UNEMPLOYMENT PROBLEM

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXII, 30 November 1938, Page 8

UNEMPLOYMENT PROBLEM

INTERNATIONAL LABOUR OFFICE RETURNS GENEVA, September. Comparing the trends of unemployment, during 1937, among men and women workers in five European countries —Czechoslovakia, France, Germany, Great Britain and Poland—the 1938 edition of the International Labour Office Year Book, which has just been published at Geneva, discloses that in all except Poland the labour market was less advantageous to women than to men. In two of the five countries—Germany and Czechoslovakia—the Year Book finds, unemployment declined among both women and men, although the decline was more marked in the case of men. Thus, in Germany, unemployment among men declined 42.7 per cent, as compared with 25.9 per cent among women; while in Czechoslovakia, unemployment among men declined 22.7 per cent, as compared with 20.5 per cent, among women. On the other hand, in Great Britain and France, there was a decline in unemployment among men. but an increase among women. Thus, in Great Britain, unemployment among men decreased 9.1 per cent., while among women it increased 6.7 per cent. In Poland, where male unemployment increased 3.3 per cent., there was a decrease of 2.0 per cent, in unemployment among women. Describing the trend in Great Britain as “a new phenomenon,” the Year Book says: ‘‘The very great increase there in unemployment among women during the year appears to be due to the greater unemployment in various industries which usually employ a large number of women, particularly cotton (11.4 per cent, of unemployment in January 1937, and 20.1 per cent, in January 1938). wool (7.1 and 21.1 per cent, respectively), knitted goods (9.4 per cent, and 14.2 per cent.), tailoring (12.4 and 16.7 per cent.), etc. On the other hand in several large branches of heavy industry which employ almost exclusively male labour, the figures show either only a very small increase in unemployment' (iron and steel, building) or an almost stationary position (engineering, brick works) or even a slight fall (ship-building, mines, public works).