Gross average hourly earnings for selected 3- and 4-digit industries and percent increase for selected periods 1938 through February 1955—Continued Gross average hourly earnings for selected 3- and 4-digit industries and percent increase for selected periods 1988 through February 1955-Continued Gross average hourly earnings for selected 3- and 4-digit industries and percent increase for selected periods 1938 through February 1955—Continued Includes data for months in which work stoppage occurred. NOTE. Data are shown for all periods for which they are available. 25.6 28.1 24. 6 25.4 Mr. LARSON. I would like to make it easier to follow these by pointing out what they are and how they fit into the general pattern. Exhibit A is the distribution of wage and salary workers according to status under the Fair Labor Standards Act. If you glance at page 3, you will see the figures I was using yesterday to respond to one of the questions on how many of these people are under interstate commerce and how many are not. Exhibit B is the wage distribution survey of manufacturing, which has been referred to frequently during the testimony and the questions broken down in considerable detail. This one, you will recall, is just the straight survey of production workers in manufacturing, which was especially conducted for this purpose. Exhibit C, which in many ways is the most all-around useful exhibit for our present purposes, shows the impact of 85 cents, 90 cents, $1, and $1.25 minimum wage rates in covered industries, as well as in the manufacturing survey. So this carries the thing a step further and points out what the impact would be on all covered workers according to our best estimates. If you will glance at this, it is broken down in table C-1 according to, first, all workers under the act, and then all manufacturing workers under the act, to show on a nationwide basis how many employees were earning less than the figures that are most involved in the discussion, 90 cents, $1, and $1.25. C-2 is a very significant table, broken down regionally into the four major regions, showing how many people would be affected in the South, the Northeast, the Middle West, and the Far West for the principal suggested figures. C-3 breaks it down by durable and nondurable goods in regions. C-5 goes into the finer classifications of various manufacturing industries, and shows the impact on a rather detailed breakdown of industries. C-6 is a very interesting set of figures which shows the impact not only in terms of the number of workers affected, but the percentage increase in the wage bill of these different figures, 85 cents, 90 cents, $1, and $1.25. The 85 and 90 are on the first page, and the $1 and the $1.25 are on the next page. To show you how we have used these tables in the working out of the figures we have been talking about, we start with the coresponding figures during the 1950 increase. We find, for example, that the 75cent rate affected directly 69 percent of the employees in southern sawmills. That is the first item in table C-7. If you look over to the right you find that the 90 cents affects 74 percent of the workers in the southern sawmills. As to the increase in wage bill, the 1950 action required a direct wage bill increase of 14 percent. In this case it is 9 percent. So you can go down the list and make this comparison. In men's seamless hosiery, which is a prominent item, down the line a way, in 1950, 75 cents required increases for 24 percent of the employees, and a 3 percent increase in the wage bill. If you glance down here you will find that the 90-cent increase requires increases for 30 percent of the workers, and the same increase in the wage bill as in 1950, namely, 3 percent. In men's dress shirts, the 75-cent rate required increases for 37 percent of the employees and 5 percent in the wage bill; and here we find corresponding figures of 33 percent of the workers, 3 percent of the wage bill. For work clothing, the 75-cent rate would require a direct increase to 52 percent of the workers and a 9-percent increase in the wage bill; and we find 51 percent of the workers and a 5-percent increase in the wage bill. You can carry out that kind of comparison to show how we arrived at the conclusion that the impact of the 90 cents was, taking it all in all, approximately comparable to the impact of the 75 cents. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Could I ask the witness a question about one of these charts to see if I understand the figures in it? On table C-1 an increase to 90 cents would result in a direct increase in the annual wage bill of $220 million, and an increase to $1.25 would amount to $2,300 million. In other words, the impact on the highly competitive industries, the low-wage industries, would be over 10 times as great if we had an increase of 50 cents as compared to an increase of 15 cents. Mr. LARSON. Yes. That is the overall picture. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you. Mr. LARSON. The same kind of comparison, of course, can be made as to the effect of the $1.25 on the percentage increase in wage bill by industries in the United States, as I have just made for 90 cents, and you see, of course, the contrast. In the southern sawmills 94 percent, or almost all of the southern sawmill workers, would have to have their wages increased by the $1.25 rate, and it would mean a 44-percent increase in the wage bill of the southern sawmills. Work clothing, 88 percent. This is work clothing for the country as a whole. Mr. WIER. Before you get off lumber, by no stretch of the imagination do you include all of the timberworkers down South in that raise, because the House removed what they thought was the problem, and that was to exempt all these-I do not know whether you call them woodpecker mills or whatever they are down there, which employ fewer than 12. No matter what the wage bill is, they are still exempt, and certainly that is not going to bring about the figure that you cite there. Mr. LARSON. It is my impression that the people dealt with in these tables are the people who are covered. Mr. WIER. That is a different picture. I am assuming in the question asked you that was the competitive industries. Mr. LARSON. That is right. This is a directly relevant table, because we have included in here the covered southern sawmill workers. Mr. WIER. What percentage of sawmills, any sawmills, employ 12 or more? We were led to believe and the basis of the exemption which was asked for was that the industry was a lot of small sawmills scattered all over the South. Mr. LARSON. Could I call on someone for that? This is Mr. Weiss. Would you introduce yourself? Mr. HARRY WEISS (Assistant Administrator, Wage and Hour Division, Department of Labor). The exemption in 1949, if you may remember, was for logging employees only, employing less than 12. It does not apply to sawmills. We estimate there are 110,000 persons employed in logging establishments that were exempt in 1949. The rest of the industry are still covered by and subject to wage require ments. Mr. WIER. Let us clarify that. That is not the way I understood the word "logging." The South has a lot of that southern pine which is manufactured into boxes for, let us say, North Carolina's strawberry and vegetable shipments. They are small mills. I assume that "mills" was the term used rather than logging. Mr. WEISS. No, sir. I think if you will check it, the exemption is limited to logging establishments. It is true one of the bills covered both, but in conference the exemption was limited to logging establishments. Mr. WIER. We had quite a tussle over that. Mr. WEISS. Yes; we did. Mr. WIER. Because almost the whole pine industry of the Southeastern States would have been exempt under that 12-man exemption applied to timber products. Mr. WEISS. In one of the bills, as I recall, it did apply both to sawmills and to logging establishments, and the conference committee finally limited it to logging establishments. Mr. WIER. Is your Department now covering what we might call a mill, small or big, and your logging interpretation would be that |