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THE REQUESTS FOR EMPLOYER CONTACTS FROM LOCAL OFFICES AND THE SEVERAL CENTRAL OFFICE SECTIONS REQUIRE AN INDIVIDUAL EXAMINATION DIGEST OF CALLS AND RESULTS CALLS MADE EXAMINATIONS COMPLETED COLLECTION STATUS LIABILITY GROSS DEFER INSP. INDEXED NEW PAYROLL EM- MONTHS ASSESSED N.D. EXAMINERS AND COMPLTD TOTAL NOT EM- EM- TOTAL COVERED PLOYEES RANT PROG. (DOLLARS COL- LIABLE PLOYERS PLOYERS COVERED COVERED NOT ISSUED ISSUED ONLY) LECTED COLL.
are well advanced in shifting the responsibility for an effective compliance program to the field. Each of our audit examiners is given a definite territory and the responsibility for employer compliance in that territory. This responsibility covers determination of employers' status, both as to subjectivity and eligibility for termination; collection of taxes; securing of delinquent reports; handling of total and partial dispositions and acquisitions; obtaining special wage information for local claims offices; making adjustments and reconciliations of out-of-balance reports; and representing other Sections where personal calls are necessary to obtain required information. The examiners are graded by use of a daily report (which will be explained later) and the condition of their territory as to outstanding delinquent reports and collections. We believe that an audit serves three prime purposes: (1) To correct past errors in contributions and wage credits, (2) to determine the financial condition of an employer in anticipation of current and future collection problems, and (3) to explain past errors to employers and instruct them on what should be reported and how it should be reported in the future. We have found that the third function is well worth the time spent, in terms of improvement of future employer compliance. Based upon this belief, we have geared our audit program to make audits when and where they are needed or potentially needed, rather than on a routine basis. Generally we make audits under one of four circumstances: 1. When there is a cessation or complete disposition of business, an audit is made immediately so that before records are destroyed or moved out of the State we may determine if the disposing employer owes any unpaid contribution. Under Indiana law, the ac
quirer may be held liable for unpaid contributions due from the disposer (up to the value of the assets acquired) unless the acquirer notifies this Division 5 days prior to the acquisition. 2. The records of all new employers are audited at the time their status as an employer is established. This is to make sure the employer understands whom and what to report which helps eliminate future errors relating to part-time labor, bonuses, sick pay, vacation pay, dismissal pay, salesmen, independent contractors, etc. (The exception to this practice was the mass status determinations when employer coverage was extended to include those with four or more employees; however, even then, all questionable cases were held out for individual audit. This tended to lengthen the time lapse in establishing new accounts, but we feel that the concrete results far more than offset the poor showing on our quarterly report.) 3. Trouble accounts are generally one of two types. One involves employers from whom benefit applicants repeatedly contend they had wages which do not show up on the wage run or that they have more wages than the employer has reported. The other type is the habitually delinquent employer. In the latter case, an audit is deemed necessary to determine his financial condition. 4. Audits are made whenever an employer goes into bankruptcy or receivership in order to establish a correct claim to be filed with the fiduciary. Under our plan, the establishment of an aggressive and alert field force has paid off; a high percentage of our audits are made on the initiative of the audit examiners in their respective territories. For example, under normal conditions, practically all new accounts are discovered by the audit examiners. When a new business starts in a territory, the examiner determines the employer's status and if he is subject, the examiner Page 3
IN AN article in this publication last December, Rob ert C. Goodwin, Director of the Federal Bureau of Employment Security, referred to some of the newer elements of our job as administrators by saying that we operated a nerve center for economic planning, income maintenance, labor market and defense manpower programs. To handle this responsibility, he pointed out the need for human relations, delegation of functions, management methods, personnel programs, communications, research, and vision. In summary, Mr. Goodwin suggested that we take a new look at our job in the field of management. We need only to look to the early days of the unemployment insurance program to realize the value of this suggestion. Then, the objective was to get the job done in any way possible. Now the program in Pennsylvania has passed the 20-year milestone. Based
on my experience as Executive Director of the Pennsylvania agency, I can say that the techniques now in use are a vast improvement over the methods of the 1930's. We know that unemployment insurance started as a "crash” program to meet an immediate and compelling need. Management practices had to be subordinated to work pressures. The Governor of Pennsylvania had scarcely signed the Act in December 1936 when we were required to hire hundreds of people to collect the 1 percent payroll tax which became due and payable within less than a month. At the same time, deadlines for printing forms, for filing reports, and for creation of procedures out of almost no experience were pressing the administrators. Compounding the difficulties was a lack of suitable office space in a capital city already crowded by emer
gency agencies. It was literally true that desks and people were moved into warehouse space which 10 minutes before did not have a floor. Production was the number one goal. Management techniques had to wait until less hectic days. Heavy claim loads, changes in rates and taxation, methods of collection and payments kept the program in a fluid state until 1941 when World War II darkened the horizon and reduced the unemployment insurance program to a secondary role. Management needs in the insurance side of the program were again subordinated as all available skills and efforts were turned to the manpower needs being serviced by the Pennsylvania State Employment Service which was under Federal supervision. Meanwhile, claims dropped to a record low as war production soared and jobs became plentiful. L'nemployment contributions based on war-swollen payrolls rose automatically and since the contribution rate was uniform (at 2.7 percent) there were few problems of collection or delinquency. In December 1941, the local claims offices were placed under the supervision of the United States Employment Service. During the war years many skilled and experienced personnel left the agency, thus reducing potential management improvement. Postwar Unemployment Insurance Load Increased The end of World War II caused many changes in production and employment throughout the Commonwealth, such as defense contract cancellations and conversion to civilian production. In addition, the high rate of discharge from the Armed Forces threw many job seekers into the labor market. Both the civilian unemployed and unemployed veterans were entitled to compensation; the first as regular claim
ants and the latter as claimants for servicemen's readjustment allowances. The strain on the management and personnel of the unemployment insurance agency became heavy. The growth of the industrial economy in Pennsylvania from the postwar readjustment to the present time continued. Today there are 196,843 employers covered by the Pennsylvania Unemployment Compensation Law, compared with 148,000 liable employers in 1940. A similar increase occurred in covered workers, who totaled 3,182,254 in September 1956. The amount of benefits paid to unemployed workers in 1954 (the year of largest payments) was $260,775,882. With the large coverage and extensive geographical territory of Pennsylvania, it is evident that management problems are many and varied. How management has dealt with the problems in several important instances will now be illustrated. Modern Management Methods Utilized The overhauling of management methods was one of the urgent requirements of the postwar period for unemployment insurance operations. Many of the procedures, forms, and systems, along with the office equipment, had been installed during the early rush days. Now new office machinery was available and it was necessary to study the entire operation to see what use could be made of high-speed equipment to improve operations. The process of computing employer contribution rates, which had grown more complicated by amendments to the law, was an annual bottleneck in the smooth flow of work. Analysis revealed this could be improved by utilizing electronic computing machinery. This decision having been made, it was necessary to "program” the conversion operations to the new method. Such retooling studies are still going on as we search for ways to improve our operations.
