laborers. According to the Japanese-American Yearbook for 1905, 2,025 of the 3,358 reported for the preceding December were laborers, 250 were students, 681 were engaged in business or employed for wages by business men, and 140 were tenant farmers in the suburbs. According to the same authority, in December, 1908, 1,661 of the total 4,457 were engaged in business or employed for wages in establishments conducted by their countrymen. In all probability between 2,000 and 2,500 were gainfully occupied in other ways. Some of these are employed in track work on the street railways, others as car cleaners, and still others as laborers in the yards and shops of the steam railways. A much larger number, however, are employed in stores, clubs, saloons, restaurants, and other places conducted by white persons and as domestics in private families. A small number are employed as janitors or cleaners about office buildings, at wages varying from $9 per week to $60 per month. As porters in saloons and in a few hotels they earn from $35 to $50 per month. A small number are employed as elevator boys at from $35 to $60 per month. By far the largest number are employed, however, as "kitchen help" in restaurants and hotels, as domestics in private families, or as "house cleaners," working by the hour or day. As dishwashers and "general help" in restaurants they are paid from $8 per week to $40 per month with board. Domestics earn from $30 to $50 per month with board and lodging. Most of the cooks are paid $40, the less skilled servants $30 or $35 per month. There are more than 20 establishments which send men to private houses to do cleaning and similar work. They are paid from 27.5 to 35 cents per hour and earn about $40 per month.

As already stated, the first Japanese to locate in Los Angeles started a restaurant. This was a low-priced place, patronized chiefly by white working men. A little later another Japanese located here and manufactured bamboo furniture, for which he found ready sale. By 1892 there were 14 restaurants serving 10, 15, and 25 cent meals, all patronized chiefly by white workingmen. In 1897 there were 15 restaurants, 7 bamboo-furniture stores, and a few other establishments conducted by Japanese. Since then, until recently, the number of branches of business enterprise and the number of establishments conducted by Japanese have rapidly increased. Most of the business engaged in has been designed to serve the needs of the increasing number of Japanese employed in Los Angeles and in other parts of southern California, but some of it, like the first establishments opened, has been designed to serve the needs of other races in this rapidly growing city. The number of establishments in which each specified kind of business was conducted in 1904 and in 1909 are shown in the following table. The figures for the year 1904 are taken from the JapaneseAmerican Yearbook for 1905, while most of those for 1909 were reported by the agents of the Commission as a result of an investigation made by them during the months of June and July, 1909. The enumeration by these agents was not complete, so that in several instances use has been made of the figures reported in the JapaneseAmerican Yearbook for the month of December preceding. In many branches of business the number of small establishments changes rapidly, so that the data presented in the table can not be accepted as being more than an approximation of the true number, and are intended merely to indicate in a general way the extent to which the

members of this race have engaged in the different branches of business enterprise.

TABLE 3.-Business conducted by Japanese in Los Angeles, Cal., December, 1904, and June, 1909.a

a Does not include physicians, midwives, dentists, interpreters, and other professional men and women. As ascertained by agents of Commission. Those marked (*) taken from Japanese-American Yearbook, and are for December, 1908.

c According to Japanese-American Yearbook for 1905.

d In most cases conducted in connection with other business.

• Number of establishments somewhat smaller because of fact noted in (d).

Most of the Japanese places of business are located in two colonies. The older colony finds its center in East First street from Alameda to Main, but many shops are located on Alameda and San Pedro, while a small number of Japanese are located on the short streets running from Main to Alameda and lying north of First street. In this section of the city, laborers and petty business men of many races are found, but the Japanese alone have colonized there. The Chinese. the Mexican, and the Italian colonies are found in other parts of the city not far away. As the number of Japanese has increased, the older white element has tended to move elsewhere, so that most of the residents of the district at the present time are foreign-born. In recent years, however, the Japanese have opened shops in another part of the city several blocks away. At present a

