Truck wages

Form of payment

This article is about non-monetary wages. For the vehicles, see truck. For the form of transport, see trucking. For some forms of crop-growing, see truck farming.

Brass trade token from Fort Laramie, Dakota Territory, used in a truck system

Truck wages are wages paid not in conventional money but instead in the form of payment in kind (i.e. commodities, including goods and/or services); credit with retailers; or a money substitute, such as scrip, chits, vouchers or tokens. Truck wages are a characteristic of a truck system.

"Truck", in this context, is a relatively archaic English word meaning "exchange" or "barter".

## Truck system[edit]

A truck system includes one or both of the following practices under which truck wages are used to defraud and/or exploit workers.

* Firstly, the truck wages are demonstrably of a lesser market value than the amount of money that would normally be paid for the same work.
* Secondly, truck systems limit employees' ability to choose how to spend their earnings. For example, credit or company scrip might be usable only for the purchase of goods at a monopolistic company-owned store, at which prices are set artificially high. As long as the company store is the only party able and willing to accept scrip for needed goods, there is no meaningful competition to lower prices. Hence, a truck system relies on a closed economic system in which employees are required to become subject to a retail monopoly in essential goods.

Truck systems have been specifically outlawed in many countries by labour law and employment standards; and legislation such as the British Truck Acts.[1]

## History[edit]

### Britain[edit]

While truck systems had long existed in many parts of the world, it was widespread during the 18th and early-19th centuries in Britain. Despite a long history of legislation intended to curb truck systems (Truck Acts), they remained common into the 20th century. In a prosecution brought against a Manchester cotton manufacturer in 1827 one worker gave evidence that he had received wages of only two shillings in nine months; the rest "he was obliged to take [in goods] from the manufacturer's daughter, who was also the cashier".[2]

In Britain the truck system was sometimes referred to as the tommy system. The 1901 edition of Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable[3] notes the tommy shop as:

> Where wages are paid to workmen who are expected to lay out a part of the money for the good of the shop. Tommy means bread or a penny roll, or the food taken by a workman in his handkerchief; it also means goods in lieu of money.

In the "Midland Tour" of his Rural Rides, the agriculturist and political reformer William Cobbett reports the use of "the truck or tommy system" in Wolverhampton and Shrewsbury. He describes the logic of the tommy as:

> The manner of carrying on the tommy system is this: suppose there to be a master who employs a hundred men. That hundred men, let us suppose, to earn a pound a week each. This is not the case in the iron-works; but no matter, we can illustrate our meaning by one sum as well as by another. These men lay out weekly the whole of the hundred pounds in victuals, drink, clothing, bedding, fuel, and house-rent. Now, the master finding the profits of his trade fall off very much, and being at the same time in want of money to pay the hundred pounds weekly, and perceiving that these hundred pounds are carried away at once, and given to shopkeepers of various descriptions; to butchers, bakers, drapers, hatters, shoemakers, and the rest; and knowing that, on an average, these shopkeepers must all have a profit of thirty per cent., or more, he determines to keep this thirty per cent. to himself; and this is thirty pounds a week gained as a shop-keeper, which amounts to 1,560l. a year. He, therefore, sets up a tommy shop: a long place containing every commodity that the workman can want, liquor and house-room excepted.

Although Cobbett sees nothing wrong in itself in the tommy system, he notes that "The only question is in this case of the manufacturing tommy work, whether the master charges a higher price than the shop-keepers would charge," but given the guaranteed market, Cobbett sees no reason why any master should ever abuse the system. However, in rural regions he notes the virtual monopoly of the shopkeeper:

> I have often had to observe on the cruel effects of the suppression of markets and fairs, and on the consequent power of extortion possessed by the country shop-keepers. And what a thing it is to reflect on, that these shopkeepers have the whole of the labouring men of England constantly in their debt; have on an average a mortgage on their wages to the amount of five or six weeks, and make them pay any price that they choose to extort.

### United States[edit]

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (November 2019)

|

See also: Company store

One reason for the truck system in the early history of the United States is that there was no national form of paper currency and an insufficient supply of coinage. Banknotes were the majority of the money in circulation. Banknotes were discounted relative to gold and silver (e.g. a $5 banknote might be exchanged for $4.50 of coins) and the discount depended on the financial strength of the issuing bank and distance from the bank. During financial crises many banks failed and their notes became worthless.[4][5]

### Australia/New Zealand[edit]

The chorus of the sailing song "The Wellerman" references Weller Bros., an Australian whaling supplier that paid in goods rather than money[6] to the workers at their whaling stations in New Zealand:

> Soon may the Wellerman come

> To bring us sugar and tea and rum.

