move upward in the group system, and that more of it than
before should betake itself to those subgroups where the fashioning of
the raw material is done and where the finishing touches are applied
to goods. The effect of the constant improvement of all processes of
production, therefore, so far as the effect on labor is concerned, is
akin to the effect of an addition to capital, in that it moves labor
upward in the subgroup series. It puts more labor into mills and shops
which make articles of comfort and luxury.

_The Nature of the Movements actually caused by Improvements._--This
upward movement cannot go on as smoothly and with as little
disturbance as that which is caused by the increase of capital.
Whenever a greater gain is made at one point than is made at another,
an influence is set working which, of itself, tends to send labor from
the one point to the other. The slowness with which the change of
method proceeds affords the time that is necessary for the protection
of labor in the first-named group, since little movement takes place
before the effects of improvements made in the second group begin to
be felt. If in 1906 an improvement is made which, in the course of
five years, would cause some labor to move from the subgroup _A_''' to
the subgroup _B_''', and in 1907 a corresponding improvement is made
in the latter industry, the equilibrium is restored before enough
disturbance has taken place to require any absolute reduction of labor
in _A'''_. The facts are (1) that new laborers as they enter the field
are drawn more to the upper subgroups than to the lower ones,--to the
_A'''_ and the _B'''_ rather than to the _A_ and the _B_ of the two
series,--and that in moving upward they are drawn at first more
strongly toward _B'''_ and later more strongly toward _A'''_. This is
the nearly constant fact in industry and is the grand resultant of all
the forces we have described--an upward flow that is continuous but
does not follow strictly vertical lines. As young men--the sons of
workers in _A_, _B_, _C_, and _D_, who might otherwise have remained
in their fathers' occupation--move to the subgroups that stand higher
in the several series, they first go in larger number toward _B'''_
than toward _A'''_, and later in larger number toward _A'''_. There is
a wavy movement toward the right and then toward the left in the
steady flow of labor from the groups that create the raw material to
those that impart to these ma