ABSTRACT
A much more important performance test than hourly output or daily output, is the weekly output of the manual labourer. The successful maintenance of an industry depends on the worker achieving a good output, not for a few hours or days, but for periods of weeks, months and years. The relation of output to hours of work in various industries has been investigated and measured from time to time for a hundred years or more. The usual method has been to ascertain the total production of a factory over a definite period, generally two months to a year, before and after some change in the hours of work. The term ‘overtime‘ is a very indefinite one, as it depends on what are reckoned to be the normal hours of work.
