Mrs. MINK. This is not an assumption that this has been delegated to the OFCC. This is a separate authorization under your Office of Secretary?

Mr. DELURY. Yes, but it will be transferred to OFCCP. We do have facilities in our new organizational structure to maintain the mission. for the veterans' program.

May I add this, too, Mrs. Mink? There is a good deal of overlap here when one talks about affirmative action for disabled veterans of all wars under section 2012 of one act and then talks about mentally and physically handicapped affirmative action programs under section 503 of another act. So, we do have people there who can aid disabled veterans under a different statute.

There is also some overlap, too, in the area of minority and female affirmative action although we do not have all the statistics yet. Some of the ones I have seen so far in the handicapped area do portray that there are quite a lot of handicapped, minorities and females in a population of the handicapped of about 11 million that are employable.

Mrs. MINK. Mr. Secretary, I was very much pleased with the comment in your statement, with which I happen to agree, that government must set an example in its own activities and its own operations if it is to expect that the private sector is to be well motivated to do the same. I am quite aware of the difficulties of overseeing the private sector to the extent that perhaps some of us would like.

Consequently it seems to me it is terribly important that the Federal Government and its agencies be the example setters in the area of job discrimination based upon sex, race, or whatever the issue might be. Because the Executive order has given the Department of Labor such a prime responsibility, it seems to me that it is equally important that the Department of Labor set up itself as a prime example of how all Government agencies should operate.

My concern is, as must be obvious, the question of sex discrimination and to what extent the Department of Labor in its own employ-ment policies, in its own implementation of an affirmative action plan, is attempting to set this very example which you say is such a necessary ingredient in getting the private sector to comply.

My first question is: Have there been issued guidelines on sex discrimination since you took office?

Secretary DUNLOP. Yes; Mr. Clark can be more specific.

Mr. CLARK. Yes; we have. I will be very happy to provide for the record our action plan which incorporates the things that you are talking about which has just been published.

Mrs. MINK. What is the date of publication?

Mr. CLARK. It is for fiscal year 1975. I don't have the date on here unfortunately but it is a very comprehensive affirmative action plan within the Department of Labor.

Mrs. MINK. I am talking about the OFCC's guidelines on sex discrimination which my notes tell me were proposed in December 1973, but as of the date of this memo had not yet been finalized.

Mr. CLARK. I thought you were talking about our own internalMrs. MINK. No; I am talking about the guidelines with respect to OFCC.

Mr. CLARK. I defer to Mr. Davis.

Secretary DUNLOP. I interpreted, perhaps wrongly, the question to refer to our own internal policies on which the Department has had and continues to have strong affirmative action programs?

Mrs. MINK. Is it not the Department's responsibility to promulgate these guidelines in order to set that down as an example for all Government agencies, the 17 agencies to which you have delegated the responsibility to enforce the Executive order? It seems to me, if you are just delegating authority to all of these agencies, without yourself delineating what these guidelines are, you are not setting the kind of example which we feel is so necessary to get voluntary compliance on the part of the private sectors of our country.

Mr. KILBERG. Mrs. Mink, perhaps I can shed some light on that. We do have sex discrimination guidelines in effect. The guidelines you are talking about were revised guidelines which were put out for comment in December 1973. There were two basic issues that we were attempting to deal with.

One was the question of the degree to which pregnancy ought to be treated as a temporary disability. That question as you may be aware is now before the Supreme Court in the Liberty Mutual case.

There is also another question which is even a thornier one, because we had taken a position under both the OFCC and Equal Pay Act with regard to fringe benefits and whether the employer had an option of making his contributions equal or insuring that the benefits were equal.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has taken the position for some years now that only equal benefits, not equal contributions, would be the appropriate approach. That matter also arose in the context of title IX, the Education Amendments of 1972. We had rather extensive hearings on that matter.

That issue has been referred to the Equal Employment Opportunity Coordinating Council. We will be meeting with Council representatives to discuss the data which we have collected and we will see if we cannot formulate Government-wide positions.

