Evening star., 1945-08-23
Letters to The Star
Full Employment Plan Defended
as Cure for Social Ills.

To the Editor of The Star:
The full-employment bill, providing
jobs for all those willing and able to
work, is not only necessary to stop
unemployment, but aids in the solution
of many Of our postwar problems, such
as existing discrimination because Of
race. creed, religion or foreign birth.
Hate, intolerance, bigotry and fear are
usually products of the struggle for jobs
when there are not enough jobs to pro-
vide work for all. Full employment will
provide the cure to most of the social
evils that af1lict our country.
The five main points the opponents
of the full employment bill raise and
the answers to them are:
/. That there can be no exact esti-
mate of how many jobs really are
needed in a given period. We are not
SO much interested in reaching the exact
number of jobs needed in given p ;iod
as in the building of apparatus flexible
enough to provide jobs whenever an
emergency occurs.
2. That full employment legislation Is
unnecessary because private industry
can do the job If it is not hampered by
Government. Every 10 to 20 years pri-
vate industry, when left to its own re-
sources, has had periodic depressions,
eliminating in the last depression,
which was not only Nation wide, but
worldwide. Our Government and the
other United Nations have devised q
program to provide money, farm prod
ucts, raw materials, ETC., so that all
nations can keep their people employed.
In doing so they have recognized a
principle that full employment by all
nations for their peoples is the key to
the prevention of wars of aggression.
3. That if workers know they can get
jobs they will be difficult to handle. In
our effort to produce materials for war
there was shortage of labor and yet the
record reveals an almost perfect score
on the part of both labor and manage
ment. The greatest amount of indus
trial strife occurs during mass unem-
ployment.
4. That the full-employment plan il
economically unsound. The source OF
all value is labor power, and unem-
ployed labor does not produce or receive
pay. This creates smaller market to
purchase commodities, which cuts pro-
duction still further, leading ultimately
to depression. The only way (outside
of war of aggression to stop depres-
sions is to provide our people with con-
slant employment
5. Full employment will mean regi-
mentation or a form of socialism. The
bill specifically provides: Section B.
Nothing contained herein shall be con-
strued as calling for or authorizing (a)
the operation of plants, factories or
other productive facilities by the Fed
eral Government; (b) the use of COM
pulsory measures of any type whatso-
ever in determining the ALLEGATION or
distribution of manpower; Cc) any
change in the existing procedures on
appropriations, or Id the carrying out
of, or any appropriation for, any pro-
gram set forth in the national budget,
unless such program shall have been
authorized by provisions of law other
than this act
Our President, carrying out the pro-
gram started by our martyred Com
mander in Chief, Franklin Delano
Roosevelt, Is calling for the passage of
the full-employment bill We would be
derelict in our duties of citizenship if
we failed to give him full support.
RICHARD STEIN.