New Division Audits All Activities In the review of management methods, it was determined that we could apply in the central office the lessons learned in auditing external operations. A division was set up to conduct audits in all central office activities, with the object of discovering and pointing out areas of possible fraud or collusion on the part of employees, spot-checking these operations for errors, and suggesting checks and review which would improve operations. This type of auditing, done by employees not directly involved in the operation produced significant results and many worthwhile ideas for improvement. As an example, certain operating areas of the Bureau were restricted to authorized employees in order to maintain security of records. Also rotation of key personnel in positions of trust was inaugurated to improve control of operations. The favorable results from the auditing program have encouraged the administrators to sponsor regular brainstorming sessions among operating personnel in all central office divisions, including sub-supervisors and group heads. There is a constant flow of ideas and suggestions as a result of creating opportunities
for suggestions. There is a wider participation in management functions and higher morale on the part of central office employees. Securing adequate and modern office space to replace the make-shift quarters used in the early years was a prime necessity. Working conditions like those in the Office Management Division shown on page 30 could no longer be tolerated. Through the passage of a special Act of the General Assembly and the assistance of the General State Authority, a modern 18story Labor and Industry Building was built and occupied in 1956 (photograph below). Almost 70 percent of the space in this fine building is allocated to the Bureau of Employment Security. The modern layout and excellent working conditions are shown in the photograph of the Office Management Division on page 31.
Personnel Research and Training Referring to the early days of the Pennsylvania Bureau of Employment Security, more than 5,000 persons were hired in the first 2 years of the program. Late in 1937, Civil Service examinations were given and qualified employees were given permanent status. Since then almost 19 years have elapsed. Various problems relating to older workers have arisen in the Bureau in recent years. A December 1956 survey of age groupings of employees in the Bu
New Labor and Industry Building in Harrisburg which houses the Pennsylvania employment security agency.
The objective of the organization and management effort is to improve the performance of the entire unemployment insurance operation.
reau revealed an average age of 45 for males and 41 for females. More than 25 percent of the permanent emplovees are over 50 years of age, 9.4 percent were over 60, and almost 5 percent were over 65. It was also found that a considerable proportion of these older workers had gravitated into a small number of activities. Impetus was given to this survey by the projected coverage of Bureau employees under Federal social security within the next year, and the possibility that many of the workers over 65 years may retire. To forestall heavy losses in certain divisions, the Bureau is studying the intention of older workers regarding retirement and meanwhile is attempting to get better balance in the age grouping of employees. It is also planned to make up staffing schedules to train replacements for those over age 65 who intend to retire when social security coverage becomes effective. Research revealed a need of executive development for supervisors. However, they cannot leave their jobs to attend university classes. The solution was to bring the university to the Bureau through the cooperation of the Pennsylvania State University Extension Service. Faculty members of this university conducted an executive development course for the top echelon Bureau supervisors. This has been followed up by training of sub-supervisors in job instruction methods so that training has become a part of every employee's activities.
War-Caused Lag Now Made Up We have pointed out how heavy work loads and the effects of war manpower needs delayed management progress in unemployment insurance operations, so that at the end of World War II a revamping of management techniques was necessary. By intensive application to the job, this lag has now been caught up. The results achieved have validated the methods used. The Pennsylvania Bureau of Employment Security for the past 10 years has been applying Mr. Goodwin's suggestion to review management techniques in unemployment insurance operations. The lessons learned during war-time operation of the Employment Service have been utilized, along with modern developments in the field of management. The result has been a marked improvement in the quality and efficiency of the whole operation, and we have resolved to continue to re-appraise our management techniques in order to meet our expanding responsibilities.
Establishing Objectives and Evaluating Results The Field Accounting Service of the Bureau is a collecting and auditing division which deals with employers. While other duties have been assigned from time to time, the main objective had been to audit employer payrolls. Since auditing is a controllable operation, complete emphasis was placed on this phase of the work. By controlling all assignments, the work of the field accountant was judged. An objective review of the work showed that paper control was not adequate, especially in the smaller field accounting offices. It was decided to reorient the objectives of the Field Accounting Service. Audits were re-evaluated, and emphasis on petty discrepancies and minor over-andunder payments was eliminated. In place of the paper controls over workloads, a system of regular evaluations by supervisors was substituted, with supervisors using a guide or checklist similar to that used for many years to evaluate employer field visits. The check list covers all phases of the field operations, including courtesy, equipment, office practice, etc. In the local employment offices, a similar evaluation is made of claims, claim record cards, and determinab. tions. Claims returned for errors are analyzed to determine reasons and training needs. | Determinations are analyzed to assure adequate fact-finding by local office personnel and conformity with policy decisions, completeness, and ac Similar review is made of courtesy, supervision, and
HANDBOOK ON WOMEN WORKERS, 1956, Womens' Bureau 96 pp., 35 cents. "Women's contribution to the 1956 economy has been unequaled at any other peacetime period in our history,” said Alice K. Leopold, Assistant to the Secretary of Labor for Women's Affairs in releasing the 1956 edition of the "Handbook on Women Workers." "A combination of factors made 1956 an outstanding year for America's women workers. The favorable economic climate enabled them to achieve an all-time high in employment, averaging almost 21 million for the year. Women's many skills, acquired through their increasing utilization of educational and training facilities, opened doors to new opportunities and brought to women workers a growing recognition,” Mrs. Leopold said. The Handbook is published biennially to meet a widespread need for information on women workers and on women's activities as citizens. A special chapter lists key women's organizations and describes their various pro. grams for advancing the status of women and improving their communities and the Nation. "In growing numbers,” Mrs. Leopold said, "women are realizing the need for their contributions in prac. tically every phase of this Nation's economic and social life. Where women themselves are concerned, it is grati. fying to know that their efforts are being well received and gaining increasing recognition.” The Handbook is designed as a source book for labor unions, employers, educators, women's organizations, and women leaders in other countries. It can be purchased from the Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington 25, D. C., and from Bureau of Labor Statistics regional offices, at 35 cents per copy.
Management Controls in a Central Office
Associate Examiner of Methods and Procedures, UI Accounts Bureau New York Division of Employment
trols propounded by authorities in the field are the following: 1. The purpose of control is to determine whether objectives and policies have been carried out, with each plan of control embracing objective, procedure, criteria, and appraisal. 2. Control is accomplished through the review of all types of reporting-accounting, costing, statistics, production, ratio analysis, graphic presentation, etc. 3. Individuals, committees, and auditors review only condensed, summarized, and invariably comparative reports which cover, however, all elements entering into management. 4. All figures and reports used for purposes of control should be in terms of standards of performance required and, where necessary, of past performance.
cussions with operating people; participation in workfor control purposes only; and inspection—the systematic review of operations. We should like to emphasize that planning, execution, and control are not separate jobs but separate parts of the same job. Consequently, procedures, evaluations, and controls developed by staff people are not to be considered as controls over line people. They are fed to the line people for self-control purposes.
Functions of New York's UI Account Bureau
To understand our management controls relative to unemployment insurance operations, a brief outline of the functions of the Unemployment Insurance Accounts Bureau of the New York Division of Employment is necessary. This is an organization of almost 1,500 people, with three major operating offices-Audits and Collections, Employer Accounts , and Benefit and Experience Rating. It collects about $200 million a year in taxes and pays out a like amount in benefits. Its functions are the following: 1. Determination of employer coverage under the unemployment insurance law. 2. Establishment of individual contribution rates for subject employers, in accordance with legal provisions. 3. Determination of the amount of employer liability for contributions, interest, and penalties.
