Unemployment in the United States

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1828236179

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-226169

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Unemployment in the United States

Place of publication:: Washington

Publisher:: United States, Government Printing Office

Year of publication:: 1930

Scope:: II, 193 Seiten

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Statement by Miss Frances Perkins, industrial commissioner of the State of New York

Collection:: Economics Books

66 UNEMPLOYMENT IN THE UNITED STATES told you this morning. I think enough was said by the principa speakers this morning, and in the questions asked of them by the Members of the committee this morning, to make it clear to all whe are sitting here this afternoon, that the problem is an intricate eco. nomical problem. There are a number of economic forces which are contributing to the cause of present unemployment; and a number of problems which make it difficult to find adequate means for the prevention or the relief of unemployment. These three bills which Senator Wagner has introduced into the Senate, taken together, from what seems to me to be a minimum program, a first step so to speak, the foundation so to speak, for suitable program of Government assistance toward the solution of the problem of prevention and relief of unemployment. There are two separate sets of activities which must be undertaken—one looking te relief and the other to prevention. There are many suggestions which can be made or have been made by economists and expert managers of industry for the prevention o! unemployment in certain, particular industries, but not on a nation- wide basis. In the treatment of the total problem we need the co- operation of the Government and industrial leadership to make any adequate progress. We have today, as has been said often, the combination of three types of nonemployment. We have first the technological unemployment, which Mr. Green discussed before the committee this morning, which is caused by the displacement of men through the introduction of machinery. Then we have the seasonal unemployment, which has become heavy, with the high peak of unemployment in an industry at one time, and a period of low depression at another. That condition has characterized some of our American industries. Now, in the season of seasonal depression there is always unemployment. It is among those workers where there is a constant fluctuation in employment— and when we have speakers, as we had here refer to unemployment, as “normal unemployment,” I am somewhat distressed. I can not conceive of the tragedy of unemployment appearing as “normal” to a man who is out of employment. We should say, probably, the “habitual unemployment” in a given community, rather than the normal unemployment. Now, that can be corrected. This unemployment due to fluctuations can be taken care of largely by the individual trades and industries themselves; and there is now a determined demand, or a determined effort on the part of the more scientifically managed industries of the United States to do what they call “ironing out the curves” in the production line, and to get the industry on an even keel. So great a company as the Eastman Kodak Co. set before a Government committee the other day, the exact method which they used to divide their production for the year into 12 parts, their manufacturing production, taking their annual production in segments of 12, so as to get an even monthly production, and have their employees continuously employed. There is another great company, the Bausch & Lomb Co., manu- facturers of optical instruments and quality production. They are located at Rochester. Now, having a varied and diversified business product, by the means they have put into operation, they are able to keep the same number of men at work continuously throughout

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