> Some day, when the tonguin' is done, ["tonguing" = breaking up and processing captured whales]

> We'll take our leave and go.

The subtext being that "some day" never comes, because without wages, the workers could not afford their passage back home.

## Relationship with company towns[edit]

Truck systems often existed in tandem with company towns (communities owned by an employer for the purpose of housing workers), which usually contained company stores. However, a truck system is not a prerequisite for the existence of a company town or vice versa.

Truck systems often persisted in long-settled, densely populated areas which hosted many employers and many merchants nominally in competition with one another. In such areas, their existence depended on the ability of employers to pay employees in scrip exchangeable at a company store. Such arrangements meant that potential nearby competitors were not typically in a position to accept the scrip at their stores (or at least not at a competitive exchange rate) since even if the company issuing the scrip was willing to accept it from non-employees, it would only accept it in exchange for goods at company-mandated prices. In this regard, employers' policies regarding the transferability of their scrip ranged from a willingness to accept it from anyone bearing it regardless of his or her relationship with the company (least restrictive) to refusing to accept scrip from anyone except the person it was paid to (most restrictive). The less restrictive the policy, the greater the potential workers paid in scrip could exchange it (likely at a discount) for goods and/or services the company store was unable (or unwilling) to provide, or for cash to obtain those goods and services. Indeed, one justification often given by employers for paying in scrip was that it supposedly prevented their workers from spending their earnings on "immoral" goods and services such as alcohol and prostitution.

On the other hand, a company town in a remote area with both the ability to keep out any potential competition for company stores, and an ample supply of cash, might be able to exploit workers in a manner similar to that of a truck system without actually employing a truck system. If the company store is the only vendor to which employees in a remote location have reasonable access to obtain goods, then such a company is in a position to pay wages in cash while charging inflated prices (also in cash) at the company store.

## See also[edit]

* Company store
* Company town
* Wage slavery
* Debt bondage
* Truck Acts
* Statare \- Sweden
* Coal scrip

## References[edit]

Notes

1. ^ G.W. Hilton (1958), The Truck Act of 1831. The Economic History Review, 10: 470–479
2. ^ Aspin 1995, p. 108
3. ^ Brewer, E. Cobham (1901). Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, New ed., rev., corrected and enl. London: Cassell. pp. 1440pp. OCLC 38931103.
4. ^ How Gold Coins Circulated in 19th Century America David Ginsburg
5. ^ Taylor, George Rogers (1951). The Transportation Revolution, 1815–1860. New York, Toronto: Rinehart & Co. pp. 133, 331–4. ISBN 978-0-87332-101-3.
6. ^ "NZ Folk Song * Soon May The Wellerman Come". folksong.org.nz. Retrieved 2021-01-12.

Bibliography

* Aspin, Chris (1995), The First industrial Society: Lancashire 1750–1850, Carnegie Publishing, ISBN 1-85936-016-5

Sources

* Anderson, Adelaide M. (1899), "Truck Legislation in England and on the Continent", in MacDonnell, John; Manson, Edward (eds.), Journal of the Society of Comparative Legislation, London: John Murray, pp. 395–406, retrieved 2008-06-01
* Burton, John Hill (1847), "Truck System", Manual of the Law of Scotland (The Law of Private Rights and Obligations) (2nd ed.), Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, p. 265
* Gaskell, P. (1833), "Truck and Cottage Systems", The Manufacturing Population of England, London: Baldwin and Cradock, pp. 342–361, retrieved 2008-05-31
* Lauchheimer, Malcolm H. (1919), "The Terms of Employment (in the Labor Law of Maryland)", Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science, vol. XXXVII, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, pp. 106–112
* M'Culloch, J. R. (1852), "Truck System", in Vethake, Henry (ed.), A Dictionary, Practical, Theoretical, and Historical, of Commerce and Commercial Navigation., vol. II, Philadelphia: A. Hart, pp. 684–86
* Morgan, James Appleton (1881), "Illegality of contracts for the payment of work otherwise than in current coin. -- The truck system.", A Treatise on the Law of Contracts by Charles Greenstreet Addison, vol. I, Jersey City: Frederick D. Linn & Co., pp. 434–36
* Ruegg, Alfred Henry (1901), "Changes in the Law of England Affecting Labour (The Truck System)", A Century of Law Reform, London: MacMillan and Co, pp. 254–257, retrieved 2008-05-31

