Evening star., 1934-12-16
Low PAY TO AUTO
WORKERS CHARGED.
Major Companies Scored at
Hearing by Federal
Representatives.
BY the Associated Press.

, By the Associated Press.
DETROIT, December 15.-A pic
ture Of low wages, speeding up Of
operations and the inroads of machin-
cry upon manual labor in the automo-
bile industry was sketched today and
tonight by numerous witnesses, chiefly
workers appearing before Government
representatives investigating condi-
tions under which motor cars are
made.
The hearing, conducted by Leon
Henderson. director OF research and
I planning for N. r. A., at the direction
of President Roosevelt, will continue
here tomorrow, then will move to other
centers of automobile production.
Assisting Henderson are Richard H.
) gLansburgh, associate N. r. A. director
of research and planning, and Isadore
] Lubin, statistical director for the De-
partment of Labor.
Major Producers Hit.
] All of the major producers-the Ford
3
Chrysler Corp.-were under fire before
! the first session of the hearing had
I concluded.
A tinsrnith at the Ford plant, Will
3 fam McKie, told the Governments
representatives that of the 1875 900 per-
sons engaged in making Model T"
Fords, only IS per cent got back to
work after the advent of the Model
A." Every change of models, he said,
means a decline in the number of
workers, due to mechanization and to
the speeding up of the assembly line.
To that same "speed-up" he attributed
: an accident in the Ford plant last
June which, he said, cost six lives.
On wages, he testified that while the
: average daily rate is IS, the average
, yearly wage is only $3.50. The peak for
Ford wages, he said, was in 1929, with
6 an average of from Sc to $40 a day
and s1,47o year.
Couldn't Keep Families.
I An employe of the Buick Motor Co.,
in Flint, Mich, Ellie Cramer, told
the commission that many of the
men in te core-making department
J quit their jobs because they couldn't
make enough to keep their families,
and went to the relief agencies for
adequate support"
Harold Paget of the Dodge Motor
Co. testified the average yearly wage
this year is less than $500; that it
was $1,000 in 1888, and $3.50 in 1882.
F. J. Dillon, organizer for the United
Automobile Workers Federal Labor
Unions, asserted that although the
Chrysler Corporation had profits of
S1O,000,000 in the first nine months
of this year, annual wages of from
$400 to $500 were common.
Michael j. Manning, a worker in
the Kelsey-Hayes Wheel Co. plant
here, said that one man who last year
turned out eight cores an hour. now
is required to make 80 He said that
at the start of 1880, 10 men produced
100 wheels an hour. Subsequently he
said, groups consisting of six men
and four women were required to
make 156 wheels an hour.
Need for Bargaining Cited. ]
Charlton Ogburn, counsel for the
American Federation of Labor, as
serted that exhaustive surveys have
revealed that subsistence level which
he said must be paid regardless of
the financial ability of the employer"
is from $1,000 to $4,000 a year.
Although the question of collective
bargaining" was barred specifically in
the presidential request for the in
vestigation, Ogburn said that many
of the ills Of the industry can be cured
only by collective bargaining because
of the peculiar nature of the industry's
problem"
THE A. F. Of L. believes" he
continued, that labor and capital
should operate as partners, but does
not believe in naturalization of in
dustry."