large number of their establishments are located on South Sixth and Seventh and Hill, Olive, and Hope streets. That is a distinctly better part of the city than the other district in which the Japanese have colonized. Yet it is a mixture of small shops, small residences, and large old residences which the original occupants have tended to vacate, making possible the gradual formation of another foreign quarter. In these two districts practically all of the business of the Japanese, save the curio shops or "bazaars" (these are located in the shopping district), are located. Moreover, all but a comparatively few of the Japanese who provide their own lodgings live in the one "quarter" or the other, usually in boarding and lodging houses or in the structures in which business is conducted.

Agents of the Commission collected data relating to 92 of the business enterprises conducted by Japanese, the men who conducted them and the members of their households and some of their employees, together with general data relating to the competition between Japanese and other races in some lines of business. The detailed investigation covered the following Japanese establishments: Two book stores, 6 curio stores, 3 drug stores, 5 fish and poultry markets, 9 fruit, confectionery, and cigar "stands," 9 provision and grocery stores, 2 watch and jewelry stores, 2 men's furnishing stores, 8 barber shops, 6 boarding and lodging houses, 9 restaurants, 4 tailor shops, 7 laundries (including separate shops), 6 pool rooms, 3 cobbler shops, 2 photograph galleries, 2 employment agencies, and 7 other establishments of various kinds. Data were also obtained for the purpose of comparison from 23 establishments conducted by members of other races in the same districts. The data relating to the date of establishment, capital employed, the amount of capital borrowed, the volume of business transacted during the year, the number and race of employees, rent paid for shop.or other structure occupied, the net profit realized from the business, and the race of patrons, are shown for each establishment in General Table 22. The personal data collected are presented in other tables at the end of this report.

DATA RELATING TO JAPANESE BUSINESS.

Barber shops. The number of barber shops conducted by Japanese has rapidly increased. There are now 44 as against 18 in 1904. These, with two exceptions, where the Japanese proprietor employs white barbers," are all small shops, the majority with two chairs, the proprietor being assisted by his wife or one employee. The 8 investigated are typical of the greater number. Most of the shops. are fairly clean, are simply furnished, and give the service characteristic of other small shops located in similar localities. The amount of business transacted varies from $1,200 per annum to something more than twice that amount. The barbers employed are paid $30, $35, $40, or $45 per month, with board and lodging, in the majority of shops; but in others, following the custom of the establishments conducted by white proprietors, the employees receive 60 per cent of the earnings of their chairs, without board or lodging.

a One Japanese proprietor employs 12 white barbers.

The prices charged are uniform-hair cutting 15 cents, shaving 10 cents, and corresponding sums for the various other services. All of the shops are freely patronized by other races as well as by Japanese, the proportions of the various races depending largely upon the character of the population residing or working in the immediate vicinity of each shop. The percentage of patrons other than Japanese in the 8 shops investigated varied from 10 to 99, the average being between 51 and 52. These races other than Japanese include some negroes and Mexicans as well as white men, chiefly foreign born. The Japanese proprietors are making very good profits. The profits of the 8 from whom data were obtained varied between $600 and $1,080, and averaged $832.50 for the year 1908. The capital invested varied from $300 to $2,000 per shop.

The first-class uptown shops have not been affected by Japanese competition, but the proprietors of the smaller shops in both sections of the city where Japanese are prominent complain of the loss of patronage. A number of shops along East First street have been closed, not because of any reduction of charges but because of the moving away of their patrons and the incoming of Japanese, who patronize shops conducted by members of their own race. In fact, they are usually not desired at shops conducted by white men giving as good service as at the shops conducted by Japanese. The union shops in the better parts of the city charge 25 cents for hair cutting and 15 cents for shaving, and their barbers receive $14 per week or $14 per week and 60 per cent of the gross earnings in excess of $23.33 per week. In many shops the price for hair cutting is 20 cents and for shaving 10 cents. In the districts where the Japanese shops are located, however, the prices are in almost every instance 15 cents and 10 cents for these services, while the barbers receive 60 per cent of their gross earnings, usually without a guaranty of a stipulated amount or a minimum wage, or wages no higher than those paid to Japanese barbers. Nor has there been any appreciable change in recent years, either in prices or in wages paid to employees. In five of these shops located near Japanese establishments 10 barbers employed by two native and one Norwegian proprietor earned about $61 per month on the percentage basis, while one barber employed by a Polish proprietor was paid only $10 per week.

