Truck System Wages

The Truck System of paying wages relates to the practice of paying workers in script, or tokens, which could only be used in designated places, such as stores operated by their employers. In some extreme cases, lawful money was never used; "store credit" would be given for purchases, with records kept by the store. No receipts for transactions were given. The "company store", with its high prices, became infamous in many places. This system was closely associated with small, isolated and/or rural communities, where uneducated workers did not have a wide choice of employment, and would quickly become indebted to their employers so they were unable to legally leave the system.

Accounts have maintained many employers would only allow their script to be used in particular places, such as stores owned by a member of their family, or only cashed at bars/pubs owned by their family. Of course, fees were deducted for changing the script, and the stores and pubs made excessive charges.

During the 18th and 19th centuries, it was a wide-spread system in the world, and still exists in some areas today (2009). It was made illegal for miners (and other specified occupations) in the U.K. in 1831.

According to the West Briton and Cornwall Advertiser newspaper, in 1848 one person sued for wages owed. He had an ill child, but could not buy the medicine the doctor ordered, as the store did not happen to have it, and all he had to use for money was script, so he could not visit any shop in town. The child died, and he could not buy a stamp to send word to his family of what had occurred. His employer pointed out they had given him 5s. for a coffin, and allowed him the afternoon off so he could bury the child. The court held that the man had agreed to be paid in script by accepting the job offered, and he was not working as a miner since he operated dubbers in a china clay pit; therefore, the 1831 laws of England against the truck-system of paying wages to miners did not apply to his situation. (1831 Act 1 and 2 Will. 4 c. 37)

In most accounts of china-clay mining even today, employees are referred to as "workers", rather than "miners", despite the places of their work always being termed "mines". Perhaps this is a remnant of the "truck system" days.

The terms "tommy shop" in the U.K., and "tienda de raya" have also been applied to this system of work/payment.

Truck systems increasingly came under criticism, and laws have been passed in many jurisdictions making it illegal for payment for work done to be made in anything but legal tender, or to specify where employees may spend their pay.

REFERENCES

"Of the Hiring, and 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, 1842. pp 84-85

"Changes in the Law of England Affecting Labour (The Truck System)" A Century of Law Reform, London; MacMillan and Col, pp 254-257

The West Briton and Cornwall Advertiser, "An Account of the Recent Trials" February 24 1848, Truro, Cornwall; Mrs. Heard, publisher