    [Thirty-Second Annual Report of the Secretary of Labor for the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1944]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

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    ANNUAL REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF LABOR
    FISCAL YEAR ENDED JUNE 30, 1944
    THIRTY-SECOND ANNUAL REPORT
    OF THE
    I -
    SECRETARY OF LABOR
    FOR THE FISCAL YEAR ENDED JUNE 30
    1944
    UNITED STATES
    GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
    WASHINGTON : 1945
    For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office Washington 25, D. C. - Price 15 cents (paper cover)
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    THIRTY-SECOND ANNUAL REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF LABOR
    LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL
    Department of Labor,
    Office of the Secretary,
    ashing ton, D. C., December 11,19LL
    To the Congress of the United States:
    In accordance with section 9 of the act of Congress approved March 4, 1913,1 have the honor to submit a report of the business of the Department of Labor for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1944.
    Respectfully submitted.
    Frances Perkins,
    Secretary of Labor.
    OFFICIALS OF THE DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, 1944
    Frances Perkins, Secretary of Labor.
    Daniel W. Tracy, The Assistant Secretary.
    Mary La Dame, Special Assistant to the Secretary.
    Frances Jurkowitz, Administrative Assistant to the Secretary.
    Douglas Maggs, Solicitor.
    James V. Fitzgerald, Director of Information.
    Robert T. Amis, Special Assistant to the Secretary.
    L. Metcalfe Walling, Administrator, Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions.
    Verne A. Zimmer, Director, Division of Labor Standards.
    James E. Dodson, Chief Clerk and Budget Officer.
    Robert C. Smith, Director of Personnel.
    John R. Steelman, Director of Conciliation.
    Isador Lubin, Commissioner of Labor Statistics.
    Katharine F. Lenroot, Chief, Children’s Bureau.
    Mary Anderson, Director, Women’s Bureau.
    Laura A. Thompson, Librarian.
    THIRTY-SECOND ANNUAL REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF LABOR
    As in the other years of the war, the period covered by the Thirty-second Annual Report of the Secretary of Labor witnessed the effective cooperation of the Nation’s wage earners with industrial management to effect the result that our fighting men received needed weapons and materials of war in record quantities.
    Labors leaders and responsible employers have with minor exceptions cooperated during the year with the United States Department of Labor and its officials, and with other Government agencies, in keeping industrial peace and increasing output. The best proof of that is written in the record of war production. We could not have reached these objectives but for the job done by American wage earners. We could not have met our vast munitions program except for their efforts. The results all over the world are records of which all of us have a right to be proud.
    The Department of Labor which, by the act of the Congress creating it, has the duty “to foster, promote, and develop the welfare of the wage earners of the United States, to improve their working conditions and to advance their opportunities for profitable employment” has followed this mandate, during the year covered by this report.
    It settled, without any work stoppage, more than 85 percent of the industrial disputes handled by its conciliators as it has been doing for many years. Altogether, 16,545 disputes, involving 6,180,472 workers were adjusted.
    It carried out emergency war programs for the War Labor Board, the War Production Board and other Government agencies through research and inspection and report.
    It brought about restitution of more than $18,000,000 of wages illegally withheld to more than 500,000 workers.
    It continued to make outstanding safety counsel and advice available to war plants and the record shows that three-fourths of the plants so serviced reduced accidents markedly with a resultant saving in human resources and an increase in production. It also continued the program to educate and train safety engineers in colleges and universities all over the country.
    It continued its supervision of the employment of women in the war industries. The recommendations of the Department made available and practical the large reservoir of women workers, which was so much needed in the war effort. Marked improvement in their working conditions gave great increase in production by women workers.
    It continued its administration of grants to the States for maternal and child health services, services for crippled children and child welfare services under the Social Security Act and the emergency maternity and infant-care program for the wives and babies of American fighting men.
    It broadened its investigation of post-war work opportunities so as to have available useful and accurate information to meet the needs of demobilization, reconversion, and the transition to peace.
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    It cooperated in making plans for the successful meeting of the International Labor Organization in Philadelphia and its officials were leaders there in shaping a constructive program for international labor standards.
    The aims and purposes of the I. L. O. as adopted by the general conference express the full concurrence of the United States Department of Labor.
    The conference reaffirmed the fundamental principles on which the organization is based and, in particular, that («) labor is not a commodity; (&) freedom of expression and of association are essential to sustained progress; (c) poverty anywhere constitutes a danger to prosperity everywhere; (	89, 720
    Washington 		429	110,088	39	7,601	468	117, 689
    West Virginia ... .					232	70, 205	40	2,091	272	78, 296
    Wisconsin. .. 	 ..	_	___	711	280, 869	63	5, 422	774	286, 291
    Wyoming				21	1,249	2	206	23	1,455
    Total	_•		21, 698	11, 782,191	3,099	459, 492	24, 797	12, 241, 683
    DIVISION OF LABOR STANDARDS.
    During this period of world conflict, increasing manpower shortages throughout the country revealed the need for meeting accelerated war output schedules with the existing work force. One tragic source of waste, of both men.and materials, is work accidents.
    A glance at the country’s record for 1943 shows the problem— 18,400 workmen were killed, 109,700 received permanent disablements, and 2,270,900 were injured seriously enough to lose working time. The loss represents 274,000.000 man-days of production, or a year’s work by 914,000 workers.
    Consequently the Division’s “tailor made’’ safety programs for war plants, designed to fit each plant’s need, were aggressively pushed through its National Committee for the Conservation of Manpower in War Industries. The volunteer services of over 600 of the country’s best qualified safety engineers were made available to 6,173 war plants during the year. This represents a total of 28,000 plants visited at least once since this program was started in 1940, the beginning of the defense period. Reports indicate that three-fourths of the plants serviced have markedly reduced their accident frequency rates. Approximately 63 percent of the plants now being visited maintain accident frequency records, first step in accident prevention and a measure of management interest. This contrasts with the 20 percent of plants who kept such records in the first years of the Committee’s program. Present service is intensified, follow-up calls range from 1 to 6 or 7, depending upon the plant’s particular problems.
    The many complex factors of expanded war production have
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    brought a slight increase in work accidents each year during the present emergency. Organized prevention programs have, however, lowered the rate of increase 45 percent in 1942 over 1941, and another 45 percent in 1943 over 1942.
    Safety Training Expanded.
    Manpower shortages among experienced safety engineers made necessary the establishment of war safety training. This has been promoted jointly with the U. S. Office of Education through its ESMWT program. The year just passed saw the enrollment of approximately 20,000 supervisors in basic 96-hour accident-prevention courses in 116 engineering colleges throughout the country. This brings the total of graduates from this type of training* during the emergency period to 65,000.
    During 1943 the Committee concentrated on a second type of training, 20-hour courses for foremen. Originally designed as in-plant training, the course has been offered to small plant personnel on an extension basis through the vocational division of the Office of Education. Some half million foremen received such training this year.
    Requests from organized labor also led to the development of safety courses suited to their needs.
    The success of war safety training brought widespread appeals to further its extension as a regular part of college curricula. Acting on these requests, a national committee representing the colleges, industry, labor, and government has undertaken the development and prosecution of such a program. The Director of the Division is chairman, and a staff member has been assigned as technician. Four engineering colleges have already approved the general plan proposed, and the Division is now developing text material, teaching procedures, and so forth.
    Safety Codes Geared to War.
    The development of American Standards Association safety codes has continued, geared to the necessities of war. A Division staff member is chairman of two code committees to develop “safety harness and safe practices for overhead work” and “standards for the construction and maintenance of safe walkway surfaces.” The Division is also assisting in the development of “standards for safeguarding the industrial X-ray.”
    Training Factory Inspectors From Seven States.
    The Division has conducted courses in industrial safety and techniques of factory inspection for State factory inspectors, upon request, for the last 10 years. The courses are held in centers where as many States as possible can participate. Up to July 1, 1943, 23 factory inspection schools had been held. The pressure of emergency work has necessitated a curtailment of this type of safety service. In spite of this, two factory inspection schools were held this year in which inspectors from 7 States participated. There is widespread demand from State labor commissioners for further courses as soon as our facilities permit.
    Eye Injuries Reduced.
    One hundred thousand American workers suffered eye injuries in 1943. The Division has expanded its eye-safety service by making
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    available to industry, labor, and governmental groups the services of an eye-safety specialist. This employee has visited hundreds of plants and conducted effective demonstrations before approximately one million workers on the need for wearing proper eye protection equipment on the job.
    Reducing Foundry Hazards.
    Early in 1944 the Office of Labor Production of the War Production Board enlisted the services of the Division in surveying safety and health hazards in foundries and forge shops. These hazards were held to be largely responsible for the serious manpower shortage in the industry. Three hundred establishments were certified as critical by WPB and visits to recommend proper safeguards were immediately undertaken by the National Committee for the Conservation of Manpower. State labor commissioners were also asked to assign qualified inspectors to assist. To date approximately 75’ percent of the visits have been made and advice given.
    Government Job Accidents Down.
    The Division has continued to serve as a clearing house on safety problems of Fe’deral agencies through its secretaryship of the Federal Interdepartmental Safety Council, established under Executive Order 8071 on March 21, 1939. Governmental activities run the gaunt of industrial hazards in the shore establishments of the Army and Navy, the Forest Service, in mining, marine, aircraft, and scores of other dangerous operations. The Division provides technical and secretarial assistance to council committees studying safety programs for automotive and highway hazards, construction, water transportation, industry, offices, agriculture, mining and tunnelling, and walkway surfaces.
    Since the establishment of the council, the accident frequency to civilian employees in Federal establishments has decreased slightly, despite a 200-percent increase in personnel and a 300-percent increase in man-hours worked. Although the total cost of compensation benefits for all injuries has increased by 130 percent over 1939, the rate per $100 pay roll has decreased by 44 percent.
    Safety Publications.
    Supplementing the Division’s direct efforts with industry, labor, and other groups is a selective publications program which provides material to the groups needing it most. This year a textbook, “Safety Subjects”, was prepared largely for engineering colleges, State factory inspectors, and other recipients of the Division safety training program. At the request of the Rubber Products Branch of the War Production Board, the Division investigated every phase of worker exposure to possibly harmful chemicals in mills processing and fabricating synthetic rubbers. The first report of a series—‘‘Neoprene”— was issued this year. Other publications included “Wartime Working Conditions”, “Joint Safety Committees at Work, Safety Through Management Leadership,” “What Would You Pay for 8,000 Years’ Experience?” and several safety posters.
    WORKING CONDITIONS SERVICE.
    Increasing manpower shortages revealed the need during this period of world conflict for meeting accelerated war production sched
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    ules with the existing work force. Just as sound accident-prevention programs served to keep workers on the job, tested methods of reducing absenteeism, turn-over, and employee grievances, and of promoting good working conditions help to speed production.
    For many years the Division has served as a clearing house for sound industrial experience in these fields, and during this period funds were made available for extending the service to nine regional field offices. A staff experienced in industrial relations, working conditions problems, and public service was recruited and trained. During the 4-month period of actual operation over 1,500 war plants, labor groups, and government agencies were served, and about 200 major investigations arid surveys were completed. The largest numbers of requests came from labor and management, with the armed services and other government agencies ranking next. Absenteeism was the industrial problem most frequently encountered, with labor turn-over, employee grievance procedure, and foreman and steward training in the order named. A large number of safety and health matters were turned up and referred to the National Committee for the Conservation of Manpower in War Industries.
    This field service was terminated by Congress on July 1. It is anticipated that limited service will continue on the former basis.
    Two publications, “The A B C of Absenteeism and Labor Turn-Over” and “A Foreman’s Guide to Labor Relations”, together with an appendix, “A guide to Labor Legislation”, were published by this Service.
    War Production and Labor Standards.
    Because only eight State legislatures met in regular session in 1943, the Tenth National Conference on Labor Legislation reviewed principally the administrative problems of State labor departments occasioned by changing wartime needs. This conference, annually convened by the Secretary, is attended by delegates appointed by the Governors of the States. The Division is responsible for planning and conducting the conference.
    Following up recommendations of the National Conference held in December, labor commissioners from industrial States were invited to confer in Washington during March with representatives of the War, Navy, and Labor Departments, Maritime Commission, War Production Board, and War Manpower Commission on a program of returning to peacetime labor standards when contract terminations and cutbacks in production permitted. State labor commissioners requested the Secretary to develop with interested Federal agencies methods for advising the commissioners in advance of impending cut-backs and terminations. A recommendation was adopted that wartime exemptions from State hours-of-work laws be reviewed to determine the need for their continuation and the earliest revocation date consistent with war production schedules.
    Legislative Services.
    Analysis of State and Federal labor laws and their administration is a basic activity of the Division. The information compiled is used constantly by employer and labor organizations. It is the only agency of Government which has such information readily available.
    Upon request during the past year, up-to-date digests of a con
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    siderable number of Federal laws and executive orders affecting workers were made.
    Biweekly mimeographed reports of pending State and Federal legislation were distributed on request to about 1,000 labor organiza- • tions, employer groups, State labor departments, and libraries. The annual digest of State and Federal laws finally enacted was also prepared. Summaries of State laws on wage payment, child labor, workmen’s compensation, and safety and health laws were prepared upon request of labor unions. A directory of Federal and State officials showing the administrative organizations of the several States was also published and distributed.
    Other publications included “Wage Payment and Wage Collection Laws” and “Private Employment Agencies” and contained analyses of State laws on these subjects together with model standards. “Principal Features of Workmen’s Compensation Laws” and 20 charts and maps on the subject were also published.
    The Division was asked by four States to furnish technical drafting assistance on bills covering industrial home work, rule-making authority on safety and health, workmen’s compensation, and the organization of a State labor department.
    Federal-State Coordination.
    This Division is responsible for working out cooperative programs between the Federal and State labor departments to reduce to a minimum duplication of inspection, provide for the most effective use of Federal and State staffs, promote uniform standards of administration, and provide for an exchange of ideas and information generally.
    During 1943-44 the work of this section consisted largely of following up and renewing or revising where necessary the several different types of Federal-State programs and activities which have been developed over the past few years.
    Agreements are in effect between the State labor departments of Minnesota, North Carolina, and the District of Columbia, and the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions and the Children’s Bureau. The State inspector inspects simultaneously for compliance with the State and Federal wage, hours, child labor, and industrial home-work requirements. Major changes in the North Carolina and District of Columbia agreements were made for the coming year.
    Agreements between the State labor departments, the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions, and the National Committee for the Conservation of Manpower in War Industries for the promotion of industrial safety are in effect in 20 States, plus the District of Columbia and the Territory of Hawaii. The latter was added during 1944 and in addition adjustments were made in a number of the plans to facilitate their operation. Under these agreements the State safety inspectors, in inspecting for compliance with the State safety requirements also make a Federal safety inspection under the safety provisions of the Walsh-Healey Act, wherever applicable. In the States where no agreements exist, arrangements were made during the year to make the technical safety services of the National Committee available to the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions in determining the safety condition of plants subject to the
    616138—45---2
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    Walsh-Healey Act and in training the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions’ inspectors to observe safety and health conditions in such plants.
    Informal programs between State labor departments and the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions and the Children’s Bureau for cooperation in the enforcement of the State and Federal laws relating to wages, hours, child labor, and industrial home work have been developed in 20 States. Under these programs information is exchanged, joint inspections scheduled, and arrangements made to avoid duplication of inspection wherever possible. An example of this type of cooperation is the arrangement made in one State where the State home-worker certificate is accepted as a valid certificate by the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions under the Federal regulations. A further conference was held in this State during the year to strengthen and expand the arrangement. In another State the home-worker handbooks issued by the'Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions are accepted by the State in lieu of a ,State handbook.
    Reports on relaxation of State labor laws for purposes of war production are being received monthly from 33 States and the District of Columbia. These reports are tabulated and analyzed, and at the end of each six months a summary report is prepared and supplied to the States and to the Fecleral war agencies.
    BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS.
    The Bureau of Labor Statistics is a fact-finding agency. It has no duties of an administrative character. It is now and has always been concerned with the collection and dissemination of information on economic developments as they concern labor. Primarily, as set forth in its creative act, the Bureau’s work is for the service and benefit of the workers of the country. In practice, its work has been of great value to employers and has been an indispensable tool for the use of public officials. This is so for the reason that in the increasing complexities of our industrial life a continuing knowledge of wages, employment, cost of living, industrial relations, and related topics is essential to a satisfactory conduct of business. Such information is vital in the framing and application of labor laws and labor policies by legislative and executive bodies.
    During its life of almost 60 years there have been no fundamental changes in these objectives, although the increasing importance of urban industry, the growing complexity of the national economy, and the intensification of concern with social problems have caused a steady expansion in its activities. The coming of the present war necessitated a readjustment in work, in order to serve the immediate needs of the war agencies. In the matter of wages, for instance, the urgent war need was for special hurry-up studies in those branches of industry, such as shipbuilding, which assumed an outstanding war importance. To make these special studies it was necessary to sacrifice for the time most of the over-all industrial wage studies which had been in demand in the years of peace. Again, the war virtually eliminated unemployment and, to a large extent, the need for statistical surveys in this field, but there was greater need than ever before for analysis of information as to possible sources of labor supply.
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    Thus the wartime requirements caused a shift of emphasis in work but not a fundamental change in the types of information collected. The restoration of activities to serve the needs of the country in peacetime will therefore present no difficulties so far as broad functions are concerned. The real task is to plan work so as to meet the new and peculiar labor problems of the post-war period. It is evident that those problems will require for their proper handling far more information on labor and associated industrial developments than has ever been regarded as necessary in an ordinary peace-time period.
    Post-War Work.
    The Bureau focused its attention on the needs of war agencies, but much preliminary work was undertaken for the purpose of readapting the activities and staff arrangements to meet the needs of demobilization, reconversion, and the transition to peace. Agencies charged with these problems requested various types of information and indicated broadly the nature of their needs.
    A return to normal collective bargaining and to enterprise based on peacetime civilian buying and consumption will naturally require that a much larger share of the work be devoted to nongovernmental needs. The increased volume of requests for information from these sources has indicated also the vital importance of increased emphasis on local, regional, and group needs for data on such subject as wages, prices and cost of living, employment, labor turnover, collective agreements, and construction activities.
    A field of greatly increased importance in which the Bureau has formulated plans for meeting transitional and early post-war needs is that of international labor. The global and interdependent nature of economic relations makes it imperative that we be informed of all important developments in other countries in such fields as wages, the relative efficiency of labor, working conditions, prices, and cost of living.
    The importance of directing thought and attention to long-range post-war needs led to the setting up of a Post-War Labor Problems Division, with no responsibility for month-to-month war work. This division undertook work in four main directions in an effort to throw light on: (1) The post-war problems of war production communities; (2) post-war interindustry shifts in employment; (3) policy proposals for minimizing unemployment during reconversion and for maintaining full employment after reconversion; and (4) the present-day value of demobilization and reconversion experiences after the first World War. Studies in these fields were conducted in large part at the request and with the cooperation of other agencies and organizations interested in post-war problems. Functions at first undertaken by the Post-War Labor Problems Division were later broadened to become the responsibility of all departments of the Bureau.
    Information From Workers.
    A significant part of the work in planning for the later stages of the war and for the early post-war period included efforts to improve the work, especially in the field of information obtained directly from workers. Most of our existing information in the field of labor statistics deals with averages by plants, industries, or groups, as for example, the average number of employees in the shipbuilding indus
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    try and their average wages. It is highly important also to have more information about what happens to individual workers and families. Such information will be especially valuable during the critical period of transition after the war, and a program for this purpose is being undertaken.
    The Bureau until recently has had to depend mainly for its statistics about workers on such sources as employers’ pay rolls, dealers’ price records, and the construction records of contractors and municipalities. The general value of the basic statistical series thus obtained is indicated by a report of a group of 30 representatives of business concerns, forming the Subcommittee on Basic Industrial Statistics of the Advisory Committee on Government Questionnaires. The report was made to the Division of Statistical Standards of the Bureau of the Budget. The Subcommittee listed 14 major types of statistical data as particularly important on the basis of the public interest, and among the 14, there are 5 that are compiled wholly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and 6 others, including consumers’ expenditures, national income, and construction expenditures, that involve extensive if not predominant use of Bureau of Labor Statistics data. But while the basic industrial statistics relating to such subjects as employment, hours, earnings, and cost of living are of outstanding value to workers, the development of statistical techniques now makes it possible—as it was not possible after the last war—to collect labor statistics through the cooperation of workers as well as employers. This method makes it possible to see the effects of changes through the eyes of the individual worker, by means of periodical reports.
