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obstacle in any case, and the housing difficulty, often meaning high 
cost of travelling to be met out of low wages, needs no explanation 
as an obstacle to place-to-place mobility. 
There are many cases of men who are quite prepared to take 
work for which they are totally unfit, since the suffering caused by the 
prolonged depression has made them only too eager to snatch 
at any piece of work they can get. Two Rota Committee 
members and two trade unionists say that, in their experience 
nearly every skilled man is willing to accept labouring as an alterna 
tive job when he signs on at the Labour Exchange. Skilled men are 
finding it more difficult to get work than the unskilled, since they are 
necessarily tied down to a narrower range of occupations. 
As regards mobility from town to town, a number of people 
of widely different experience are of the opinion that the Insurance 
system is not responsible for any unwillingness of men to seek work 
elsewhere. The part that benefit plays is quite negligible in view of 
(1) the housing problem; (2) the character of the work elsewhere 
(the worker is suspicious when any job has not been filled locally); 
(3) the low wages generally offered, which do not make the change 
worth while. 
Nevertheless, a social worker reports a considerable amount of 
migration, but adds that most of it appears to be towards Newcastle 
rather than away from it. 
The Effect on the Worker in Employment. 
The Insurance scheme has only partially removed the fear of 
suffering due to unemployment, as out of work benefits are too small 
to remove it completely. “ Among the men with whom I have 
come in contact and who have got work after periods of unemploy 
ment,” says a social worker, “ I find a strong desire to retain their 
jobs. This has also tended to cause men in temporary bad health to 
stick to their work rather than apply for National Health Insurance 
as in normal times they would. I have evidence also from some 
employers that men are working harder and keeping better time 
than previously.” 
Except in cases where rates are fixed by Trade Union agreements 
there has been a fall in the real wages paid to unskilled and casual 
workers. Employers who engage non-union men are able to obtain 
all the labour they require at rates which compare very badly with 
the standard rates paid elsewhere, especially in what are now known 
as the “ sheltered ” trades. 
SURVEY AND CONCLUSIONS. 
Whilst it may not be safe to draw sweeping conclusions from the 
eight reports summarised, they reveal a certain similarity of experience 
in places of widely different type that compels comment. The investi 
gation covers a composite sample of British industrial areas. Working