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information when you want to, what will be the effect upon the personnel of the Census Bureau in Washington? Will it be reduced?

Mr. TAYLOR. In my opinion the peaks will be materially reduced. Mr. CURTIS, The peaks?

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes.

Mr. CURTIS. I am confining my question just to the employees in Washington, not enumerators.

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes. I think in discussing that with the people in the Bureau we have tried to get a more balanced, more effective organization, and as to the specific number of employees and so on, I would rather have Mr. Capt answer that question. But my impression is that you would reduce the peak loads, and that you would have actually fuller employment of what you might describe as your more permanent staff.

Mr. CURTIS. In other words, you would have more or less number of employees if this is enacted, from the 1940 census to the 1950? Your average number of employees would be more or less than the average number of employees between the 1930 census and the 1940 census?

Mr. TAYLOR. Will you mind having Mr. Capt answer that question in detail, because as I say

Mr. CURTIS. I don't care who answers it.

Mr. TAYLOR. My impression is that because of the enactment of this act, the peaks would certainly be lower, and you would get fuller utilization of your permanent staff on account of this staggering arrangement which we have there, and also a difference in our conception of how to use the field offices. That is really an impression more than a positive statement I can make as to the actual numbers. Mr. CAPT. The way the law reads at present, we take this decennial census every 10 years, in the years ending in naught, and we get a tremendous peak of work. Our employees in the Washington office went from less than 1,000 employees to around 10,000 employees in 1940. That will drop down after the decennial census period is over, which runs for 3 years. It will go away down again to maybe 1,000 employees. Then in 10 years it will jump away up again.

By this provision we will spread the load out and over the 10-year period we will have, certainly not any more man-hours or man-months in the Bureau than we have at present, because we will have a more uniform staff. They will be better trained and they will produce with higher efficiency. So I think it is perfectly safe to say, insofar as anybody can estimate, that our total man-hours or man-months over the 10-year period will not exceed what it has been in the past, and you will get much more efficiency, much more rapid reporting, our figures will be more nearly current. They will not be purely historical as they have been largely in the past, and we will have information when it is needed.

Mr. CURTIS. Another thing right there; you say you have about 1,000, and that your peak load jumps up to 10,000.

Mr. CAPT. That is what it did in 1940. The peak is going down. We have around 6,000 in Washington at present. The decennial period runs for 3 years by law from January 1, 1940. During that 3-year period we have run from a little less than 1,000 up to around 10,000 in the Washington office. Now we are on the decline and are around 6,000 clerks in Washington.

Mr. CURTIS. If this legislation is enacted, about what will you have for the remaining 7 years?

Mr. CAPT. It is hard to predict that far ahead. It depends entirely on what the Bureau is called upon to perform in the way of services for the defense program, and I doubt if any man can foresee what the defense is going to need in the next month even.

Mr. CURTIS. If this legislation is enacted you will not need 10,000 in 1950?

Mr. CAPT. Well, that is a long way off for me to venture an estimate, but I cannot conceivably see how we could use anywhere near that number in 1950, because in 1950 instead of taking the census of everything in the country, as we did in 1940, we will only take the census of population, agriculture, and perhaps some other. We will have taken the census of business, manufactures, and mines in 1948. The result of that great peak load we get every 10 years is that we overburden our personnel and our equipment and our space. It is tremendously overburdened, and the information that should be gotten out in a few months cannot be gotten out for many months, because we have so much to do. In 1950 if we only have population, agriculture, and perhaps housing we can get through in a hurry. The economic surveys and the mines will have been taken care of by 1948 and will have been disposed of.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Curtis, I would rather if you would conclude the interrogation of Mr. Taylor, and Mr. Capt will be the next witness. You are getting away from the witness we have here. Mr. Kramer has begun to want to ask some questions of Mr. Capt, too. I would prefer to wait until Mr. Capt gives his testimony in chief. So, finish with Mr. Taylor, please.

Mr. CURTIS. Well, this section authorizes you to take an inventory of materials needed for defense in the United States, does it not?

