agencies, for basic data as to the expanding requirements of war industries for workers to complete contracts they are now engaged upon. The CHAIRMAN. How many new offices do you expect to open? Mr. CORSON. We do not propose to open any additional offices for this purpose. The CHAIRMAN. You mean you will expand the activities in your present office? Mr. CORSON. Yes; this work is carried on by the interviewers in the local offices. We have a total of 1,425 offices and approximately 10,000 interviewers throughout the employment service. These interviewers will actually do the leg work. They will visit employers to obtain from the employers themselves their estimate of needs for the next 6 months as to the labor they will need by occupations and types. This gives us data upon which to plan our activities through indicating by communities what the volume of work is going to be and the number of workers that are going to be needed. It also indicates the number of persons that are going to have to have training or be brought in to do the work in a community. For instance, the Bell Telephone has to know how many people are coming into a community in order to know what facilities they are going to need in that community. The information furnished by us enables them to make orderly plans for expanding their service. The War Production Board wants to have information relative to the labor market before they place any contracts in order to assure that there will be enough labor available to perform the contract. The National Housing Agency, as has already been pointed out, uses information developed by us as a basis for determining whether or not additional public housing is needed in a community. The estimate presented here involves a total of 145 additional people in the local offices to actually do the leg work, making contacts with the employers and assisting them in making out estimates and transcripts. The CHAIRMAN. To what extent would the Bureau of Labor Statistics be able to do this work? Mr. CORSON. The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not enter into this activity. They do not attempt to make any detailed estimates as to the needs of individual employers through going to employers to find out how much work they are going to have or the number of workers they need in order to meet their requirements over the next 6 months.. This is not statistical work; this is a determination of hiring needs as a basis for finding people and having them when they are needed. Mr. O'NEAL. Does the Bureau of Labor Statistics consider the question as far as employees of the Government are concerned. Mr. CORSON. We have no connection with the Government offices in this service. Mr. O'NEAL. We hear a great deal of criticism of that, but you are not making any study of the number of people in the Government service. Mr. CORSON. No. Mr. O'NEAL. Do you know of any other agency that is making a canvass of that situation? Mr. CORSON. I am sure the Civil Service Commission is making exactly that type of study. EXTENSION OF FARM PLACEMENT SERVICE The CHAIRMAN. We next have an estimate here of $2,058,333 covering the extension of Farm Placement Service to insure adequate labor to meet agricultural production goals. That is a very laudable objective to meet their needs. We will insert in the record at this point pages 16 to 21 of the justifications. (The statements referred to follow:) Estimated additional requirements for local employment offices to meet agricultural labor requirements of food production program, fiscal year 1943 Function Person- Average Total cost 1. (a) Recruit and interview farm workers, receive employer orders, selecting and referring workers. (b) Filing, typing, and stenographic service, preparing index cards and reports... 2. Operation of 6 mobile units to perform above functions.. 3. Performance of above functions at 89 Farm Security Administration camps.... Total estimated cost for personnel services. 4. Estimated additional cost (travel, rent, telephone and telegraph, and equipment) 3. Total personal services and other costs.. 2,058, 333 'For 7 months' period and based on average salaries appearing on State pay rolls for personnel in small local offices. 2 3 months. 3 Based on time and cost distribution studies made in State employment service agencies. JUSTIFICATION FOR ADDITIONAL FUNDS TO EXPAND THE FARM PLACEMENT PROGRAM The Farm Placement Service carries out the provisions of the Wagner-Peyser Act in the recruitment of farm workers to assure the planting, cultivation, and harvesting of crops. The war and its effect on the manpower of the Nation has made this service vital to the production of food for the armed forces, domestic consumption, and the United Nations which are now unable to produce sufficient food. The War Manpower Commission has directed the United States Employment Service to take such action as may be necessary to assure that its maximum efforts are expended in the recruitment and placement of the number of workers required for the production, cultivation, and harvesting of any agricultural commodities essential to the effective prosecution of the war. In accomplishing this objective, a tremendous burden will be placed on the United States Employment Service. The United States Employment Service, through the Farm Placement Section, intends to fulfill its obligations by aggressive and positive action. Adequate funds for personnel will be required as explained in the following presentation of needs: I. PERSONAL SERVICES A. Mobile units of interviewers.