There seems to be two or three positions extant in the Government. I would like for the record a bit of braggadocio perhaps but in line with your comments about equal employment within the Department, within Government, itself, to point out that the Office of the Solicitor has had a particularly good record in that regard. 34 percent of our attorneys are women. We have nine associate solicitors, four are women, four are white men, one is a black male. Our record with regard to hiring minority males is not as good as it is with regard to women although it has gone up 2 percentage points in the last year and is now better than 9 percent.

I think there have been some serious efforts in our office along with other agencies in the Department of Labor to have affirmative action programs and they are monitored rather closely.

Mrs. MINK. What is the total number of positions that are considered management positions in the Department of Labor and what percent of those positions are held by women?

Secretary DUNLOP. Mr. Clark is our Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management.

Mr. CLARK. I don't have the total numbers, but I can give you the percentage figures, if I may. For example, in the area of women we

have 10 percent of the superior grades, GS 16 and above, that are now occupied by women.

Mrs. MINK. What was it 5 years ago?

Mr. CLARK. I would have to check, but I am sure that it was lower. Secretary DUNLOP. Let us furnish that information.

[Information was not submitted prior to press time.]

Mr. CLARK. Additionally at the present time, of the professional positions throughout the whole Department, 20.9 percent of those are occupied by women.

In the area of minorities, for example, the total Federal average is 14.6 of blacks. In the Department of Labor we have 26.7 percent.

So we think we have done a fairly decent job within the Department of Labor. Obviously we are not happy with the totality of what we have done. The Secretary has given this one of his highest priorities as far as my activity is concerned. We do have a very active equal employment opportunity program throughout the Department.

Just recently, for example, out of our own existing resources we established in each of our 10 regions a fulltime equal employment opportunity person who will be responsible to insure that the objectives and the targets and milestones that we have established for the Department will be effective within each of those regions.

Mr. CLAY. Who does the Director of Equal Employment Opportunity report to?

Mr. CLARK. To me.

Mr. CLAY. Isn't that in violation of the regulations?

Mr. CLARK. It is not in violation of the regulations.

Mr. CLAY. What does chapter 71.2304 say?

Mr. CLARK. It says it will function under the general supervision of the head of the agency.

Mr. CLAY. It says immediate supervision as required by regulation of the Secretary of Labor. Can we check that?

Mr. CLARK. Yes; we can. I am not sure that wording is the way I understand it the last time I read it.

Mr. CLAY. Will you check it for us?

Mr. CLARK. I will.

Mrs. MINK. I want to get back to the guidelines on sex discrimination. As I understand it, they were proposed in December 1973, and the new regulations have not yet been promulgated. What is the reason for the failure of the Department to promulgate these guidelines when it is admitted that they are not in conformity with the guidelines that have been established by EEOC?

We talk about the need to coordinate, the need to have similar standards. It seems to me we have been completely neglectful of this issue with which we have been very vitally concerned. It seems to me that since EEOC has enunciated the standards, the Department of Labor should conform to these guidelines and promulgate them, especially as they have been included in these proposed guidelines.

Mr. KILBERG. Interestingly enough, under title VII, and I don't have the statute with me but I can get you for the record the exact citation, but title VII contemplates that in issuing sex discrimination guidelines, the EEOC will attempt to conform with the existing guidelines of the Department of Labor under the Equal Pay Act. They chose to go off in a different direction in regard to the fringe benefit issue.

Because of that rather thin attempt to compel them to agree with us, we thought we ought to review our position to see whether our position in fact is the correct one. It is an enormously complex issue. We found after we got started down the track it involves us not only in questions of EEOC law but the Internal Revenue Code, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 as well as conflicting positions of HEW and other agencies.

So it seems to HEW, and we are not going to follow that lead, that that matter ought to be referred to the Equal Employment Opportunity Coordinating Council, which is where it remains.

The rest of the guidelines are now in the process of being finalized, and some decisions, some policy decisions in the Department, will now have to be made on them.

