Hans Bayer’s journal article examines the changing position of salaried employees in industrial society. Its starting point is a contradiction: their numbers are growing, yet many of their tasks require less training and experience, while their functions increasingly resemble those of manual workers. Bayer rejects both numerical growth as proof of rising status and functional convergence as proof of declining importance. His central argument is that employees acquire new economic and social functions through industrial development, but can secure a stronger position only by understanding those functions and organizing collectively.
Soviel steht jedenfalls von vornherein fest, daß man mit bloß quantitativen Feststellungen dem Wesen der Problematik nicht näherkommen kann.
English translation: This much, at any rate, is clear from the outset: merely quantitative findings cannot bring us closer to the essence of the problem.
This methodological claim governs the article’s two-part structure. Bayer first identifies the forces transforming industrial society, then examines their consequences for employees’ work, internal differentiation, advancement, relations with manual workers, and future collective orientation. Statistics supply evidence of tendencies rather than a sufficient explanation of social position.
The first part distinguishes “objectification” from concentration. Objectification means replacing subjective impressions and intuitive decisions with scientific methods. Within firms, forecasting, planning, specialized research, and detailed administrative instructions make decisions more systematic. Bayer’s discussion of feedback-based administration is particularly revealing: decisions previously reserved for higher management can be assigned to subordinate personnel through specified rules. Rationalization therefore redistributes tasks without necessarily granting those performing them greater independent authority. Across the economy, technological research and the expansion of services similarly increase the importance of organized knowledge. In public policy, national accounting and econometric methods enlarge the capacity to anticipate the effects of intervention.
Concentration denotes the growth and combination of enterprises. Bayer links it to technological requirements, research facilities, automation, increasing risk, and advertising competition. Medium-sized firms remain important, but often complement large enterprises and depend on shared research, market analysis, and institutional cooperation. Their survival does not invalidate concentration; it demonstrates how even relatively personalized businesses increasingly require collective organizational resources.
Objektivierungs- und Konzentrationstendenzen durchdringen sich gegenseitig und verstärken sich.
English translation: Tendencies toward objectification and concentration interpenetrate and reinforce one another.
Scientific administration makes larger enterprises manageable, while concentration supplies the resources necessary for sophisticated methods. Bayer’s concern extends beyond economic efficiency: concentrated economic power can penetrate culture, public opinion, and politics. The same developments that create new opportunities for employees consequently pose threats to freedom.
The second part begins with the expansion of salaried employment in commercial, technical, financial, research, and administrative functions. The growing service sector and the development of public economic policy further enlarge these fields. Automation may eliminate particular tasks without cancelling this broader expansion. Bayer treats international employment comparisons cautiously, acknowledging that their categories are not directly comparable.
His decisive distinction within the employee population is between authority and expertise. Some senior employees exercise delegated leadership; others are important because of specialized contributions to research, planning, or technical progress, without themselves commanding others. Occupational importance therefore cannot be equated with participation in managerial authority. For most employees, specialization restricts work to narrow segments of the enterprise. Drawing on Werner Hansen, Bayer advocates a holistic organization of administration that enables employees to understand the business and their place within its operations, rather than identify with it only morally or imaginatively.
The discussion of qualifications and promotion sharpens this argument. Bayer uses an empirical study edited by Otto Stammer while acknowledging objections to its methods and the generalization of its findings. Its evidence suggests that relatively few positions demand advanced training or substantial experience. Technical development also brings salaried and manual functions closer together. Against reliance on career opportunity as their distinguishing feature, Bayer stresses the scarcity of senior and qualified posts and the reservation of some higher positions for university graduates.
Die Karrierechancen sind aber offensichtlich in der heutigen Situation eingeengt.
English translation: Career opportunities, however, are evidently restricted in the present situation.
Limited advancement makes meaningful participation in everyday work more important, not less. Employees cannot generally escape fragmented work through promotion; improving its organization becomes a collective responsibility and a justification for trade-union activity.
Bayer consequently replaces status rivalry between manual and salaried workers with reciprocal dependence. Gains achieved by manual workers benefit employees, while employees can undertake pioneering work in administrative organization and employment law. Their distinctive knowledge should serve common interests rather than sustain claims to superiority.
In der Struktur der modernen Gesellschaft sind wesentliche Gegensätze zwischen Arbeitern und Angestellten nicht begründet.
English translation: Fundamental antagonisms between manual workers and salaried employees are not grounded in the structure of modern society.
This solidarity has a political dimension. Defending freedom against concentrated power requires constructive alternatives, including economic democracy, rather than resistance alone. Political education and social conscience are essential because employees’ uncertain collective orientation presents both a danger and an opportunity.
The concluding section calls for a future-oriented employee identity. Historical prestige and individual aspirations divide employees precisely when industrial change gives them new shared responsibilities. Bayer’s article is thus both an analysis of occupational transformation and an intervention in employee politics: numerical expansion will not automatically improve social standing. A renewed position must be built through informed participation, collective consciousness, and solidarity with other working groups.
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