UNITED STATES OF AMERICA JUL 27'43 This Issue in Brief Food rations in Axis and occupied countries. Food rations established for Germans make them far better fed than the people of any of their allies except Bulgaria. In fact, the amounts allotted in Italy and Hungary are even less than in some of the conquered countries. Furthermore, it is noted that in Italy even these rations are not always obtainable. The rations of various commodities in Germany and other Axis countries and in countries subjugated by them are shown in the article on page 37. Methods of controlling absenteeism. Certain methods of controlling absenteeism, based on experience in the aircraft industry, are presented in an article on page 9. The methods suggested include measures for keeping employees in good health, improvement of plant conditions and arrangement of optimum work schedules, cooperation between management and the local authorities and agencies for adequate transportation and housing, and various measures for the assistance of employees in their personal problems (difficulties connected with home responsibilities, rationing, tax and legal matters, etc.). The use of publicity and certain morale-building campaigns is also suggested. Cost-of-living indexes in wartime. Wartime shortages and rationing have changed the level of living of wage earners, and it has become necessary to price a different level of living in order that the cost-of-living index shall continue to fulfill the purpose for which it was designed. The monthly adjustments in the index, taking into account changes in wartime buying, are summarized for the period since January 1942 in the article on page 82. Relative severity of post-war demobilization. An outstanding problem that will have to be met at the end of the war will be the reemployment of demobilized servicemen and workers released from the war industries. The severity of the situation will vary from State to State, depending largely upon the amount of such "excess" labor in relation to the normal capacity of the industries within the State to provide work. In an attempt to gain some idea of the magnitude of the problem the Bureau of Labor Statistics calculated, for each of the States and the District of Columbia, the probable number of demobilized workers in relation to the numbers employed in 1940. In no State did it appear that the "excess" required to be placed would be less than 19 percent of normal pre-war employment and in some States the percentage ran above 50 percent. Page 1. Living costs since beginning of retail price control. In the 12 months since the OPA issued the General Maximum Price Regulation, living costs have advanced appreciably. Underlying this rise has been a growing disparity between increasing money incomes and diminishing supplies of goods and services available for civilian consumption. Increases have been especially great in retail food prices and, particularly in recent months, for certain services. Successful control of foods at retail has been hampered by the fact that many unprocessed agricultural commodities are still exempt from OPA regulation. For most other living costs in the past year, changes in the quality, variety, and quantity of materials offered for sale have been more important than direct price increases. The most stable element in the cost of living has been rent, which on the average declined slightly in large cities. Page 66. Industrial injuries in shipyards. Early in 1943 a comprehensive program of accident reporting was adopted, covering all the shipyards building vessels for the U. S. Navy and Maritime Commission. This program will reveal the unsafe conditions and practices that lie behind the occurrence of accidents, and point the way for the necessary safety work. The need for such a general program is indicated by the fact that the time lost through nonfatal, disabling accidents in privately operated yards in the first 3 months of 1943 would, if continued throughout the year, offset the full-time efforts of nearly 5,000 workers. Page 5. Workmen's compensation experience in Wisconsin, 1942. During 1942 the number of industrial injuries in Wisconsin increased in about the same ratio as the increase in number of workers employed. The data also reflected the increased employment of women and the changed age composition of the labor force. Wisconsin compensates for all occupational diseases as well as accidents; and in 1942, as compared with 1941, the number of disease cases in proportion to the total increased by one-fifth, but the compensation cost of these cases fell by one-eighth. Page 117. Manpower situation in Great Britain, 1943. For further wartime increases in output of war and necessary civilian goods, Great Britain must depend upon increased productivity of persons already at work and part-time work by persons who are performing other necessary tasks. The chief reservoir of part-time labor consists of married women who also have to care for their children and homes under peculiarly trying conditions. New Government measures have been taken recently to direct workers into full-time and part-time employment. Workers' movements are recorded both when they move into and out of employment, to insure immediate and full use of their productive efforts. Page 17. Pay differentials for night work, under union agreements. About 72 percent of the workers in manufacturing industries, who are covered by union agreements, work in plants which have night shifts. Almost 70 percent of these union workers receive extra pay for the night shifts; these constitute about half of all the factory employees who are under union agreements. Nightwork differentials are particularly common in the agreements in the aircraft, automobile, electrical-machinery, shipbuilding, and fabricated-steel-products industries. Page 133. FOR JULY 1943 Relative Severity of Post-War Demobilization by States 1 THE relative severity of the post-war demobilization problem for each State may be said to depend upon the size of its "excess" labor supply, during the reconversion period, in relation to its pre-war capacity to provide employment. It may therefore be measured by the ratio of the total number of demobilized persons in the State to the employment in 1940. The group of demobilized persons will include members of the armed services who may be expected to return to the State, as well as industrial workers within its borders who will lose their jobs as war production is curtailed. This article gives an estimate of the reemployment problem presented in the various States by these demobilized persons. The estimate depends upon four assumptions, which are not intended as predictions but do provide a convenient basis for a preliminary analysis: (1) That the war will be ended both in Europe and Asia by December 1944, at the peak of the war production effort; (2) that the United States will maintain an armed force of 2,500,000 in the early post-war years; (3) that war production will be rapidly curtailed to the level of post-war defense requirements; and (4) that industrial reconversion and expansion to high levels of civilian production will proceed as rapidly as physical and technological factors will allow, with no delays caused by financial difficulties or uncertainty of markets. Use of this last assumption means that the magnitude of the coming reemployment problem, is, if anything, understated. As is indicated in the map on page 2 there are dramatic contrasts in the severity of the demobilization problems which the different States will experience. Michigan, with its converted automobile industry, will have the gravest situation. It appears that there will be almost 6 ex-servicemen or former war workers for every 10 persons employed in the State in 1940. Connecticut, long a center of the munitions industry, will also be seriously affected, with a ratio of demobilized persons to pre-war employment of nearly 49 percent. Washington and Indiana will have ratios of 45 percent. The next group includes eight States in which the problem of demobilization will be somewhat less severe, with demobilization ratios ranging from over 35 to 42 percent. These States are California, Kansas, Maryland, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Utah. In a considerably larger group, containing 17 States, the impact of demobilization will be relatively lighter, either because the volume of war industry is not very large or because the high pre-war level of Prepared in the Bureau's Post-War Division by Emile Benoit-Smullyan. |