FORD'S LATEST

Evening Star, Issue 20636, 8 November 1930, Page 28

FORD'S LATEST

A TEN-MONTH YEAR The eight-hour day—the five-day week—and now .Henry Ford sees the ten-mouth working year approaching (says an American paper). It is in the motor business that tho ten-month year is most confidently predicted. “Merely camouflage for mass production of unemployment,” decries the Louisville ‘Courier-Journal.’ “Characteristically, he combines sound social reasons with convincing economic ones,” declares tho .Newark ‘ Evening News.’ The statement arousing such typical sharply contrasting characterisations appears as follows in an interview in the ‘ Border Cities Star,’ of Windsor, Ontario: “ Work is the only thing which can restore prosperity. Unemployment is not a natural phenomenon ; it is the visible result or the general ignorance of economic health Jaws. “Tho problem challenging us now is how to control industry so that workmen may have steady employment. “ What it will come to in the motor car industry, it seems to me, is a ton-month industrial year. “The summer months are not good months to be working in a factory, i’eoplo need change. “Such an adjustment will take time, of course, because the workers, as well as tho manufacturers, will have to adapt themselves to such a schedule; but we have accomplished bigger things in the past. The eight-hour day, for instance, was a bigger adjustment to make, and so was the five-day week. “ A ten-mouth industrial year will be th© next thing. At the present time it averages about eleven months.” . None of tho numerous critics who come to bat hits harder than the Manchester (N.H.) ‘ Union.’ That paper finds in Ford’s “panacea” only the merit of an “attempt to tackle” a world-wide economic problem of “ overequipment, overproduction, and unemployment ” that baffles American industry. Further we read; “ Like so many of Mr Ford’s schemes, the details are ignored. Most workers would be pleased to accept a two months’ vacation each year, and they could no doubt bo trusted to take care of their time profitably. “But what about wages? Is the worker to receive twelve months’ pay for ten months’ work, or is he to forego pay for his vacation, and make it up in other pursuits? “ Who is to bear the expense of maintaining extensive industrial plants in idleness for one-sixth of their time? “ Is capital investment to pay dividends on an annual basis ? “ These are some of tho details that Mr Ford has ignored, and many would be gratified if he would elaborate his scheme more fully. Russia has recently introduced a five-day week calender for the express purpose of eliminating tho cost of maintaining expensive industrial plants in idleness one day in seven. If these plants are to lie idle for two months each year, some one must pay for it. Is the management to bear this expense, tho worker, or the consumer? In fact, ono wonders if Mr Ford really meant his suggestion to be taken'seriously.”