Evening star., 1932-07-24
SHORTER DAY HELD
DEPRESSION CURE
Waldo Sees No Other Way to
Meet Problems of Ma
chine Age.

Special Dispatch to The Star.
NEW YORK, July 23-That shorter
hour working week is the eventual So
luton Of the depression was the decla-
ration of Richard Waldo. president OF
the Mcclure Newspaper Syndicate, IN
radio address here today. He spoke un-
der the auspices of the American Legion.
He said:
1t has been my conviction for the
last two years that the shorter hour
week is the keylog in the depression
lam. Until the fetish Of an eight-hour
day for five or Ave and half days
week is destroyed We shall continue to
see our economic wealth evaporate and
our political institutions give evidence
of decay For some years I observed
the steady decrease of working time
and our vast increase Of wealth with
the conviction that they were closely
related.
Holds Results Inescapable.
From 1898 to 1918 mass production
(and therefore labor -Savng) machinery
was developed by this Nation in the
face of European skepticism. Over the
same 20 years American labor was con-
Ceded reductions in working time
mostly by the strike and lockOutsrouteS
in a roughly proportionate measure.
BY the end of the Great War Europe
no longer scoffed at mass production
Perhaps the greatest single achievement
of the war was the convincing of the
nations that mass production would
rule the future.
To those of us who had the good
fortune to be somewhat behind the
scenes in Europe while the United
States shared in the war it was clear
that in the years following the making
Of peace Europe would go mass produc-
ten as fast as American machines
could be bought or initiated, European
nationals trained in the United States
be repatriated as managers, foremen
and workers and American money be
borrowed to finance the combination
working 10. y or more hours day
But it was equally clear that approx
mately a decade must pass before these
facts and their ineScapable results would
be accepted by any large number Of
Americans.
Capital did not foresee and labor
did not forecast that the war would
give the United States a temporary
golden time while Europe was getting
on its feet and that thereafter we
should have from at least the European
countries a competition that would level
the peak of prosperity to the plane OF
a struggle for subsistence.
When capital and labor agreed in
1918 to a standard eight-hour day they
brought into effect an average 50-hour
week In 20 years 10 hours week had
been cut from the average individuals
working time We can see now by the
charts that it was not enough, but the
average of 80 minutes reduction year
for 20 years was wholesome move
in the right direction.
hn
a provision for further reductions pro-
portioned TO the development of ma
chine efficiency, we would not be where
We are TODAY Instead, the elght-hour
dav has been treated as a sacred thing,
and between 1918 and 1929 reduction
in average working time Of only 80
minutes for the entire period was con-
ceded-less than three minutes year
was handed back to the employe-con-
sumner while our prosperity was rocking
the world.
Paper Profits BHilt.
And that prosperity was built In
large measure upon the failure to MAKE
proper reductions in working time.
Book profits of corporations and small
concerns alike piled up as pay rolls were
cut down These profits stimulated
the purchase of labor-saving machinery,
of stock flotations founded on prospec-
tive profits and stock Split-upS only
justified by profits yet to be achieved.
Everybody could get in on the opera
tions and nearly everybody did. But
there was a major error in the whole
project. Yet the separation Of con-
sumers from pay rolls at steadily
ascending rate was viewed with alarm
by but a few-and their warning voices
IrOu-roeH in the c1QrRinU Of the
ticker.
Man has devised but two means of
providing mass consumption. One is
the dole-and England disinteg cates
under that system. The other is the
pay roll. and the United States has
grown great by building the greatest
pay rolls in the world. But pay rolls are
merely records of people employed, End
We have allowed the ei2ht-hour pay
rolls of today to drop to a point that
may we'll be incomprehensible to the
generations which come after US
The sound and very able statistical
section OF the American Federation OF
Lat Dor estimates an average six-hour
day as an approximation. The Amer
lean Legion indorses the estimate.
Many of the chief industrial leaders
have given their approval. The two
great organizations are presenting to
Jne NdLlOn Hdtlolldi lidoe ic'iEd al
campaign With the shorter week as its
main objective.
In 1929 our average pay roll time
was 49le hours a week. If 90 per cent
of the people avail bile and competent
for employment had been put to work
they would have produced with an
average of 34 working hours a week
all that we could have then consumed
The 15la-hour error compelled lay-offs,
which dug the initial pit into which we
have fallen We have widened and
deepened that pit steadily. Fear and
the burden of caring for the unem-
ployed will continue their undermining
work until jobs and confidence in jobs
re-establish the spending habits of our
people
Leaders of the world as we have