Mrs. MINK. When can we expect to have these guidelines issued by the Department of Labor?

Mr. KILBERG. It is going to depend obviously, I think, on the policy decisions which are to be made. They have not yet been sent to the Secretary. He has not yet had an opportunity to review them. I am sure he will want to.

There are questions as to whether there are provisions in those guidelines that we will want to go forward with awaiting the decision of the EEOC. There are also questions, I gather, about whether we ought to go forward, given the fact that the Supreme Court has now got the pregnancy temporary disability issue pending before it in the Liberty Mutual case.

Mrs. MINK. You know that HEW, after we passed title IX of the Higher Education Act in 1972, took 3 years to promulgate regulations with respect to those issues affecting education. We are very much concerned that your Department not drag along similarly and fail to come up with regulations which conform with those which we believe are equitable and have already been established by EEOC.

I cannot reconcile the reluctance of your Department to issue these regulations when the standards have already been stated by EEOC. Mr. KILBERG. Mrs. Mink, I very much share your concern. As an attorney, one of the matters of most concern to me is the uncertainty. The law needs to have a degree of certainty if people are to comply with it. I would hope that we could get these guidelines out on at least those matters on which there is general agreement.

Mrs. MINK. What is the record of the Department on the issue of equal pay for equal work, particularly as relates to male and female employees in specific job classifications?

We have selected job titles provided us by the Civil Service Commission in various occupational series. By way of demonstration, let me give you one of them.

The general clerical and administrative occupational series 301 showed that the average salary for male employees is $22,441, for female employees, $11,810. While maybe your rate of employment of female and males over the last 5 years may indicate some progress, 10 percent does not strike me as being very much. The real heart of the matter is: what do they get paid when they are hired?

Secretary DUNLOP. Does that question refer to Government employment?

Mrs. MINK. In your Department, sir.

Secretary DUNLOP. Employment in the Department of Labor?
Mrs. MINK. That is what I am advised.

Mr. CLARK. I am not sure I really understand the question because there is no differential between the rate of pay between male and females in the Federal sector.

Mrs. MINK. I will be very happy to turn over these figures to you. Mr. Chairman, I would ask unanimous consent that the response of the Department together with this chart be included in the record at this point.

Mr. CLARK. I will be very happy to do that.

Mr. HAWKINS. The figures referred to will be included in the record at this point. The response when it is received will be included following that request. Do you clearly understand the request?

Mr. CLARK. I assume you are going to give us something in writing so that we can respond appropriately, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HAWKINS. The committee will submit a specific request to the Secretary, and you will respond to that request.

Mr. CLARK. We will be very happy to do that.

Mr. HAWKINS. Thank you.

[The material referred to follows:]

AVERAGE SALARY DIFFERENCES BETWEEN WOMEN AND MEN IN 3 PROFESSIONAL OCCUPATIONS, U.S. DEPARTMENT

Source: Civil Service Commission central personnel data statistics for Nov. 30, 1974.

Mrs. MINK. My final question goes to the private sector which, of course, is our main concern, and to the responsibility under the Executive order of the Department of Labor with respect to contract and contract enforcement.

What kinds of audit procedure does the Department have in effect. to ascertain whether, if at all, Government contractors are in compliance with respect to the affirmative action plans to which they indicate their allegiance when they obtain a Government contract? Is there any audit procedure at all in your Department?

Secretary DUNLOP. As I indicated earlier, the Department has delegated over the 10 years to the Federal agencies, 17 of them, the development of compliance and investigation action. Those delegations are pursuant to general rules which have been laid down by the Depart

ment.

I think Mr. Davis might develop a little bit more in detail. The important point is that it is not the Department of Labor that goes into a Government contractor's plant or into a Government contractor's job. It is one of the compliance agencies which has supervision over the Government contracts which that agency holds.

Mrs. MINK. If I might indicate, in the GAO report which I am now holding, on page 50 the Department of Labor in commenting on the