    Employment Statistics and Related Data.
    The Bureau’s three-fold problem during the war—the maintenance of its standard statistical series, the focusing of its work on the needs of war agencies, and the planning of its work to meet reconversion and early post-war needs—is illustrated by the work in the field of employment statistics and related data.
    There are few statistical series more fundamental or more widely used than those on employment, pay rolls, man-hours, and labor turnover, and such series as those relating to average hours and average earnings, which are derived from the employment and pay rolls data. This basic statistical work was continued and extended during the year. The demand for information on employment greatly increased. The number of persons on the mailing list for the regular monthly detailed employment report almost tripled. Reports on the employment of women in manufacturing industries were undertaken, the initial period covered being June 1943. Turnover figures relating to the employment of women were also published.
    Since the beginning of the national defense program in 1910, continuous labor-requirement studies have been made in cooperation with other agencies, notably the War Manpower Commission, for purposes of over-all evaluation of manpower developments. Detailed studies of labor requirements were made for specific munitions industries, such as aircraft, shipbuilding, synthetic rubber, and high octane gasoline. This work also has been carried on in cooperation with the War Manpower Commission and various other agencies. As an example, in cooperation with the Petroleum Administration for War and the Office of the Rubber Director, estimates were prepared of the amounts and
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    types of labor needed to staff the aviation gasoline and synthetic rubber plants. The results of these studies were used in preparing staffing plans for the two industries. Additional studies were made of the probable effects on these industries of various selective-service policies, such as the draft of all men under 26 and the deferment of fathers, for use in the formulation of policies to insure efficient production of aviation gasoline and synthetic rubber.
    The petroleum-industry study led to the establishment of labor utilization standards for the Petroleum Administration for War. Assistance was given also in the preparation of a manual on labor utilization for aircraft plants, for use by the Materiel Command, Army Air Forces. Similar manuals to assist other war plants were prepared.
    Widespread interest and requests for information from members of Congress led to surveys of the extent of absenteeism in a number of important war industries. Special reports on this important aspect of labor utilization were compiled for various divisions of the War Production Board, War Manpower Commission, and Army Service Forces.
    Studies were undertaken of the magnitude and character of reconversion and post-war employment problems. A sample survey was made involving interviews with approximately 500 industrial and labor leaders to determine anticipated employment, by industry, six months and two years after the end of the War. In addition, a statistical summary was started of the post-war plans of American industry (in terms of employment) as determined by local committees on economic development. Studies to determine employment opportunities after the War were initiated in response to requests of the Army, the Navy, the Director of Retraining and Rehabilitation, the Office of Education, and other public and private agencies. This work has resulted in the preparation of thousands of tables and charts showing the impact of war and the possible impact of peace upon employment, industry by industry.
    Studies have been made of the effects of the war on employment in war production communities and tlie probable nature and extent of post-war readjustments in these communities. About 25,000 copies of area studies were distributed by June 30. 1944. Technical assistance to State and local groups concerned with post-war problems has been provided upon request. Estimates of the effects of the cutback of war contracts on selected communities were made for various public agencies.
    Studies in the field of technological changes and labor productivity were continued. I he major interest in such studies arose originally from the effects of mechanization and similar changes either on the total volume of employment opportunities or on the types of occupations and available jobs. Studies in this field during the war were related significantly to labor requirements, the labor supply, and the conservation of manpower. Technological changes during and after the war may be expected to have far-reaching effects on the amount of employment, the types of skills and occupations, the hours of work, wages and the cost of labor, and the possibilities of maintaining high levels of production and of living standards.
    Special studies were made in the field of construction employment to help labor, industry, and the Federal, State and local governments
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    in preparing for the substantial expansion in construction during the transition and post-war periods. These surveys have included an exhaustive study of the post-war capacity and characteristics of the construction industry, forecasts of construction demand, and estimates of labor requirements for given types of public works costing various sums of money.
    Estimates were made for the Bureau of Reclamation of the Department of the Interior of the potential amount and distribution of labor and materials for a proposed $2,670,000,000 worth of reclamation work. Estimates of the employment requirements of the various projects already programmed for post-war construction by States and municipalities have been prepared and requests come in constantly from other localities for similar service.
    A study was initiated for the Senate Special Committee on Postwar Economic Policy and Planning to show the amount of labor required on and off the site and the amount and kinds of material needed for 1,000 dwelling units, for $1,000,000 worth of highways, and for various other types of construction such as school buildings, reclamation work, river, harbor, and flood control, hospitals, water and sewerage projects, airports, post-offices, and court houses.
    Policy studies initiated in 1942 for the purpose of examining and evaluating policy proposals to facilitate full employment after the war were continued during the past year. The results of these studies have been made available to appropriate committees of .the Congress. These studies have been carried on in close cooperation with other agencies of the Federal Government and with private organizations, such as the organizations of labor, the Committee for Economic Development, and the National Planning Association. The last of these has created committees of responsible and recognized leaders of business, labor, and agriculture to explore the areas of agreement with respect to post-war economic problems. The staff has been extensively called upon by the labor members for advice with reference to technical economic problems arising in these discussions.
    Several studies were made for the purpose of drawing parallels between experiences in the first World War and the present war and of foreshadowing possible parallels between demobilization and reconversion problems after the first World War and after the present war.
    Wages and Hours.
    The Bureau, from its beginning, has placed great emphasis on wages and hours of labor. Adequate compensation and moderate hours, together with safety, satisfactory places of work, and a voice in determining the conditions of work, are the natural and perpetual objects of striving of working men and women.
    The information collected in the field of wages and hours has been of three principal types: (1) Monthly reports of average hourly and weekly earnings and weekly hours, by industry, in a wide range of manufacturing and nonmanufacturing industries.; (2) annual reports of union scales of wages and hours in several important organized trades; and (3) periodical reports, usually at intervals of 2 or 3 years, on the detailed structure of wages and hours in important industries, such as iron and steel, coal mining, and cotton goods. The monthly reports were continued during the war as essential war work and in
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    response to growing demands for the data. The annual union wage surveys were also continued because of their wide use by both labor unions and employers in wage adjustments. The comprehensive studies of the industry-wide structure of wages and hours were merged with work undertaken for the National War Labor Board. The needs of the Board were chiefly for immediate and detailed occupational wage-rate data, by labor market areas, for use in fixing wage brackets, in passing on applications for voluntary wage adjustments, and in the handling of the thousands of wage dispute cases coming before the Board.
    Occupational wage-rate information by industry and sex has been obtained for about 400 different localities. The work has been conducted by field representatives, supplemented by the aid of personnel loaned by the Division of Wages and Hours and Public Contracts. Visits were made during the year to about 65,000 establishments in both manufacturing and nonmanufacturing enterprises.
    These studies of wages are one example of the increased effectiveness with which the statistical agencies of the Government have been used. In the last war, as in this, it was necessary to expand enormously the volume of current wage data and to that end transfers of emergency funds were made. In the last war the work was started so late that the data were compiled only after the war ended and then embraced reports of wTages in 223 coal mines and 2,142 establishments in 27 manufacturing industries. In this war, the work was begun nearly a year before the peak of war production was reached. Week by week data were transferred to the War Labor Board with the result that it was able to escape from an accumulating backlog of unprocessed cases that could not be disposed of at first because of lack of data.
    The basic wage materials obtained in these surveys consist of straight-time hourly earnings of workers in specific occupations. These materials are supplemented by information regarding types of products, amount of employment, provisions for overtime, late-shift work, vacations, union agreements, and related items.
    The occupational wage-rate studies have been the main source of information required in the administration of the wage stabilization program. Summary reports covering 58.000 of the 65,000 establishments visited were transmitted to the National War Labor Board during the year. A substantial amount of wage data for the remaining establishments was used in special reports to the Board. The information was used also in the developing of an index of wage rates described later. The advantage of fact-finding by an agency that is free of administrative responsibility is well illustrated by wartime wage-rate studies of the Bureau. While the Bureau’s program was designed to fit the administrative requirements of the War Labor Board, the information collected was used to serve much broader interests. Among the other Federal agencies, the War Manpower Commission, the Office of Price Administration, and the War Production Board have been important consumers. This same body of wage information has been supplied continuously in an increasing volume to labor unions, private employers, congressional committees, and numerous other public and private agencies. During the year, the
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    Bureau handled 20,000 requests for specific occupational wage-rate information from sources other than the War Labor Boards. The cost of collecting the data necessary to answer these requests one by one would have been greater than the cost of the entire project. Thus, it may be said that the public received a service without extra cost to the Government equal in value to the cost of collecting the data for administrative purposes. Alternatively, it may be suggested that a fact-finding agency that is adequately staffed to answer essential inquiries from the public will have on hand almost all of the factual data for the operation of an emergency program.
    One of the earliest activities of the Bureau consisted of studies of the structure of wages and hours, by industry, occupation, and region. Later, monthly reports of employment, pay rolls, and man-hours were obtained from employers and from these reports monthly averages of hourly earnings, weekly hours, and weekly earnings were computed. These were computed on an industry basis. Special tabulations for particular areas or segments of industries were made to meet particular needs. The number of industries covered in 1939 was 109, and this number was expanded by 1944 to 154. In addition, averages were computed for various groups of industries and for manufacturing as a whole. Recent revisions were made to conform to changes in the standard industrial classifications adopted for general use by Government agencies.
    During periods of comparatively stable employment and of slight change in premium payments for overtime, the trends of average hourly earnings tend to conform to changes in basic rates of wages. During recent years, however, average hourly earnings have risen not merely because of changes in basic rates but also because of the increased proportion of workers in such high-wage industries as shipbuilding and because of the rise in the proportion of overtime payable at premium rates. The fact that average hourly earnings did not change as did basic rates of wages had a vital bearing on the use of average hourly earnings data in wage stabilization policy. That policy applies to rates of wages, not to earnings, which are affected also by the amount of work or of output, just as price stabilization applies to charges made per item sold. An important part of the Bureau’s work during the year was therefore devoted to the construction of wage-rate indexes to supplement the data showing changes in average hourly earnings.
    The average hourly earnings data were recomputed for the purpose of eliminating the effects of premium payments for overtime and also the effects of shifts in the proportions of employment in high-wage industries as compared with industries paying lower wages. The expansion of work in occupational wage rates for the National War Labor Board gave an opportunity to measure changes in job rates themselves as well as general wage changes. The study of wage-rate changes made use of data for approximately 7,500 establishments obtained through visits by field representatives. These establishments were located in 69 separate urban areas.
    Recent field surveys of wages included general industry surveys in such industries as aircraft engines, airframes, aircraft subassembly, fluorspar mining and milling, nonferrous metals, shipbuilding, iron mining, petroleum production, and petroleum refining. Special
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	23
    studies which may be described as “tailor made” to fit particular cases numbered more than 400 during the year. In addition to studies of this nature for the National War'Labor Board, many were undertaken for other administrative agencies and for Congressional committees.
    Studies of the entrance rates -of common laborers were continued. Attention was given to an important field in’ which little information has been available, namely, that of the earnings of white collar workers. Plans were formulated for surveys in various industries in the Hawaiian Islands and Alaska.
    Prices and Cost of Living.
    The pioneer work in wholesale prices, retail prices, and cost of living by the Commissioner of Labor for the Senate Committee on Finance in the 1890’s was initiated by the Committee because the absence of statistics on these subjects “led to constant and indeterminable dispute over facts in every economic discussion.” The statistical data then collected and later expanded by the Bureau of Labor Statistics became the basis of one of the most widely used sets of statistics.
    When the national defense program and, later, the war program required the administrative use of price and cost-of-living data, the war agencies turned to the Bureau because of its long experience and because the use of its facilities prevented duplication, promoted efficiency, and insured the improvement of the permanent price and cost-of-living records of the Federal Government. The regular work has been improved and extended during the war through direct appropriations by the Congress. In addition, a great variety of special studies m the field of prices and rents, has been undertaken, particularly for the OPA, for which the Bureau has acted as one of the principal statistical collecting agencies throughout the war.. The War and Navy Departments and other Government contracting and purchasing agencies were also assisted with a large amount of price data and with expert consulting services on the maintenance of their own price records and ~l T) c! PXP.S,
    Throughout the year, indexes of prices and the vast assembly of basic price information were used to measure the success of the wartime stabilization program, with regard to broad movements of prices, and also as to costs of particular goods and services.
    Just as the Bureau has adapted its work to meet the needs of war agencies, it is .planning to be in a position quickly and effectively to readjust its activities to the needs of reconversion agencies and also to serve the country’s private, local, and regional requirements. Reconversion will be in part national in scope, but perhaps even more significantly local and decentralized in nature. International price and cost-of-living problems will also receive greater attention in the postwar period.	....	.
    The regular surveys of food prices in 56 cities and of other items m the family budget in 34 cities for use in the cost-of-living index have been continued in fiscal 1944, as well as the surveys in 20 small cities and 11 war production centers. Together with 7 other cities for which partial data are available, indexes of the cost of living are available for a total of 73 cities in the United States. With the cooperation of the Office of Price Administration, indexes were begun in 1944 for three cities in Alaska, based upon a study of comparative costs of living
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    in Alaska and in the States, undertaken at the request of the Governor of Alaska at the close of the fiscal year. Similar indexes of costs of living are now being carried on under Territorial auspices in the Territories of Hawaii and Puerto Rico.
    Broad as it is, the present program of cost-of-living surveys does not adequately cover certain important areas of the United States— notably the Mountain States and the Great Plains areas. No surveys are made of the cost of living in any cities in 12 States, and 20 States are not represented in the national average, which is the official cost-of-living index. It is recommended that surveys be extended to cover more cities, so that questions may be answered about the local effects of the wartime price rise upon living costs in at least one city in every State.
    Extensive studies and tabulations were made for the various committees which reviewed the cost-of-living index, particularly those acting for the War Labor Board in disputes on wage cases. These studies include tests of accuracy of the Bureau’s food prices on the basis of actual purchases.
    The final report of the Special Committee of the American Statistical Association on the Bureau’s cost-of-living index was released October 10, 1943. This Committee was appointed in April 1943- at the request of the Secretary of Labor and of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, to “review the official cost-of-living index and to advise the Bureau on any ways in which it can be improved to serve the many wartime demands now being made on it.” Frederick C. Mills, Professor of Economics and Statistics at Columbia University, was chairman.
    The Committee found that the index is “a satisfactory instrument for measuring what it attempts to measure, average movements in the retail prices of goods and services purchased by city workers.” It recommended, subject to considerations of cost and the need of Congressional Committees and administrators, an expansion in the coverage of the Bureau’s indexes, the development of geographic measures of cost of living, frequent small-sample studies of family expenditures, and once in five years a comprehensive study of local differences in income and consumption habits among occupational groups in different parts of the Uniteci States.
    President Roosevelt appointed a committee, November 5, to report on the Bureau’s index. This Committee was composed of two labor members, George Meany of the American Federation of Labor and R. J. Thomas of the United Automobile Workers, CIO; two industry members, George K. Batt and Horace B. Horton; and one public member of the National War Labor Board, William H. Davis, chairman.
    Mr. Meany and Mr. Thomas submitted to this Committee and released to the press at the end of January 1944, a recommended report on “Cost of Living,” which stated that living costs had increased 43.5 percent from January 1941 to December 1943, instead of the 23.4 percent shown by the Bureau.
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    25
    At the request of Chairman Davis, the Bureau prepared an appraisal of the Meany-Thomas Report, in which it stated that the conclusions of the report (that living costs had risen 43.5 percent) could not be substantiated and indicating in detail the reasons for believing that the Bureau’s index is a good measure of average price changes for essentials of family living, the purpose it is designed to serve. The nature and limitations of the index were also discussed in the report. It emphasized the fact that the index is an average, summarizing a wide range of changes in living costs for different families in different communities.
    Chairman Davis then announced, in April 1944, that he had appointed an Advisory Committee of Statistical Experts to the President’s Committee on the Cost of Living, with Wesley C. Mitchell of Columbia University as chairman. The report of this committee was made public in June 1944. The Mitchell Report states: “Our examination of the methods used by the BLS and the other information we have gathered * * * leads us to conclude that the BLS has done a competent job, under very difficult market conditions, in providing a measure of price changes for goods customarily purchased by families of wage earners and lower-salaried workers living in large cities.”
    The report goes on to say that there are some factors in the wartime price situation that probably are not completely represented in the index, the most important being up-grading and quality deterioration. Taking all these factors into account, the advisory committee estimated that the increase in average prices charged wage earners and clerical workers from January 1941 to December 1943 may be as much as 25.9 percent and cannot be more than 27.4 percent. The Bureau’s index shows 23.4 percent. In presenting its estimates, the Committee said:
    “At the risk of being tiresome it is important to point out that many of our estimates of the shortcomings of the index are little more than crude guesses, though we think they are more considered and therefore better guesses than those made heretofore. Most of the magnitudes we state should be thought of only as ‘possible’ and only to a limited extent as ‘probable.’
    “In spite of the fact that we talk about shortcomings of the index, both in achieving its acknowledged objectives and in measuring certain changes that are outside its objectives, in general, we have little advice to offer for improvement in the methods used by the BLS. The methods used by us in estimating the shortcomings of the present index are for the most part not suitable for an official index that must be based on measurable phenomena.”
    Philip Murray and R. J. Thomas released a report called “Living Costs in World War II, 1941-1944” June 26. This report estimates that living costs rose 45.3 percent from January 1941 to March 1944 as compared with the 22.8 percent shown by the BLS index. (The rise to March 1944 as shown by the BLS index was slightly less than the rise to December 1943 primarily because of a sharp decline in egg prices.)
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    The President’s Committee had itot reported its findings at the end of the fiscal year.1
    The retail price work of the Bureau in the field of living essentials is not only the basis of the cost-of-living indexes, but the average prices obtained in these nationwide city surveys are used extensively by the public and by such agencies as the Office of Price Administration, the War and Navy Departments, and by business firms. Food prices especially have been widely used as a measure of the success of the stabilization program as it applied to specific foods. In addition, special studies were undertaken for the OPA to determine the relation between prices charged by dealers and ceiling prices. These data were used for statistical analysis without revealing the identity of individual stores.
    In connection with its collection of retail price data, information has been obtained regarding supplies available to civilians, both of clothing and textiles and of foods.
    Data on rents and vacancies in 73 cities are regularly obtained directly from tenants, to insure accuracy. They are used by the OPA as a basic measure of the success of the rent control program.
    The Bureau has acted as statistical agent for the OPA in conducting over 500 special rent surveys in fiscal 1944, and a total of more than 1,700 since June 1942. These surveys indicate broadly (not with respect to individual cases) the need for rent control in particular cities, the extent of compliance with rent controls, or the possibility of decontrol. Incident to these surveys, information on vacancies, crowded housing, and sales of rented properties, which are of value to the NHA and to local housing agencies, have also been obtained.
    Extensive coverage of industrial and wholesale prices for many years has provided prices of all leading raw materials, semi-manufactured and manufactured goods. From this file, which includes over 10,000 price series, about 900 are selected which are the basis for the official index of wholesale prices, while others are used for a number of special indexes, such as those on waste and scrap materials (of especial significance in the war and post-war price adjustments), of machine tools, and of local prices of building materials in 50 cities.
    In fiscal 1944, various group indexes for industrial prices were reconstructed on the basis of new data, as for example, a complete new index of lumber prices, and a general index of machinery prices for 1 * * 4
    1 The report of the President’s Cost of Living Committee was made public on Novem-
    ber 18, 1944. The Chairman of the Committee stated, “The accuracy of the BLS index
    figures for what they are intended to measure is confirmed. They are entitled to the good reputation they' have long enjoyed. They constitute a competent measure of price changes for goods customarily purchased by families of wage- earners and clerical workers in large cities. . . . Under the exceptional market conditions which exist in wartime, and so long as we have a seller’s market, allowance should be made for a hidden increase in the cost of living of probably as much as 3 and certainly not more than
    4 percentage points, due to quality deterioration, disappearance of cheaper goods, decrease of special sales and increase in under-reporting prices actually charged. Unlike the price changes recorded by the BLS these items of temporary disadvantage of the buyer in a seller’s market are not directly measurable but they have been soundly estimated by the Mitchell Committee. If the index is to be used to represent changes in the cost of living of urban workers in small as well as large cities there should be an upward adjustment of the index figures by not more than one-half of a percentage point.” Mr. Davis’ statement was transmitted to the President with a letter from Horace B. Horton and George K. Batt, the Industry Members of the Committee, in which they concur in the main with the general conclusions of the Chairman’s report, a letter from George Meanv. rrivin" “a special renort to c’nrify certain points which the American Federation of Labor feels have not been sufficiently emphasized,” and comments on the report by R. J. Thomas.
