Evening star., 1932-09-06
POSTPONE HEARING
ON SCALE OF D. c.
RELIEF PAYMENTS
Commissioners to Advance
October Session, However,
Says MagnuSSon.
PROPOSED REDUCTION
OF 40 PER CENT SCORED
Monday Evening Club Sets Forth
Obiections-Favors Individual
Adjustments.

The hearing before the Board OF
Commissioners to members Of the Mon
day Evening Club protesting against a
40 per cent slash in the scale of relief
payments to the unemployed in the
District was called off today when it
proved impossible for Leifur Magnusson,
president, to get in touch with sui
ficient representation of the Executive
Committee owing to the holiday season.
Mr.. Magnusson presented letter how
ever, in which he said that the regular
October meeting would be advanced to
this month for the purpose of holding
public discussion of unemployment re-
lief matters, and the Commissioners
promised a hearing after the meeting
has taken place.
Meanwhile Mr.. Magnusson presented
some conclusions of his own, to the
effect that the relief should be adjusted
to each individual case, and not di-
rected to saving certain percentage
Of the fund for certain period.
Magnusson's Letter.
His letter said in part:
1T seems to me that there should
be agreement on this principle, namely,
that relief should be based solely on
the necessity of the individual case as
disclosed by careful investigation. What
the amount of that need should be will
be revealed in the experience of social
workers and in the general sense of
the community as to what constitutes
a minimum budget necessary for the
maintenance of the average family of
five with additional allowances or de-
ductions for variation up or down from
that standard family. If the giving of
f1f0 fnf CT rot inn
at all it is as a test of the bona fide
character of the applicant, though there
are Of course other valid tests for that
purpose. 1t is work whose economic
necessity is wholly incidental to the
question of relief. For certainly if it
is taken to be economically sound public
work it is worth the going rate of
wages. The principle of need on the
other hand is the one commonly ac-
cepted in the administration of private
charities, and in such measures as old
age pension laws, workmen's compen-
sation, and unemployment insurance
wherever it exists.
From this principle of need there
follows the second and negative prin-
ciple that relief payments should not be
considered in the light of competitive
wage scales. Relief administration can
ssScASS dA4OAo W lchC S1ucS lIl lll6
wage bargaining process between en-
ployers and workers. One can scarcely
believe that Congress gave a mandate
to use the relief system in opposition
to the whole policy of the present Fed
eral administration which is to keep up
wages and to share the work, not by
cutting wage rates, but by shortening
hours.
"The Real Problem"
I'm general. the real problem in re-
Lief administration, it seems to me, is
not the eking out of a fund, but the
maintenance of the social fabric. This
Is not to say that money should be
squandered, but only that it should be
made to go as far as possible for the
purpose in question. For why did Con-
gress appropriate the money? Ger
tainly not to spend or save as such,
but to secure certain ends. The ques-
ton is not money to save or to spend,
but money to conserve values, in this
case, social and human values. The
difference is vital. For it is the differ
ence between need based upon health
and decency and what the market will
bear regardless of ethical considera-
tions.
If need is accepted in principle, then
the task of administration becomes one
Of ascertaining the minimum of health
and decency budget for a given sized
family; If the second principle of COM
petitive price (wage) is accepted then
one has the current wage scale to go by
AS to the proposed lowering of the
rate OF relief pay, considering the mat
ter now as purely wage question, or
as the President put it ito uphold wages
until the cost of living was adjusted, >
is there not grave doubt as to the
validity of 40 per cent reduction in
the going rate? How slow the de-
crease in the cost of living in Wash
ington has been is shown by the, fact
that it is only SO per cent below the
peak costs of June, 1920; only 10 per
cent below June, 1929, and only per
cent lower than it was in June, 1881,
when the going rate CT common labor
in Washington was probably 40 to SO
cents an hour. In June of this year
the cost of living in Washington was
only per cent lower than in Decem-
Der last year when unskilled labor
rates in Washington were still probably
about 35 to As cents an hour"
Mr.. Magnusson's data was taker
from the United States Bureau oi
Labor statistics.
Mr.. Magnusson reinforced his re-
marks by including an editorial from
The Evening Star, entitled Spreading
Relief Thinly," because of its bros
and catholic spirit" and because il
emph9 sized "the really significant social
eSDectS Of the Drohen1 "