Evening star., 1939-12-11

and unemploy- *SS'''SS>a '''''S '
ment rolls being David Lawrence.
diminished only slightly, the big
question before the country is what
are the obstacles to employment and
who is interfering with the men in
America who create jobs.
A striking instance of job preven-
ton came to this correspondent over
the week end. An employer whose
plants employ in the neighborhood
of $4,000 men was talking about the
Christmas rush for his product
and he said he wished he could have
worked his plants on two successive
Saturdays before Christmas. He has
the 5-day week and if he works his
men on Saturdays he must pay time
and half for every hour. He said
that even the time and half pro-
vision was not a preventive where
1t concerned manual labor, but when
he came to figure out what it would
cost him to pay time and a half
for his office force of several thou
sand persons, the total cost was
prohibitive
S1,300,000 Pay Roll.
Thus approximately $1,300,000 of
pay roll was taken away from the
manual employees by Federal law
which made impossible the exten-
sion for only two days of manu-
featuring operation that would have
created job hours for thousands of
people.
This correspondent inquired
whether the situation would have
been better under an amendment to
the Federal wage and hour law which
was killed by the G.. I. O. at the
last session Of Congress and which
provided that all employees with SAL
aries of 5000 month or over should
be exempted from the provisions of
the law The answer was that 80
per cent of the office staff received
salaries in excess Of 5000 a month
and that if such provision had
been incorporated in the law last
year, the company would have found
1t economically possible to work the
plants in the two days in question.
There are other instances through
out the country in which employ
ment is actually being retarded and
the creation of jobs prevented be-
cause of the provisions of the wage
and hour law. There is little COM
plant about the minimum wage pro-
visions, but the arbitrary imposition
of a time and half clause for over
time, blanketing all industries and
all conditions without regard to sea-
sonal problems, especially in the
handling of piece workers, is work
ing to the detriment of American
labor.
A congressional investigation of
the operations of the wage and hour
law would doubtless reveal many in
equities which have interfered with
business expansion but about which
the public as a whole has little
knowledge. The mere fact that
the G. I. O. could successfully lobby
against the S200-a-month provision
indicates that even members of
Congress are aware of the way in
which the wage and hour law is
hurting the workers of the country
by keeping them from getting extra
work.
Law Prevents Volunteers.
There are many white collar
workers who receive vacation with
pay and sick leave and other bene-
fits and who do not really mind
working few hours extra now and
then, especially when it is the means
Of creating work for their fellow
men who are less fortunate in in
come But the existing law prevents
an office worker from volunteering
his services. The statute is strait
Jacket which deprives the individual
Of his right to contribute his services
for a few extra hours d week if he
so desires.
The investigation of the labor
board and the labor act has come
after three years of agitation and
complaints with respect to the
operations of the Wagner Act The
wage and hour law is only little
more than year old but already it
is apparent that an adamant posi-
ton is being taken against any
amendments, and the administration
which at first supported some
amendments has apparently lost
interest in them and there are no
indications that any fight will be
made to get them adopted.
The history of legislation in
America reveals that when an un-
compromising position is taken by
the sponsors of a law and when
after actual operation it is revealed
to be unfair, the clamor for revision
grows more and more intense until
finally public sentiment for COM
plete repeal develops and many of
the worth while features of reform
law are swept into the discard on a
tide of public resentment The
wage and hour law had many
friends when it was passed but it is
beginning to lose them in accord
ance as the administrators of the
law and the sponsors in Congress
refuse to put the full weight of
their support behind changes which
have been found necessary so as to