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    27
    the use of OPA. A new wartime index of civilian goods in primary markets was also completed, based on 125 series, using wartime weights.
    Difficulties were encountered in the industrial field as well as in consumers’ goods in keeping abreast of changes in goods in the markets due to wartime conditions, and an active program was continued to add to and improve these price reports. It was necessary to review the list of reporting firms frequently and also to make more than 1.000 contacts in order to maintain the validity of its current price reports in the industrial field.
    There was an increasing recognition of the importance of these basic price records. They were used, for example, by the 0. P. A. in check-ups on the success of its price control program, by the Government in the purchase of industrial goods, and by business firms for various purposes. Numerous special tabulations were made from unpublished price records, and more than 500 requests were received per month during the year from individuals and business firms.
    Technical assistance was again given to the War and Navy Departments in the constructing of their indexes of prices paid by them for the materials of war. The War Department’s indexes were issued in monthly series beginning in February 1914. The Navy Department’s indexes had not been completed by the close of the fiscal year. The data underlying both sets of indexes, however, were widely used in preliminary form for the guidance of these departments in their purchase and pricing policies.
    The Price Branch also issued the first volume of its comprehensive history of prices during the war, “Wartime Prices, Volume I, August 1939 to Pearl Harbor.”
    Consumers’ Cooperation.
    In many countries the cooperative movement has had a significant effect on prices, cost of living, and the purchasing power of workers, and in addition has afforded extensive experience in economic self-government and the management of business enterprises. Although the growth of cooperatives in the United States has been much less extensive than in some other countries, widespread interest in the movement has led the Bureau to make annual surveys and to undertake studies of special developments, as in the field of credit unions. A directory of consumers’ cooperatives, as of January 1, 1943, was published as a Bureau bulletin (No. 750).
    The main activity in this field in 1943-44 was the compilation of a research report on cooperatives in European countries, with reference to their possibilities in post-war reconstruction. This report (being published as Bulletin No. 770) was the outgrowth of work undertaken at the request of various agencies of the Federal Government which will have to deal with the rehabilitation of the war-devastated countries.
    Industrial Relations.
    Monthly statistics of strikes, analyzed by nature, causes, and results, have been compiled for about twenty years. These have been extremely valuable in measuring the extent of industrial unrest and indicating the principal causes. Much time has been given to supplying information serviceable in preventing or adjusting industrial dis
    28
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    putes. Many union agreements have been collected and analyzed and extensive materials on methods of conciliation and arbitration have been prepared.
    The strike statistics are accepted as the only comprehensive and reliable indicator of the frequency and severity of strikes. An outstanding characteristic of most of the strikes during the war has been their comparatively short duration. The amount of idleness caused by strikes during the year ended June 30, 1944, was about one-ninth of one percent of the available working time. The National War Labor Board was concerned with about one-third of the strikes during the year. Most of the strikes occurred before the issues in dispute were referred to the Board, but some took place while the cases were pending and some were in protest against Board decisions. Strike balloting under the provisions of the War Labor Disputes Act, effective June 25, 1943, preceded only 64 of the 4,450 strikes occurring during the year.
    An encouraging aspect of industrial relations has been the increasing number of unions and employers who have made efforts to establish sound industrial relations based on intelligent and workable collective bargaining terms. Basic to the establishment of such relationship is knowledge of what terms are feasible and reasonable. One of the important functions of the Bureau is to provide this information to employers and unions and to agencies, both public and private, that are concerned with employer-union negotiations and the settlement of their disputes. A file of about 15,000 current union agreements has been built up. Analyses of the provisions of the agreements are made as needed. During the year ten studies were prepared on collective bargaining for publication.
    The texts of union agreements and other written materials in the files do not show how specific terms in the agreements actually work out, which practices and policies prove to be satisfactory and why, and which are least successful or are causing trouble and friction. This type of information must be obtained directly from managers, union officials, and employees. It has been possible to make only a limited number of studies of this nature but the results have been so serviceable as to warrant the extension of work in this field. Collective bargaining, it is recognized, is not merely the adopting, modifying, and renewing of collective agreements but is also a continuous process of jointly interpreting the terms of collective agreements and applying them to complicated and changing conditions.
    Working Conditions.
    An important contribution in the field of working conditions has been the periodic collection of statistics on the frequency and severity of industrial injuries. Basic information on the number, characteristics, causes and effects of injuries has made it possible to direct attention to conditions most in need of remedial measures and to measure the degree to which accident prevention methods have succeeded in reducing injuries. The need to conserve manpower during the war created demands which made it possible to undertake a monthly system of reporting for aiding safety men in directing their efforts without delay to conditions most in need of attention. Studies are conducted each year in industries with the most serious accident frequencies, particular attention being paid to the conditions and prac-
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    29
    tices which bring about accidents and to the methods of prevention. By special arrangements with the Maritime Commission and the Navy, the collecting and analyzing of accidents in contract shipyards was undertaken. Special studies were completed in the longshore and foundry industries.
    Studies to find out what particular schedules of working hours are most satisfactory as regards both output and the well being of individual workers in various types of industrial activities were made. Although they were limited to a few situations in which intensive surveys could be made, the results are striking. It appears, for instance, that no one schedule of working hours is the most efficient. Much depends on the character of the work (heavy, light, etc.), on the plant surroundings (ventilation, light, safety appliances, etc.), and on the degree of cooperation between workers and management.
    The value of these studies has already been demonstrated by the use being made of them by the plants covered and by Governmental agencies concerned with production. The results suggested the desirability of further studies, not only with respect to the influence of hours but also the effects of other working conditions such as health hazards of occupations, wage incentives, rotation of shifts, and rest periods.
    An important phase of the well being of workers is the rehabilitation of disabled workers. Even in peacetime there are large numbers of such persons—victims of disease and of accidents in the shop, on the highway, and in the home. The war will increase many times the number of persons with similar disabilities acquired in the armed services.
    Effective methods of rehabilitation, placement, and assignment to suitable jobs would permit these persons to become productive and self-supporting citizens. For this purpose specific information is greatly needed to counteract established prejudices against hiring disabled persons, and to guide the rehabilitation program in its developmental stages. An unusual opportunity exists at present for obtaining the information required. Wartime needs for labor have opened up jobs for disabled persons where they formerly would have been refused employment. Plans have therefore been made, in cooperation with the Veterans Administration, the Office of Vocational Rehabilitation, and the War Manpower Commission, for undertaking a study of the actual experiences during the war in the rehabilitation of disabled workers.
    International Labor Conditions.
    Labor developments in foreign countries have been followed for many years and information made available in printed or memorandum form. The present war greatly increased the interest in foreign economic conditions, particularly on the part of Governmental agencies such as the foreign Civil Affairs Division of the War Department and the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, which are concerned with transitional governments and the administration of relief and rehabilitation policies in the warring areas. The demands made by these and other agencies and by individuals were in excess of what could be handled. Post-war conditions will intensify these demands, because labor and economic conditions in other coun
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    tries will have a vital effect on our own economic conditions and policies.
    In addition to information regarding wage rates, labor cost, and working conditions in other countries, it is necessary to have data relating to international prices and the comparative purchasing power at wholesale and at retail of the various national currencies. It is especially desirable, for example, to have information regarding prices as well as wages and employment in the so-called “export” and “import” industries affecting international trade relations and policies. In making decisions on the tariff, international investments, finances, and other international arrangements, members of the Congress and administrative officers of the Government will need far more extensive information than has heretofore been available.
    It is planned to extend the work in these fields in cooperation with such agencies as the Division of Labor Relations in the Department of State. The Bureau has worked in close association with the International Labor Organization since 1934, when the United States, by Congressional action, became affiliated with that agency. Its Philadelphia meeting in the spring of 1944 indicated clearly the important role which it will play in the post-war world in the attempt to build a secure basis of international peace in terms of just and equitable wages, adequate employment, and satisfactory living conditions for the workers of all countries. Labor organizations in the United States are vitally interested in similar organizations in other countries and in the use of the types of information which the Bureau compiles in the field of international labor conditions.
    Publications.
    The act dreating the Bureau directs it not only to acquire but also to “diffuse” labor information. The Monthly Labor Review, now in its 30th year, is the principal medium for making public the Bureau’s regular statistical series and summaries of its special studies, and, in certain cases, the results of the work of other bureaus of the Department of Labor. About 90 percent of its contents is concerned with current statistical compilations and summaries of special studies. During the past year 15 special bulletins were published in addition to numerous reprints. There was a reduction in the number of pages printed and in the number of reports published, primarily due to economies in printing techniques and in the distribution of published materials. The emergency needs of wartime have tended to reduce the longer, more detailed formal publications and to increase the demand for brief, quickly prepared reports on current labor matters.
    Field Operations.
    A much larger proportion of work has been done in field offices during the past two years than ever before. This came about in part as a result of the regional and local plans of operation of such agencies as the National War Labor Board and the Office of Price Administration, which depend in large measure on the Bureau for wage and price data. There has also been a large increase in the demands made for local and regional data by unions, local governments, business firms, and various agencies, official and unofficial, concerned with problems of reconversion and the maintenance of employment and business activities after the war. In addition, there has been an extension
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    31
    of cooperative relations with State governments in collecting basic data in such fields as employment and pay rolls.
    The field services are performed by 8 regional offices and 4 branch offices. Data collections and other field projects, as well as the general informational services, are coordinated in each region under a Regional Director, responsible for all work in his area. Bureau representatives are regularly called upon for technical advice and for analyses and interpretations of industrial trends. The various kinds of data compiled are available in all the regional and branch offices. The value of the field offices is attested by the great demand for their services not only by Federal agencies, but also by labor organizations, industry, city and State governments, and the public generally.
    CHILDREN’S BUREAU.
    General Program.	•
    The activities of the Children’s Bureau during the fiscal year 1944 have been developed with the purpose of directing all possible effort to assuring to children under wartime conditions the nearest possible approach to normal home care, educational opportunity, and creative experience in the communities in which they live. The problems confronting children in wartime are in general those which have caused concern in peacetime, but they are enlarged and intensified.
    The forces that had been set in motion before the war for control of maternal and infant mortality continued to achieve results in 1943. The infant mortality rate for that year was 40 per 1,600 live births, the same as in 1942, and the maternal mortality rate was 23 per 10,000 live births, as compared with 26 in 1942. Continued vigilance is necessary to maintain the gains made and to avoid an upswing in the mortality figures. The number of births in 1943 again topped the record with 2,935,171 live births registered in the United States—a birth rate of 21.9 per 1,000 population, the highest since 1924; an estimate of unrecorded births brings this total to more than 3,000,000.
    At increased tempo boys and girls under the age of 18 years are taking their places as full-time and part-time workers in aircraft and other war production factories, and in hotels, restaurants, laundries, bowling alleys, motion-picture theaters, and mercantile establishments. For all types of employment the increase during the past year has been proportionately greater for the 14- and 15-year-old group than for the 16- and 17-year-olds. In April of this year, while schools were still in session, the most reliable estimates available showed nearly 3,600,000 boys and girls 14 through 17 years at work— almost a third of the total population of these ages and three times as many as when the census was taken in March 1940. About half of these young persons were working full time, and half part time. Somewhat less than a million were 14 and 15 years of age and about 2,000,000 were 16 and 17 years of age. In addition, thousands of children under the age of 14 are working both during the school year and during vacation, but there is no official count of their numbers. Some 5,000,000 boys and girls 14 through 17 years of age were at work in July 1944 when the seasonal farm program was well under way.
    Some 4,600,000 married women are having to manage their homes with the husband absent, either for service in the armed forces or for 616138—45-------3
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    other reasons. A total of 16,000,000 women are employed, of whom 2,750,000 are estimated to be mothers of children under the age of 14 years. Children have received far less guidance, companionship, and supervision during the war period than under normal conditions. Many thousands are living in war-industry or war-camp communities to which they have migrated, either with their families or by themselves. In their new surroundings they are often subjected to makeshift and overcrowded housing and lack of community facilities characteristic of war-congested areas. Many boys and girls between the ages of 15 and 18 years are living entirely unsupervised in places to which they have gone without their families to take employment in war industries or to be near war camps. An increase in the number of delinquency cases disposed of by juvenile courts (roughly 51 percent higher in 19-13 than in 1940) on the basis of preliminary figures from more than 200 juvenile courts is an indication of the ways in which in our war effort we have failed to meet the needs of children and young people.
    To meet these problems the Bureau works with official and unofficial agencies and groups. Many of these have been brought together for consideration of over-all problems in the Bureau advisory committees and in the Commission on Children in Wartime, first appointed in 1942 for a 2-year period and reappointed in 1944.
    The methods which the Bureau has at its disposal for advancing the health and welfare of children include studying the facts surrounding child life; reporting on these facts to parents and to the general public; administering grants to the States for maternal and child-health services, services for crippled children, and child-welfare services under title V, parts 1, 2, and 3, of the Social Security Act, and grants to the States for emergency maternity and infant care for families of men in the armed services; and administering the child-labor provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act. Its resources for fact-finding have been curtailed greatly during the war period, partly by reductions in appropriations and partly by the use of staff time in advisory services which bring the resources of earlier research and fact-finding to bear on critical war situations.
    With funds provided through the Department of State the Bureau carries on an active program of cooperation with the other American Republics in training personnel and developing extended programs of maternal and child-health and social services to children. These services are financed through allotments from the Department of State under its program of cooperation with the other American Republics.
    As the time for final victory draws nearer, the Bureau, in cooperation with other agencies, has begun to explore some of the ways in which demobilization and reconversion will affect family life and the welfare of children and youth, and the measures that will be necessary to assure the health, education, and welfare of children and young people throughout the Nation.
    Payments to States.
    In its administration of grants to the States for maternal and childhealth services, services for crippled children, and child-welfare services, under title V of the Social Security Act, the Bureau in 1944 approved State plans and made payments for all three programs to the 48 States, the District of Columbia, Alaska, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii. By
    Payments to States
    $5, 946,183. 74
    29, 700, 000. 00
    3, 781, 751. 77
    1, 423, 314. 24
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	33
    action of the Governor, Utah withdrew from participation in the Federal-aid program for child-welfare services April 1, 1944, and is now engaged in reviewing its whole public welfare program for children.
    One -regular and two deficiency appropriations for grants to State health agencies for emergency maternity and infant care of wives and infants of men in the lowest four pay grades of the armed forces1 totaled $29,700,000. In July 1943 plans were in operation in 39 States, the District of Columbia, Alaska, and Hawaii. By March 1944 plans were in operation in all the States and in the District of Columbia, Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico.
    Federal-aid payments made to the States during the fiscal year from appropriations for the fiscal year and balances carried over from previous years were as follows:
    Maternal and child-health services—
    to State health agencies----------------------------
    Emergency maternity and infant care—
    to State health agencies____________________________
    Services for crippled children—
    to State crippled-children agencies, usually health or welfare departments---------------------------------
    Child-welfare services—
    to State public welfare agencies--------------------
    Emergency Maternity and Infant-Care Program.
    The program of medical, hospital, and nursing care for the wives and infants of men in the four lowest pay grades of the armed forces continued to expand during the year. A large proportion of the time of the Division of Health Services was occupied by this program, which was still growing at the end of the fiscal year. From the beginning of the program, in March 1943, to June 30, 1944, care had been authorized by the State health agencies for 399,918 mothers and infants.
    The Bureau makes payments under this program to the State health agencies, which in turn make arrangements with private physicians, hospitals, clinics, public-health nurses, private-duty nurses, and other professional personnel. During the early stages of the program care authorized was confined for the most part to medical and hospital services for mothers and newborn infants. As administrative procedures began to function more smoothly, medical and hospital services were expanded and nursing and medical-social services were made available; medical, hospital, and nursing services were also authorized for infants during the first year of life. During the last quarter of the fiscal year 6 percent of all cases accepted were sick infants less than 1 year of age.
    The provision by Congress for the fiscal year 1945 of funds for State administrative expenses will make it much easier for the State health officers and maternal and child-health directors to handle their programs. During the year the Bureau held seven regional conferences to discuss with State health-department staffs problems relating to the program, including the purchase of hospital care. The limited staff of regional consultants could not meet many of the requests of the State health agencies for help in developing and operating this program. It was impossible to give sufficient advisory service on such
    1 The appropriation act for the fiscal year 1945 provided also for the wives and infants of Army aviation cadets.
    34
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    matters as the administrative procedures necessary to handle the great numbers of applications for care, appropriate methods of encumbrance of funds, calculation of cost of care in hospitals, and reporting of cases.
    Nursing representatives of National and State organizations and health agencies who are members of the regular Children’s Bureau Advisory Committees on Services for Crippled Children and Maternal and Child Health met on October 4, 1943. Recommendations regarding policies for the provision of nursing services for EMIC patients by public and voluntary agencies were made which were used as a basis for national development of this phase of the program.
    The physicians on the Advisory Committee on Maternal and Child Health Services of the Bureau met on October 21, 1943, for their second discussion of policies relative to the emergency maternity and infant-care program, and made a number of valuable recommendations. This was followed by a conference on December 10 and 11 of official representatives of various organizations, including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Association of Obstetricians, Gynecologists, and Abdominal Surgeons, the American Hospital Association, the Association of State and Territorial Health Officers, the United States Public Health Service, the Army, the Navy, the American Red Cross, the American Legion, and certain national organizations representing the interest of citizens in maternal and child health. Summaries of these two meetings were printed in the Journal of the American Medical Association. At a conference called by the Bureau on February 1 and 2, 1944, pediatricians and State and local public-health officials discussed problems relative to providing health supervision and medical care of sick infants under the EMIC programs. On March 16 a group of hospital administrators met to review Bureau policies on the purchase of hospital care and made recommendations as to certain changes in these policies. On June 5, 1944, a group of 19 obstetricians, including 8 members of the Advisory Committee on Maternal and Child-Health Services were invited to the Bureau to discuss the obstetric aspects of the EMIC program. Such meetings give the Children’s Bureau the benefit of technical advice on the medical, nursing, and hospital phases of the program and prepare those who attend to share in explaining the aims, policies, and procedures of the program to the groups of which they are members.
    After review of the experience of the first few months of the program, the Bureau issued as of December 1943 revised policies under the title, “Administrative Policies—Emergency Maternity and Infant Care Program.” Several amendments to this bulletin were issued later in the year to make for greater ease and flexibility in administration and to clarify determination of eligibility.
    The foundation of maternal and child-health services that was available in State health departments before the war, with grants from the Bureau, made the emergency maternity and infant-care program possible. In turn, this new program has contributed to the development of improved standards of maternal and infant care and has stimulated widespread interest in developing additional resources for medical, hospital, and nursing care. Young mothers are reached early in pregnancy and given health information and health services. Re
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    35
    ports from 36 States show that during the last quarter of the fiscal year 89 percent of these young mothers were delivered by physicians in hospitals. Standards of hospital care have been improved in many States. The program has stimulated interest in State legislation providing for licensing maternity homes and hospitals. Many social problems have arisen—particularly problems related to young mothers still in their teens and away from home.
    Among the methods used to inform the wives of servicemen eligible for care under the emergency maternity and infant-care program, in addition to a folder and press and radio, were two announcements enclosed with allotment checks mailed by the War and Navy Departments to servicemen’s wives. News of the program was given to husbands and fathers in the services through special articles placed with the major servicemen’s journals. With the assistance of the Bureau, the Signal Corps produced a motion-picture “short” on EMIC, which was shown at all military camps. Information about the program was also widely distributed by the State health departments.
    The program is a wartime measure, utilizing existing services and methods of providing maternity care and medical care to infants; it will automatically come to an end 6 months after the war is over, except that care authorized before the end of this period will be carried to completion. The fact that these wives and infants can receive free of charge and without investigation of financial resources, care by qualified physicians in approved hospitals has been stated by representatives of the armed services to be an important morale-building factor in our national war program.
