UNEMPLOYMENT

Greymouth Evening Star, 5 August 1929, Page 8

UNEMPLOYMENT

WHAT IS BEING DONE At their last conference the State Premiers decided to give effect to important recommendations, having for their object the diminution of unemployment. (writes a contributor to the Sydney Morning Herald). These recommendations were contained in the report by the Development and Migration Commission on unemployment and business stability within Australia. In his policy speech, the Premier of Victoria announced his intention to appoint, as recommended, an industrial stability committee. In the United States, the Senate Committee on Education and Labour has just completed an investigation similar to that conducted by the Commission. It is notable that the methods of inquiry and the industrial and business factors taken into consideration in America, were almost the same as those considered in Australia. The United States Senate resolution, authorising the investigation, instructed the committee to “make an investigation concerning, the causes of unemployment and the relation to fits relief of :— 1. The continuous collection and interpretation of adequate statistics of employment and unemployment. 2. The organisation and extension of systems of public employment agencies, Federal and State. 3. The establishment of systems of unemployment insurance or other employment reserve Funds, Federal, State, or private. 4. Curtailed production, consolidation, and economic reconstruction. 5. The planning of public works with regard to stabilisation of employmenty and

6. The feasibility of co-operation between Federal, State, and private agencies with reference to 1,2, 3, and 4.”

UNITED STATES EXAMPLES The United States committee was assisted by the Institute of Economics and by representative business and industrial leaders, who were invited to Washington. The statements of some of these leaders are of general interest.

Mr E .G. Draper, of Hills Bros. Co., of New York, packers of food products, said that his company used to employ about 300 persons • for eight or nine months of the year, and about 1300 for the other three or four months. A plan for stabilisation was suggested ; scientists showed how the food could be packed for future demand, and with some diversification of production, the company succeeded until now it employs about 1000 persons throughout the year. The problem of untrained workmen was largely eliminated, and the result was a higher morale, a greater production, better workmanship, and greater profits. “While endless discussion upon unemployment has taken place in the last 50 years,” said Mr Draper, • “no adequate machinery has ever been set up to attack the problem in an organised, nation-wide way. The field is practically virgin territory. If several of the largest and most influential corporations of the country would cooperate to investigate and strive to cure this evil, they could do more in five years than a drifting policy could accomplish in 25 years.” Air S. L. Lewisohn, of the Miami Copper Coy., and other industries, estimated that if seasonal unemployment could be eliminated from the United States, as he insisted that iit could, American business would be saved about £400,000,000 a. year. Air IT. S. Dennison, president of the Dennison Manufacturing Coy., 'Massachusetts, showed how his industry had stabilised employment through adherence to a budget system, through manufacturing products of a diverse nature, through withholding expenditure in time of prosperity, and throwing all these reserved funds into action in times of threatened depression. Mr Dennison said that his company had set aside each year a sum of £15,000 to insure an income for its workers. The company onlv guaranteed to pay wages in times of unemployment to the extent of this sum. When idle from, any cause, even that of transferring from one department to, another, income is reduced by transfer from one higher-paid job to a lower-paid one, the workers were assured protection from this fund. Yet the company had not spent £15,000 for all the years since the fund was created. According to Mr Dennison, the fund became a penalty on. idleness. The various departmental executives had struggled to prevent the slightest unemployment which would tap the reserve fund. Inevitably the company had benefited.