Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1942-08-03
4O-Hr. Week
Unnecessary
For Health
Never Believed 5 DAYS
Work Taxed Body e
BY wEsTBROOK PEGLER

Il right just as an d de-
starter in the table OF weights
and measures and, as they say
in Congress, for other purposes.
But the notion shouldn't be
allowed TO jell into a confirmed
American principle that 40 hours
a week, divided into five eight
hour days, is the limit beyond
which the worker begins to get
pale and wan and lose appetite
and weight and his efficiency
falls off.
/ have worked more days OF
II hours than days of eight in
my time in the newspaper BUSH
ness and l believe that nova
days my hourage, as suppose
the statisticians would call 1t,
will run even higher.
My health. nevertheless, i am
sure brother Will Green Of the
AFL will be glad to hear, re-
mains fine and my severest
critic will admit that these es-
says continue TO set new stand
ards of excellence.
IN LONDON, when | was
cub with the UP. / alternated
first with Hal OFlaherty and
then with Bob Getty on a night
trick which ran from 9 p. m.
until z in the morning, with no
time out for lunch because there
was no place open for lunch, and
seven days week for four
weeks at a stretch.
Al the end OF trick we got
couple of days off 10 get plas-
tered and adjust ourselves TO
daylight.
There was a lot Of mutterinl
done and | could turn in a fair /.
job of sulking. but we were
short-handed and the work had
10 be done. and any one who
breaks down and dies from
+ such hours al such work is Just
delicate.
The hangover from the BRAN
nigans that followed a month on
the night side hurt more than
the work.
Forty hours of pick-snd-
shovel work, or even four hours
probably, would put me in
hospital. and so great is my per-
sonal adherence to such toll
that ! think 40 hours is a bar
gain figure in this sphere of
work. If the fellow really works.
The same goes for coal min
ing and l think truck driver
shouldn't have TO push one OF
those big double-j ointed boxcars
over the road more than 30
hours a week.
But / never did believe in the
five-day week for any one, ex-
cept as a means OF distributing
the available work among the
greatest possible number in hard
times.
| HAVE been in factories and
Il shelters where. at a glimpse
from the outside, you would pic
ture toilers grinding themselves
up in the great industrial ma
chine, and have seen men put
ting forth surprisingly little
eXertion.
II isn't going 10 kill a man
10 press a button and watch
machine do the work even if he
puts in six full 12-hour DAYS.
The hockey pokey cart is all
ways touring the plants and
the c formidable roughnecks
may be seen chewing and suck.
ing away on coco-WalnuttC
cruncho-creemee kisses an1x
scratching their shoulder blades
against post until a bell rings,
indicating that the machine is
through that particular job.
The hero of the assembly line
then comes 10 and presses the
button 10 stop the power and
that is the extent of his about
effort for the four freedoms
everywhere in the world.
In big smelter / saw more
men sitting around doing Moth
ing than men really working.
The idea was that they had
TO be there for particular duties
which occurred only a few times
and for few minutes each time
in the course of a shift.
Under the feather bedding
~ practices of railway labor
nowadays a man could put in
SO hours a week on the lob and
never suffer from ANYTHING
worse than boredom.
Railroad workers are paid al
most as much money for loafing
ms they earn by working and
railroad labor relations are one
great fake put over on the
people at large.
You are always hearing about
the marvelously fine labor rels-
tons of the railroads. but TIA
reason is that the management
never wins a contest. and man.
agement can't strike.
have a letter from a woman
in Liberal, Kan, who outlines
her day as farmers wife.
1t runs from 4:30 a. m. until
1920 at night. including three
big meals for lot of farmhands
and doing around the house and
caring for the pigs and fowl
AS Harry and I set on the