* Commissioners appointed to Inquire into the Truck System, ed. (1871), Truck; or, Semi-Serfdom in the Shetland (Zetland) Isles (2nd ed.), London: Elliot Stock
* Manufactories, Commissioners for Inquiring Into the Employment and Condition of Children in Mines and (1842), "Of the Hiring, and the Wages Paid to Persons Employed in Mines", The Condition and Treatment of the Children Employed in the Mines and Collieries of the United Kingdom, London: William Strange, pp. 84–85
* "The Truck-System", The British and Foreign Review, vol. XV, London: Richard and John Edward Taylor (published 1843), 1842, pp. 79–100

* Cobbett, William. Rural Rides at Project Gutenberg

* v
* t
* e

Law

Core subjects|

* Administrative law
* Civil law
* Constitutional law
* Contract
* Criminal law
* Deed
* Equity
* Evidence
* International law
* Law of obligations
* Private law
* Procedure
* Civil
* Criminal
* Property law
* Public law
* Restitution and unjust enrichment
* Statutory law
* Tort

Disciplines|

* Abortion law
* Agricultural law
* Aviation law
* Amnesty law
* Banking law
* Bankruptcy
* Commercial law
* Competition law
* Conflict of laws
* Construction law
* Consumer protection
* Corporate law
* Cyberlaw
* Drugs law
* Election law
* Energy law
* Entertainment law (Media law)
* Environmental law
* Family law
* Financial law
* Financial regulation
* Health law
* Immigration law
* Intellectual property
* International criminal law
* International human rights
* International slavery laws
* International trade law
* Jurimetrics
* Labour
* Landlord–tenant law
* Law of war
* Legal archaeology
* Legal fiction
* Maritime law
* Marriage law
* Military law
* Nationality law
* Probate
* Estate
* Will and testament
* Product liability
* Public international law
* Refugee law
* Reparations
* Space law
* Sports law
* Tax law
* Transport law
* Trust law
* Unenforced law
* Women in law

Sources of law|

* Charter
* Legal code / Statutory law
* Constitution
* Custom
* Divine right
* Divine law
* Human rights
* Letters patent
* Natural law
* Natural and legal rights
* Case law
* Precedent
* Law reports
* Legal treatise
* Regulations

Law making|

* Ballot measure
* Codification
* Decree
* Edict
* Executive order
* Proclamation
* Legislation
* Delegated legislation
* Regulation
* Rulemaking
* Promulgation
* Repeal
* Treaty
* Concordat
* Statutory law
* Statute
* Act of parliament
* Act of Congress
* Basic structure doctrine

Legal systems|

* Civil law
* Common law
* Chinese law
* Legal pluralism
* Religious law
* Canon law
* Catholic canon law
* Hindu law
* Jain law
* Jewish law
* Parsi law
* Sharia
* Roman law
* Byzantine law
* Socialist law
* Statutory law
* Xeer
* Yassa

Legal theory|

* Anarchist
* Contract theory
* Comparative law
* Expressive function
* Feminist
* Law and economics
* Legal formalism
* History
* Libertarian
* International legal theory
* Principle of legality
* Principle of typicality
* Pseudolaw
* Rule of law
* Rule of man
* Sociology

Jurisprudence|

* Adjudication
* Administration of justice
* Criminal justice
* Court-martial
* Dispute resolution
* Fiqh
* Lawsuit/Litigation
* Legal opinion
* Legal remedy
* Judge
* Justice of the peace
* Magistrate
* Judgment
* Judicial review
* Jurisdiction
* Jury
* Justice
* Practice of law
* Attorney
* Barrister
* Counsel
* Lawyer
* Legal representation
* Prosecutor
* Solicitor
* Question of fact
* Question of law
* Trial
* Trial advocacy
* Trier of fact
* Verdict

Legal institutions|

* Barristers' chambers
* Bureaucracy
* The bar
* The bench
* Civil society
* Court
* Court of equity
* Election commission
* Executive
* Judiciary
* Law enforcement
* Legal education
* Law school
* Legislature
* Military
* Police
* Political party
* Tribunal

History|

* History of the legal profession
* History of the American legal profession

* Law portal
* Category
* Index
* Outline

* v
* t
* e

Economics

Theoretical|

* Microeconomics
* Decision theory
* Price theory
* Game theory
* Contract theory
* Mechanism design
* Macroeconomics
* Mathematical economics
* Computational economics
* Behavioral economics
* Pluralism in economics

