Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-02-02

The compensation is not so great as pay for the same
class of work outside the departments but departmental
work offers opportunities for rapid advancement to
positions of responsibility and good pay the outside.
"The Geological Survey offers special opportunities
for high-class scientific employment. hope and be-
eve the time is coming when expert in these scien
tific lines will be paid better salaries. Our best men
leave the service when they become really efficient and
valuable When they become valuable to the govern
they readily command much better wages outside
the service
"Purelv clerical and administrative work offers
special opportunities for the really efficient young men
of the country The pay and opportunities for advance
nent are small as compared to those in the commercial
world. This class of employees should also have more
paw sort of provision should be made tor their
retirement when they become inefficient after long SER
vice.
under present conditions government employment
as compared outside employment offers less oppor
tunty for the young OF real ability hope 1t Will
not always be this way. The young man who gives
valuable service to the country does it at great sacrifice
Many willing and patriotic enough to do this
Many who could command much better pay outside
the service giving their time and labor TO the country
for the love OF it.
"As say many able and energetic men serve the
government at salaries far below the commercial STAN
dard for like services They choose to do because
the public service satisfies their best and highest ideals
of personal integrity and professional achievement
Such men are continually forced out of the service by
the necessity of making due provision tor themselves
and their families before old age comes them IT
the government would insure them against this peril
it could continue employ them at salaries far less
than private corporation would be compelled to pay
Every consideration of economy and sound business
policy requires that their services should be retained
terms so favorable the government The loss, taken
in the mass irreparabe for the system operates as
survival of the unittest by continually drawing off
the more energetic and ADLER men, leaving larger and
larger proportion of the inefficient in the public service
Mr. Fisher refers to the "old age OF the clerks No
government clerk who has spent his life in Washington
can look forward with OF mind to the dsab1l
ties of age. This is true because his small salary has
been eaten up by his daily needs.
HENRY L. STIMSON, Secretary of War, deposes,
IL @The purely monetary rewards and opportunities
of the government will be great those offered
in the business and professional world esewhere and
if the government service is to be maintained upon
high and increasing level of proficiency must meet
competition from other quarters by compensatng
features that will the best talent to its service
and retain it.
Mr.. NAGEL, Secretary of Commerce and Labor,
A"A points that there some advantages in the
government service; but he concludes with the en-
phatc warning that man, having once been given such
a position seldom finds the courage to relinquish it..
He says:
sitions to which an ambitious young person may well
aspire Take for illustration, the bureaus in which the
work is more or less scientific In such cases well
equipped Young person may render the government
vice far beyond the compensation and at the time
receive a return that perhaps other experience
give. In other words the bureau IS to all ntents and
purposes training school of the highest order Fur
thermore these bureaus may be said to offer particular
inducement for permanent employment. The oppor-
tunities for promotion good, and the ultimate re-
Enumeration is such that security which the civil
vice affords may well be accepted as compensation by
anyone who is interested investigate and to develop
particular subjects.
scientific in which similar opportunities to be found
Persons in charge of special work given the benefit
of experience that probably could not be advantage
ousy had in other places which certainly equps them
for better positions aterward IN private pursuit With
them the most important question to be whether
they will have the resolution to surrender their positions
befO thew too TO he aCCeDtabe