New-York tribune., 1918-12-06
City Club Wants
Workers. Health
Insurance i'm II. Y,
Post-Wa ar Programme Sent to
GovernOr-Elect Also Calls
for Housing Body, Good
Roads and State-City Job
Bureau

The City Club submitted yesterday to
Alfred E. Smith, Governor-elect, sug-
gestions for a reconstruction pro-
gramme drawn up by Joseph Nj. Price,
chairman of the clubs board of trus-
tees. The programme elaborates state
machinery for the benefit of the indi-
vidual, providing for health insurance
public works construction, municipal
and state employment bureaus and a
state housing commission, the sugges-
tions being specified as follows:
l. The passage Of a moderate work
mems health insurance measure similar
in scope to the measure prepared by
the City Club, the State Federation of
! Labor and other organizations, and in
troduced in the Legislature of 1918.
?. The systematic pushing forward
employment for the men of the re-
turning armies.
3. The adoption of a constructive
programme for state and city coopera-
tive employment Offices and the vigilant
regulation of the private protit-making
agencies.
Would Probe Housing Problem
4. The creation Of a state housing
commission to investigate and report
as to the best methods of securing ade-
quate and proper housing, whether
through a system Of state loans or
otherwise.
"Therc is an increasingly insstent
demand" says Mr.. Price in a memo
randum attached to the suggested pro-
gramme, ION the part of organizations
of wage earners that this mutually
supported and managed health insur-
ance protection be quickly put into op-
Grafton in New York State The value
OF workmen's compensation for acc-
dents is no longer questioned by en-
ployers, who in the beginning often
opposed it. And the workers them
selves very naturally believe that the
disabilities due to sickness-the most
important cause Of dependency-should
also be covered by statewide insur-
ance plan. 1t is believed that the ad
vantages of health insurance will very
quickly be demonstrated and that this
legislation, which logically follows the
workmen's compensation law, will re-
suit in increased interest in the promo
ton OF health in q form not unlike the
safety first campaign which developed
out Of The workmens conversation
movement
Would Improve Highways
Among the public works which Mr..
Price suggests might be pushed at
times when the labor supply threatens
to exceed the demand are good roads
and barge canal terminals Closely
mixed 70 TINS suggestion is the one
ior publlc employment agencies, which
should be developed, he thinks. as a
state system, to the costs of which mu-
nlclpallties contribute, the entire svs-
tenn to cooperate at every point with
the United States Employment Service
AS TO the housing commission. he saws:
me tact that our previous efforts
to obtain adequate housing in this
country have failed can no longer be
ignored, but il may be doubted whether
we are agreed upon the remedy. Before
INC war our public authorities limited
themselves to the prevention in some
measure of the erection of bad houses.
while all tho other progressive coun.
tlles OF the world ondeavored also to
increase the supply of good housing
OF the type most needed and spent or
lent at low rates of interest public
moneys to that end
Would Investigate Housing
This latter policy our national gov
eminent adopted as a war measure
by building houses, in some cases, for
~ IT'S munitlon and shipbuildng workers.
snail we in this state adopt and ex
tend the same policy as a peace meas
rre If 50, shall it he done bv The
state or the municipalities Whnt
Nachlnery shall be framed for these
rove undertakings What standards
Tor these houses shall be adopted
a,ow snail they be enforced? Must
extra precautions against the erection
of unfit houses commerciaIlv also be
adopted? The safest, and, indeed. the
quickest way to settle these and MANY
similar questions is for the state to
appoint commission to investigate
and report on the matter"