    Continuing Maternal and Child-Health Program.
    During the fiscal year 1944 regular maternal and child-health activities in the States under title V, part 1, of the Social Security Act, were curtailed to a considerable extent by reason of loss of medical, nursing, and other public-health personnel to the military services and the demands of the emergency maternity and infant-care program. Reports from the States for the calendar year 1943 show that under State health-department supervision, 146,000 women were given prenatal medical service, a decrease of 12 percent as compared with the high point in 1941. The number of infants admitted to child-health conferences for medical services was 186,000, approximately the same number as in each of the preceding 2 years. Publichealth nurses in 1943 made 1,227,000 prenatal and postnatal visits, a decrease of 8 percent from the 1,332,000 such visits made in 1942, the high point for this service. Nurses made 4,844,000 visits for infant, preschool, and school hygiene, a decrease of 8 percent from the 1942 high point (5,246,000). The number of examinations of school children by physicians reported (2,124,000) showed an increase over 1942 (1,624,000)". There was some reduction in immunizations for smallpox and diphtheria as compared with 1942, but the numbers were larger than in 1941.
    State health departments extended their nutrition services, during the year, even though some positions remained vacant because the demand for public-health nutritionists far exceeds the supply. The range of activities carried on by nutritionists continued to broaden. An increasing number are giving some service to institutions for the care of mothers and children, including small hospitals and maternity
    36	ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    homes, and convalescent homes for crippled children and children suffering from heart disease. Services to the agencies sponsoring school-lunch programs and to centers for day care of preschool children showed an increase. Bureau and State public-health nutritionists are devoting a large part of their time to the national nutrition program through which all governmental agencies that have an interest in nutrition are joining forces with citizens’ groups, labor, management, agriculture, and the professions in a unified effort to improve and maintain the nutritional status of the population.
    Special projects financed from maternal and child-health funds included a university training center for Negro midwives, a group of child-health conferences in a war-congested urban community, partial maintenance of an obstetric hospital in the foothills of the Appalachians, and several demonstrations of obstetric and pediatric care in rural areas.
    Services for Crippled Children.
    The number of crippled children on State registers increased from 347,000 at the close of the calendar year 1942 to 364,000 at the close of 1943.
    The reports from the State crippled-children agencies for the calendar year 1943 under the grant-in-aid program continued to show the wartime decline in the volume of services for crippled children that first became evident in 1942. For example, the number of children admitted to clinic service in 1943 (82,000) was 11 percent less than in 1942 and 21 percent less than in 1941. The number of children cared for in hospitals during 1943 (31,000) was 13 percent less than in 1942 and 27 percent less than in 1941. The declines were due in large part to withdrawals for service in the armed forces of medical and nursing personnel and physical-therapy technicians. Many States report cases that cannot be taken care of, one of the striking evidences of the reduction in medical care for civilians. The total number of crippled children needing care and not receiving it is not known because it is useless to make surveys to determine how many are not cared for when facilities to provide care are short because of the war situation.
    Additional clinics conducted for crippled children in local communities in some States have offset in part the difficulties encountered by parents in transporting their children to distant medical centers. Children seen in diagnostic clinics are being classified according to urgency of need for care, and operative treatment is being provided on a selective basis. In a few States selected cases are being referred to qualified general surgeons. Some children are being sent to other States where the services of orthopedic and plastic surgeons are still available. State crippled-children agencies are giving services to crippled infants coming under the emergency maternity and infantcare program.
    The number of crippled youths referred to vocational-rehabilitation agencies increased in 1943. Under the Vocational Rehabilitation Act approved July 6,1943, State agencies administering Federal and State funds may authorize medical care and hospitalization for physically handicapped persons of employable age who are eligible for vocational training. An agreement has been worked out between the Children’s
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	37
    Bureau and the Office of Vocational Rehabilitation, Federal Security Agency, with regard to the services to be provided by. the respective agencies for crippled youths of employable age but below the age of 21. This agreement has been sent to the State agencies as a basis for comparable agreements at the State level.
    Poliomyelitis.—The figures for poliomyelitis for the calendar year 1943 reported by the United States Public Health Service showed 12,401 cases, the highest incidence since 1931, when almost 16,000 cases were reported. (Figures for the first 9 months of 1944 exceed the total for the entire year 1943.) The 1943 cases were reported chiefly from the Southwest and the West Coast, and from Illinois and Connecticut.
    A regional poliomyelitis conference attended by administrators, practicing physicians, and representatives of citizens’ groups from 10 States was held in February 1944 under the auspices of the State crippled-children agencies of Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas, in cooperation with the Bureau. Further research and coordination of public and private activities were urged.
    The Bureau is urging all State crippled-children agencies to develop in advance a coordinated plan with all agencies whose resources can be used in case an epidemic occurs. This involves training of professional and volunteer personnel and plans for rapid mobilization of facilities and services for diagnosis and consultation, hospital and convalescent care, and follow-up.
    Rheumatic fever.—Rheumatic-fever programs were in operation in 17 States by June 30, 1944, and several other States were prepared to initiate such programs as soon as essential professional personnel was available. Reports from 12 State agencies and the District of Columbia with programs in operation during the calendar year 1943 showed 2,000 admissions to clinic service, 500 acutely ill children given care in hospitals, and 400 children given 33,000 days of convalescent care in hospitals or convalescent homes. The need is so great that it will be necessary to make available additional Federal or State funds if services are to be provided in all the States on a State-wide basis.
    The first National conference on rheumatic fever called by the Bureau was held October 5 to 7, 1943. The conference afforded opportunity to exchange experience in the administration of State programs, to review medical, nursing, and social problems that affect the rheumatic child, to consider new developments in diagnosis and therapy, to explore needs for extension and improvement of the programs, and to discuss the adequacy of present facilities and services for meeting the needs of children with rheumatic fever or rheumatic heart disease. Members of the subcommittee on rheumatic fever of the Advisory Committee on Crippled Children attended the conference and met as a group to discuss next steps that should be taken in the light of the conference discussions.
    In view of the increasing interest of professional and citizen groups in the welfare of children with rheumatic fever and heart disease, the American Heart Association in 1944 took the leadership in forming a council on rheumatic fever in accordance with recommendations of a conference which it sponsored in January and which called for the extension of public programs for the study, prevention, and treatment of this disease and for the provision of additional funds from
    38	ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    private sources for special studies, professional education, and public education in regard to the problem.
    Publications and Advisory Service on Maternal and Child Health.
    Publication No. 30, The Child From One to Six, was completely rewritten and submitted to members of the Bureau’s Pediatric Advisory Committee. A children’s book list was prepared for publication in collaboration with the United States Office of Education. A leaflet, If Your Baby Must Travel in Wartime, was in press at the close of the fiscal year.
    More than one and a half million mothers were reached through bulletins for parents. These included 247,722 copies of Prenatal Care, 992,757 copies of Infant Care, and 205,605 copies of The Child From One to Six. Additional copies were sold by the Superintendent of Documents.
    Much of the effort of the Bureau’s Division of Research in Child Development has been devoted to the development of standards based on previous research. Information was also obtained concerning the service given and the problems encountered by child-guidance clinics. Visits were made by a physician to day-care centers for children of working mothers to evaluate health services and conditions in these wartime facilities.
    The publication, “A Maternity Policy for Industry” (Folder 30), based on earlier studies, was widely circulated. It formed the basis of a statement issued by the War Department in July 1944, applicable to Army-owned and Army-operated installations. Standards for maternity and infant care for use in infirmaries in Federal publichousing developments were prepared. The Bureau continued to give consultation service on the care of newborn and premature infants in hospitals. The Bureau and the United States Public Health Service have prepared standard plans for hospital nurseries for newborn infants. These plans have been used for the construction of nurseries in approximately 50 hospitals built in war-congested areas with Federal funds and an unknown number of hospitals financed in part with Federal funds.
    Plans have been developed for more comprehensive mental-health service through staff which includes a psychiatrist, a psychologist, and a consultant in social services. This is a field in which there is great need for study, for encouraging mental-health training of physicians, nurses, teachers, and social workers dealing with children, and for advisory service that will aid in relating child-guidance services to other health, educational, and social services for children.
    May Day—Child Health Day.
    In his annual Child Health Day proclamation, the President called upon young people to use May 1 as an occasion to discuss among themselves and with adults how the boys and girls of the Nation can contribute to the better health of their communities. In support of this challenge, the Bureau received the cooperation of more than 50 youthserving organizations, and distributed through them and through schools, May Day News, suggesting discussion programs. The newspapers reported meetings held and discussions participated in by hundreds of groups of young people.
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	39
    Social Services for Children.
    The Social Service Division has continued to devote its attention chiefly to the problems created or intensified by the dislocation of family and community life due to wartime conditions. The absence of millions of fathers in military service and the increased employment of mothers outside the home are the greatest causes of family dislocation. Children in migrating families are often exposed to abnormal family and community life in war-congested areas. Adolescents are restless and under tension and many have left home to seek employment.
    The widespread desire to strengthen and extend child-welfare programs to meet the needs of children and youth growing out of these situations brought to the Children’s Bureau during the year increased requests for advisory service from State public welfare departments, law-enforcement agencies, National and local private agencies, defense-council committees on children, and citizens’ groups. In October 1913 the Secretary of Labor appointed a General Advisory Committee on Social Services for Children to advise the Bureau on all phases of its program of social services for children, including the social-security program for child-welfare services. In February 1914 a subcommittee was appointed to serve as the Advisory Committee on Leisure-Time Services for Children.
    Grants to States for child-welfare services.—In addition to the provision of child-welfare workers in local areas the State plans for child-welfare services for the fiscal year 1944, developed jointly by the Bureau and the State public welfare agencies, included special State staff to provide leadership in dealing with wartime child-welfare problems. Twelve States developed special projects for the study and prevention of juvenile delinquency, including special consultants on the State staff, workers assigned to State training schools, and workers assigned to local areas to work on the control of juvenile delinquency. Federal funds were budgeted for mental-hygiene service in 15 States. For consultation service on the development of community day-care services for children of working mothers the plans of 26 States budgeted 57 State workers and 156 workers on the staff of local public welfare departments.
    The problem of securing personnel continued to be serious but there appeared to be a slight improvement in this situation toward the close of the year. To meet the problem of staff shortage and turnover the State public welfare agencies increased their staff-development programs both through in-service training and through educational leave for professional training.
    On December 31, 1943, 669 professional workers employed in State or local child-welfare programs were paid in whole or in part from Federal funds, including 80 giving part time to child-welfare services. Of the 669 workers, 243 were on the staff of State public welfare departments, 101 were in local welfare departments in urban areas of special need, usually war congested areas, and 325 were in local welfare departments serving rural areas. Child-welfare services were being provided in more than 400 counties and other local areas in all the States and in the District of Columbia, Alaska, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii.	J
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    The State public welfare agencies report that on May 31, 1944, 43,135 children in 23,391 families were receiving service from childwelfare workers paid in whole or in part from Federal funds.1 Of these children 68 percent were in their own homes or in the homes of relatives, 23 percent were in foster-family homes, 7 percent were in institutions, and 2 percent were elsewhere.
    Services for children of employed mothers.—The Federal funds available for day-care projects for children of working mothers during the year were those appropriated to the Federal Works Agency for community facilities. Bureau regional child-welfare consultants have continued to review and recommend child-care projects, not under school auspices, submitted to the Federal Works Agency.
    Close cooperation was maintained with the United States Office of Education and the Office of Community War Services in the Federal Security Agency, the War Manpower Commission, and the Federal Public Housing Authority on National policies and plans in relation to care of children of working mothers. The regional child-welfare consultants have worked with State public welfare agencies and with State and local children’s committees on the development of services to these children. A study of child-care services in 13 communities, covering community planning, counseling services, group care, and foster-family care, and a study of day-care services in Cleveland, Ohio, were made during the year.
    On request of the Council of Personnel Administration the Division of Statistical Research conducted a survey of the need for day care of children of women employed by the Federal Government in the Washington Metropolitan Area, and the findings were used as a basis for planning community facilities to meet the need revealed.
    Coordination of Community Services for Children, St. Paul.—The St. Paul Community Project, carried on from 1937 to 1943 in cooperation with local agencies, closed its office in St. Paul on July 31, 1943. lhe project was established to study (1) the problems of a community in identifying and treating children with personality and behavior difficulties, and (2) ways of developing and integrating social and welfare facilities to meet the needs of children. At the close of the fiscal year the Bureau’s report on the project was in the final stages of preparation.
    As one result of the project a Coordination Center for Communitv Services for Children has been established in St. Paul under the direction of the council of social agencies and with support from the community chest, the county welfare board, the St. Paul Department of Education, and the Bureau of Catholic Charities.
    Juvenile delinquency.—In the fall of 1943 two publications, Understanding Juvenile Delinquency (Pub. 300) and Controlling Juvenile Delinquency (Pub. 301), were widely distributed in connection with public discussion of wartime juvenile delinquency. A preliminary statement on juvenile-court statistics for 1943, based on telegraphic reports from 145 juvenile courts, was issued in February 1944, together with the report on juvenile-court statistics for 1940-42. The figures for 1943 showed that there was a 30-percent increase in the number of juvenile-delinquency cases disposed of by the 145 courts in
    1 Excludes Utah, which withdrew from the program as of April 1, 1944, to review its whole public welfare program.
    9
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	41
    1943 as compared with 1942. The report of the study of the effect of war conditions on the behavior of children and young people, made in 10 war-congested areas during the previous fiscal year, was published in the Survey Midmonthly for March 1944.
    The extensive use of jails for the detention of children has caused great concern throughout the country. The Social Service Division has continued to assemble information on this subject and to make its findings available to State and community groups.
    The Bureau has cooperated with the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Sheriffs’ Association, and the Division of Social Protection of the Office of Community War Services in considering how special training of police for work with juveniles may be organized and how closer working relationships between the police and other community agencies dealing with children can be developed. Studies in representative communities to be made early in the fiscal year 1945 were planned.
    In relation to wartime delinquency the Bureau has worked closely with the Office of Community War Services and its Division of Social Protection and with other Federal agencies. The Newport News project undertaken last year, in cooperation with the Bureau of Public Assistance of the Social Security Board and the Virginia State Department of Public Welfare, to develop methods of organizing a community to deal with wartime delinquency, was continued throughout the year. Financial responsibility for the project was assumed by the Virginia State Department of Public Welfare on July 1, 1944, with the two Federal agencies continuing to serve in an advisory capacity.
    Other social problems affecting children.—Among the problems which have become acute during the war period are the increase in many war-congested areas of the number of nonresident girls without established homes who become pregnant, difficulties arising from the absence of the father in military service, increase in the placement of infants for adoption without supervision by responsible public and private agencies, and the inadequacy of maternity-home facilities in many areas. The Bureau through its consultation service is contributing toward the development of plans to provide services for the mothers and infants affected by these situations. It works closely with the National Committee on Unmarried Parenthood, with local committees dealing with that subject in 30 cities, and with State public welfare agencies.
    Group work and recreation.—There has been marked increase in recognition of the value of group experience for children, evidenced by the growth in summer playground programs, teen-age recreation centers, and day camps for children of working mothers. The Children’s Bureau is contributing to this movement through the services of two group-work consultants in the Social Service Division, who are working with Federal agencies, National youth-serving agencies, State welfare departments, and local agencies on cooperative planning for leisure-time services for children and youth and the use of group experience to aid in their development.
    The Bureau’s Advisory Committee on Leisure-Time Services for Children met on March 13, 1944, and is preparing recommendations on teen-age recreation, recreation in children’s institutions, State
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    organization for recreation service, and plans for post-war recreation for children and youth.
    Child Labor and Youth Employment.
    Extent of youth employment.—In April of this year, while schools were still in session, the most reliable estimates available based on the sample labor-force survey conducted by the Bureau of the Census, Showed nearly 3,000,000 boys and girls 14 through 17 years of age at work. The number had increased to 5,000,000 in July. Almost 1 in every 5, of the children 14 and 15 years of age were at work in April 1944, as compared with about 1 in 7, in April 1943. In the 16- and 17-year age group the ratios were 1 in 3 in April 1943 and 1 in 2 in the corresponding month of 1944.
    Reports are now being received of employment certificates issued to children 14 through 17 years of age in 43 States, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico, and in 30 cities in 2 other States. For the 37 States and 31 cities reporting each year from 1940 to 1943, inclusive, there was an increase of 300 percent from 194Q to 1942, and of more than 85 percent from 1942 to 1943, in certificates issued for full-time or part-time employment. The increase was relatively greater among the 14- and 15-year-old children than among the 16- and 17-year olds. Preliminary and incomplete figures for the first 6 months of. 1944 indicate that the high levels of 1943 are being maintained.
    Part-time employment of school youth.—Available information pointed to the fact that much of the part-time employment of children attending school was harmful to both health and educational progress. Policies for part-time employment of school youth, developed in cooperation with the United States Office of Education and the War Manpower Commission, were agreed upon and issued early in September 1943. Strong stimulus to their use was given by their endorsement in March 1944 by the four Government agencies most directly concerned with the production of war goods—the War and Navy Departments, the Maritime Commission, and the War Production Board.
    Young migrants.—Another wartime aspect of youth employment that has aroused concern is the widespread migration of young people under 18 for work in war-industry centers where they are separated from their families. This migratory group includes large numbers of boys and a smaller number of girls 16 and 17 years of age, and some children of 14 and 15. Many of the large war industries send their agents out through the country to recruit new workers and increasingly, young people under 18 years of age are being added to the labor force. A brief survey was made in February 1944 covering six large industrial cities or centers located in different sections of the country. It revealed the seriousness of this situation. Upon arrival at their place of employment these boys and girls are immediately swallowed up in the army of older war workers who have preceded them to the locality. Without relatives or ties of any kind in the community they are their own masters. They are entirely free from supervision and only by chance do they come into contact with the stabilizing influences of the community.
    Young workers in agriculture.-—The War Food Administration estimated that 400,000 youth under 18 years of age would be placed
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    43
    in farm jobs by official placement agencies in the summer of 1943 and that 700,000 in all would be employed. A brief survey in 1942 showed that the administration of most of the programs for employment of these young persons was inadequate and that further cooperation and planning were essential if improved patterns of employment were to be developed on any wide scale.
    The direct liaison relationship with the War Food Administration and the Extension Service of the Department of Agriculture, which administer the farm-labor program, was continued. The policies and standards developed by the Industrial Division with the cooperation of other agencies have been largely accepted and have been incorporated to a considerable extent in Extension Service publications.
    The Bureau has cooperated with National youth-serving agencies and their Interagency Committee on Youth in Wartime Agriculture. This committee recommended that local programs be arranged in accordance with Children’s Bureau standards and urged that representatives of the youth-serving agencies serve on State and local youth farm-labor committees.
    As developed, with the advice of the Subcommittee on Young Workers in Wartime Agriculture, under the General Advisory Committee on Protection of Young Workers, the standards recommended for employment of children on farms in this war emergency include: A 14-year minimum age, with a 16-year minimum for those who are to live in farm homes or camps not run by a recognized youth-serving agency; medical examination and consent of parent; preparation for the work; regulation of working hours; and provision for supervision, fair wages, safeguards from injury and illness, and insurance against accidents.
    Cooperation of Federal agencies on youth employment.—In addition to the cooperative activities already described, both the War and Navy Departments, working closely with the Bureau, have established policies for employment of minors under 18 that set high standards for their young workers. The War Department directives require conformity with both State and Federal child-labor and school-attendance laws, and also establish standards substantially in accord with the child-labor provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
    The Navy Department in its circular letter regarding labor standards for its civilian workers established a 16-year minimum age for employment in naval establishments (except for non-civil-service employees in ship’s service) and required observance of the “Policies for Part-Time Employment of School Youth” for 16- and 17-year-old minors who are attending school, except for apprentices under the Navy's own apprenticeship program.
    The Post Office Department regulations since 1941 have required that minors shall be employed in conformity with State laws respecting age and hours of employment, but do not require adherence to Federal standards. During the 1943 Christmas season, the Department obtained permission from the United States Civil Service Commission to employ minors 14 and 15 years of age to assist in handling the Christmas mail. Though the authorization required adherence to certain standards, reports received by the Bureau indicate that employment conditions below these standards existed in many local offices.