-Mobile units of Employment Service interviewers has been determined to be one of the most effective means of coping with the problem of recruitment and placement of agricultural workers. Previous experience on a much smaller scale than provided for herein has proven this method to be satisfactory; for example, during the past season, a mobile crew of 3 Employment Service interviewers was used in the Norfolk, Va., area. In less than 1 week these 3 Employment Service interviewers recruited in excess of 400 agricultural workers which met a portion of farm labor needs in Virginia. Another mobile crew was sent into the Charleston, S.. C., area, and in the same period of time recruited 100 workers. Due to lack of funds, the Farm Placement Service has not been able to carry out further recruitment drives with mobile crews. It has been further determined that this is the most effective method of handling seasonal farm labor recruitment problems. The cost of establishing and maintaining Employment Service offices in all of the areas requiring farm placement service would be prohibitive, and the administration of such a program would be difficult. This type of recruiting will permit the Farm Placement Service to be brought nearer to the worker and place of employment. Mobile groups of interviewers will work in close cooperation with established United States Employment Service offices in order that there will be no duplication of effort, and in order that such groups may take advantage of local labor offices' knowledge of labor supply in local areas. It is requested that funds be approved for establishment of six mobile units. B. Farm Security Agency camp interviewers.-Farm recruitment and placement interviewers will be stationed in Farm Security Agency camps, which are established for the express purpose of furnishing adequate housing for farm workers, in order to more effectively recruit workers from these camps. Farm Security Agency camps are established in crop areas which included large acreages grown in highly perishable crops, and which require a heavy in-flow of agricultural labor. Such camps accommodate from 300 to 1,000 workers each, and provide housing and other facilities for workers normally coming to the area for work. The United States Employment Service has an agreement with the Farm Security Agency which provides that at least one interviewer shall be placed in each camp in order to make Employment Service facilities available to these workers, thus providing an orderly flow of workers from the camps to farm jobs. There are 89 Farm Security Agency camps, of which 46 are of permanent construction and 43 are for mobile use. Mobile camps are moved from one locality to another and from one State to another, depending on the size and type of the crop to be harvested, and the inadequacy of housing in the locality. It is possible under these arrangements to operate a one-man office by integrating our efforts with the Farm Security Agency camp officials. By utilizing camp facilities, we save local office rentals. The efforts of the interviewer in each Farm Security Agency camp will be blended with local employment offices serving the areas involved, and with any mobile crews which may be working in such areas. C. Additional interviewers and clerks for regular offices.-The United States Employment Service proposes to meet the continuing problem of recruiting sufficient farm labor by adding additional staff in existing offices to handle farm placement activities. The present farm placement program is entirely inadequate to handle the needs placed on the United States Employment Service by the food-for-freedom program. The number of additional personnel requested for already existing United States Employment Service offices to handle the farm labor program should alleviate this serious situation. Due to the present shortage of funds, many employment offices serving rural areas have curtailed their activities, and in some instances offices have been closed. Staff therefore is not available for organizing the farm labor market to make the best use of labor which is available. Many local offices are now staffed on a one-man basis, but experience has shown that this type of office is not effective in serving agricultural labor requirements, since there must be large-scale field recruitment and grower contact. In those important agricultural localities having a one-man office and where there is other activity which precludes sufficient field work, additional farm placement staffing is essential if the job is to be done. The larger offices in urban centers, but in close promimity to extensive agricultural projects, are in need of additional personnel to adequately handle farm placement functions and engage in pertinent field activities. These offices have had little demand in the past for farm workers, and therefore have little or no staff to serve the tremendous increase in farm-labor requirements. Offices in large urban centers and not adjacent to agricultural areas are being used to recruit city dwellers to meet the greatly increased farm-labor demand in other areas. Many of these offices are insufficiently staffed to engage in the activities necessary, since farm placement is a new business to them. These offices are already overburdened in handling war construction and production projects, and as a result, little time is available to recruit workers for the farm, which is of equal importance in the war. D. New employment offices. The above request for expanded farm placement activities provide for the establishment of 320 new offices in critical farm areas throughout the Nation to meet the labor requirements of the war food production program. War-food producers have not been provided with a labor service nearly as adequate as an already inadequate service to war industrial production indus try. In a great many instances, offices serving rural areas have, because of shortage of funds, been curtailed or closed. If the United States Employment Service is to engage in an all-out recruiting program for farm workers and direct the orderly flow of farm labor, sufficient staff and offices must be made available; for example, the United States Employment Service, because of lack of office and staff, has been unable to direct labor available in Florida to North Carolina and Connecticut where shortages have existed. One State on the western coast received employer orders for 3,650 beet thinners and vegetable farm hands. In response to these orders, the United States Employment