Evening star., 1933-10-19
Employment and Wage Increases.

The President and all supporters Of
the new deal have good reason for
qualification over the sixth successive
gain, over the month preceding, in
employment and industrial pay rolls.
During September, Secretary of Labor
Perkins reports, 100000 more workers
had jobs than in August, and there was
a gain of about Sl0,000,000 a week in
wages over the previous month. Since
the low point in March the gain in
employment and industrial wages has
been steady. Employment gained 80
per cent last month as compared with
gain Of ct per cent in pay rolls, indi-
eating lag in pay rolls which may
be explained in part by the fact that
some OF the new employment registered
was on a paro-time basis. But employ
ment is back to the level of April. 1881,
and pay rolls to the level of October,
Iceland to be going up instead Of
down is encouraging.
AS Miss Perkins points out, there is
probably greater gain in employment
than shown by the Department of Labor
figures, which take into account indus
tries normally employing about 10000. 900
Of the 100000 gainfully employed
workers of the country. Something like
S6400C000 week is being paid to the
workers in the country above what they
were receiving last March. 10 this in
crease in purchasing power can be
maintained, and the rise in wages made
to equal or approximate the rise in
employment, the most important con-
tribution to recovery will have been
made.
For, while the President naturally has
his eyes on the various price indexes,
solid recovery depends fundamentally on
unemployment and larger pay rolls. One
Of the complexities of the present sit
uation is the danger that the rise in
prices, some of which may have been
due to speculation and fear over the
prospects of imitation, will so outrun
the gains in purchasing power of the
people that the buying movement will
be retarded
Since last March, according to the
Associated Press, the cost of living has
Increased about nine per cent. This
has accompanied an increase in the
wholesale price index - which always
moves faster than the retail indexes
OF about eighteen per cent over the
low point in February. Now an in
crease of eighteen per cent in the
wholesale index is relatively large
increase. One must go back to the
boom days of the war period to find COM
parable increases. The wholesale price
index rose twenty-three per cent in
1916 over 1915; thirty-seven per cent In
1917 over 1916; eleven per cent in 1918
over 1917; five per cent in 1919 over
1918 and eleven per cent in 1920 over
1919. Those were extraordinary price
rises, directly attributable to q war
involving almost every nation Of the
world.
While it is represented that certain
influential elements in the administra-
tion have their eyes on the price level
Of 1926 as an objective, prices would
have to rise about 40 per cent above
what they are today to reach that
objective. That might be possible over
a reasonable period of time. But what
it would mean to the wage earner-n
attempted all at once-is understood
when 1t is remembered that the in
crease in wholesale prices since last
February, eighteen per cent, has been
accompanied by an increase in the cost
Of living of nine per cent. and the
protests over this nine per cent in
crease are already being heard. 1t is
more important that wages and en-
ployment reach the 1926 level, and to
do this employment must gain about
thirty-four per cent and pay rolls
about eighty-seven per cent. It
becomes increasingly obvious that adj
vance toward recovery depends on
increasing employment and wages, and
not by manipulating currency to
achieve an arbitrary level of prices
with a shorter standard of measure
ment. The change in price levels
during the war and afterward took
place without currency manipulation or
imitation, and with fixed money
standard