Empirical|

* Econometrics
* Economic statistics
* Experimental economics
* Economic history

Applied|

* Agricultural
* Behavioral
* Business
* Cultural
* Demographic
* Development
* Digitization
* Ecological
* Education
* Engineering
* Environmental
* Evolutionary
* Expeditionary
* Feminist
* Financial
* Geographical
* Happiness
* Health
* Historical
* Humanistic
* Industrial organization
* Information
* Institutional
* Knowledge
* Labour
* Law
* Managerial
* Monetary
* Natural resource
* Organizational
* Participation
* Personnel
* Planning
* Policy
* Public
* Public choice / Social choice theory
* Regional
* Rural
* Service
* Socio
* Sociological
* Solidarity
* Statistics
* Urban
* Welfare

Schools
(history)

* Mainstream
* Heterodox
* American (National)
* Ancient thought
* Anarchist
* Mutualism
* Austrian
* Behavioral
* Buddhist
* Chartalism
* Modern monetary theory
* Chicago
* Classical
* Critique of political economy
* Democracy
* Disequilibrium
* Ecological
* Evolutionary
* Feminist
* Georgism
* Happiness
* Historical
* Humanistic
* Institutional
* Keynesian
* Neo- (neoclassical–Keynesian synthesis)
* New
* Post-
* Circuitism
* Malthusianism
* Marginalism
* Marxian
* Neo-
* Mercantilism
* Mixed
* Neoclassical
* Lausanne
* New classical
* Real business-cycle theory
* New institutional
* Physiocracy
* Socialist
* Stockholm
* Supply-side
* Thermo

Economists

* de Mandeville
* Quesnay
* Smith
* Malthus
* Say
* Ricardo
* von Thünen
* List
* Bastiat
* Cournot
* Mill
* Gossen
* Marx
* Walras
* Jevons
* George
* Menger
* Marshall
* Edgeworth
* Clark
* Pareto
* von Böhm-Bawerk
* von Wieser
* Veblen
* Fisher
* Pigou
* Heckscher
* von Mises
* Schumpeter
* Keynes
* Knight
* Polanyi
* Frisch
* Sraffa
* Myrdal
* Hayek
* Kalecki
* Röpke
* Kuznets
* Tinbergen
* Robinson
* von Neumann
* Hicks
* Lange
* Leontief
* Galbraith
* Koopmans
* Schumacher
* Friedman
* Samuelson
* Simon
* Buchanan
* Arrow
* Baumol
* Solow
* Rothbard
* Greenspan
* Sowell
* Becker
* Ostrom
* Sen
* Lucas
* Stiglitz
* Thaler
* Hoppe
* Krugman
* Piketty
* more

Lists|

* Glossary
* Economists
* Publications (journals)
* Schools

* Category
* Index
* Lists
* Outline
* Publications
* Business portal

* v
* t
* e

Employment

Classifications|

* Academic tenure
* Casual
* Contingent work
* Full-time job
* Gig worker
* Job sharing
* Part-time job
* Self-employment
* Side job
* Skilled worker
* Journeyman
* Technician
* Independent contractor
* Labour hire
* Temporary work
* Laborer
* Wage labour

Hiring|

* Application
* Background check
* Business networking
* Cover letter
* Curriculum vitae
* Drug testing
* Employment contract
* Employment counsellor
* Executive search
* list
* Induction programme
* Job fair
* Job fraud
* Job hunting
* Job interview
* Letter of recommendation
* Onboarding
* Overqualification
* Person–environment fit
* Personality–job fit theory
* Probation
* Recruitment
* Résumé
* Simultaneous recruiting of new graduates
* Underemployment
* Work-at-home scheme

Roles|

* Cooperative
* Employee
* Employer
* Internship
* Job
* Labour hire
* Permanent employment
* Supervisor
* Volunteering

Working class|

* Blue-collar
* Green-collar
* Grey-collar
* Pink-collar
* Precariat
* White-collar
* Red-collar
* New-collar
* No-collar
* Orange-collar
* Scarlet-collar
* Black-collar
* Gold-collar

Career and training|

* Apprenticeship
* Artisan
* Master craftsman
* Avocation
* Career assessment
* Career counseling
* Career development
* Coaching
* Creative class
* Education
* Continuing education
* E-learning
* Employability
* Further education
* Graduate school
* Induction training
* Knowledge worker
* Licensure
* Lifelong learning
* Overspecialization
* Practice-based professional learning
* Professional association
* Professional certification
* Professional development
* Professional school
* Reflective practice
* Retraining
* Vocational education
* Vocational school
* Vocational university
* Mentorship
* Occupational Outlook Handbook
* Practice firm
* Profession
* Operator
* Professional
* Tradesman
* Vocation