Service referred 214 workers, which is less than 6 percent of the growers' needs. This was due to the inadequate number of office and staff available for recruitment purposes. If labor demands are not met, this means that crop production growers will suffer with a resultant curtailment of the food-for-freedom program. The problem is twofold, in that it involves: (1) Full and efficient utilization of local labor supply; and (2) effective organization of distant labor supplies to meet requirements in areas of labor demand. The United States Employment Service proposes to meet this problem by establishing new local offices in critical rural areas. In certain sections of the eastern seaboard, labor shortages have been approximately 29,000 workers. Southeastern States have estimated a farm labor demand of approximately 50,000 workers. The evacuation of the Japanese on the western coast will require the recruitment of approximately 25,000 additional workers. These figures are cited to indicate the size of the recruitment job of the United States Employment Service. If present trends continue, the lack of transportation facilities for farm workers will increase the number of shortage areas. Increased personnel activities, therefore, must be inaugurated to develop new sources of labor and to acquaint farmers with the facilities of the United States Employment Service. Agricultural workers have been drawn into industry on an unprecedented scale. The Department of Agriculture estimates that more than 1,500,000 workers in rural areas migrated to urban areas during 1940 and 1941. Northern agricultural sections of the Nation, which are in many instances adjacent to industrial areas, are placing an increasing dependence on labor from southern sections for crop operation activiites. Such labor must be recruited in distant areas and directed to the areas of demand or crop production goals will not be met. On the basis of pleas of the United States and State Departments of Agriculture, farmers have planted and will continue to plant acreage in many cases far in excess of local labor supply available to care for the acreage plan. Farmers have reasonably assumed that assistance will be given them by the United States Employment Service in locating the needed workers. It is recognized that the total farm labor supply now available is not sufficient to meet the requirements of the foodfor-freedom program. Yet it is estimated that approximately 40 percent of the labor supply is not being effectively utilized. We know that sugar beets have been plowed under in certain areas because labor was not available to take care of the crops. Many other crops for which the Army has contracted, such as tomatoes and other vegetables and fruits suitable for canning, were not planted, because the growers thought that labor would not be available for harvest. The general pattern of the United States Employment Service provides for services to industry rather than to agriculture. While there are approximately 1,500 United States Employment Service offices which furnish itinerant service to approximately 3,000 points, many of which are in rural areas, experience has shown that such itinerant service is not effective. Itinerant interviewers in many cases are required to travel to 2 or 3 points during the day, spending 1 or 2 hours at each point; thus permitting but little opportunity for recruitment and placement purposes. New offices should be established at many such points if effective service is to be rendered to farm employers and laborers. Many offices are serving a great number of counties, making it almost impossible to render effective service; for example, the United States Employment Service office at Dodge City. Kans., serves a total of 11 counties. Persons familiar with this wheat-producing area will immediately recognize that is it impossible for 1 office to serve this number of counties, especially during the wheat-harvesting season. Service on an itinerant service basis to these heavy wheat-producing areas in the past have been ineffective. USE OF FUNDS FOR FARM PLACEMENT SERVICE The CHAIRMAN. Will you give us a summary of the purposes for which this money is to be used? Mr. CORSON. Your statement, Mr. Chairman, indicates that there is not much necessity of my attempting to say anything with respect to the needs. At the moment we are in the peak of the harvesting season and the need is very apparent. The debates on the floor of Congress in the last 3 or 4 days evidence the need for some assistance to farmers to provide additional supplies of labor to help harvest their crops. I believe this need is pretty clearly shown. Now the evidence here shows that we are requesting a total of approximately 1,500 people in the existing local offices, and in 320 additional local offices to assist farmers in finding what labor supply may be available in these ard adjacent areas. The CHAIRMAN. How are you going about determining how much is available? Mr. CORSON. The first thing they are going to do is to interview the farmers, by going out on the farms, and finding out how many people they are going to need and where they are going to need them, and when they will need them. In addition to that, through processing the occupational questionnaires of the selective-service registrants we can find whether or not there is an available supply in the community. This will be particularly important when we get into the harvest season and have to meet seasonal problems. Mr. TABER. How are you going to get the information from the farmers? Mr. CORSON. In the spring we plan to contact the farmers to find out what help they are going to need, based on their best information as to the amount and type crops they will plant, and the labor needed for each of the crops. Mr. TABER. Could not the local county agents discover that? Mr. CORSON. The county agents many times will be able to supply us some of the information, and many times they will not. Mr. TABER. He can give you most of it; can he not? Mr. CORSON. No, I think not. |