1)
NIGHT WORK IN INDUSTRY
amongst individuals carried out for the convenience of the per-
sons concerned. There has been so much divergence of opinion
as to the merits of the different systems that the committee have
found it difficult to arrive at any definite conclusions. Those
who favor the weekly change argue that the strain of the night
work and the difficulties of obtaining adequate sleep during the
day are such that it is undesirable for workers to remain on night
work for more than a week at a time. On the other side it is
stated that repeated changes make it more difficult to settle down
to either system, and that the night work after the first week be-
comes less trying, while the ability to sleep bv dav increases.’
On physiological grounds, arguments have been put for-
ward in favor of less frequent changes because of the diffi-
culty of adaptation of body functions to hours of sleep and
work. In many cases the worker desires a less frequent
rotation of shifts because he is thus enabled to become accus-
tomed to the hours of rest and work, while with more fre-
quent change he often finds that, at the point when he has
become adapted to his hourly schedule, he must take his
place on the new shift. Indeed, in several plants the em-
ployees- themselves prefer to work on a fixed shift because
of this consideration. On the other hand, where employees
dislike to work on the early or late night shift, there is a
decided preference for day work. In order to allocate the
employees to shifts on an equitable basis, many plants there-
fore have adopted a policy of frequent rotation, either on
a weekly or a bi-weekly basis.
In most of the establishments included in the present in-
vestigation which operate on a rotating organization of labor
forces, the shifts change each week or every two weeks, as
may be seen from Table 2. Of the one hundred plants, sixty-
four change shifts each week; twenty-eight, every two weeks;
one plant, every three weeks; and seven plants. each month.
LecfL ResTricTiONS ON N1gHT WORK
“In certain states night work is prohibited between certain
hours for minors and women. In all states, with the excep-
tion of Montana, South Dakota and Texas, persons under
sixteen years of age are not permitted to work at night in one
1 Great Britain, Ministry of Munitions, Committee on Health of Munition
Workers, Memorandum No. 5, 1916.