Attendance|

* Break
* Career break
* Furlough
* Gap year
* Leave of absence
* Long service leave
* No call, no show
* Sabbatical
* Sick leave
* Time clock

Schedules|

* 35-hour workweek
* Four-day week
* Eight-hour day
* 996 working hour system
* Flextime
* On-call
* Overtime
* Remote work
* Retroactive overtime
* Six-hour day
* Shift work
* Working time
* Workweek and weekend

Wages and salaries|

* Income bracket
* Income tax
* Living wage
* Maximum wage
* National average salary
* World
* Europe
* Minimum wage
* Canada
* Hong Kong
* Europe
* United States
* Progressive wage
* Singapore
* Overtime rate
* Paid time off
* Performance-related pay
* Salary cap
* Wage compression
* Working poor

Benefits|

* Annual leave
* Casual Friday
* Child care
* Disability insurance
* Health insurance
* Life insurance
* Marriage leave
* Parental leave
* Pension
* Sick leave
* Take-home vehicle

Safety and health|

* Crunch
* Epilepsy and employment
* Human factors and ergonomics
* Karoshi
* List of countries by rate of fatal workplace accidents
* Occupational burnout
* Occupational disease
* Occupational exposure limit
* Occupational health psychology
* Occupational injury
* Occupational noise
* Occupational stress
* Personal protective equipment
* Repetitive strain injury
* Right to sit
* Sick building syndrome
* Work accident
* Occupational fatality
* Workers' compensation
* Workplace health promotion
* Workplace phobia
* Workplace wellness

Equal opportunity|

* Affirmative action
* Equal pay for equal work
* Gender pay gap
* Glass ceiling

Infractions|

* Corporate collapses and scandals
* Accounting scandals
* Control fraud
* Corporate behaviour
* Corporate crime
* Discrimination
* Exploitation of labour
* Dress code
* Employee handbook
* Employee monitoring
* Evaluation
* Labour law
* Sexual harassment
* Sleeping while on duty
* Wage theft
* Whistleblower
* Workplace bullying
* Workplace harassment
* Workplace incivility

Willingness|

* Boreout
* Careerism
* Civil conscription
* Conscription
* Critique of work
* Dead-end job
* Job satisfaction
* McJob
* Organizational commitment
* Refusal of work
* Slavery
* Bonded labour
* Human trafficking
* Labour camp
* Penal labour
* Peonage
* Truck wages
* Unfree labour
* Wage slavery
* Work ethic
* Work–life interface
* Downshifting
* Slow living
* Workaholic

Termination|

* At-will employment
* Dismissal
* Banishment room
* Constructive dismissal
* Wrongful dismissal
* Employee offboarding
* Exit interview
* Layoff
* Notice period
* Pink slip
* Resignation
* Letter of resignation
* Restructuring
* Retirement
* Mandatory retirement
* Retirement age
* Retirement planning
* Severance package
* Golden handshake
* Golden parachute
* Turnover

Unemployment|

* Barriers to entry
* Discouraged worker
* Economic depression
* Great Depression
* Long Depression
* Frictional unemployment
* Full employment
* Graduate unemployment
* Involuntary unemployment
* Jobless recovery
* Phillips curve
* Recession
* Great Recession
* Job losses caused by the Great Recession
* Lists of recessions
* Recession-proof job
* Reserve army of labour
* Structural unemployment
* Technological unemployment
* Types of unemployment
* Unemployment benefits
* Unemployment Convention, 1919
* Unemployment extension
* List of countries by unemployment rate
* Employment rates
* Employment-to-population ratio
* Wage curve
* Youth unemployment

Public programs|

* Workfare
* Unemployment insurance
* Make-work job
* Job creation program
* Job creation index
* Job guarantee
* Employer of last resort
* Guaranteed minimum income
* Right to work
* Historical:
* U.S.A:
* Civil Works Administration
* Works Progress Administration

Comprehensive Employment and Training Act

See also|

* Bullshit job
* Busy work
* Credentialism and educational inflation
* Emotional labor
* Evil corporation
* Going postal
* Kiss up kick down
* Labor rights
* Make-work job
* Narcissism in the workplace
* Post-work society
* Presenteeism
* Psychopathy in the workplace
* Slow movement (culture)
* Toxic leader
* Toxic workplace
* Workhouse

See also templates

* Aspects of corporations
* Aspects of jobs
* Aspects of occupations
* Aspects of organizations
* Aspects of workplaces
* Corporate titles
* Organized labor

*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template