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    State and community action on child labor.—Laws relating specifically to child labor or to compulsory school attendance were enacted in five States (Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, New York, and Virginia). Some of this legislation lowered child-labor or school-attendance standards or continued for another year legislation relaxing such standards. Three of the five States (Louisiana, Virginia, and Michigan) improved their compulsory school-attendance requirements. All the States except two (Georgia and North Carolina) have an age for compulsory school attendance of at least 16 years, State-wide in application, but a number of State laws include many exemptions. It must be borne in mind also that the full value of a 16-year school-attendance standard cannot be realized as long as many State child-labor laws have a 14-year minimum age for employment, and exemption from school attendance is permitted for 14- and 15-year-old children going to work.
    State officials increasingly are turning to the Bureau for advice and information on child-labor problems. Special interest is evidenced in laws and regulations affecting employment in bowling alleys, in laundries, on railroads, on boats, and in casual labor, and in limitations of hours of work of youth still in school.
    Back-to-school drive.—A “Back to School” campaign was initiated by the Bureau with the cooperation of the United States Office of Education in the summer of 1943. A leaflet bringing together ideas and facts for the use of various community groups in spreading an understanding of the importance of schooling for teen-age youth was distributed widely. Mayors and other public officials participated on nearly 100 local radio programs supporting the drive. Network radio programs were presented.
    Child-labor inspections under the Fair Labor Standards Act.— Under an arrangement agreed upon by the Chief of the Children’s Bureau and the Administrator of the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions, wage-hour inspectors not only inspect for child labor in all establishments inspected under the wage-and-hour provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act but also make special child-labor inspections as recommended by the Bureau. Plans for child-labor inspections are made jointly by representatives of the two agencies, and consultation and assistance in the child-labor aspects of the inspection work are given by Children’s Bureau staff. A marked expansion has occurred in the number of child-labor inspections made by the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions, along with an increased awareness of the importance of the child-labor aspects of the program. The childlabor consultants assigned to the regional Wage and Hour and Public Contracts offices have also given advisory service in connection with child-labor inspection procedure and technique under the Public Contracts Act.
    The child-labor inspections represented by cases closed during the fiscal year 1944 under the child-labor provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act covered all 48 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. They totaled 4,951, as compared with 3,961 in the previous fiscal year.
    Disposition of violations.—The number of violating establishments and the number of minors illegally employed in the year ended June 30, 1944, almost equalled the numbers for the 2 preceding years combined. The number of establishments in violation in 1944 was 2,938,
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    45
    as compared with 1,294 in 1942, an increase of 127 percent, and the number of minors illegally employed was 8,436, as compared with 4,083 in 1942, an increase of 107 percent. Many of the minors illegally employed were very young; 482, or 6 percent, were under 14 years of age and 116 were under 12 years of age, some as young as 8 years. Half of those under 12 years were in the canning and packing industry.
    The number of court cases, though small, has increased each fiscal year since the beginning of the war, numbering 47 in 1942, 75 in 1943, and 121 in 1944. In the 104 civil suits brought by the Bureau, 100 injunctions were granted, 99 of them consent decrees. Convictions were obtained in all 13 of the criminal actions brought by the Bureau.
    Certificates of age.—The cooperative agreements between the Bureau and State departments of labor or education in 44 States, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico, providing for the issuance of certificates of age, have continued in effect during the past year. So also has the program for issuance of Federal certificates of age by the Bureau in the 4 States (Idaho, Texas, Mississippi, and South Carolina) where no adequate provision for this service is provided in the State child-labor law. These State and Federal certificates serve as proof of age under the child-labor provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act, protect employers from unintentional violations of the law, and are an important preventive measure.
    Reports from the States show greatly increased volume of work of local certificate-issuing officers and a much heavier task in supervision of certificate issuance by State officials. Even with all the difficulties confronting the age-certification programs throughout the country, however, State and local officials have recognized the value of the system as strengthening the enforcement of State as well as Federal child-labor laws.
    The volume of work of issuing offices has also greatly increased, the total number of certificates issued for minors 14 through 19 years of age in all four Federal offices, rising from 11,085 for 1942 to 26,168 for 1943 and 40,512 for 1944.
    Hazardous-occupations orders.—Prior to last year, six orders had been issued under the power given to the Chief of the Bureau in the Fair Labor Standards Act to find and declare occupations particularly hazardous for the employment of minors between 16 and 18 years of age. These orders, establishing in effect a minimum age for employment of 18 years in the industry or group of occupations covered, relate to (1) explosives plants, (2) work as motor-vehicle driver and helper, (3) work in coal mines, (4) logging and sawmilling, (5) operating woodworking machines and certain types of off-bearing, and (6) occupations involving exposure to radioactive substances.
    Many questions have been raised by employers as to the application of the orders and as to whether the employment of minors is permissible under certain specific circumstances. For example, a number of operators of explosives plants asked permission to employ 16-and 17-year-old minors in administrative areas or other parts of the plant where no explosives were used. In these cases tests were developed to determine whether the areas in question could logically be classed as separate plants in administering Hazardous-Occupations Order No. 1. Other queries led to a clarification of Order No. 5, which prohibits employment of minors under 18 on woodworking machines,
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    to indicate that the order applies to metal-working machines used to cut wood and to woodworking machines used to cut materials other than wood.
    No new orders have been issued during this past year, emphasis being placed on advisory standards as better adapted to immediate wartime needs.
    Advisory standards for youth employment.—The advisory standards for the safe employment of young workers, Nos. 7 and 8 of which were issued during the fiscal year, are based on the degree of hazard of the occupations covered and have been prepared with the advice of employers, workers, and organizations interested in safety and health. The subject of No. 7 is the operation of metal-working machines, and of No. 8, the aircraft industry. The Bureau has received many indications that these standards have been of great value during the war period in guiding employers in the placement of their young and inexperienced workers in safe and satisfactory employment. In addition to private industry, Government departments such as the War and Navy Departments are using them as a guide in their placement of minors under 18.
    Relaxation of Federal standards for 1^- and 15-year-old children.— Pressures to use children of all ages in all types of industry have grown from month to month. Requests for relaxation of the Federal standards have also increased, becoming intensified in the spring of 1944. For nonmanufacturing industries, two relaxations only permitting extension of employment of 14- and 15-year-old children have been made by the Chief of the Bureau, and these only after careful consideration of all the facts and advice from the War Manpower Commission as to possibilities of other sources of labor.
    The first of these relaxations, effective October 9, 1943, and limited to the war period, allows 14- and 15-year-old children to head and peel shrimp for shipment as fresh raw or fresh frozen shrimp, when the work is carried on outside school hours and in compliance with the other provisions of Regulation No. 3 (Employment of Minors Between 14 and 16 Years of Age), with the condition that they may be employed up to 8 p. m. but not more than 6 clays in any 7-day period. A meal period of not less than 45 minutes must be allowed after not more than 5 hours of work, and pure drinking water, adequate washing facilities, and adequate sanitary toilet facilities must be available within the immediate proximity of each packing shed.
    The second relaxation, effective November 11, 1943, permitted the employment outside school hours of 14- and 15-year-old children in the picking of turkeys during the period between November 11, 1943, and December 31,1943, only. Such employment was limited to 6 days in any 7-clay period, and the same regulations as to meal periods and sanitary conditions were imposed as are required for the heading and peeling of shrimp. Certificates of age were required to be on file for each 14- or 15-year-old child, and the employer was required during the effective period of the amendment and for one year thereafter, to keep a record containing the name and address of each child so employee!, and the hours worked each day and each week by each child.
    Many problems have arisen in connection with the employment of 16- and 17-year-old girls working on Government contracts, as permitted by the Secretary’s order allowing restricted employment of
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    girls of these ages under the Public Contracts Act. Many requests for modification of the conditions of the order were received, and after departmental consultation it was agreed that under specified circumstances modification of the maximum 8-hour day and the 10 p. m. closing hour might be considered on joint recommendation to the Secretary by the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions and the Bureau. Under no circumstances might such modification extend the maximum daily hours beyond 9, or allow for more than 48 hours a week, or permit work after 12 midnight. No modification was granted unless (1) it was in accord with the State law or the State authority under wartime powers had approved the modification, (2) the local War Manpower official had certified that adequate labor supply above 18 was not available, and (3) the War Department or the Navy Department had approved the request for modification as necessary for war production.
    Service to Children in Minority Groups.
    A pediatrician on the staff continued to cooperate with Meharry Medical College in reorganizing the department of pediatrics and contributing toward the improvement of medical care available to the Negro child from Negro physicians. He also conducted for the Tennessee State Department of Public Health a series of lectures and consultations for Negro physicians in three sections of the State. .
    The Social Service Division, through its consultant on services for Negro children, gave intensive service in a number of West Coast communities affected by the migration of large numbers of Negro war workers. In San Francisco and Colorado Springs assistance was given on community organization for surveys of conditions affecting minority groups. In these and other communities attention was given to analyzing community attitudes that were in themselves problems affecting the development and protection of children. Consultation service was given to State departments of public welfare in California, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington, on the development of both white and Negro staff leadership that would prove effective in community programs.
    Measuring Services to Children.
    The Division of Statistical Research collaborated with the United States Public Health Service in devising a report form designed to show in greater detail the public-health personnel and the health facilities available in local areas. This form, sponsored by the two Federal agencies, was in trial use in 10 States and the District of Columbia during the year ended June 30,1944.
    A plan of reporting was worked out during the year for the emergency maternity and infant-care program, to meet the needs of the Division of Health Services for administering the program and for allotting funds to the State health agencies monthly to meet obligations incurred. A study was made of the extent to which cases authorized to receive maternity and infant care should have been closed because the applicants had moved from the State and therefore no care would be provided by the State. A second study was started to evaluate the work of the State health agencies in the determination of eligibility.
    The plan for reporting children receiving service under the socialsecurity program for child-welfare services was revised and extended.
    610138—45--4
    48	ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    Heretofore the State public welfare agencies have reported only on children served by workers paid in whole or in part from Federal funds for child-welfare services. Beginning July 1, 1944, the State agencies will include all children receiving noninstitution al services from workers in public welfare departments wTho are paid from Federal, State, and local funds. The coverage will be extended progressively to include children receiving institutional care and to children served by private agencies and juvenile courts.
    Extension of State-wide reporting of juvenile-court statistics was planned. At present only 8 States furnish statistics on a State-wide basis. At the close of the fiscal year a 1-year experiment conducted in cooperation with the District of Columbia Council of Social Agencies was nearing completion. This was designed to yield more complete information on juvenile delinquency through the registration of cases known to the police department, the juvenile court, the school authorities, and the public welfare agency.
    A report on expenditures in 1940 and in 1942 in 30 urban areas cooperating with the Bureau in reporting statistics of health and welfare services was published under the title “Community Health and Welfare Expenditures in Wartime.” During the fiscal year reports on the volume of health and welfare services were received from 43 urban areas through the social-statistics project.
    Commission on Children in Wartime.
    As part of its exploration of how organizations can aid in promoting State and community programs for children the Commission on Children in Wartime held a conference with church leaders October 22, 1943, to discuss the ways in which the churches can help to inform the public of the wartime needs of children and of community programs for their benefit.
    To bring to light the needs of children in minority groups, a conference on services for Negro children was held December 6 and 7. Recommendations adopted by the conference were directed toward more adequate public services for children of minority groups, of whom Negro children represent a large majority, as a necessary part of the effort to develop essential services for all children in the United States.
    The Chief of the Bureau in February 1944 reappointed the Commission for a 2-year period, to advise on measures needed to promote the welfare of children and youth as we move from war to peace. The membership of the Commission again includes the chairmen of the Bureau’s advisory committees, executives of National organizations conducting programs for children and youth, and representative State and local officials. Government advisers from other Federal agencies meet with the Commission.
    The Commission met March 17 and 18, 1944, to reexamine its objectives and accomplishments, to define new goals, and to consider the organization of social forces to promote these goals. A feature of the meeting was a youth panel on next steps in planning for youth, participated in by 12 boys and girls, 16 to 20 years of age, drawn from rural and city areas and representing both school and employed youth. The Commission adopted a statement reviewing gains made during the war years and problems still to be met and setting 10 goals, published under
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    the title, “Goals for Children and Youth in the Transition From War to Peace.”
    A Committee on Plans for Children and Youth is working with the Bureau’s advisory committees, in relation to these goals, on the development of measures needed in the fields of health and medical care for mothers and children, leisure-time services for children, social services for children with special needs, and youth education and employment.
    Cooperation With National, State, and Local Groups.
    Since it was created in 1912 the Bureau has had effective cooperative relationships with National, State, and local organizations concerned with the welfare of children. These contacts, even closer through the fact that many members of the Commission on Children in Wartime are representatives of such organizations, have proved effective in placing with active professional and citizen groups the publications relating to wartime situations affecting children and youth and programs developed to deal with these situations.
    In cooperation with the Office of Civilian Defense the Bureau has worked with State defense-council committees concerned with children and youth and has supplied them with publications for their use and the use of local defense-council committees on children. Similar service has been given to other State committees dealing with the problems of children and youth.
    To aid States and local communities in evaluating their provision for children and youth in preparation for post-war plans the Bureau issued during the year another publication based on the recommendations of the White House Conference on Children in a Democracy (1910) entitled “Our Concern—Every Child; State and community planning for wartime and post-war security of children.”
    International Cooperation.
    The staff prepared material on child health and child welfare in certain occupied countries for the Office of Foreign Relief and Rehabilitation Operations. After the transfer of activities to the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, consultation service was continued. The Associate Chief of the Bureau was appointed one of the alternates to the United States member of the UNRRA Technical Committee on Health.
    Consultation service to the United States Committee for the Care of European Children was continued. A report was made on a review of the administration and service of the European-Jewish Children’s Aid.
    Memoranda were prepared expressing the Bureau’s position on the preliminary recommendations proposed for consideration at the International Labor Organization conference held in Philadelphia April 20-May 3,1944, for the use of the Secretary of Labor as United States delegate to the conference. Many of the recommendations adopted in the field of employment, child labor, medical care, and social welfare are significant in relation to Children’s Bureau programs.
    The work of the Inter-American Unit was expanded in accordance with plans approved by the Interdepartmental Committee on Cooperation With the American Republics of the Department of State.
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    Staff consultation service extending over periods of several months was given on the request of the respective governments as follows: To Paraguay, a nurse to assist in training nurse-midwives; to Bolivia, a social-work consultant to advise on child-welfare legislation and services; to the Dominican Republic, a physician and public-health nurse-midwife on maternal and child-health services; to Costa Rica, a social-work consultant to cooperate with the National Board of Child Welfare and the National School of Social Service; to Cuba, a social worker to aid in establishing a school of social service; to Peru, a nutritionist to assist in strengthening the national nutrition program for mothers and children, and a social-work consultant to assist in developing rural social services for mothers and children; and to Brazil, in cooperation with the Office of the Coordinator of InterAmerican Affairs,.a child-welfare consultant to help plan for a school for dependent girls.
    Through arrangements with the Pan American Sanitary Bureau, the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs, the Department of State, and nongovernmental professional agencies, persons brought to the United States for professional training whose interests pertain to the fields of maternal and child health and social welfare are referred to the Bureau for advice concerning their programs in the United States. Many individuals from other American Republics visited the Bureau and a number were given aid in arranging for observation and study of children’s services.
    Beginning in July 1943 a Spanish edition of The Child was published in Mexico by'the Pan American Institute of Bibliography and Documentation.
    In May 1943 the Council of the American International Institute for the Protection of Childhood designated the Chief of the Bureau to serve as the Institute’s special representative for the northern zone of the continent. In accordance with this plan, the Chief of the Bureau in the spring of 1944 sent the director of the Bureau’s Inter-American Unit to Mexico, Nicaragua, Honduras, Salvador, and Guatemala. As a result of the visit the Mexican Government appointed a new technical delegate as a member of the council, the formal adherence of El Salvador to the Institute took place, and the Governments of Honduras and Nicaragua expressed interest in the question of adherence.
    Plans for the Reconversion and Post-War Periods.
    1.	Restriction of child labor; development of full educational and employment opportunity for youth.
    As peace approaches hundreds of thousands of boys and girls under military age who have cut short their schooling for gainful employment, will be demobilized from industry. Their readjustment will be as difficult, in some cases, as that of veterans of military service. Action to keep out.of the labor market those children and young people who should be resuming or continuing their education will be of great importance during the reconversion period. Constructive programs for young people should be developed, including educational and employment counseling, well-planned part-time programs of school and work, and other measures aimed to encourage the return to school of young persons who interrupted their education for wartime employ
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    ment, and the completion of schooling, at least through high school, for other young persons. Youth should have the opportunity, also, in some way to give service to their communities. These programs must be based on State and community planning, with Federal encouragement and, in certain instances, financial assistance.
    Adoption of a policy of Federal aid for general elementary and secondary education is essential if access to educational opportunity is to be assured to children everywhere in the country.
    The minimum age for employment during school hours should be raised to 16 years in the 32 States'and the District of Columbia which now have a lower basic minimum age. This objective should be pursued vigorously in the 1945 sessions of the legislatures.
    The child-labor provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act should be amended to cover young persons employed in agriculture at any time (not merely when legally required to attend school as at present) but exempting children working on their home farms.
    Provision for full enforcement of Federal and State child-labor laws should be made through adequate appropriations and provision for the necessary qualified staff.
    2.	Extension and improvement of health services and medical care for mothers and children.
    During the war the emergency maternity and infant-care program has reached more than two-thirds of the estimated number of children coming into the world whose fathers are men in the four lowest pay grades of the armed services of the United States, and aviation cadets. This is a wartime program, which will terminate 6 months after the close of the war. There is urgent need for expansion of continuing State programs and provision of additional services for maternity care and for health supervision and medical care of children from birth through adolescence.
    Evidence of the urgent need for expansion of health and medicalcare facilities for children has been dramatized by the rejection in a recent period, chiefly for health or educational reasons, of about 40 percent of the men examined for service in the armed forces. The extent of need was well*known before the war, but it took the war emergency to show how poorly we have measured up to our responsibilities to the 40 million children of the Nation—fitting them for adult responsibilities and privileges.
    Legislation should be enacted, separately or as part of an inclusive National health program, to provide Federal aid to the States to enable them to expand existing health services and provide additional services for maternity care and for health supervision and medical care of children from birth through adolescence, making such services fully available in every county or other local administrative unit in the United States.
    Medical-care programs should be developed around health centers and hospitals in which facilities for diagnosis, consultation, and health education are fully available. The program should include the organization and development of health and medical services for school children, including those in high school, through health services in the schools and diagnostic and treatment services in the community.
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    The crippled children’s program, which now reaches only a minority of children in need of special attention, should be expanded so that all physically handicapped children in need of service will have access to it. Special emphasis should be given to a Nation-wide plan for care of children with rheumatic fever and with heart disease resulting from rheumatic fever, one of the most important causes of death in childhood.
    3.	Extension and improvement of State and local child-welfare programs.
    Additional grants should be made available to the State public welfare agencies for developing child-welfare services so that they reach every child in need of help, in every county or other local administrative unit, providing for every child according to his need. The existing program of Federal cooperation with State public welfare agencies in extending and strengthening local child-welfare services reaches only a few hundred counties. The need for such services has been sharply accentuated by wartime conditions adversely affecting home life and the health and well-being of children. Long-existing problems which have been scarcely touched during the war period and which will require special consideration include the needs of the mentally handicapped child, the child with behavior problems, the child detained in jail, and the child without supervision because his mother works.
    Social services for children should be part of every local public welfare program. They should include measures for the reduction of juvenile delinquency, individual services to children failing to make satisfactory adjustments in home or school, and such special services as may be necessary to protect and care for children lacking normal parental care and guidance.
    4-	Development and expansion, under grant-in-aid programs for maternal and child health, and child welfare, of provisions for training professional personnel.
    5.	Action by the States and local governmental units to develop and support more fully programs necessary for fhe health and welfare of children, with such Federal assistance as may he provided.
    6.	Increased appropriations to the Children's Bureau for research and informational services.
    These appropriations are needed to provide adequate foundations of scientific knowledge and public understanding for services for the promotion of maternal and child health, elimination of child labor, educational and employment opportunities for youth, prevention and control of juvenile delinquency, and protection and care of children without parental care and supervision.
    The Bureau was created to serve as a center of research and information concerning all aspects of child welfare and child life. Its resources for research have been curtailed seriously during the war period, at the same time that its administrative responsibilities have increased. Conditions affecting child health and child welfare must be known, existing services evaluated and expanded, or new services carefully planned, if the best use is to be made of resources made available for children through Federal, State, and local governments and private effort.