Experienced Personnel Hard to find and Keep Recent program changes in unemployment insurance in New York State--the extension of coverage to employers of "three or more" in 1956 and to employers of “two or more” in 1957, which will add an estimated 130,000 employers by the end of 1957– have emphasized the importance of other concepts of control. For example, extended coverage meant the need for more payroll examiners and account clerks in the central office. But we found our attempts to hire payroll examiners in the open market thwarted by the fact that private industry and other government agencies outbid us for their services. Similarly, our trained account clerks are siphoned off by other agencies. So in the broadest sense, control is a man, properly qualified, well trained, knowing what constitutes a day's work and producing it. Paper controls have little meaning when this man does not exist in an organization. Likewise, every other well performed management function-planning, organization, staffing, directing, coordinating, reporting, budgeting--is a measure of control. These are sometimes called "preventive controls." This article is limited chiefly to a description of what some experts describe as a “corrective control”_the use of reports, statistics, evaluation studies, and control ratios in unemployment insurance operations in a central office. However, there are at least three other important "corrective controls," namely: Ohservation--the every-day look at operations and dis
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comparative information for analysis of present per- The law also allows a claimant's statement of wages formance. and employment to be taken if the employer does not Evaluation studiesprogram, policy, procedures.-Be- reply. Constant analyses are being made of this cause of space limitations, we will mention, in the program: Can we extend the period of 7 days allowed paragraphs which follow, only a few of the studies the employer? How much failure is due to the emwhich have played a part in management control of ployer being out of business? Are incomplete replies insurance operations and have been the basis for for which employers are penalized due to an ambig. further planning, execution, and control. uous Request form? How accurate are claimants' New York was a pioneer State in the request wage statements? What improvements in procedure should reporting field. Wage and employment information be made? What recommendations should be made from employers needed for monetary determina- for revisions in our basic program and policy? tions is requested only when claimants file for benefits. In 1956, extension of coverage to employers of three Statistics show that almost 95 percent of employers or more on any day” meant the registration of about send timely replies to Requests. But, how accurate 50,000 additional employer units. Our planning are they? For a number of years, New York has included use of Federal Old Age and Survivors Inmeasured results against a sample of field audits by surance reports (Form 941) to identify employers who payroll examiners of employer records. Analyses should be registered; an extensive educational camhave led to improvements in our basic Request Wage paign; and use of an informational fiver enclosed with Reporting forms; special reminders to employers who Federal OASI reports. Yet, how could we be certain were underreporting wages because of tips and that we had registered all liable employers? In gratuities; checklists of employer errors left with November 1956, the staff of the Field Audit Section employers by payroll examiners; reminder slips undertook a survey in key cities in New York State. attached to the Request forms advising employers of In this survey, all the employing entities in an area, either a single building, a square block, or a continthe importance of accurate replies. uous series of business addresses were contacted. ReUnderlying Request Wage Reporting in New York sults showed that substantially all employers who is the $10 penalty assessed against employers for failure to should have been covered under the provisions of the reply to a Request within 7 days of the day of mailing. law in 1956 were already registered. Work Program Actual 7/1/55--6/30/56 Actual June 1956 July 55--June 56 Units Units Units Unit of per per Code measure Man- Man man Man- Operation ment Volume hour hours hours Volume hour hours Volume hour Page 5
SOCIAL SECURITY AND PUBLIC POLICY, Eveline M. Burns, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1956, 291 pp., $5.50 IN the introduction to Social Secu- grams here and abroad. She has the objectives.” She sees the dilemmas, rity and Public Policy, Dr. Eveline detached and balanced academic as for example, the necessity of ad. Burns poses these "current issues" on point of view of a teacher in many ministrative controls against claimunemployment insurance: institutions-from the London School ants' malingering and the possibility Should the coverage of unemployment professor of Social Work at the New of Economics to her present post as that, if the controls are too stringent insurance be broadened? Should unem. or rigid, they may result in denying ployment benefits be higher or lower than York School of Social Work, Colum. benefits to many genuinely unemthey now are should benefits be paid has had practical experience in bia University. At the same time she ployed workers. to the dependents of unemployed workers.? American social security programs She recognizes the issue of the apShould the eligibility conditions be tightened or should they be liberalized? and problems from the days when she propriateness of incentive taxation, served as advisor to the original Com through systems of experience rating, Under what circumstances and for what kinds of conduct should workers be dismittee on Economic Security to her on which labor and management are qualified from receiving benefits? Should present active participation in the so sharply divided. Here she points benefits be paid for more than the usual Federal Advisory Council on Employ. out that since an employer's prospect 20-to-26-week maximum duration? ment Security. of securing a lower rate depends on compensable unemployment rather Should the program continue to be The four major questions which than on unemployment itself, the em. she considers that each government financed almost exclusively by em ployer can improve his prospects in ployers? Should the taxes of employers must decide, to assure to its citizens one of three ways: stabilizing his be reduced if their own employees suffer some minimum of economic security, labor force, opposing improper little unemployment? If so, what is the claims and payments, and bringing best formula to use for granting tax re- 1. The nature of the protection to pressure to modify the law and its inductions? Should the financing of be afforded and the conditions to be terpretation to reduce the chance that unemployment insurance continue to be satisfied for its receipt. an unemployed worker will be en. essentially a State responsibility (with titled to benefits or to assure that the Federal Government meeting only 2. The specific risks to interruption benefits will not be too high or dura. the costs of administration)? of income for which public responsi- tion too long. In a later chapter, she bility will be accepted. declares unequivocally that, since exWhat should be the Federal role if 3. The financial arrangements to perience rating is an integral part of some States are unable to finance benefits at the average level without having to be made, including decisions as to all State systems, minimum Federal how the burden shall be shared be. standards relating to benefits, duraraise taxes far in excess of those levied in tween different sections of the popu. tion, and certain disqualifications the majority of States? If the Federal would seem to be an essential safe. Government comes to the aid of the lation. * * * and * * * the relative States, should this take the form of loans financial responsibilities of different guard. levels of government. Particularly applicable to unem. or nonrepayable grants? Should the Federal Government get out of unem. 4. The allocation of administrative ployment insurance is Dr. Burns' statement that one of the more im. ployment insurance