The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-11-12
Wall Streets
Workers Hit
By Big Layofs
Office Workers Union
Winning Support of the
White Collar Employees
BY ROBERT LANE
O.. r. Al

WORKERS OF the white collar class
in Wall Street are beginning to
listen alphabetically to the or
ganizers Of the Office Workers
Union. They are beginning to listen
because their conditions have be-
come worse with every year of the
economic crisis. Here are some of
the main facts:
Employment: Loss of jobs and
layoffs have hit the Wall Street
worker no less than factory work
ers. Estimates vary as to the ex-
tent Of unemployment in the Street
as compared with the peak of 1929.
Some say so per cent, some put it
even higher.
HOrnblOwer and Weeks, one of the
largest stock brokerage firms in the
Street, in the boom days at times
did about 10 per cent Of the entire
business contracted on the floor of
the Exchange. In the boom DAYS it
employed 300 to 900 employees. Now
it has only from 2S0 to $40 on its
payroll. Stone, Webster and BIOd-
get investment subsidiary of Stone
q WebSter) employed about 200 in
1923; today they have about so.
Guide, Winmill g. Co, q smaller
firm, has dropped about 80 work
ers in the same period. FshnestOck
& Co.. has cut its force IS per cent.
SehgSberg and Co., another small
firm which had rs workers on its
books in 1929, now employs g. De-
Coppet & DOremus laid off ITS in
two weeks; about half of It's 1000
employees since the beginning of the
year.
Consultations have invariably
meant a drop in the number of en-
ployed by the merging firms.
Wage Cuts: Those who are still
lucky enough to have jobs have
been hit by double edged wage
cutting system. Direct slaShes have
been given by all the Offices in the
Street. The minimum cut seems
to have been about 20 per cent, the
average from IS per cent to 40 per
cent. Margin clerks formerly re-
ceiving $50 week now receive only
$25, and $45-a-week purchase and
sales department clerks have been
cut to $40. Secretaries who preV-
ously got $40 are down to 500. Book
keepers with $50 a week salaries
have been cut to $25. Cashiers who
got $I25 weekly in 1929 are down
to $50. Stenographers who received
$50 to $35 are down to $18 to $22.
Runners are getting SIS.
Even the minimum wages pro-
vided for financial offices have been
f1outed by the firms. The New
York Stock Exchange and the Curb
Exchange are supposed to pay
weekly minimum of $16 under the
N.R.A. code, but they have cut this
to $15. Appeals and protests lodged
over this violation have not yet
been answered by MIRA. authori-
ties.
If workers protest against the cuts
they are fired.
Scotch Weeks: This is another
word for the stagger (share-the-
work. system and wage cutting.
The usual practice is for the firm to
require each worker to take off
week each month without pay, or
possibly two weeks off in five as
for example, at Jaquelin & De Cop
pet. Or 1t may take the form of
two days off each week. This
amounts to a cut in monthly earn
ings of at least Is per cent in ad-
dition to the straight cuts men
toned above.
Speed-up: With the lay-off and
the stagger system in force, work
ers are often forced to do not only
their own work but that of one or
two additional workers who have
been fired or who are taking their
time off. Whenever the Offices are
very busy the employers don't take
on additional help. The result is a
considerable increased load OF work
for the existing staff. There is also
no commensurate compensation for
overtime work.