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    7.	Strengthening of family life to meet the problems of reconversion.
    We cannot safeguard children nor provide for them the security and opportunity which their welfare and growth require unless we begin with the family. Beyond the special services for children here recommended, public and private policy should be directed toward the following goals for family life, included in the first item in the statement on Goals for Children and Youth adopted by the Commission on Children in Wartime:
    Strengthening and extension of special guidance, counseling, and rehabilitation services particularly needed in reestablishing families disrupted by wartime separations, with due recognition of the.spiritual, emotional, and social bases for wholesome family life.
    Assistance and service to families of men in the armed services facing radical readjustments of income and standards of living. Economic policies designed to encourage production of an abundant supply of goods to meet the needs of families and children and to provide employment opportunity for all at such wages and under such conditions as will assure an adequate economic ' basis for family life, with protection against discrimination in employment because of race, creed, or national origin.
    Extension of the coverage and benefits of social-security programs without residence restrictions.
    Housing policies and standards directed toward providing every family with decent housing so planned that necessary health, education, recreation, and welfare facilities and services for children are available.
    WOMEN’S BUREAU.
    Service to America’s working women finds the Women’s Bureau faced with the same objectives and responsibilities for women’s welfare and increased employment opportunities in a condition of world conflict as it faced on its creation in 1918. Certain basic differences between the two periods are great and significant, but some of the obvious similarities are discouraging.
    Though the Armistice of November 11 followed the creation of the Woman in Industry Service within so few months that practically none of the plans on paper had come to fruition, a backward glance reveals the close similarity of conditions in the industrial scene in 1944 and the conditions confronting the new service for women in 1918.
    Among the chief differences where the Bureau itself is concerned is the fact that the Woman in Industry Service was organized 15 months after the United States entered World War I, and the Armistice was signed 4 months later; whereas in this later period the Women’s Bureau, with 21 years behind it and in possession of great resources of knowledge and experience, set up its defense program of surveys and of collaboration with other war agencies in the early spring of 1940, as much as 20 months before the United States declared its intention as to World War II, and has been increasingly involved in war activities ever since.
    The two most disturbing similarities have to do with discrimination : the first concerning equal pay without regard to sex, at both periods approved in theory by Government and people and yet far
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    from being common practice; and the second concerned with the Bureau’s constant struggle for an adequate appropriation, a condition still greatly handicapping its activities in spite of the tremendously increased need.
    The year has been an overfull one, with essential surveys in progress seriously hampered, and highly important studies obviously impossible of undertaking, because of inadequate funds and personnel. Representation on the Interdepartmental Committee on Postwar Foreign Economic Policy, with its Special Committee on Labor Standards and Social Security and a further Subcommittee on Standards for the Employment of Women, was an interesting responsibility of the year, as were all the postwar studies that engrossed especially the Research Division. The 25th anniversary of the Bureau, celebrated in July 1943, and the christening of the Liberty Ship “Anna Howard Shaw” were high lights of a more social character but not without their official significance.
    Throughout the year the Bureau continued its close cooperation, in the interest of woman employment, with a wide variety of agencies and individuals, including the War and Navy Departments, Maritime Commission, War Manpower Commission, United States Employment Service, National War Labor Board, Office of Defense Transportation, War Production Board, Office of War Information, and a number of other war agencies; with labor unions—A. F. L., C. I. O., and railway brotherhoods; with State labor departments, Consumers’ Leagues and other community groups; with social workers, educators, employers, and employees; with the Bureau of Labor Statistics and other Department of Labor agencies; and with organizations of women such as the National Women’s Trade Union League, Young Women’s Christian Association, Business and Professional Women’s Clubs, American Association of University Women, and many others.
    Women’s Occupations in War Industries.
    Concentrating on the needs for women in war industries, the Women’s Bureau has continued to examine particular processes well fitted for performance by women and their conditions of work, with recommendations as to any changes designed to add to efficiency and well-being of workers. For some of these investigations findings have been published, others are still in progress.
    Among the reports published are those for the steel, shipyard, and foundry industries. These plants, formerly employing few or no women, had at the time • visited women at work constituting the amazing proportions of respectively 8, 10, and 16 percent of their production workers (excluding women clerical workers even in the plant offices). Though these are industries not well suited to the permanent employment of large numbers of women, they now are excellently served by women in many important capacities. The surveys report on hours of work, rates of pay and upgrading, suitable occupations, and work conditions. Especially in the case of shipbuilding particular recommendations are made for the proper selection and job placement of women, suitable induction and counseling for them as workers, and provision of adequate medical, safety, and service facilities.
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    At the request of the traffic panel committee of the National Federation of Telephone Workers, a study is being made of jobs in the traffic, commercial, and accounting departments in telephone companies. Its purposes are to assist the War Labor Board in establishing sound wage rates for operators (whose jobs have never been studied), and to make possible a comparison of rates for telephone workers with those of other war workers.
    Another study now in progress as to women’s occupations in particular industries covers Army supply depots; others will indicate the essential importance of women’s work in wartime railroad operations and in the manufacture of engines for aircraft.
    Regional and Field Representatives.
    In its several regional stations the Bureau has been able to meet at short notice immediate demands for advisory services to employers, labor organizations, State and Federal authorities, employee and citizen groups, and others. Cooperating with such persons and agencies, regional representatives have attended conferences, made inspections, furnished information, and otherwise been of assistance. A not inconsiderable part of’this work had to do with investigating conditions and recommending policies as to transfer of workers from plants that had declines in orders for war manufacturing and hence were making cuts in labor force.
    Conditions for Safety and Health of Women in War Plants.
    Certain needs that stand paramount in the employment of, women if best performance is to be obtained, especially where women new to the job are hired, were summarized popularly in a pamphlet of advice entitled “When You Hire Women.” Particular attention was given and specific recommendations were made in the field of the administrative supervision of women workers directed toward increasing their efficiency. The requisite qualifications and the effective functions of the woman personnel executive and her group of assistants were outlined in some detail as an aid to management in better placement and supervision of women workers, especially as a result of the experiences in shipyards.
    The widening field of responsibility on the part of the industrial nurse—including as it must a knowledge of plant working conditions, accident prevention,* service and food facilities, women’s personal and family problems, and other matters—led the Bureau to prepare a small bulletin designed to give a series of helpful suggestions to the industrial nurse, including those as to the causes and prevention of fatigue, the importance of good health habits, special health problems of women, occupational diseases, means of getting health information before the employees, and other subjects.
    One major condition for the health and safety of women workers lies in fitting the hours of work to their best performance. Late in the fiscal year the Bureau began a study expected to indicate certain of the effects of various standards of hours of women’s work in particular jobs. Plant records from establishments that have worked under two different schedules are consulted for data on hours and earnings, production, and the extent and causes of lost time. To give a more complete picture of the entire work load carried by women workers, such women are interviewed in their homes to secure infor
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    mation on the additional length of time required in the day by their home responsibilities, and the adjustments the individual must make under the longer hours.
    Community and Living Facilities for Women War Workers.
    The importance of satisfactory living arrangements as well as suitable conditions of work is emphasized in the report of a series of visits to 11 New Jersey and 6 New York centers that housed women migratory cannery workers. The comprehensive recommendations of the Women’s Bureau include standards as to the location and construction of housing facilities, water supply and sanitation, recreation and supervision, and other matters. Supplementing earlier publications issued by the Bureau on women war workers’ housing, a progress report has been made on efforts begun last year to overcome housing shortages for ■women war workers. Six national organizations of women provided this information, assembling for the purpose brief summaries from their groups in 44 States. In another study made this year, the importance of various community services in reducing absenteeism and turn-over in war-industry localities is discussed.
    During the fiscal year Women’s Bureau agents found many sensational examples of need and an encouraging number of successful services in their surveys of 37 war-industry communities, looking into the needs of women and advising with local authorities not only on housing but on methods of solving such problems as child care, shopping time, transportation, and recreation.
    Community and living conditions, as well as conditions on the job, also are uppermost in a report as to the employment of nonfarm women on farms in the northeastern States, made incident to the urgent demand for women workers especially on market-garden or truck farms and in orchards. Its recommendations are designed to aid in a better utilization of this source of labor supply in the 1944 season, based on the successful practices observed in the preceding year. A similar study has been in progress on the Pacific coast.
    Minimum Wage and Other Laws Affecting Women War Workers.
    Looking forward to the postwar period when economic conditions less favorable to high wages than those prevailing in the past few years may return, the Women’s Bureau has urged States with minimum-wage laws to extend the coverage of such laws by issuing new wage orders, and to revise existing wage rates that have ceased to reflect modern living costs. Technical assistance and factual information have been furnished in this modernizing.of wage orders. At the request of one large industrial State a detailed budget was prepared by the Women’s Bureau that would permit of the proper functioning of the minimum-wage division. For another, a plan for the organization and an outline of the functions of a State minimum-wage division were drafted, after visits to 7 States for consultation on this subject with their minimum-wage administrators. The Bureau also has advised with representatives of other Federal agencies, private organizations, and State minimum-wage administrators to outline, the kinds of provisions that would be most beneficial for incorporation into future State laws. Among requests from States for standards to be included in laws and orders governing woman employment were those as to a wartime amendment to the Oklahoma hour law, as to-standards
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    for a California sanitary code, and as to legal provisions to govern labor camps in New Jersey.
    Study has been made of special enforcement problems growing out of war conditions, particularly that of enforcing guaranteecl-weekly-wage provisions in cases where women are unwilling or unable to accept employment for a full workweek. Experiences of State administrators responsible for enforcing guaranteed-weekly-wage provisions have been exchanged through the facilities of the Bureau. States have been advised as to the effect of the Federal withholding-tax law on the collection of wages due under State minimum-wage orders, through interpretations furnished the Women’s Bureau by the Bureau of Internal Revenue. Current cost-of-living figures prepared for the Women’s Bureau by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and a revision of the standard budget for women workers made in cooperation with Department of Agriculture authorities, have been furnished on request to large numbers of organizations and individuals. Addresses were made on problems of woman employment to 20 groups in 10 States and the District of Columbia, including conferences of welfare, industrial, and State labor department authorities, union groups, women’s organizations, clubs, and schools.
    The Women’s Bureau continued its program throughout the year for the establishment of wage rates for the job without regard to the sex of the workers. At the request of unions, contract provisions were reviewed by the Bureau to assure against the adoption of wage provisions discriminatory to women. A resolution on equal pay adopted in Philadelphia by the International Labor Organization was drafted in the Women’s Bureau. At the request of the Bureau, Federal agencies several times during the year modified official policy in the interest of more equal wage practices for men and women. For example, the War Department, following an analysis of jobs in arsenals requested by the Bureau, enunciated this policy. Following Women’s Bureau representations a lower rate was not established under the Public Contracts Act, as was proposed, for auxiliary workers in the sugar-refining industry, all of whom are women; and the National War Labor Board gave blanket approval of all wage increases made in compliance with State equal-pay laws and ordered adjustment to this end to be made by certain of its regional boards. A 4-page leaflet, prepared and widely distributed, presents in clear and simple form the situation in May 1944 as to wages based on the job and not on the sex of the worker. It states briefly the very real gains made; the decisions in N. W. L. B. cases; the recommendation of equal pay made by 7 Federal war agencies; the equal-pay laws in operation in 5 States; and the attitudes of unions and management. Other legal interpretations much sought from the Women’s Bureau include its summaries of wartime State labor laws for 'women, and the wartime status of maximum-hour laws. A major revision is now in progress to set forth the State labor laws currently in force for women, with an explanation of the wartime changes.
    War needs and war changes have raised new problems as to women’s property and marriage relationships. To meet certain of these, the Bureau has issued a supplement to its earlier studies on legal status to give the significant additions and revisions made by State legislatures over the past 5 years in the laws defining the civil status of
    58
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    women, and has further analyzed existing sex distinctions in the State laws. Among responses to special requests was a memorandum on the effects of the equal-rights amendment on laws relating to family and property rights of women; and the report prepared at the request of the United States Bureau of the Census (population) on the incidence and duration of waiting periods in State marriage laws.
    Women in Labor Unions.
    The war years, with their great increment of women at work, also have seen enormous increases in woman membership in labor unions. Whereas about 800,000 such women members were reported in 1939, the approximate number has been estimated recently as 3,000,000. The Women’s Bureau program in cooperation with unions consequently has expanded. At the request of the United Electrical Workers, the Bureau entered into a joint program with the union in St. Louis and in several localities in New York State for the purpose of developing a better understanding between the women union members and other women’s organizations iji the communities, so that more adequate solutions of community problems affecting women workers could be developed. An educational campaign among A. F. L. and C. I. O. unions with large woman memberships was undertaken to secure the inclusion in union contracts of provisions not discriminatory against women, such as equal-pay clauses and seniority clauses that apply equally to men and women. The Bureau also has in progress an inquiry into women’s activity in unions and the action union groups are taking to secure equal treatment, equal pay, and equal seniority rights for their women members. It includes advice to officials and women on how to increase the value, to union and to women, of women’s membership and participation. In consultation with a committee of union women the Bureau issued a preliminary leaflet giving technical aid in phrasing provisions in union contracts in such a way as to secure best protection for women workers. Aid was given to unions in preparing their wage material for briefs before the War Labor Board.
    Needs of Women Workers After the War.
    In the early months of the fiscal year, war production shifts already were causing lay-offs that severely affected women in some localities, and the Bureau was receiving many requests for information and suggestions as to postwar policy for women. To meet these until results could be gained from the more comprehensive research program obviously needed, the Bureau issued a small bulletin drawing an initial picture of the various factors to be considered; stressing aims toward a high level of employment; pointing to certain sound basic policies; quoting the judgments of employers, Government officials, and women’s groups; and suggesting some of the lines of future job possibilities for women. Of this pamphlet over 12,000 copies were called for almost at once.
    Meanwhile, a concerted program of necessary research along several quite varied lines was planned and begun to provide background for further policy recommendations. In making these plans many conferences were held with representatives of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Women’s Committee of the War Manpower Commis
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	59
    sion, and women in labor unions and in certain of the major women’s organizations.
    To secure an authentic over-all background as to the war movements in woman employment, the Women’s Bureau requested the Bureau of the Census to collect special data indicating the extent to which women had entered and had left the labor market during the war period; the shifts in their employment among the various chief occupation and industry groups; the sources of the new woman-labor supply; and the age and marital status of women newly employed and of those usually a part of the labor force.
    Following these two initial bases that have been provided in this year, the Bureau began two others of a number of much needed major lines of research and investigation to be directed to the postwar needs of women workers. One of these—the only part of the program that entailed field work—is a series of investigations designed to obtain recent information directly from representative samples of women workers themselves in several selected industrial localities as to whether or not they were employed before Pearl Harbor; whether they expect to continue at work after the war or to return home; whether they desire occupations similar to their present ones; whether they have newly come to their present community and wish to remain there or not; and especially what their financial responsibilities are, the size and earning status of their families and whether family members are in service, and the extent to which the earnings of these women workers are necessary for family support. Late in the fiscal year four localities having major war industries were thus sampled by Bureau agents, and the tabulation for two of these is under way. Indications are that not more than one-fourth or one-fifth of the women now at work plan to leave the labor market after the war. This is not surprising, since 80 percent as many were employed before as during the war, some young women newly entering must be considered continuing members of the labor force, and in some families of servicemen it will be more necessary than ever for the women to work.
    The fourth of the major projects in the initial Bureau plan has been the beginning of a continuing program of research of a forward-looking and dynamic character as to the outlook for women in certain occupational fields in the postwar period. A series of some 5 nr 10 occupations in health and medical fields are being studied for the future prospects, including for example those of nurses of various types, occupational and physical therapists, laboratory technicians. Well under way also is a study of certain particular industrial occupations in which women are especially proficient, and factors affecting their opportunities in a number of industries in which these occupations are a major feature. Preliminary data are being collected in a number of other occupational fields, and along other lines as well, designed to aid in forming policies as to women workers in the postwar economy.
    Handclasps With Women Workers in Oother Countries.
    This year’s session in Philadelphia of the Conference of the International Labor Organization saw a considerable amount of work done in various divisions of the Women’s Bureau as an aid in furnish-
    6Q	ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    imr several types of material, advice, and policy suggestions to officials oAhat organization. A Women’s Bureau staff member was one of the specialists the Department of Labor had in attendance to give nppded assistance and she served as a consultant to women m foreign of these women met with the Director of the
    Women’s Bureau to discuss methods of implementing lecommenda tions adopted bv the International Labor Conference. .
    Of mutual interest to authorities in the United States and in, Great Britain is the handling in these respective countries of the problems connected with wartime woman employment. During the year W omen’s Bureau members have conferred on this subject with a number of Brithh officials and visitors to America. The Bureau has brought together in a concerted story the British Government’s programs as to^woman employment in the emergency, knowledge of the successes and difficulties in which can throw light on United States po c es Much more generally than here, the British Government has accepted and followed the advice of informed women as to situations inZ”u“hXPlTr-American Division, in association with the State Department the Women’s Bureau cooperates with the other American Republics in the task of improving working	an<^argnf
    emplovment opportunities for women. The Division selves as a smrnce of data about women of the other Americas by making avail-
    1 in tn TTnitpd States Government agencies, educational institutions, ±r unYons; women s organizations, and individuals the information acquired through observation and study in 7 South American coun-tries as for example about vocational and other schools, labor leto latio’n for employed women; women’s organizations m countries vis-■ hed • and so forth. A short pamphlet was prepared reporting the effect of the war on employment of women m Brazil, and anothei is; in progress dealing with Ecuador. Paraguay, and Peru. Sixty-four addresses were made to women’s groups, Inter-American Institutes, labor union and university lecture%eries, in 11 States and the District of Columbia In April the chief of the Inter-American Division was appointed the United States representative on the Inter-American Commission of Women, an official commission to which each of the 21 American Republics appoints one representative.	.
    The Division supplies information as to womens status in the TTnitpd SLates to South America, and has sent publications and visua material to tabor department officials, directors of social-work schools, and others who have asked for such materials for use m their work. A number of official visitors to the United States from Latin America have been given assistance in planning their programs, m maki appointment for them, in interpreting, and m securing the information they sought.
    A Center for Research and Information on Women Workers.
    Officially the center for information and advisory services on women workers the Bureau must carry on constant research for curiJ"t data on a wide range of related subjects. Recent calls have included reouests as to plant changes to fit jobs for women; summaries of data mlenrth of work hours’ or on effects of rest periods; information on women’s work in particular and often obscure fields, as in the mica industry, or local transport; data on woman employment in specific
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    61
    regions; data on entrance rates in war industries, trends in wages’, earnings of clerical workers; employment outlook for women in technical jobs, or in long-time woman-employing industries; woman employment in other countries, such as Canada, Russia, or Burma, or on postwar plans for women in other countries; and a great variety of other matters. Besides this endless research, much material must be organized in leaflets for popular use, and on request special articles and radio programs must be prepared. This year more than 600 sets of the 5 posters on women in war industries were distributed, as were over 200 printed or hand-made posters, maps, and charts, and 5 new posters were prepared. One exhibit showed women on similar jobs in World Wars I and II. From a file of over 3,000 photographs of women in essential industries many album displays were made for particular programs, such as those in school or labor-union groups and others.
    Recommendations.
    As has been true of practically all 25 annual reports preceding this of 1944, the Director’s chief recommendation is for the granting of an appropriation adequate to the task allotted to the Women’s Bureau on its creation in 1918. Women constituted 22 percent of all working people even before the w^r and have reached some 35 percent of all workers at the war production peak. With such figures it should be a simple matter to convince anyone that the welfare of so large a part of the labor force—on a par with men in responsibilities, right to work, aptitudes and skills, but differing from men in physical limitations, the function of childbearing, and the double schedule of worker and homemaker—not only warrants but demands adequate recognition of the agency charged with their welfare now and in the future.
    The competent handling by the Bureau of the enormous task with which it is faced under war conditions has received recognition from prai tically every quarter except the important one that appropriates the funds for carrying on its work.
