The Wilmington morning star., 1940-04-05
WASHINGTON
DAYBOOK
BY JACK STINNETT

WASHINGTON, April 4.-Probably the big.
sest surprise when. the 1910 census figures are
in will be the increase in the number of
women in the labor force.
Estimates already are running around g..
600, 900. That means there are 5000, 900 more
jobs that are filled or could be filled by women
workers than in 1880. Figuratively speaking,
5000, 900 additional women in the last 10 years
have turned their backs on housewifery and
cast themselves on the auction block of labor.
The reasons are numerous. The depression
years had a triple-play effect: ~ Dwindling
family incomes drove the ladies to pounding
the and reading the Help Wanted:
(2) when the men of the family were thrown
out of work completely, the women had to
find employment or the family starved; (S)
thousands of marriages were postponed in.
definitely and many of the brides-to-be became
brides-never-to-be (their fiances "outgrew them
finally selected younger women) and sought
solace and sustenance in work.
And Furthermore
There are other reasons. The spread Of birth
control, as evidenced by the rapidly falling
birth rate, left more thousands necessarily
seeking an interest in life outside the home.
Contributing, too, was the great increase in
housekeeping gadgets, releasing women from
cash economy"-a realization of the saving
involved in having cash on hand to purchase
from stores and companies that had no CT edit
system or made liberal discounts for cash.
There Is one other factor worth mentioning:
Spread of the knowledge among employers
that for many jobs women were eminently bet.
ter equipped and cheaper than men. The me.
chanical computation machine is an example.
At this, women we're found to be more &C.
curate, s~teadier, heater, less inclined to rebel
against lack of advancement, and contented
with less pay than were men. There are hun.
dreds of other fields where the same rules
were found to apply. The result: a greater de.
mand for women,
No city picked &C random can be said, at
this point, to be typical. And the people who
expert the census experts are not basing their
conclusions on South Bend, Ind, where a spe.
cial census already has been taken. But it is
significant that in that city Of approximately
1000 0 there is an increase Of almost 1000
women in the labor force since 1880.
If you are interested in social service, labor
unemployment, economics, or any of a dozen
other pseudo-sciences which concern America
in mass, you'll have to draw your own conclu-
sions. I'm just telling you what the experts
tell me-the big surprise in the census and
the one you will be hearing and reading most
about, will be this big increase in the army OF
women who work or want to.
A Marital Problem
Another surprise to some (although not to
those who are up on their censuses) will be
that the 1910 tabulation will show a grea.
many more married men than women in the
country.
That's a honey for parlor quiz games, but
the explanation is simple.
In 1880, there were approximately 200, 900
more married men than women in the United
States. The reason was merely that that many
male immigrants had arrived who had not
been able to Cor being able, weren't in any
hurry to- send back to the old country for
their wives.
immigration, of course, has fallen off. Thus
the number of married women is approaching
the number of married men.