altogether? Should responsibility between private organany plans be made to provide for the izations and government and between portant byproducts of the continuing income needs of persons who exhaust different levels of government. operation of a social-security system unemployment insurance benefits? is that the community begins to ob. Any reader wanting shortcuts to tain comprehensive and reliable data These are questions to which we Dr. Burns' discussions of unemploy. concerning the risk insured against. are all seeking answers. But Dr. ment insurance per se will find an And in spite of the real contributions Burns, sagely, gives no one right adequate index, but the conscientious to knowledge made by our statistical answer. She does not discuss all reader who explores an entire subject and research programs, we agree that these questions re unemployment in- will be rewarded by illuminating there is a disturbing lack of knowsurance in one chapter or Part. Nor vistas of experience in other pro. ledge of the precise effect of the var. does she discuss all programs of one grams and other countries. Yet the ious provisions of our social-security country as a unit. She recognizes concluding chapter on "The Choice system. We, too, want to know how that many of the issues posed are of Social Security Policies" empha- much insecurity may be reduced by to several programs, and sizes that the effect of social security any given measure, how much stabil. what is done in one program may on freedom, on initiative, and on ization of employment results from have repercussions on another. There- mobility depends on the special pro. experience rating, what proportion fore, Dr. Buras discusses "some of the gram and its specific environment of workers are likely to malinger, and outstanding social security issues of and that policy can never be fixed what kind of controls will deter them. the day" in the context of the general once and for all. and specified problems posed by any Here is a book that we can recom The controversies in our field are governmental action in this field. ment to all thoughtful students of our not slighted, but Dr. Burns presents program, including State and Federal No one is better qualified to take more than one point of view, because, administrators, State and Federal leg. this "across-the-board” approach than as she says, "intelligent policy forma- islators, and the labor and employer Dr. Burns with her long and wide tion is the attainment of the best pos- groups who would influence legislaexperience in social security pro- sible compromise between conflicting tion in this field. -RUTH RETICKER, formerly Program Technical Advisor, Unemployment Insurance Service, Bureau of i Employment Security. 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Employment Security Activities at a Glance April 1957 United States and Territories
Bureau of Employment Security. “Let's look at the State of Pennsylvania,” he said, “where there was an 80 percent increase in handicapped placements in 1956 over the year before ... at Kentucky, where placements of the handicapped almost doubled over at Massachusetts, which reported 8,100 handicapped placements . . at New York, where placements of handicapped jumped from 30,000 in 1955 to 35,000 in 1956." The President awarded his trophy for “Handicapped Man of the Year” to Hugo Deffner of Oklahoma City for his one-man campaign over a 10-year period for the elimination of steps in public buildings. Mr. Deffner was stricken with polio at the age of 20 but learned to get around on crutches. Ten vears ago a sall on a front step brought a shoulder injury which made crutches impossible. Thus began his campaign which won national recognition. The five winners in the eighth annual essay contest also received their awards from the President. These consisted of cash prizes and certificates. This year's contest was entered by 10,000 high school juniors and seniors in 36 States and Hawaii. The theme was “Employment of the Handicapped, A Community Responsibility.” First prize of $1,000 went to Sharon Garrett of Judge Memorial High School, Salt Lake City, Utah. The other winners were: Virginia Trujillo, Antonito Public High School, Antonito, Colo., second prize$400; Denny Sue Carlisle, Albuquerque High School, Albuquerque, N. Mex., third-$300; Virginia Davis, St. Luke's High School, Hohokus, N. J., fourth-$200; and Clare Frances Connors, St. Mary's Central Catholic High School, Milford, Mass., fifth-$100. Each year the cash awards and expense money for the trip to Washington for the essay finalists are provided by the Disabled American Veterans. A new feature of this year's contest was the permanent award of a wood and bronze wall-type plaque to each of the five high schools represented by the national prize winners. This is a result of a grant announced at the 1956 annual meeting of the President's Committee. The theme for the 1958 essay is “How Hiring the Handicapped Helps You and Me.”
New OVR Grants Grants totaling over $395,000 in support of 14 research and demonstration projects were announced recently by the Office of Vocational Rehabilitation. Under the Office's Special Projects program, grants are made to encourage the development of new knowledge and better methods in the rehabilitation of disabled persons. The recent grants bring the total, since the program began in 1955, to about $2.75 million. Special Project grants are awarded to private nonprofit groups, State vocational rehabilitation agencies and other public organizations to help finance in (Continued on page 16) Page 7
unrest so great that the peace and harmony of the world is imperiled.” The following things were felt to urgently need improvement: Hours of work; wages; unemployment measures; protection of the worker against disease, sickness, and injury arising out of his employment; the protection of children, young people, and women; provision for old age and injury: recognition of the principle of equal pay for equal work; freedom to organize unions; and vocational and technical education. In 1944, during a later crucial period in world history, the underlying principles of the ILO were reaffirmed by the International Labor Organization in the Declaration of Philadelphia, which restated the fundamental objectives of the Organization in the light of changed and changing international conustier, ditions. ILO Develops Standards The ILO works through three principal bodies: the International Labor Conference, the Governing Body, and the International Labor Office. It is dependent on the cooperation of member nations. It is not an international parliament; it has no power to coerce and can impose no standard or system on any nation. The Conference, composed of delegates from all member nations, meets a year. Its main functions are to develop standards on labor questions and to establish the basic policy of the Organization. Each member country is entitled to send one employer, one worker, and two government delegates to the annual Conference. All delegates may be accompanied by advisers to assist on technical matters. The employer and worker delegates must be chosen in agreement with the most representative employer and worker organizations in each country, where such organizations exist, and they speak and vote indeelm pendently in the Conference. With such broad representation from most member countries, the Conference constitutes a true world forum on labor and social questions. United States delegates are appointed by the Ed President. The employer delegate is recommended 15- jointly by the Chamber of Commerce of the United States and the National Association of Manufacturers; the worker delegate by the American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations. Every 3 years the annual Conference elects the Organization's Governing Body. The Governing Body, which meets three or four times each year, also has worker, employer, and government members and mi acts as the executive council or board of directors. It determines the agenda of the Conference, decides policy matters which arise between sessions of the Conference, makes up the Organization's budget and, in general, supervises the work of the Secretariat (the International Labor Office) and that of all subsidiary organs, regional conferences, industrial committees, and other special committees.