    Other recommendations at the close of 26 years are for the passage of minimum-wage laws in States not covered, and the issuing of wage orders where they are needed; the attainment as soon as possible of the National standard of an 8-40-hour (5-day) week; the extension of the Social Security program to agricultural workers and household employees ; the same opportunities for women as for men in the way of technical and vocational training; wages for men high enough to cover the support of a family at the “American standard” of living; the undisputed practice of the principle of equal pay; the working out of a thoroughly equitable system of seniority rights in employment; continuation of the programs begun and more extensively planned to formulate policies as to women workers’ needs in the reconversion to a peacetime economy with full employment; the restoration to the Department of Labor of the Employment Service, as well as all the other activities properly belonging thereto.
    WAGE AND HOUR AND PUBLIC CONTRACTS DIVISIONS.
    Once again in the war year ended June 30, 1944, promotion of the war effort was a primary goal of the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions. Not only were emergency war programs carried
    62	ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    out for the War Labor Board, the War Production Board, and other agencies, but special effort was continued to simplify and integrate the administration of the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Public Contracts Act to cut to a minimum any burden on industry that might impede the fullest production for victory.	'
    Having themselves pared their budget request for the enforcement of the two Acts below the appropriation for the previous year, the Divisions were cut a further 20 percent by Congress. With this reduced staff, composed largely of new personnel in view of a 50 percent turn-over during the year, compounded on a 50 percent turn-over the year before, through transfers to the armed services, war industries, and war agencies, a total of 54,431 inspections were completed, compared with 61,000 the previous year and 75,000 during the year ended June 30, 1942. Thus under this program it was possible last year to inspect about one-tenth of all the establishments in the country—of which there are more than 500,000—with workers protected by the Acts. Several hundred thousand such establishments have never yet been inspected in all the years that the Acts have been in force; many go out of existence without ever being inspected and probably as many new covered establishments came into existence as were inspected for the first time last year.	.
    Three facts stand out in regard to enforcement: A substantial increase in restitution despite the lower number of inspections; the continued high proportion of monetary violation cases where, despite prevailing high wages, there was failure to pay the minimum wage of 30 to 40 cents an hour; and the continued upward trend of child-labor violations.
    Of the 54,431 completed inspections under both Acts, 51,178 establishments were found subject to the wage or overtime provisions; of these, 36,815 or 72 percent were found in some violation; 24,830 or 49 percent were in violation of the minimum wage or overtime provisions of tlio xVcts
    ' Mounting to more than $1,500,000 above the previous year’s total, restitution of $18,620,369 of illegally withheld wages was agreed to or ordered paid to 534,422 workers in 20,622 establishments. Failure to pay the minimum wage of 30 to 40 cents an hour was involved in 28 percent of these cases and restitution of such minimum wages was found due more than 100,000, about one-fifth, of all the underpaid workers.	.
    In the 5 years and 9 months that the Fair Labor Standards Act had been in force through the end of the fiscal year, about $70,000,000 m restitution of illegally withheld wages had been agreed to or ordered paid to almost 2,000,000 workers in about 90,000 establishments, with almost half the cases involving failure to pay the minimum wage of 40 cents an hour or less. Several times this amount has probably been collected in addition over the period, through private action or negotiation by employees and their unions under a section of the Act which provides double penalties for failure to pay the minimum wage or time and a half overtime after 40 hours a week.
    Coverage under the Public Contracts Act remained near the high point established the previous year when the nunjber of new contracts reported to the Divisions nearly equalled and the value exceeded the total for the whole preceding period since the Act went into effect in
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    63
    1936. In the year ended June 30,1944, 98,167 contracts with a value of $30,261,662,189 were reported to the Divisions, not counting secret, confidential and restricted contracts, as compared with fewer than 4,000 valued at less than $200,000,000 in the first fiscal year of the Act’s operation.
    Many establishments are covered under both Acts so that it is impossible to give separate figures for restitution, which in many cases would be due under either Act. Of the 54,431 inspections completed during the year, 11,900 were made under the Public Contracts Act, all but 269 of which were concurrent with Wage-Hour inspections. In 51 percent of the Public Contracts inspections violations were found and in 3,912 of them, violations of the minimum wage or overtime provisions. During the year 3 firms were blacklisted for serious violations.
    As a result of concentrated emphasis, complaint cases were reduced to the proportions of a working backlog, with 5,531 complaint cases on the books at the close of the year. In addition to inspecting on complaint, the Divisions proceed on a spot-check basis in industries and areas where there is reason to believe violation may exist and, so far as staff is available, concentrate on such sore spots as may be revealed and reinspect firms with records of serious monetary violation or poor safety and health standards in the past. The Divisions also inspected a number of firms in industries where the minimum wage had just been raised to 40 cents through wage-order action.
    The tremendous increase in our war labor force, which has seen the employment of almost 3,000,000 children 14 through 17 years of age, has led to a marked upturn in child labor violations. During the year, 4,589 establishments employing minors in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act or without certificates were reported to the Children’s Bureau by the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions. Over half of these establishments were in violation of the Act’s child labor provisions, and inspection by the Children’s Bureau revealed an additional 183 violating establishments. A total of 8,436 minors were found employed in “oppressive” child labor. Over 70 percent more establishments were found in violation last year than during the preceding fiscal year and 127 percent more than during 1942, while the number of minors illegally employed increased almost 85 percent over 1943 and 107 percent over 1942.
    The child labor provisions of the Public Contracts Act provide that no boy under 16 nor girl under 18 shall be employed on government contracts in excess of $10,000. A wartime exemption has been made permitting employment of girls between 16 and 18 years of age under certain conditions. The Act provides liquidated damages of $10 for each day each minor is employed under conditions prohibited by the Act and this exemption. During the year 575 firms were thus assessed for child labor violations and the liquidated damages amounted to $394,410. Although inspections under the Public Contracts Act increased 50 percent over the previous year, the number of establishments violating the child labor provisions increased over 600 percent.
    Under the Public Contracts Act the Divisions are charged with inspection of safety and health conditions in plants working on public contracts. This has assumed greater importance during the war emergency, when losses from industrial accidents have increased alarm-616138—45---------5
    64	ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    ingly, owing to firms entering fields of production new to them, skilled and unskilled workers going to new jobs and an influx of new workers: Women, learners, aged, handicapped, and minors in industry. The Act provides that compliance with safety and health provisions of State laws is prima facie evidence that the requirements of the Public Contracts Law are being met, and cooperative agreements have been made with 20 States having efficient safety and health programs and inspection forces, whereby these States conduct and enforce safety, sanitation and health requirements, once again avoiding overlapping inspections. These States are notified whenever a contract covered by the Act is awarded to a plant within their borders.
    The Division of Labor Standards of the U. S. Department of Labor has developed safety programs to reduce the number of on-the-job accidents in war industries, organizing a National Committee for the Conservation of Manpower in War Industries composed of |600 safety engineers located in all sections of the country. In those States in which there is no agreement between the state and the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions, the NCCMPWI provides a technical advisory service, to assist in seeing that the requirements of the Public Contracts Law are being met. Again with a view to avoiding duplication, safety experts of the NCCMPWI visit plants and check serious safety and health hazards reported to them by the Divisions, with a view to making recommendations for their correction. Of the 8,222 establishments inspected as to safety and health, some 2,700 were found in violation of the State code, of injury frequency rate regulations or to have unsatisfactory safety or health conditions.
    Litigation.
    Proceedings for injunctions against future violations of the wage or hour provisions were instituted in 347 cases, while the criminal penalties which the statute provides for cases of wilful violation were invoked m 41 cases. The drop in the number of suits instituted i e-sulted largely from a decrease in consent decrees. Contested cases showed a slight increase over the previous year, with 77 cases con-tested..
    The most significant decision of the U. S. Supreme Court relating to the Fair Labor Standards Act was in the case of the Tennessee Coal, Iron and R. R. Co. v. Muscoda Local in which the Court upheld the Administrator’s position that hours spent by miners in underground metal mines traveling from the portal to the working face and in returning to the portal at the end of the day was work or employment compensable under the Act.	. .	.
    Next in importance was the Supreme Court’s decision m Addison y. Holly Hill Fruit Products, Inc., invalidating the Administrators definition of “area of production.” The Court split five to four on this case. The prevailing opinion ruled that the “area of production” contemplated by the Act was a geographical area and that the Administrator’s authority was limited to designating teiritonal bounds” and did not “allow the Administrator to discriminate between smaller and larger establishments within the zone of agricultural production.” The Administrator proceeded, following the decision, toward the formulation of a new definition as expeditiously as possib e.
    By declining to review several Circuit Court decisions, the Supreme
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    65
    Court has left in effect a number of significant decisions, some of which were decided in favor of the Administrator’s interpretations and some of which were contrary to his interpretations. In Sun Publishing Co. v. Mailing, the Sixth Circuit held that a small newspaper which received portions of its news through leased telephone wires and international news services, and whose out-of-state circulation was only three percent of its total, was within the coverage of the Act. The decision also ruled that the application of the Act to a newspaper did not abridge the freedom of the press or constitute unlawful discrimination under the Fifth Amendment. It sustained the validity of the Administrator’s definition of “executive,” “administrative” and “professional” employees exempted from the Act by Section 13 (a) (1).
    The Eighth Circuit held (Mailing v. Addison-Miller Co.) that a consent decree enjoining violations of the Act and requiring the employer to pay back wages could not be set aside on the ground that it was beyond the power of the Court. This decision sustained the right of the Administrator to secure the restitution of unpaid wages at least in instances where the parties consent to the judgment.
    Other cases upheld the right of the Administrator to secure judicial enforcement of subpoena without prior prqof that the employer was covered by the Act {Mississippi Road Supply Co. v. Mailing and Fenton v. Mailing).
    One very significant decision upheld the power of the Administrator to prohibit the employment of home workers in the embroidery industry as a measure for safeguarding the rates established by a wage order (Guiseppi v. Mailing). One of the judges was of the opinion that the Administrator had authority to make such a regulation not only with respect to wage order rates but also to protect the statutory minimum rates. A petition for review of this case by the Supreme Court is now pending.
    In no case was it necessary during the fiscal year to resort to the courts under the Public Contracts Act. Thirty-six administrative hearings were held. Administrator’s decisions were rendered in 17 cases and decisions of the Secretary in three cases, the great bulk of decisions not being appealed.
    Exemptions.
    In interpreting the applicability of the Fair Labor Standards Act exemptions in particular situations, consideration has been given to the special conditions resulting from the war. This has been necessary in many fields; for example new policies and procedures have had to be developed for disabled veterans and for training of workers to meet war production demands. Regulations and interpretations have had to be revised because of changes in wage structure, occupational patterns and business practices.
    Action by Congress to provide for post-war rehabilitation of disabled veterans and of civilians injured in industry has required effective cooperation with the Veterans Administration and the Federal Security Agency insofar as the programs enacted are affected by the Fair Labor Standards and Public Contracts Acts.
    The Veterans Administration under Public Laws 16 and 346 of the 76th Congress has set up extensive programs of service to disabled veterans which call for widespread training on the job in industry and specialized occupational therapy and employment training in
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    hospitals and institutions. Many of these activities will bring the veterans within the protection of the Fair Labor Standards and Public Contracts Acts. So far as possible, the Veterans Administration will place handicapped veterans, and civilians for training in jobs where their handicaps will not affect their earning capacity. However, it is expected that the handicaps may in some cases call for subminimum wages during training. Coordinated procedures, safeguarding the veteran’s earning ability throughout the training period, provide for special certificates for such training at subminimum rates without possibility of delay. The Administrator has empowered Regional Vocational Rehabilitation Officers of the Veterans Administration to issue such subminimum rate certificates under specified conditions, for not more than 90 days. If a subminimum wage rate beyond 90 days is needed, a continuing certificate may be issued by the Divisions.
    The program of training and retraining of veterans under the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944 will require the formulation of additional policy in the application of the Acts to apprentice training, and the upgrading and retraining on the job of workers in industry.	.	...	.
    The responsibility for vocational rehabilitation of disabled civilians is vested in the Federal Security Agency, whose services for handicapped civilians follow closely those for disabled veterans. Special certificates authorizing subminimum wage rates are issued by the Divisions when circumstances warrant, on application of the state vocational rehabilitation officers who are directly responsible for the Federal-State Program under the supervision of the Federal Security Agency.
    Throughout the year, handicapped workers in sheltered workshops operating under the Divisions’ regulations have continued to produce substantial amounts of goods needed for the war effort. Particularly those for the blind have acquired contracts for war and essential civilian goods in increasing numbers.
    The Sheltered Workshop Committee established by the Administrator to advise on administration of the Fair Labor Standards Act in relation to these shops formulated and published last year at its own expense a statement of elementary standards respecting the policies, organization, operation, and service activities of sheltered workshops. The acceptance of this statement by sheltered workshops has substantially assisted the Divisions in administration of the Acts and aided the workshops to attain acceptable labor standards. An increasing proportion of workers in sheltered workshops average well above the applicable minimum wage under the Acts.
    The continuing war manpower requirements and the shortage of labor have made the employment of physically handicapped persons in industry increasingly essential. At the same time, general plant wage increases coupled with the Divisions’ expanded educational program to make employers conscious of the need to raise wages for certificated handicapped workers have resulted in a decline in the number of certificates issued permitting the employment of handicapped workers at a subminimum wage as well as an increase in the wage rates permitted under certificates still in effect. During the fiscal year, 2,141 applications for handicapped certificates were received and 1,881 cer
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    67
    tificates were issued. The workers now certificated include many of the more seriously handicapped who have entered the competitive labor field for the first time.
    Industrial home-work regulations issued as part of industry wage orders restrict home work in the Jewelry, Gloves and Mittens, Button and Buckle, Knitted Outerwear, Women’s Apparel, Handkerchief, and Embroideries Industries. Under the orders, home work may be performed only by persons unable to adjust to factory work because of age or physical or mental disability, or who are kept home-bound through responsibility for an invalid. An employee applicant must have been engaged as a home worker in-the industry prior to a specified date unless this results in unusual hardship to the home worker.
    As reported under the heading Litigation, embroideries firms filed actions to determine whether the Administrator was acting within his power in issuing home work regulations for that industry.
    At the end of the fiscal year, 1,710 certificates were in effect in the other six restricted industries throughout the country. In addition, 1,630 certificates issued by the New York State Department of Labor in the Gloves and Mittens Industry, approved under the Federal regulations, were in effect.
    Following the industry committee recommendation of a 40-cent minimum wage for the Communication, Utilities, and Miscellaneous Transportation Industries, the Administrator received an application from the Western Union Telegraph Company to employ messengers engaged exclusively in the delivery of letters and messages at subminimum wage rates. On the basis of testimony and evidence submitted at a public hearing, the Administrator found that a subminimum wage rate for messengers was not necessary to prevent curtailment of opportunities for employment and the application was subsequently denied.
    The' Independent Telephone Association, representing a preponderance of all telephone companies not affiliated with the American Telephone & Telegraph Company, also subject for the first time to a 40-cent minimum wage, applied for amendments to the learner regulations to increase the length of the learning period for switchboard operators and to increase the number of learners who might be employed at subminimum wage rates under special learner certificates. After a hearing on this application, the learner regulations for the Independent Telephone Industry were amended to increase the subminimum wage rates for learners from 25 cents to 30 cents for the first 320 hours and 35 cents per hour for the next 160 hours of a 480-hour learning period for switchboard operators. Authority was also granted to issue certificates to the extent of an employer’s proved need to meet abnormal labor turnover resulting from the war emergency. The amended regulations recognized the difference in the need for a subminimum rate for learners in large and small exchanges, learner certificates being denied to exchanges of 2,000 or more stations unless the exchange could show that unusual circumstances made the issuance of a learner certificate necessary to prevent curtailment of opportunities for employment.
    There was a marked decline in the number of learner certificates issued during the fiscal year, due principally to the difficulty of obtaining learners at rates less than 40 cents an hour in an increasing
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    number of tight labor markets throughout the country and to the general rise in the wage levels during the war emergency period. During the year 2,100 applications were received and 1,753 certificates issued, as compared with 3,853 applications and 3,313 certificates the previous year, and 6,125 applications and 5,182 certificates the year before that.
    A public hearing on the need for readjustment of apprentice rates in the diamond-cutting industry resulted in abolishing subminimum rates for apprentices in the continental United States and a considerable increase in the rates in the Puerto Rican branch of the industry. Wage orders.
    The past year saw the completion of one of the most important tasks set by the Congress in the Fair Labor Standards Act: that of establishing as rapidly as was economically feasible a 40-cent hourly minimum wage for all of the 21,000,000 workers in the continental United States protected by the Fair Labor Standards Act.
    While under the terms of the Act a universal 40-cent statutory min-' imum becomes effective on October 24, 1945, the Congress provided an industry committee and wage order procedure through which the 40-cent minimum could be achieved, industry by industry, prior to that time.
    Since the inception of the Act there have been 70 industry committees. During the year 19 wage orders were issued, bringing direct wage increases to 40 cents an hour to 610,000 workers in the following industries employing about 15,000,000 covered workers:
    Embroideries Industry; Pens and Pencils Manufacturing Industries; Metal, Plastics, Machinery, Instrument, and Allied Industries; Mattress, Bedding, and Related Products Industry; Miscellaneous Textile, Leather, Fur, Straw, and Related Products Industries; Canned Fruits and Vegetables, and Related Products Industry; Cottonseed and Peanut Crushing Industry; Vegetable Fats and Oils; Stone, Clay, Glass, and Allied Industries; Chemical. Petroleum, and Coal Products, and Allied Manufacturing Industries; Meat, Poultry, and Dairy Products; Fruit and Vegetable Packing and Farm Products Assembling Industry; Wholesaling, Warehousing, and Other Distribution Industries; Logging, Lumber and Timber, and Related Products Industries; Bakery, Beverage, and Miscellaneous Food Industries; Metal Ore, Coal, Petroleum, and Natural Gas Extraction Industries; Construction Industry; Finance, Insurance, Real Estate, Motion Picture, and Miscellaneous Industries; and Communication, Utilities, and Miscellaneous Transportation Industries.
    Industry committees also met and made recommendations for special rates for Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.
    Although no new wage determinations were made under the Public Contracts Act in the year, several were amended by the Secretary of Labor. A summary of these amendments which became effective during the year follows:
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    69
    Amendments to minimum wage determinations under the Public Contracts Act, fiscal year
    Industry	Amendment provisions	Effective date
    Handkerchief		(1) Minimum changed from 35 cents an hour, or $14 a week (40 hours) to 40 cents an hour or $16 a week (40 hours). (2) Provision added for employment of learners at subminimum rates in accordance with present applicable regulations issued under the Fair Labor Standards Act.	July 8,1943
    Men’s Neckwear		(1) Minimum for boxers and trimmers changed from 37.5 cents an hour, or $15 a week (40 hours) to 40 cents an hour, or $16 a week (40 hours). (2) Employment of learners and apprentices at subminimum rates made subject to present applicable regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act.	July 8,1943
    Seamless Hosiery		(1) Minimum changed from 36 cents an hour, or $14.40 a week (40 hours) to 40 cents an hour or $16 a week (40 hours). (2) Provision added for employment of learners in accordance with the present applicable regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act.	July 8,1943
    Cotton Garment and Allied Industries; Knitting, Knitwear, and Woven Underwear Industry; Rainwear Industry.	Provision added for employment of learners at subminimum rates in accordance with present applicable regulations under Fair Labor Standards Act, as those regulations were amended on June 28, 1943.	Sept. 13,1943
    Men’s Hat and Cap		(1)	Minimum for auxiliary workers changed from 37}4 cents an hour, or $15 a week (40 hours) to 40 cents an hour, or $16 a week (40 hours). (2)	Removal of the limitation on the proportion of auxiliary workers permitted. (3)	“Auxiliary worker” redefined.	Mar. 2,1944
    Work for war agencies.
    Earlier reports have described programs carried on by the Divisions for various war agencies, which in the year ended June 30, 1944 were as large in scope—in terms of personnel—as the whole regular enforcement program under the two Acts.
    Throughout the year the Divisions continued as primary public contact for the War Labor Board in stabilization matters, furnishing information to all inquirers on jurisdiction, policy statements, general orders and regulations of the Board; issuing written rulings on these subjects; distributing, receiving, and screening for the Board applications for voluntary adjustments; referring to the U. S. Conciliation Service disputes which came to their attention in the course of their activities; and through speeches, radio, “clinics,” and publicity releases carrying on a comprehensive information program to reduce the volume of inquiries by keeping the public informed.
