United States Steel: A Corporation with a Soul. Arundel Cotter
opinion arose regarding the plans, each of the men present urging changes which he thought would be of benefit to the company he represented. While the discussion was at its height somebody rose and said, “Gentlemen, it is not a question of what is best for the Duluth, Missabe & Northern, the Oliver Iron Mining Co., or any other company; the whole question is, what is best for the interests of the United States Steel Corporation!” That settled it. All differences were smoothed out and a harmonious plan quickly agreed on.
This result was due to the plan referred to which was devised to give each employee the stimulus of personal ownership, an incentive not confined, as it had been formerly, to a few individuals, but distributed throughout the organization.
The plan, as finally worked out and put into operation, was designed to accomplish three main objects: first, to interest employees in the Steel Corporation as a whole and not merely in the operations of the subsidiary for which they worked; second, to give them an incentive to do everything possible to reduce expenses and correspondingly increase profits; third, to offer them an inducement to stay with the Corporation and identify themselves with it.
It is with the first, or stock subscription part of the plan, that the public is most familiar. The benefits of this are extended to all employees of the Corporation who desire to take advantage of it. It is simply an effort to increase their interest in the Corporation and at the same time encourage thrift by enabling them to purchase stock at an attractive price and to pay for it in small instalments, with the additional incentive of a bonus for holding for a certain time the stock purchased. Usually the offering price has been a point or two below the market, but in 1920, for the first time, the subscription price was set slightly above it.
In effect the stock subscription plan makes for a capital-labor partnership. It benefits both the worker and the employing company. It, in a small way, makes the worker a capitalist himself and enables him to see something of both sides of the case in capital and labor disputes. This plan, and others more or less similar adopted by other companies, have done more to bring into accord the relations between capital and labor than thousands of sermons and theses by theoretical reformers. It is a hard-headed, practical solution of the great problem.
The late George W. Perkins has generally been credited with the conception and perfection of this plan. And unquestionably he had much to do with it, and took a leading part in its consummation. He always took a keen interest in anything that tended to better the conditions surrounding the worker or to reduce the friction that, unfortunately, exists between capital and labor. But, as a matter of fact, the plan was largely Judge Gary’s, as was brought out in the testimony in the Steel dissolution suit, and—to quote Perkins himself:
“Two men have been my especial inspiration—one of them Judge Gary, the actual operating developer of corporation progressiveness as we have it at its best; but he has a positive passion for doing good things and big things behind the screen of somebody else’s personality; and credit that belongs to him—tremendous credit—lands elsewhere. Over and over he has made me protest against his insistence that I or another should accept applause for accomplishment directly belonging to himself; for instance, in employees pensions and profit sharing.”
In its application the stock subscription plan has been an unqualified success. Particularly in recent years employees of all classes from common labor to executives have shown eagerness to avail themselves of its terms to acquire a personal financial interest in the big Corporation. Subscriptions for years have far exceeded the amounts of stock offered and all over-subscriptions have been honored. The figures of the annual subscriptions to stock under the plan speak for themselves:
| YEAR | PREFERRED SHARES TAKEN | PRICE | COMMON SHARES TAKEN | PRICE | NO. OF EMPLOYEES SUBSCRIBING |
| 1921 | —— | —— | 255,308 | $81.00 | 81,710 |
| 1920 | —— | —— | 161,298 | 106.00 | 63,324 |
| 1919 | —— | —— | 155,098 | 92.00 | 59,792 |
| 1918 | —— | —— | 93,488 | 92.00 | 41,991 |
| 1917 | —— | —— | 66,519 | 107.00 | 38,326 |
| 1916 | —— | —— | 49,538 | 85.00 | 24,631 |
| 1915 | No offering | ||||
| 1914 | 42,687 | 105.00 | 47,346 | 57.00 | 45,928 |
| 1913 | 34,418 | 109.00 | 25,583 | 66.00 | 35,687 |
| 1912 | 30,613 | 110.00 | 30,528 | 65.00 | 36,575 |
| 1911 | 19,324 | 114.00 | 29,072 | 70.00 | 26,305 |
| 1910 | 24,679 | 124.00 | —— | —— | 17,381 |
| 1909 | 17,953 | 110.00 | 15,380 | 50.00 | 19,116 |
| 1908 | 30,398 | 87.50 | —— | —— | 24,527 |
| 1907 | 27,150 | 102.00 | —— | —— | 14,163 |
| 1906 | 24,001 | 100.00 | —— | —— | 12,192 |
| 1905 | 18,180 | 87.50 | —— | —— | 8,494 |
| 1904 | 31,644 | 55.00 | —— | —— | 9,912 |
| 1903 |
47,551
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