The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1940-12-19
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Washington, D. c.

During the week before his Carib-
bean cruise, the President held a
series of private conferences which
were of prime importance in con-
nection with his plans for the new
congress. In them he disclosed that
he is doing a lot of thinking about
domestic problems along two lines
/. Youth.
2. Old-age pensions.
Democracy can resist subversive
ideologies, the President held, only
by convincing youth that it does
have a stake and a future in the
existing system.
The President indicated that he
had no particular program in mind.
In fact, he asked for suggestions
and ideas.
On old-age pensions, Roosevelt
disclosed that he has made up his
mind as to what he wants. His
idea is to change the existing sys-
tenn of widely divergent state con-
tributions to one of uniform federal
pensions, beginning at lower age
than the present 65.
Roosevelt also voiced sharp criti-
cism of the moguls of the social
security board who have so vigor-
ously opposed liberalization of the
law. He declared that they have
been a big obstruction to reform
and that the time had come to over
rule them. 1t was significant that
fhn DrnciIn,f hoI IiCo,,ccoI bic
plans with them and was proceed
ing independently.
NOte-Since January l, when the
amended law became operative,
10000 applications for old-age pen
sions have been approved by the
social security board for total out
lay of 81, 1890 a month. With the
$7,048,000 paid out in lump sum
claims to survivors, the total old
age pension outlay so far is around
$28, 100000. The average pension is
500 a month. In his conferences,
Roosevelt talked of placing 10000
oldsters on federal pensions within
a year.
No MASS PRODUCTION
One of the big complaints of de-
tense chiefs is lack of machine-tool
facilities. Yet there are many small
plants of this type around the coun-
try that have been literally begging
for orders and not getting them. One
company with $50 lathes has been
advertising for business in trade
journals for months.
Also there is strong evidence of
a lack of vision or initiative or both
in making the best use of mass
production facilities. The blame for
this goes right back to high defense
quarters.
The gigantic resources of the auto
industry, for example, have been
practically untouched for defense
output. New plants have been or
dered that will take months to build,
when by a coordination of the great
auto factories, parts of planes,
tanks, guns, ETC., could be turned
out in carload lots daily and assem-
bled at central points.
William Reuther, young official of
the United Auto Workers, long ago
proposed such a plan for daily out
put of 500 all-metal pursuit planes
of the most powerful type in the
world, and at one-third their pres
ent cost. But the matter is still
"being discussed"
Other industries could be used in
the same way for similar short
cuts on other armament needs, but
they are not. Meanwhile, defense
output drags along, and precious
weeks and months fit by.
BRITISH DAMAGE
Confidential military estimates of
Nazi bombing damage to Great
Britain are that British industrial
production has fallen off about 30
per cent.
While this is a very serious crimp