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2 
UNEMPLOYMENT IN THE UNITED STATES 
123 
OUTLINE OF PERMANENT EMPLOYMENT SYSTEM 
(Adopted by the conference, October 11, 1921) 
1. A permanent system of employment offices for bringing workers and jobs 
together with the quickest despatch is necessary, both in times of depression and 
prosperity. 
2. Your committee finds that there are now 25 States which have established 
State employment systems, and public employment offices are now being operated 
in about 200 cities, of which about 17 are purely municipal enterprises. Most 
of the 200 offices are supported jointly by the State and municipality. Your 
committee feels that in any permanent system the State should be the operating 
unit of such employment offices, and that the extension of such offices should 
be encouraged. The Federal Government itself should not operate local offices 
or do placement work. 
_And that is precisely what this bill proposes to do, in direct contra- 
diction with the recommendation of this conference. } 
Then the conference went on to suggest a constructive method 
of securing cooperation and coordination of national and local effort, 
as follows: 
3. However, for the purpose of bringing about coordination, the Federal 
Government should— 
(a) Collect, compile, and make available statistical information. 
. That is provided for in a more extended form by one of the bills 
in this group. 
(b) Collect and make available information which will facilitate interstate 
placements. 
(¢) Through educational measures improve standards of work and encourage 
the adoption of uniform systems. 
4. The existing provision of the Federal Government and many State govern- 
ments for all branches of such work is inadequate, and should be strengthened. 
The work is of first-rate importance, and should be recognized as a job for men 
of first-grade ability from the top down. The director should be appointed 
directly by the President. Adequate salaries should be provided and adequate 
safeguards to secure the proper personnel and to protect the tenure of office. 
5. An adequate permanent system of employment offices as above suggested 
would obviate the necessity of creating new offices whenever new emergencies 
arise. It would also prevent the public employment office from being regarded 
as a mere temporary philanthropic device, and thus through misunderstanding 
from not being used generally. 
® 6. In order to secure and maintain the confidence of both employers and workers 
in the impartiality of the service rendered and the statistics published, an advis- 
ory committee consisting of representatives of employers and workers should be 
appointed to cooperate with the director as well as a similar system of local advis- 
ory committees to cooperate with the State and municipal offices. 
That goes to the very question that I just emphasized, and you 
will observe that the two new items introduced into the bill represent 
the recommendations made in the sixth provision of this resolution. 
But the resolution, you see, is most emphatic in declaring that the 
Federal Government should not enter upon local placement work, and 
that only State agencies of a local nature should be employed for this 
purpose. } . . “ 
Now this resolution was further emphasized by the adoption the 
same day of a further resolution: 
1. Cooperation with the emergency employment agencies erected by the State’s 
municipalities. . 
2. Informing States in which there is scarcity of labor of the situation in States 
where there is surplus of labor of the kinds desired. 
3. Securing and compiling information on employment opportunities throughout 
the country.