The Governing Body is composed of 40 members. Twenty represent the governments, 10 the employers, and 10 the workers. Ten of the government seats on the Governing Body are filled on a permanent basis by representatives of the 10 countries of chief industrial importance. One of these 10 has always been the United States, since it joined the Organization in 1934; American employer and worker delegates have also usually been elected as representatives of their respective groups. The International Labor Office at its headquarters in Geneva and its branch and field offices and missions around the globe employ more than 800 fulltime officials from 60 nations. The International Labor Office issues publications, prepares reports for conferences, conducts research and investigates and assembles current information about the world labor market, and provides the staff for conferences and other meetings of the Organization. In addition to its clerical, research, and publishing activities, the Office also maintains several technical divisions of experts who advise and assist member nations on such matters as vocational training, social security, manpower, labor relations, work standards, industrial safety, and handicrafts. The Office operates under the immediate supervision of a Director-General appointed by the Governing Body who, in turn, selects the permanent staff of the Organization. The Director-General also frames recommendations, including budget proposals for the consideration of the Governing Body and coordinates all committee and specialized program activities. At present, the chief executive is Director-General David A. Morse, an American who has served since 1948 and who was recently given a unanimous vote of confidence for a 5-year extension of his term to begin in 1958. Like other international organizations, the ILO is financed by contributions of member governments. The budget is subjected to an exhaustive week-long analysis and debate by the employer, worker, and government members of the Governing Body, and it reflects a program of activities which those three
U. S. Delegates to the ILO U. S. Government Delegate on the Governing Body and Chairman of the U. S. Delegation to the International Labor Organization conferences is ). Ernest Wilkins, Assistant Secretary of Labor for International Labor Affairs. U. S. Government Delegate to the ILO Conference is Francis O. Wilcox, Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs. U. S. Worker Delegate to ILO Governing Body and Worker Delegate to ILO Conferences is George Philip Delaney, the International Representative of the American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations. U. S. Employer Delegate to International Labor Conferences is Cola G. Parker, attorney and consultant, and president of the National Association of Manufacturers, 1956–57. Page 8
Claimants from mass layoffs are directed to a special line in this local office. initial claim along with a complete low earnings re- monetary determination but also a local office claim port. This form is issued at the time of the shutdown record card, normally produced in the local office, only to workers who, by virtue of little or no vacation is machine produced and returned to the local office. pay, are potentially eligible for unemployment in- In the meantime, the local office retains the upper surance. The employer, and the instructions printed half of the perforated mass shutdown form for control. on the form, tell the worker to complete the few items As the claim record cards and monetary determinarequired of him and to present the completed form at tions are received in the local office from the central any unemployment insurance office. office, usually within several days, they are interfiled with the additional claims in social security number order by employer. When the claimant returns to Warned in Advance work at the end of the vacation period, he hands in to the employer, in accordance with our previous By reason of the spring survey of employers, each arrangements, the one or more continued claim forms local office knows when to expect the workers from which were issued to him by our local office. The any particular plant to arrive in the office. Accord employer then returns these collected continued claim ingly, special stations and summer personnel are ready forms to our local office and we check them against for the rush. When these claimants arrive in the the local office records and clear them for payment. office, they are routed by sign and monitor to the The grouping of claims and local office records by vacation claim sections where their mass shutdown employer has been found to keep errors to a minimum claims are accepted as fast as they can be scanned for and to result in all the workers at a given plant completeness, and continued claim forms handed out getting their checks at approximately the same timefor completion at home. By monitoring the lines as in about 2 weeks—thus avoiding complaints and inthey form and removing those claimants whose forms quiries. are incomplete or require special attention (as in the To keep the closest control over all phases of the case of Unemployment Compensation for Veterans, vacation claim processing, a special statistical report etc.), the vast majority of claimants are in the office has been in use for the past several years. This no longer than it takes them to walk up to the appro- detailed report is required from each office weekly priate counter and out again with only a few seconds during the summer, and identifies the precise stage involved in the actual claims taking transaction. of processing of each vacation claim-initial or After the claimant has left the office, the mass continued. shutdown claim form is checked against the files as The streamlined and effective procedures governa clerical operation to determine whether it is a new ing the filing and processing of vacation claims deor additional claim. At the end of each day, the scribed above would be impossible without the colower halves of those forms which are new claims are operation which we have received from Connecticut forwarded to the central office where not only a employers. In return for the assistance furnished us Page 9
The results of the survey were related to the XII General Census conducted by the National Statistical Service in 1952 to the extent that this was possible. Some of the findings are presented in the table on
The basic purpose of the survey was to gather information to aid the government in organizing a National Employment Service in line with the needs of the country's workers and employers. An important byproduct was experience in planning and carrying out a labor market information project.
The monthly average of extra hours for each empleado was 6 hours and 56 minutes per month, and for obreros, 9 hours and 30 minutes. It was also found that 251 persons worked less than the normal schedule of hours for the firms where employed. The empleados in this group worked an average of 5 hours and 42 minutes per day and the obreros, 6 hours and 8 minutes.
The International Labor Office is continuing its plan of assistance to Chile, and in October sent Nils Ström to help us continue development of a National Employment Service. One of our first projects is to again carry out an employment survey, based on the same establishments visited in 1955, but limited to three branches of activities—textiles, construction, and the leather industry. The survey will include the following items: Number of empleados and obreros in the establishments on October 31, 1956, increases or decreases in personnel from the months of November 1955 to October 1956, the causes, and the current hours of work.
Many Left Jobs of Own Volition With respect to separations, it appeared that about 40 percent of the empleados and 55 percent of the obreros left their jobs of their own volition. Also, it was established that the greatest turnover occurred in the occupational group classed as “personal productor.” In the Province of Santiago, by relating the survey data with census information, it was estimated that Santiago employers make about 7,268 new hires a month, and about 5,619 persons leave their jobs, a difference in favor of hires of 1,649 a month. Of all the data gathered in the survey, the distribution of workers by general occupational fields was the most difficult to control and tabulate. Chile has an adequate national system of industrial classification, but the survey demonstrated that we need a better and more useful system of occupational classification. After long and careful review of the results of data from the 648 establishments in Santiago, we arrived at the following percentage distribution of 99,913 workers: Percent Management, administration, supervision, and general office workers.. 17.8 Professional and technical workers. 5. 1 Sales and commercial workers.. 3.8 “Personal Productor" workers directly and indirectly involved in production, including transportation. 65. 9 Security personnel, guards, watchmen, etc. 1.0 Personal service workers. 6. 4 This first employment survey has provided Sección Colocaciones with valuable experience and has assembled a body of useful information. The data on volume of employment, the distribution of workers in general occupational fields, and employment turnover were submitted to the Director General of Labor for his use in reorganizing and expanding the National Employment Service should adequate funds for expansion become available. The information obtained on the 648 employing establishments in the city of Santiago was used to establish an employer record file in Sección Colocaciones and this file provides the basis for planning and carrying out an employer relations program and a program of expanded and improved labor market information for the Ministry of Labor.
(Continued from page 2) vestigations, studies, and demonstrations to further progress in restoring handicapped persons to usefulness. Seven of the newly announced grants are for new projects; the remaining seven for continuation of projects started earlier. Approval of all the projects, located in nine States and the District of Columbia, was recommended by the 12-member National Advisory Council Vocational Rehabilitation chaired by Miss Mary E. Switzer, director of the Office of Vocational Rehabilitation. One of the new special projects receiving Federal financial support is sponsored by the Oregon Division of Vocational Rehabilitation. It is designed to demonstrate the effect a coordinated program of services would have on the rehabilitation of mental hospital patients. These services would be provided by the State health, welfare, and rehabilitation agencies, the State mental hospital, and their counterpart agencies in local communities and counties. The amount of the grant is $63,550. Length-of-Service Awards THE Incentive Awards Committee of the Department of Labor has revised its procedures for granting length-of-service awards. As of March 4 of this year, the awards are based on total civilian and military Federal service rather than being restricted to service in the Department of Labor. Awards will be given after completion of 10 and 20 years of satisfactory service and at 5-year intervals thereafter.
Most of the students hired for peach packing were girls.
PPROXIMATELY 350 high school boys and girls in the area of the Gaffney local office of the South Carolina State Employment Service found out during the 3-month peach season of 1956 that work in packing sheds of Sunny Slope Farms was a highly profitable vacation occupation. During May last year, Gaffney local office interviewers visited the high schools and took applications on 350 students 16 years of age or older for work in the Sunny Slope Farms packing shed during the peach harvest. Every boy and girl who qualified was offered a job. If any student did not report for work another was offered employment. During the height of the peach season, the peaches
must be picked daily and packing sheds must operate every day so that there will be no backlog of fruit at any time during the shipping season. Since some students preferred not to work on Sundays, the Gaffney local office arranged to have from 10 to 25 additional workers report each Sunday to alleviate any shortage in the sheds. Each boy and girl was trained by expert peach packing supervisors to perform a certain job skillfully. Peaches bruise easily and must be handled with care in order to reach their destination in perfect condition. At least 75 percent of the students hired were girls. The manager of the farm feels that girls have better eyesight and finger dexterity in finding defects in peaches as they move along on the conveyor belt. During a rest period every 3 hours, the manager furnished soft drinks and a sandwich for each worker. This arrangement was found to boost morale of the workers.
