Life — April 5, 1923 — page 21: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This political cartoon depicts three figures labeled "MIDDLEMAN," "BANKER," and "PORCUPINE MANUFACTURER" firing rifles at a vulture on the left. The caption reads "Only Seven Hundred Dollars a Year." The satire appears to critique how various middlemen and financial interests profit from workers earning meager wages—only $700 annually. The vulture likely represents either poverty, exploitation, or death itself, which these profiteers are supposedly fighting. However, the irony suggests they're actually complicit in the system that keeps workers impoverished while they enrich themselves through financial manipulation and manufacturing. This reflects early-20th-century American labor and economic reform debates about income inequality and profiteering.