Mr. TAYLOR. We have that authority now, but we have to do it in a form which is more cumbersome. For example, that is a part of the arrangement we have worked out with the O. P. M. They have to pay us special funds, or transfer to us special funds in order to have us do that. We haven't either the funds or the personnel at the present time so that we can do that, unless we push off the 1941 census of manufactures. Mr. May and Mr. McClure will give you the various special jobs we have done for them under this rather cumbersome method. They will not give you the names of the companies, but we have been able to get information in specific inventories, specific general locations and so on.

Mr. KINZER. I understood you to say that in 1941 the manufactures census has not been proceeded with by your bureau.

Mr. TAYLOR. We have done some of the preliminary work on it, but there is a special date that you take it on.

Mr. KINZER. Well, it is now the tenth month of the year 1941. Mr. TAYLOR. I gave you the wrong year. Did I not?

Mr. CAPT. No; that is correct. If you take the manufactures

census as of 1941, you cannot start until the end of the year.

start in 1942 taking the census of manufactures for 1941.

We

Mr. TAYLOR. We normally start around the first of the year, send

out the questionnaires around next spring.

Mr. CAPT. Yes, some time after the first of the year.

Dr. REED. It covers operations in 1941.

Mr. GRANT. Mr. Taylor, in your opinion, under this subsection (b), would the Census Bureau be authorized, without any further authority of law, to go out and take another housing census and count bathtubs? Mr. TAYLOR. I do not interpret that to mean a complete census at all. I interpret that to mean essential spot information.

Mr. GRANT. You do not understand it to include a complete census? Mr. TAYLOR. No; I do not.

Mr. GRANT. I have another question, Mr. Taylor. I think our people, generally, have great confidence in the Census Bureau, and no doubt that has been built up by the fact that the Bureau has always honored the confidences placed in them and does not release this information. Under the wording of section 3, as written, it says that any individual census report or any information contained therein may be used in connection with the national-defense program. Those words are all-inclusive and very broad. I imagine there would be few things that could not by some stretch of the imagination be construed to be needed in connection with the national-defense program. All of us, of course, are anxious to do everything we can to expedite the national-defense program. No doubt your Department has given a lot of study to this bill and I am wondering if you are able to suggest some further safeguards which could be written into the bill for the protection of our people.

Mr. TAYLOR. I think if you will continue with the reading of that paragraph-it says:

under such rules and regulations as may be prescribed with the approval of the President, by the Secretary of Commerce.

Mr. GRANT. I appreciate that, but the time to stop an abuse, if we can, is before it arises, and not after it has arisen, and I was just wondering what might be written into the bill as a further protection to the people whose business affairs and almost their personal lives might be thrown open to whomever might be able to comply with the rules that had been promulgated for dissembling that information.

Mr. TAYLOR. Our feeling is that the language that I have just read gives the maximum protection that is necessary, but if the committee has any suggestion how that can be increased, naturally that is up to the committee.

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Taylor, right on that very point, believe you indicated a few minutes ago that the real demand for this bill originated with the O. P. M., to get this information.

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes.

Mr. ALLEN. So that if we should place too many limitations on section 3, you would have no need for the bill.

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes.

Mr. ALLEN. In other words, is it your statement in a nutshell that the demand for the bill is really a national defense proposition?

Mr. TAYLOR. That is right. Frankly, I cannot think of any information that would be contained in one of the schedules or the questionnaires that would be made available to national-defense agencies that is of such importance that it would even begin to outweigh the interest of national defense. People are very secretive about things that you can get out of a telephone book.

Mr. ALLEN. In other words, the Department takes the position that this is an all-out defense effort?

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Mr. TAYLOR. That is right.

Mr. ALLEN. Now, let me ask you this question: the objection that I have heard raised to the bill relates to the matter of the interest of small business. Any business census that is taken is a help to business to find out where business is, and how to get it and so forth, and about the competition and so forth.

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes.

Mr. ALLEN. I have had it represented to me that to lengthen out the period from 2 to 5 years militates, or might militate against the small business concern rather than help the small business concern. What have you to say on that?