No particular transportation problems arose since the young people arranged car pools to reach their work. It is estimated that the high school students earned approximately $180.000 during their employment at the farm. The average rate of pay was about 75 cents an hour. Depending on the amount of peaches picked that day, the students usually worked from 8 to 10 hours per day. The average student made about $575 during the season. Many used this money to help defray their college expenses during their freshmen year; others spent it on vacation tours. In addition to the high school students, 25 applications were taken on college students for supervisory work in the sheds. Girls from Limestone College in Gaffney and Converse College in Spartanburg and
men from Clemson College at Clemson and Furman University in Greenville were hired. Their rate c pay ranged from $1.50 to $2.00 per hour, an average of about $1,470 each for the 3-month period. The same experiment was tried by the Aiken locai office to get workers for the Ridge Section peach packing sheds. Approximately 450 students were employed during the harvest season in five packing sheds in this area. These experiments showed that, in both skill and ability, high school youth make above-average packing shed workers. With good supervision, the students do an excellent job. Present indications are that there will be a bannst peach crop in South Carolina in 1957 and the Farm Placement Division of the South Carolina State Employment Service is planning to place larger numbers of students in peach harvest work. The 1956 experiment proved that the students and their employers benefited greatly from the trial.
TV Brings Vocational Guidance Into the Schools
By N. J. HAYDOCK
THE 'HE Wilkes-Barre office of the Pennsylvania Bureau of Employment Security recently tried a different approach to publicizing its counseling and testing program-and with good results. Mrs. Edna Davis, counselor at the Wilkes-Barre office, participated in the first of a series of weekly 15-minute vocational guidance television programs sponsored by the Wilkes-Barre City Public School District. This series is designed to acquaint students of the city's three public schools, as well as the general public, with the services and facilities available to them in the community relating to job opportunities-how and where to go to obtain suitable employ
quired to assemble in their school auditoriums to view the television and listen to the well-planned vocational guidance discussion of the day. The programs are, of course, viewed in thousands of homes as well. The first program highlighted the counseling and testing services of the State Employment Service which are available to the workers of the community, These services were discussed in a question-andanswer forum in which Mrs. Davis and R. Harold Saunders, vocational counselor at Wilkes-Barre's Coughlin High School, participated. The Coughlin High School librarian described the literature and other materials relating to vocational guidance and higher education which are readily available to the students in the school's library. Using appropriate slides, Mr. Saunders explained simple terms the breakdown of the various parts of the DICTIONARY OF OCCUPATIONAL TITLES. Mrs. Davis emphasized that “employment counsel
This educational telecast series, titled “The $200,000 Quiz," is broadcast each Friday morning at 11 o'clock over TV Station WILK in Wilkes-Barre. The thousands of students of Wilkes-Barre's three public high schools (grades 9 through 12) are
ing is of particular value to young people who lack information about job opportunities and job requirements and who need skilled guidance in evaluating their job assets or in planning to meet labor market entry requirements for a given field of work.” She also stressed that the general function of the State Employment Service is to serve as the community's job center to which job seekers can turn for assistance in obtaining suitable employment, and to which employers can turn for aid in filling their job openings with qualified workers.
the graduate. The cost of the training would be comparatively modest considering the fact that a job at $3,600 a year under Federal civil service w s guaranteed the counselee on the successful completion of the prescribed training course. “It was ascertained in the course of the counseling interview that the young man had a handicap of a nature which would make him eligible for college training under authority of the Pennsylvania State Bureau of Rehabilitation. The disclosure of this handicap and its nature proved fortunate for the applicant. The counselor followed through with the result that the State Bureau of Rehabilitation approved the payment of tuition for the necessary training at Penn State Extension School in the applicant's home community of Wilkes-Barre. “This young man successfully completed the prescribed course of training and is now employed in Washington, D. C., while attending night school pursuing a course which will enable him to advance in his chosen field. Needless to say, he is a happier individual than on the day when, with uncertainty as to the future, he approached the Wilkes-Barre ES counselor to be interviewed.”
What Young People Ask Some of the pertinent “youth” questions discussed by the Wilkes-Barre ES counselor were. "What is employment counseling?" "How do you select young people for this (counseling) service?" "If we have a student in the city schools who needs employment counseling, how can we refer him to you?" “What services do you offer young people?” “Can you give the TV audience a typical case that will illustrate the type of help you give?” In response to the last query, Mrs. Davis cited this "typical case.” Last June, following graduation, a young graduate of an academic course, an honor student, was referred to the Wilkes-Barre ES counseling section for assistance in procuring a suitable job. This young man was suited for and keenly interested in, entry in the engineering field. Owing to compelling financial circumstances at home, the youth had not applied for a scholarship, since he was aware that he would not be able to attend college. "An ES counselor, cognizant of the on-the-job training opportunities for engineering draftsmen trainees, who could complete a 10-week training course, which existed at the Naval Gun Factory in Washington, D. C., discussed that possibility with
Testing and Counseling Tools The tools used in the testing and counseling processes were shown and described in conjunction with the question-and-answer portion of the TV program, in which the ES counselor, together with a representative of the Wilkes-Barre City Public School District, participated. The washer and rivet and the peg board units of test equipment were prominently displayed and their uses described before the TV camera for a clearer understanding, especially by student viewers, of the physical tools used in aptitude testing. The paper and pencil phase of testing also was outlined. Succeeding programs of the series featured discussions of particular jobs by persons of the community employed in professional, skilled, and semiskilled occupational categories.
E VERY former prisoner referred to the Las Cruces local office of the New Mexico State Employment Service by a Federal correctional institution has been offered employment related to his previous experience and training. This accomplishment was reached through the diligent efforts of prison officials, the active job promotion of the Employer Relations Representative in the Las Cruces local office, and a dynamic three-way plan of cooperation among the Bureau of Prisons, the Texas Employment Commission, and the New Mexico State Employment Service “Rehabilitation" is at least as important as punishment. This is the idea behind an up-to-date prison system. It is a premise agreed upon by sociologists in general and criminologists in particular. If, after “paying his debt to society,” the former prisoner is not given a receipt in the form of an opportunity to earn a living, then one of the major purposes behind his incarceration is automatically defeated. In establishing a system of Federal correctional institutions, the Federal Bureau of Prisons has undertaken a program designed to provide rehabilitation through the three broad programs: vocational, social, and recreational. The Employment Service is. of course, primarily concerned with the vocational aspect of the rehabilitation plan. When the vocational training program began at the prison in 1955, it was not fully unified with Emplovment Service placement activities. Chronologically. the first step towards coordination bore only indirectly on the placement of releases. The staff of the employment office in Las Cruces had frequently referred workers to job openings at the prison, but parolees had not been referred to the Employment Service. In the fall of 1955, we arranged for representatives
Inmates in the auto mechanics class examining the front end Page 10
Many useful items are made in the woodworking section of the hobby shop.