    The magnitude of the total job is reflected by the following figures: From the start of the program in October 1942 to June 30, 1944, the end of the fiscal year, a total of 148,229 rulings were issued, 226,782 Form 10 applications were serviced and forwarded to the Board, and 2,300,000 personal interviews, telephone calls, and letters were handled. That only 1,571 rulings were reversed by the War Labor Board, about 1 percent of the total, bespeaks the quality of the accomplishment. Its dispatch is attested by the time elapsed between the receipt of a Form 1 (request for ruling) by the Divisions to the date of issuance of a ruling. This has averaged from 4 to 5 days over the past year. The average time elapsed from the receipt of a Form 10 (application for voluntary adjustment) by the Divisions to the date of forwarding the processed application to the appropriate Regional WLB has been 2 to 3 days.
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    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    At the close of the year, the Divisions were handling an average load of approximately 1,000 Forms 1 per week, and approximately 4,000 Forms 10 per week.
    In addition, since the Divisions in their regular enforcement of the Acts were inspecting establishments in a large number of industries and had trained inspectors and supervisory staff, they were asked to combine enforcement activities for the WLB with the work they were already doing. This meant a substantial saving in time, money, and manpower for the Government, and relieved the employer of the burden of different investigations by different inspectors at different times. Very few employers opposed or refused to cooperate with the Divisions’ inspectors in permitting an investigation to be made of their plants.
    These inspections were of two types. The first was a test check conducted as an automatic adjunct of an FLSA or PCA inspection, to check compliance as to wage stabilization. The second was a full-dress investigation made upon the express request of the WLB where there was reason to believe, through complaint, test check, or analysis of particular industries or areas, that violations of wage stabilization were serious. Both test check and full-dress investigation reports, upon completion, were referred to the WLB for disposition and the Divisions’ inspectors were made available for testimony at enforcement hearings whenever required.
    During the year, the Divisions completed a total of 19,320 test checks and 6,395 full-dress investigations. Top officials of the NWLB have been generous in stating that it would have been impossible to administer the wage stabilization program had it not been for the participation and assistance of the Divisions.
    Smaller in scope, less known to the public, but equally important to the winning of the war on the production lines, was the work for the War Production Board, whose earlier phases were also described in earlier annual reports.
    Throughout the year aluminum, copper, and steel—the three most critical basic war materials—were channeled into production through the controlled materials plan, directed by the War Production Board whose eyes and ears were the Divisions’ inspectors. As a result of their audits, bottlenecks in war production were substantially reduced. Early in 1944 the War Production Board was able to announce that the country was “over the hump” in respect to these three critical materials.
    Thousands of tons of idle aluminum, copper, and steel were brought out of hiding by the inspections. Under CMP regulations, plants were allowed enough critical materials for 60-day use. Inspectors found a shipbuilding firm with enough of one type of steel for nearly 10 years, enough of one grade of copper tubing for three years, enough of one grade of steel plates for almost five years. A machine company had steel and brass on hand for periods of from two to six years. An iron works was revealed to be diverting controlled material into unauthorized products. Such examples were multiplied many times.
    The result of hoarding and diversion might be tanks without treads, planes without propellers. The CMP ended this waste of scarce materials tied up in unfinished products and parts and succeeded in
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	71
    bringing under control the national supply of steel, copper, and aluminum.
    Under the Divisions’ CMP inspection program, a total of 10,141 completed cases were returned to the WPB. Inspection man-days totaled 57,313. From the reports reviewed by the WPB, compliance action was taken on all but 62 cases.
    In addition to the CMP audits and the previous PRP inspections, the Divisions aided the WPB through numerous special emergency industry surveys. A recent one was conducted in the fibre-box industry, because of the critical pulp shortage that had developed throughout the country toward the close of the fiscal year in view of the great need for high-grade kraft paper for the manufacture of the V boxes required for Army, Navy, and Lend-Lease overseas shipments.
    The Divisions also were called in for a materials audit of all major United States Navy Yards throughout the country in a joint operation with Navy Department personnel.
    With manpower on the West Coast critically short, the Divisions were called in on an emergency basis in the five cities of San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, and Seattle to make inspections whereby the orders of the Area Manpower Priorities Committees— with representatives of the public, employers, and labor—might be enforced. On the basis of these inspections thousands of workers were transferred from plants where an excess of labor was being hoarded to airplane and other factories where they were vitally needed.
    OFFICE OF THE SOLICITOR.
    The Solicitor of Labor serves as legal counsel to the Secretary and to all the Bureaus and Divisions of the Department of Labor, both in Washington and the field. Organized on a functional basis, the Office of the Solicitor during the fiscal year 1944 rendered legal services discussed below under the following headings: 1. Litigation; 2. Administrative Proceedings; 3. Interpretations and Legislation; 4. Wage Determination and Wage Adjustment.
    7. Litigation.
    Although it has been the practice to publish for the guidance of industry and labor interpretations of the Fair Labor Standards Act which are given great weight by the courts, the ultimate scope and application of the Act can be finally determined only by authoritative, judicial decisions. Many of the areas in which doubt formerly existed have already been clarified. During the past year the process of judicial interpretation and clarification continued furnishing precedents from which may be ascertained the proper application of the Act to other situations. There remain, however, many other areas in which further litigation will be required before the correct interpretation of the Act is established.
    The decisions in Tennessee Coal, Iron cfi R. R. Co. v. Muscoda Local No. 123, 321 U. S. 590; Addison v. Holly Hill Fruit Products, Inc., 320 U. S. 725; Sun Pub. Co. v. 'Walling, 140 F. (2d) 445 (C. C. A. 6), 322 U. S. 728; 'Walling v. Addison Miller Co., 138 F. (2d) 629 (C. C. A. 8), certiorari denied 64 S. Ct. 781; Mississippi Road Supply Co. v. 'Walling, 136 F. (2d) 391 (C. C. A. 5), certiorari denied 64 S. Ct. 57;
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    Fenton v. Walling, 139 F. (2d) 607 (C. C. A. 9), certiorari denied 321 U. S. 798; and Guiseppi v. Walling, 144 F. (2d) .608 (C. C. A. 2), certiorari denied 65 S. Ct. 84 are discussed in the litigation section of the report of the Wage and Hour and Public Contracts Divisions.
    Other judicial decisions of importance handed down under the Fair Labor Standards Act related to coverage of the Act and methods of computing overtime.
    Decisions rendered before the beginning of the fiscal year 1944 on the meaning of the phrase “necessary to the production” of goods for interstate commerce had already indicated that it embraced not only the employees engaged directly in production, but also the employees engaged in various supporting activities in the same economic unit. The Supreme Court’s decision in Walton v. Southern Package Corp., 320 U. S. 540, puts this issue beyond dispute, holding that a watchman on duty at night when the plant was not in production was engaged in an occupation necessary to the production of goods foi interstate commerce. The limits of coverage are not so clearly defined by judicial decisions, however, in the cases of employees in an economic unit one step removed, who are engaged in furnishing necessary means of production. During the past year, however, a number of judicial decisions were handed down which sustain the Administrator s view that these employees also are protected by the Act. In Reynolds v. Salt River Valley Water Users Assn., 143 F. (2d) 863, certiorari denied 65 S. Ct. 117, the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that employees maintaining an irrigation system which supplied water to farms producing crops for interstate shipment were engaged m the production of goods for commerce. Other cases have held that the employees of utilities furnishing power for use in such production are engaged in occupations “necessary to the production” and covered by the Act. E. g., Engel v. New Mexico Public Service Co., 7 Wage Hour Kept. 466 (D. N. M., 1944), now pending on appeal to the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit; cf. Davila v. Porto Rico Railway Light & Power Co., 143 F. (2d) 236 (C. C. A. 1).	.
    The scope of the Act also depends in part upon the meaning to be given to the term “employees” as used in the Act. The decision of the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Walling v. American . Needlecrafts, 139 F. (2d) 60, gave broad scope to the Act by rejecting the argument that the test of the employment relation is the common law criterion of control and holding the test is the actual economic relationship.	.
    Much of the most troublesome wage and hour litigation under the Fair Labor Standards Act arises under Section 7, which requires an employer to compensate any employee for work in excess of 40 hours in a workweek at “one and one-half times the regular rate at which he is employed.” In part this is due to the wide variety of methods of compensating employees found in American Industry. Unfoitunately, however, since the decision in the Belo case (fWalling v. Belo Corp., 316 U. S. 624), a large number of employers have attempted to avoid compensating their employees at higher rates for overtime than for regular hours by making contracts which they believe comply technically with the requirements established by the Supreme Court in that decision. The Department has continued to prosecute vigorously cases of this kind and during the last year has obtained a number of
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	73
    judicial decisions which indicate that employers and their employees are not free to fix by contract an arbitrary rate as the regular rate for purposes of computing overtime but must pay time and a half the employee’s actual regular rate of pay. See 'Walling v. Harnischfeger Corp., 54 F. Supp. 326 (E. D. Wis.), now pending on appeal to the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit; Walling v. Fischer Lime & Cement Co., 7 Wage Hour Rept. 624 (W. D. Tenn., 1944) ; Walling v. Green Head Bit A Supply Co., 138 F. (2d) 453 (C. C. A. 10) ; Walling v. Helmernch A Payne, 138 F. (2d) 705 (C. C. A. 10), reversed 65 S. Ct. 11; Walling v. Arctic Circle Exploration Co., 56 F. Supp. 944 (W. D. Wash.). On the other hand, some courts continue to hold a contrary opinion. See e. g., Walling v. Ehlman Grain Co., 7 Wage Hour Rept. 128 (N. D. Ill., 1944) ; Walling v. Toungerman-Reynolds Hardware Co., 7 Wage Hour Rept. 1117 (M. D. Ala., 1943), both of which are now pending on appeals by the Administrator. The scope of the Belo case will be better defined by the Courts during the coming year on appeal from the diverse decisions noted above.
    Application to the telegraph industry of the prohibition against oppressive child labor, which is contained in the Fair Labor Standards Act, was affirmed by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Lenroot, 141 F. (2d) 400. The Court held that the transmission of telegrams constitutes “production” of “goods” which defendant “ships” in commerce. The Supreme Court has granted certiorari and will hear the case during the October term.
    In an important case arising under the Copeland Act, the Supreme Court held that the prohibition applies to a foreman, having the power to hire and discharge employees, who secures kickbacks from persons employed on federally financed buildings or works even though the employer does not participate in any way in the commission of the violations. United States v. Laudani, 320 U. S. 540. The Court stated that its conclusion was fortified by the legislative history of the bill which made it clear that it was the Congressional purpose “to assure that the Federal funds thus provided for workers should actually be received by them for their own use except when diverted by the authority of law or a worker’s voluntary agreement.” In ruling that the foreman of a contractor is subject to the Act, the Court expressly stated that it was not deciding that the Act would apply to every extortioner or blackmailer, as it was not called upon to define the outside scope of the broad statutory language.
    The appellate work of the office required the preparation and filing of 19 briefs in the Supreme Court and 41 briefs in the United States Circuit Courts of Appeals. Wartime pressure on child labor regulations resulted in a substantial increase in the volume of child labor litigation. One hundred and eleven actions for injunctions were filed as against 72 in 1943 and 42 in 1942. There was also an increase in the number of proceedings under the Walsh-Healey Public Contracts Act. Forty-four complaints were issued in 1944 as against 21 in 1943 and 19 in 1942. Contested civil litigation under the Fair Labor Standards Act for violation of the wage and hour provisions remained approximately at the 1943 level. Sixty-one criminal prosecutions were active during the year, as were 77 special proceedings. Seventy-seven
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    of the injunction proceedings which were filed resulted in contests, and 305 consent decrees were secured.
    2.	Administrative Proceedings.
    Statutes administered by the Department, including the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Walsh-Healey Public Contracts Act and Executive Orders 9240 and 9248 require numerous administrative proceedings looking both to the issuance of regulations and to the adjudication of specific cases. The Office of the Solicitor performs the necessary legal services in connection with such proceedings.
    Under the War Labor Disputes Act, the Secretary of Labor, the National War Labor Board and the National Labor Relations Board are designated as the agencies to receive notices of labor disputes threatening seriously to interrupt war production. On the thirtieth day after a valid notice is filed, the National Labor Relations Board holds an election on the question whether the workers will permit such interruption of production. During the thirty-day period the employer and his employees are required to continue production under all the conditions which prevailed when the dispute arose. The Secretary of Labor, the National "War Labor Board and. the National Labor Relations Board have established a coordinating committee which processes the notices. An Assistant Solicitor and the National Representative of the Conciliation Service represent the Secretary on this Committee. The National Representative is also the Docket Officer for the three labor agencies. The Office of the Solicitor assists in ruling on the validity of the notices and prepares the rulings which are issued by the Docket Officer.
    The Act provides that certain disputes are covered by its provisions only if the President finds that the employer is engaged m activities “contracted for in the prosecution of the war.” The President has delegated his authority to make such findings to the Secretary of Labor. The Solicitor secures the data required for such findings, advises the Secretary and drafts the findings.
    The Fair Labor Standards Act provides a procedure for raising the statutory minimum wage of 30 cents an hour to 40 cents by administrative action. In connection with this wage order program, the Office of the Solicitor participates in drafting industry definitions, Acts as counsel to industry committees, conducts public hearings for the Administrator on industry committee recommendations and drafts the Administrator’s findings, opinions and orders. As the result of new methods of securing evidence required for these proceedings the legal phases of which have been worked out by the Solicitor, it has been possible to complete the task of bringing interstate industry on the mainland up to a universal 40 cent minimum wage well in advance of the statutory deadline of October 24, 1945. Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, however, continue to present special minimum wage problems which cannot be solved for a considerable period of time. At the end of the fiscal year there were pending minimum wage recommendations for 16 industries in Puerto Rico and 14 industries in the Virgin Islands.
    After extensive hearings, the Administrator issued a wage order containing terms and conditions prohibiting home work in the Embroideries Industries. The Order has been affirmed by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, but its operation has been stayed
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR	75
    pending decision of the Supreme Court on petition for a writ of certiorari.
    The decision in Addison v. Holly Hill., holding invalid the prior definition of “area of production” has required reconsideration of the meaning of this term which distinguishes between exempt and nonexempt industries handling agricultural products. The Solicitor’s Office also continued to perform the usual legal work in connection with the determination of reasonable cost of facilities furnished to employees in lieu of wages, the issuance of regulations for learners, handicapped workers and apprentices permitting their employment at wages lower than the minimum wage prescribed in the Act, the handling of cases involving the cancellation of certificates for such workers and the issuance of regulations defining “seasonal” industries in which workers may be employed in excess of 40 hours during the seasonal period without payment of overtime.
    The consolidation of inspections under the Fair Labor Standards and Public Contracts Acts and the large volume of public contracts has resulted in a substantial increase in the number of formal complaint proceedings for violations of the Public Contracts Act. Attorneys in the Office of the Solicitor act as trial examiners in these cases, and others assist the Administrator and the Secretary in the drafting of their decisions. During the fiscal year 23 Examiners’ Reports were filed as against 14 in the preceding fiscal year, and 17 Administrator’s Decisions were issued as against 7 in the preceding fiscal year.
    The legal work involved in the issuance of orders exempting industries from the provisions of Executive Order No. 9240, pursuant to Executive Order No. 9248, was also performed by the Office of the Solicitor during the year.
    3.	Interpretations and Legislation.
    The Solicitor was called upon during the year to provide advice and to issue opinions on numerous questions involving the meaning and application of the provisions of the various statutes and Executive Orders administered and interpreted by the Department. Requests for such opinions were received from individual employers and employees, from trade associations and labor organizations, from members of Congress, Government officials in other departments and agencies, and State and local public officers, and from the various bureaus and divisions within the Department itself. Local service was given in many thousands of these requests by attorneys located in twentyseven regional and branch offices which have been established in the cities which are headquarters for the field offices of other Divisions of the Department of Labor.
    In contrast to the request for such opinions which were received in previous years, when the general provisions of such statutes as the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Walsh-Healey Public Contracts Act were not widely known or understood, the inquiries this year were, for the most part, concerned with problems of a difficult or complex nature. They usually involved questions upon which clarification of the law was needed either because of the absence of precedents or in order to resolve apparent conflicts between previous interpretations of the law by administrative officers and the courts.
    There has been a substantial increase in interpretative work relating to the child labor provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
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    The manpower shortage occasioned by war conditions has doubtless been a primary cause of this increase, as employers who normally would not employ minors are now seeking to learn how they can do so within the framework of the act.
    The Children’s Bureau, under an appropriation act approved on March 18, 1943, undertook the administration of a program of grants to States for maternity and infant care and services to wives and children of servicemen in the four lowest pay grades. The original appropriation was in the sum of $1,200,000. Subsequent appropriations during the fiscal year 1943-44 by the Seventy-eighth Congress totalled $53,900,000. This program, which provides for payments on a large scale to physicians, hospitals, nurses and others, under specified conditions, required the establishment of new procedures. It became the duty and responsibility of the Office of the Solicitor to assist in drafting these procedures and to render frequent legal counsel to the Children’s Bureau in their interpretation of the legislation and regulations.
    The Office of the Solicitor has been called on more frequently during the fiscal year to render legal advice to the Conciliation Service. This has resulted from the increase in the number of regulations affecting labor. A large proportion of the assistance was made available to arbitrators associated with the Service who required legal assistance or consultation with respect to collateral judicial or administrative rulings in the field of labor law bearing upon their awards.	.
    The Women’s Bureau and the Division of Labor Standards, which have extensive relationships with State departments of labor and with Federal agencies, were called upon frequently for advice in the interpretation and administration of Federal or State labor laws. Such inquiries, when they involved legal questions, were referred to the Solicitor for his opinion. Many of the inquiries during the fiscal year 1943-44 involved special situations resulting from wartime conditions.
    The need for the development and maintenance of labor and social standards on an international scale resulted in the calling of a conference of the International Labor Office in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the spring of 1944. The Office of the Solicitor prepared studies and reports which were submitted to the Organization in advance of the conference, in fulfillment of the obligation of the United States under the constitution of the Organization, and participated in discussions relating to the framing of the policies of, and in the drafting of documents for, the United States Government delegates to the conference. A representative of the Office of the Solicitor was attached to the staff of the United States Government delegation and served in the capacity of draftsman and legal counsel.
    4-	Wage Determination and IVage Adjustment.
    War construction demands kept the volume of work under the Davis-Bacon Act and the National Housing Act at a high level during the fiscal year. There was a total of 7,768 wage determinations issued, including confirmations and modifications based on Wage Adjustment Board action. The problems involved in making these determinations were intensified by the need for coordination with the wage stabilization program. A statistical summary of this work follows:
    ANNUAL REPORT SECRETARY OF LABOR
    77
    Fiscal year 19
    Requests received______________________________________5, 670
    Total decisions rendered_______________________________7,768
    New decisions________________________________5, 322
    Modifying decisions based on Wage Adjustment Board action________________________________2,058
    Advisory opinions____________________________ 388
    The task of wage stabilization for the Building Construction Industry continued to be carried forward by the Wage Adjustment Board for the Building Construction Industry. This Board was established by order of the Secretary of Labor on May 29, 1942, to administer the Wage Stabilization Agreement of May 22, 1942, between the Building and Construction Trades Department of the American Federation of Labor and several Government agencies. When the general wage stabilization program for American industry was established in Executive Order 9250 on October 3, 1942, specific provision was made for the continuation of the Board. In a number of general orders issued by the National War Labor Board, subsequent to the Executive Order, the Wage Adjustment Board was given jurisdiction over all labor disputes and voluntary wage or salary adjustments involving mechanics and laborers employed in the Building Construction Industry.
    The Wage Adjustment Board consists of nine members appointed by the Secretary of Labor, of whom three represent labor, three represent industry, and three, including the Chairman, represent the public. The Chairman is the Assistant Secretary of Labor, and the co-chairman is an Assistant Solicitor.
    The Office of the Solicitor performs the technical services required by the Board including the preparation of Board decisions, reports, and procedural regulations; presiding at public hearings and serving on Panels of the Board. A statistical summary of this work follows:
    Requests for reports____________________________________1,756
    Reports prepared________________________________________1, 639
    Requests for decisions__________________________________ 415
    Decisions prepared______________________________________ 294
    Departmental Expenditures.
    The Department spent $61,535,256 on all the above outlined activities during the year, of which $40,851,250 was in grants.