Mr. TAYLOR. Well, it is certainly my impression that the increase in the current information, plus the other things we are going in other bureaus of the Department, that the small business man is going to get much more complete service than he has ever had in the past. I mentioned before this question of the regional offices and so on. We are sending out regional consultants who are specifically trained in many problems, but particularly small business problems, into the field, because in the past, as you know, people had to come to Washington, and small business is at a disadvantage when it comes to Washington. They would rather talk their problems over when they are out in the field, and I say the combination of that type of information, plus the fact that we are sending people out where small business is, will give them a much better service than they have ever had before. Mr. ALLEN. In other words, you think this will help small business rather than hurt it?

Mr. TAYLOR. That plus the other things I mentioned. We are very conscious that the small business man has been at a disadvantage from the standpoint of getting information about the country and about his own business. He, either rightly or wrongly, did not know where to go, and we are going to help him get the information he has to have.

Mr. KRAMER. May I interrupt?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

Mr. KRAMER. Mr. Taylor, how is it going to help the smaller business mant the benefits of priorities that he cannot get over large industry Say he is a small manufacturing man in a shop, and if he cannot get just a very small piece of wire necessary to manufacture his product, he has to close down. It is the smallest factor that goes into his product, and yet he cannot get it because large industries have a hold over him. How is it going to help him recover? There are just hundreds of such industries in my district in Los Angeles. I am just wondering how it is going to help him. Mr. TAYLOR. First, by information.

Mr. KRAMER. What will information do? What they want is authority to get this material from whoever is going to give it to him. They have been getting the run-around from O. P. M., Federal Housing, Congress, and everybody who has anything to do with it has the same complaint. They just can't get the material they need, and necessarily they have to shut down. Unless this one article, which is coiled into a spring that goes into their product, can be procured, and that material is going to the big institution. There will probably be two or three hundred employees out of work, there will probably be more shutdowns because the same situation arises in many instances.

Mr. TAYLOR. You are familiar, I am sure, with the steps that have been taken to reorganize the defense contract service.

Mr. KRAMER. Yes; that has been reorganized, and now I understand they are going to reorganize it again. Do they ever get through reorganizing?

Mr. TAYLOR. It is hoped they will

Mr. KRAMER. In the meantime this small industry cannot hang on. You can't have 150 men and women standing around in your plant on Saturday morning expecting to come in and get their payroll check. If you can't get the material to finish your product, even though you have orders, while you are waiting for the Government agencies in Washington to try and figure out a reorganization, I never saw anything that was more of a Chinese puzzle. What is the answer to it? How is it going to benefit that small industry we are talking about today? Are we going to get around it by some quicker method by this procedure you are talking about now, or are we just going to give O. P. M. some information and get the same answers we are getting now, "We are doing the best we can"?

Mr. TAYLOR. I think I mentioned to you that there are steps we are taking which have nothing to do with this particular thing. It is a combination of the information and the man out in the field.

Mr. KRAMER. Just how are they going to bring this improvement in that situation about?

Mr. TAYLOR. You go where business is, Mr. Kramer; you go where you get your information.

Mr. KRAMER. I get it direct from the industry, who bring their difficulties to me.

Mr. TAYLOR. That is it. We are sending those men out there so that they can parallel your efforts.

Mr. KRAMER. I understand that. You have sent men out to Los Angeles, in two or three different groups. One got started and employed a lot of office help and put in telephones, rented offices, and before we knew it another group came out. They were supposed to work with the other, but when they were asked, one said, "I don't know what he is here for," and the other said, "We don't know either." and here is industry at a standstill, and we are organizing white-collar jobs in Government agencies to do something, and they are doing nothing. Is this going to be another?

The CHAIRMAN. I believe Dr. Reed wants to give you the answer. Dr. REED. I wonder if the first thing Mr. Kramer wants to know isn't where that wire is that the manufacturer needs.

Mr. KRAMER. We know where it is. We want to know how to get it. Mr. Ford has the same situation. He parallels my district. have hundreds of calls. If you think it is funny, come on out with me and I will show you a situation where industry is actually shut down because of just a small amount of material they are unable to get through a lot of red tape that O. P. M. has set up, and which they themselves do not know what they are doing about. They are going at it backwards instead of forwards. I am for going along with progress, but I cannot see where it is going to benefit industry unless you are going to do something, and let me know just how you are going to do it.

Dr. REED. Is anyone's judgment better than the fact he bases that judgment on? Perhaps O. P. M. has not had the facts to base judg

ment on.

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