of the employment security system to make talks about employment to men who were to be released in the near future. Because the Federal Correctional Institution at La Tuna, Tex. is actually located on the Texas-New Mexico State line, halfway between Las Cruces, N. Mex. and El Paso, Tex., the employment offices in both cities shared responsibility for these informational discussions. Alternating each month, the meeting was conducted by Milford Hill, manager of the Las Cruces Office, or by William C. Gwin, VER-counselor in El Paso, who was assigned to the task by the District Director of the Texas employment Commission in El Paso. At the first discussion, the Supervisor of Education and the Supervisor of Classification and Parole at the prison described the prison's plan for vocational rehabilitation. The prison plant, they said, had originally been a detention camp for Mexican aliens and only recently had been converted into a correctional institution. The vocational education program had been started in January 1955. The prison, in addition to all the other functions of a small town, has an efficient farming and dairy operation which enables it to function as a self-sufficient community. Thirty-five types of vocational training are given in crafts and "white-collar” occupations. Each inmate is a producer, a craftsman, a tradesman, or a distributor. Men who have been fully qualified in a given vocation prior to imprisonment frequently are assigned to positions as teachers. Vocational teachers are hired on an hourly basis from a nearby high school to conduct night courses in other trades. The prisoners who are directed to the correctional institution are men convicted of Federal offenses who are deemed to have a greater potential for re
habilitation than others. This sactor appeared, later, to have considerable influence on employers in their decision to offer jobs to parolees. For the most part, the men are young adults (as distinguished from juveniles) under 30 years of age who have been sentenced for the first time. Mr. Hill, in his discussions with them, soon found that as a whole they were eager to be “rehabilitated,” very receptive to suggestions that might facilitate getting a job, resourceful in asking pertinent questions and in developing plans toward reaching various vocational goals. As part of their energetic encouragement of the rehabilitation and placement projects, Warden Reed Cozart and Associate Warden P. R. Bergen provided quarters where the group could sit comfortably and the lecture, with the informal discussion which follows it, could be conducted with understanding between the Employment Service representative and the men scheduled to be released. The two ES men follow a similar pattern in their initial discourses. Each outlines methods whereby one may decide on a job goal and make plans for reaching it, considering interests, aptitudes, prospects, and training opportunities. They give hints on the appropriate attitude in making application and the preparation of the application forms. They discuss occupational outlook, unemployment insurance, and numerous other related matters pertaining to getting and holding a job. Throughout the discussion, they emphasize the aid which is available from the Employment Service. Questions asked by inmates range from the perennial “Should I tell a prospective employer about my prison record?” and “What opportunities are now available for heavy equipment operators in overseas jobs?” to inquiries about details of unemployment insurance laws. Each reply generates further questions, resulting in long question-and-answer sessions. Many of the prisoners, when released, return to their homes or to parole boards in distant parts of the country. Others, however, prefer to have employment in Las Cruces or El Paso where the nearest public employment offices are located.
Upon receipt of one of these résumés in the Las Cruces office, the placement problem, one of the most essential parts of the rehabilitation process, was assigned to Harold Z. Moore, the employer relations representative. Mr. Moore's successful placement of the workers might be described as the climax of the entire rehabilitation program. He incorporated the placement of former prisoners into his regular program of employer visits. In his discussions with employers, he would, when one of the prisoners was qualified for any job in that organization, describe the man's qualifications and perhaps review with the employer the résumé of employment background provided by the prison. Mr. Moore found that the majority of emplovers appeared to believe sincerely that the parolees should have an opportunity to earn a living and reenter society, but a much smaller number were willing to provide that opportunity. Most felt there was sufficient assurance that the public would not learn of the worker's prison record, but seemed to fear most that there might be a recurrence of the crime for which the man had been convicted. Many felt that it would not be "good business” on their part to hire an "exconvict” when another worker with equal qualifications was available.
Personal Interview Helps Get Job Many prisoners must have a bona fide offer of employment pending before they can be discharged. This job offer is much easier to secure under circumstances which permit the employer personally to interview the applicant before committing himself to hiring him. This was easily arranged, since the employing establishments and employment offices in each city could be reached within 30 minutes driving time from the prison. Résumés of each prisoner's employment qualifications, prepared by prison officials, were extremely helpful in placing the men referred to the Las Cruces oflice. The résumé detailed the man's previous work history, training, personality, hobbies, medical record, the nature of the crime for which he was convicted, and a prospectus of future adjustments.
Encouraged by First Effort However, Mr. Moore was encouraged by the satisfactory placement of the first prisoner with whom he worked. The prisoner in question was a personable, 23-year-old high school graduate who had had casual work experience as a truck driver, logger, caterpillar operator, cement finisher, service station attendant, and roofer. During his prison term he had learned to use a typewriter and had been assigned as a clerk in the institution's education office. He had had an excellent record of cooperation while incarcerated. At the time of his imprisonment under the Dver Act for involvement in an automobile theft, he was still of near-juvenile age, although he was already a veteran of the Korean campaign. While he was in prison he matured considerably. The fourth employer with whom Mr. Moore discussed this man's qualifications agreed to interview him, without any advance commitment whatever, for a position as route salesman. The interview was arranged and the applicant was accompanied to the employer's establishment by the prison's Supervisor of Education. The employer was favorably impressed by the applicant's qualifications and hired him. Incidentally, the salary for this job is considerably higher than for similar positions in the community. The firm involved is one which screens applicants carefully and checks references extensively. The job holder, in this case, has been very successful in both vocational and social adjustment. He handles several hundred dollars of the firm's money daily and is being considered for promotion to a supervisory position. Other workers in the organization do not
know he was in prison but think that he recently was discharged from the Army. He belongs to a young people's civic club and is taking college courses at night. Mr. Moore has also placed other parolees who have
proved to be satisfactory workers. Although there may be some such individuals in the future who cannot successfully be placed by the Employment Service local office, we shall always give them the best service possible.
Counselor, West Palm Beach Local Office Florida State Employment Service
HOW OW can the employment security program objec tive-to secure for all ages maximum employment, production, and purchasing power-be achieved for the youth of a community? This problem presents a continuing challenge to the West Palm Beach office of the Florida State Employment Service. Through the years our population growth has made ever greater the recurring summer task of helping both the high school graduates and other youths to find jobs. Our economy makes this task difficult. Although growth has pushed our year-round employment to a high level, our area still has a winter resort peak employment season. This occurs when the young people are in school, are least in need, and are least available for jobs. The impact of this stopped us in our tracks in the summer of 1953.
A number of factors led us to try this approach. Our past local office efforts had succeeded in helping only a few young people secure jobs. But many students were anxious to be served if we could produce results. We had to bring forth a program which would win enthusiastic support of employers, without which it could not succeed, and one which appealed to youth. We decided that in a place outside the crowded local office we could operate a limited "employment service for youth" program. Our plan was cosponsored by the West Palm Beach Chamber of Commerce and the City Department of Recreation, which also provided office space. We set up the service for youth in the Howard Park Recreation Center, known to the young people of the community as “Teen Town.” Hence, our new name "Teen Town Employment Service." The local high schools announced the location and date of opening. Local newspapers and radio stations gave the news to the public. “Teen Town Employment Service” in West Palm Beach became a reality. During the summer of 1954, the program brought gratifying results but it also showed us many problems yet to be solved. That year the “Teen Town” office stayed open 3 hours each day for 6 weeks and found jobs for 22 percent of the young people who contacted the center. We felt that much had been accomplished but our goal of jobs for all was still far away. The challenge had not been met completely.
