Evening star., 1945-05-31
Long Congress Debote
Seen on JobIess Fund


Seen on JobIess Fund
S25.Week Plan Impractical, Due
to Living Costs, Says Writer
By David Laurence
President Truman's proposal that un-
employment insurance benefits be raised
to $25 q week by supplementing what
is now given in range that varies from
SO to SIS week will be one of the
most deeply controversial questions that.
Congress will debate in the months to
come.
There are two aspects to the matter
which make 1t complex. One is the fact
that living costs vary from State to
State and uniformity of compensation
would appear to be impractical. The
other is that If imitation takes hold in
America, $25 may be too little in any
State to tide over the individuals who
are left without jobs in the readjust-
ment period.
There was time when America de-
bated the minimum wage laws of the
States and of the Federal Government
to determine what was a reasonable
wage for subsistence. Yet the sums,
ranging around SIS week, by which an
individual was supposed to be able to
support his family are now criticized as
inadequate.
The whole argument as to whether
the unemployment insurance should be
increased may turn on the all-important
question OF whether $25 in future years
will purchase what SIS did before. If
the price ceilings are not going to be
maintained and manufacturing costs
are going to rise because governmental
controls of wartime are relaxed, then it
may conceivably happen that $25 will
hardly be subsistence wage.
Administration Problem,
Entirely apart from the adequacy of
the sum is the problem of administra-
ton. Who shall be given the insurance?
Should family in which the husband
and the children work be entitled to
extra compensation because the wife
"OA nSt AAA a pldilC' ollOOlu pcISUIlS
who have been offered jobs and refuse
them for temperamental or other rea-
sons adequate to themselves but not
satisfactory to some governmental
agency be entitled to unemployment
compensation for 26 weeks of the year?
Should there be line of demarcation
between compensation paid in the ab-
normal r1orini Of line
ing the close of the war and perma-
nent. compensation paid in any period
OF unemployment hereafter?
Each Of the States can administer the
unemployment compensation laws and
make its own rules, but in some States
the unemployment insurance is used
as device for payment durins
periods OF loafing. Should the Federal
Government prescribe rules condition.
ing its contribution on a uniform
treatment of the idle, and if this is
done will the States feel that their
rights are being impaired and that they
are being given Federal subsidy which
in effect could control the whole of the
unemployment compensation?
The program to which the admins
tratlon has called attention is not yet
worked out. Congress will have q battle
on its hands if it tries to manage or
direct the State government compensa-
ton plans. There is no reason why the
Federal appropriation cannot be made,
however, without stipulations, and In
such a way that the States could allo-
cate the actual compensation to the
individuals on the basis OF need with
some check on the sincerity Of the
workers effort to get a job.
Principle Accepted.
Unemployment compensation as a
principle Of this era of social reform
has been widely accepted. The questions
raised are by no means unsolvable. But
it cannot be denied that the Federal
Government will be getting deeper and
deeper into employer-employe relation
ships and will ultimately find 1t neces-
sary to keep down the expense OF un-
employment insurance by taking con-
structive steps to prevent unemploy-
ment. This leads into the realm of
economic planning.
Undoubtedly case can be made for
orderly reconversion of wartime facili-
ties. so that employees would not be
without work for any considerable
length of time. But there is the fact
that individuals like to choose the city
or town where they want to work and,
there is no way by which work can
always be made in the exact locality
where the individual chooses to reside.
Some incentives to pay compensation to
offset transportation or moving ex-
penses may eventually be proposed. It
is subject that can hardly be simpli :,
fed into mere matter of whether one
favors or opposes the increase of un-