Baths.-A large percentage of the Japanese barber shops have baths in connection. Some bathing establishments, however, are run independently. Some of the Japanese establishments have as few as 5 or 6 tubs, others as many as 25. Of three places investigated, all had white as well as Japanese patrons, the latter race constituting slightly more than one-half of the total number. The price charged in an ordinary bath is the same as that which has been charged in these districts, viz, 15 cents, while that for a "salt " bath is commonly

5 cents more.

Laundries. In 1904 two small laundries were conducted by Japanese. In 1909 there were seven, but three proprietors maintained second shops in which ironing alone was done, while another maintained two of these establishments. The washing in such cases is done in the poorest parts of the Japanese quarter, while the ironing is done in good shops in the better residence districts, so as to attract

trade. With two exceptions these laundries are small, employing a few persons each. The two largest employ 20 and 23 laborers, respectively, so that the total number regularly employed in laundries is about 75. A comparatively few others are employed by the day when additional help is needed. These laundries have little in the way of equipment. In fact, they do "hand work" almost exclusively and send most of the household linen delivered to them to the white steam laundries to be done at "family flat work" rates.

Those investigated reported that from 60 to 99 per cent of their patrons were of races other than Japanese. With the increase in the number of Japanese laundries, two steam laundries conducted by whites reported that they had lost the small percentage of patrons of that race which they formerly had. These Japanese laundries compete to a certain extent with some half dozen small French hand laundries located in the same parts of the city and a large number of steam laundries conducted by the various white races. In May, 1909, the Laundrymen's Association, a loose organization of which practically all of the white laundry proprietors are members, fearful of the results of Japanese competition, adopted a resolution providing that no member of the association should accept any work from Japanese laundrymen. There is also a "gentlemen's agreement between the laundrymen and the laundry machinery supply houses to the effect that the latter shall not furnish equipment of any kind to the Japanese. The laundrymen fear the results of Japanese competition if their laundries are equipped with modern machinery.

From what has been stated it is evident that the competition between Japanese and other laundrymen is practically limited to those articles which are laundered as "hand work." A comparison of Japanese rates with those of the French and other laundrymen shows that while they are about the same on about one-half of the articles contained in " gentlemen's and ladies' lists," there is considerable variation, the Japanese rates in such instances almost without exception being the lowest. Their rates on articles which are preferably done as hand work are noticeably lower than those of their competitors.

The larger steam laundries have an 8-hour day, but as is usual in this trade, there is much overtime work on certain days of the week. The smaller hand laundries and those conducted by the Japanese have a longer workday, 10 hours being reported as the normal, which is frequently exceeded. Four Japanese proprietors of laundries at the time of the investigation employed 33 persons. Two of these were German-Russian women, employed temporarily at $1.50 per day, or 15 cents per hour. The remaining 31 washermen or ironers were all Japanese men. Two of these were paid $45 and $40 per month, respectively, and received board and lodging in addition to their wages. The wages paid per month to the 31 men were as follows: Forty-five dollars to 1, $40 to 1, $35 to 4, $32 to 1, $30 to 7, $25 to 9, $20 to 5, and under $15 to 3. The average monthly wage paid to those who received board and lodging was $27.30. The average wage bill, allowing for board and lodging, was approximately $35 per month. Five of the steam laundries investigated employed 460 women and men. Various races were found among them-1