has been pointed out more than once, the average
employer, when encountering a difficulty in material or ma-
chinery, at once turns the matter over to a group of experts for
investigation; whereas, if the difficulty is with the workers, he
at once assumes the attitude of warfare. Yet the need for cool
understanding of the nature of the difficulty is certainly as great
in the second instance as in the first.

And what is more to the point, the worker's opinions can not
be simply controlled. The direction of our social and industrial
development always represents a resultant of conflicting forces,
and among these forces the aspirations of the worker exert a
constantly increasing influence. The authors of the present
text assume that every citizen of a democracy is called upon
to bear his part in adapting our institutions to the bewildering
changes of our social and industrial system, and that an in-
telligent appreciation of the attitude of the worker will enable
us to substitute, in some measure, wise co-operation for wasteful
conflict.

It will be apparent that this approach frankly assumes the
influence of environmental factors upon human opinions,
motives, and actions. Whatever theories we may hold in regard

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