We Need Advance Information
The local office was crowded with qualified workers laid off because of the end of the winter resort season. High school was out and the new graduates poured in seeking employment. College students returned home and wanted jobs. Scores of other youngsters sought summer or part-time work. The deluge hit our office, with its limitations of personnel and work space, harder than a Florida hurricane. It was impossible to serve these young people adequately--and the problem was more acute because of their lack of work experience. Our "matching men with jobs” approach meant that youths, with no employment background, were not able to find work. During the following months the question, "Can this office meet the needs of the young people of this community?" cropped up again and again. The only possible answer was “It has to try.' Before summertime rolled around again, an idea had developed into a plan for action which caught fire and captured the imagination and support of the community. A spe program resulted. We called it our Teen Town Employment Service."
Our first year's operations had led us to realize that we need to know in advance more about what types of jobs the young people want. In planning for the summer of 1955, we developed a questionnaire on experience and type of work sought. Each high school junior and senior filled out this questionnaire. When we had summarized the replies, we knew what the young people wanted to do and what they had to offer emplovers. Newspapers gave this information to the community.
Our past experience and the thinking expressed in the workshop contributed to our plans for the summer of 1956. We changed our Youth Placement Program so that high school graduates and college studen: seeking summer work were directed to our regular office. We felt this also would assure the graduate who had taken advantage of the ES-high schoo. program of additional guidance in light of current labor market conditions.
In the 1955 effort the Chamber of Commerce and Department of Recreation continued as sponsors but the name of the special service was changed to “Youth Placement Center” because the youngsters associated “Teen Town” with recreation. Staying open 5 hours daily for 9 weeks, the center found jobs for 48 percent of those applying. We were well pleased and felt that this was as high a placement percentage as we could achieve, but further analysis showed much room for improvement. For one thing, placements of undergraduates and young teenagers had been very few. The youngsters could not compete against the graduates and the college-age group. They needed special consideration. Another discovery was that, while wellintentioned, the service was doing harm to graduating seniors and to prospective employers who had permanent work in mind, not just summertime gapfilling jobs. Along this same line was the conclusion that advanced college students could be served best through the regular channels of our local office, because of their greater work experience backgrounds.
Restricted to Undergraduates Undergraduates only would be served at the special center. Advance knowledge of their job needs and talents were sought through screening forms which we asked sophomore, junior, and senior classes in the local high schools to fill out. Then we began 3 concerted campaign. We used newspaper advertisements and stories, radio announcements, and personal contacts to locate jobs for these young people. The Youth Placement Center stayed open 4 hour daily for 8 weeks. At the close of this period, the tally sheet read 57 percent of the undergraduate applying had been aided in successfully finding jobs. By age group, the placements were as follows: 14 years: 16 applications, 6 placements—37 percent 15 years: 51 applications, 29 placements-57 percent 16 years: 50 applications, 27 placements—53 percent 17 years up: 61 applications, 40 placements-63
Before the next summer came, more planning had to be done. Part of it was accomplished in a community forum in which many persons interested in the problems of youth participated. The ParentTeachers Association sponsored the forum workshop. Employers, parents, and young people in the community took part. A field representative of the National Child Labor Committee, and the Child Labor Consultant of our Florida Industrial Commission assisted in the planning and appeared on the program. The workshop found that many employers think young people lack a sense of responsibility and vocacational objectives, and need close supervision. Following a discussion of the school curriculum, those attending the workshop expressed a general feeling that the 80 percent or more of the youth in our area who do not go on to college are poorly prepared to enter the labor market and perhaps need more vocationally significant terminal education. The students themselves expressed their belief that employers fail to recognize their capabilities, and that, because of their minor status, they did not receive comparable pay for comparable work performed by older persons. Parents expressed belief that jobs are a good answer to the needs of children for something to occupy their idle hours and as a way for them to gain maturity and accept responsibility. The Employment Service told of its problems in assisting youth who, because of the nature of our economy, are entering the labor market during the slow season in the area. We also stressed the need for all employers to notify us of their employment needs.
After the center closed that summer, 75 other undergraduates came to us seeking jobs. Through our local office we were able to place 32 percent of them. This placement percentage-lower than for any age group served in the special center-proved in our minds that integration of the youth center with the local office could not meet the need as successfully as a separate facility. The 1956 total, including all youth from age 13 through the high school graduates, numbered 512 applications and 217 placements (43 percent). The Youth Placement Center program proved that to obtain our objective for the youth group, a specialized service is a must. This is a two-part servicein the local office for graduates, and a limited summer Employment Service outside the local office for undergraduates. Our West Palm Beach youth program has dore more than just get young people jobs. It has brought through the door of our local office many emplovers we had not otherwise reached and it created greater all-round public interest in all our work. Undoubtedly the greatest value of these efforts to the Employment Service is that they should bring valuable dividends in the years ahead. Of whatever success our efforts have been, they are our way of meeting today's challenge of youth, of helping start to vocational success those who will be the leaders in the world of tomorrow.
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1957 Page 11
A TEST BATTERY SPARKS A TRAINING PROGRAM, W. B. McCarter MARYLAND'S SICK-CLAIM PROGRAM, Robert E. Kaiss “CAN YOU USE ME?" Charles Mooshian A BEAN PICKERS' BULLETIN, Maynard S. Hempstead EXPANDED SERVICES TO RESERVATION INDIANS, Arizona State Employment Service LOCAL OFFICE SUPERVISION AND MANAGEMENT CONTROL, Theodore R. Maughan. FIRST INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF SOCIAL SECURITY ACTUARIES AND STATISTI- CIANS, George F. Rohrlich COOPERATION PLUS COURAGE, Luther J. Luckett VOLUNTEER FARM LABOR REPRESENTATIVES, Willard M. Williamson AGAIN HOLLYWOOD LEARNS OF OUR SERVICES
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR JAMES P. MITCHELL, Secretary ROBERT C. GOODWIN, Director
Record IAPES Convention Studies
KEYNOTING the theme, “Employment Security Plans for Tomorrow," for the 44th annual meeting of the International Association of Personnel in Employment Security, in Miami, Fla., late in June, Under Secretary of Labor James T. O'Connell told the more than 1,400 representatives of the United States, Canada, Alaska, Puerto Rico, Japan, Korea, and Lebanon that “fantastic quantities of work and ingenuity have fashioned our present fortunate conditions.” He then pointed up the need for training to develop and utilize manpower. Training-in the schools, the communities, the offices, and the factories—to keep pace with stampeding technology was stressed from the opening of IAPES Chapter Presidents' Day June 24 through the closing session of the record convention on June 28. Mr. O'Connell put it this way: “There is no way to develop skills except through continuing and persistent improvement in the quantity and quality of the education, training, and occupational opportunities of an ever-increasing number of individuals." He said that the Nation will add some 10 million persons to the labor force by 1965—almost all of them will be needed in professional, technical, and skilled categories—and that the need for the unskilled, farmers, and farm workers will continue to decline. Mr. O'Connell called for cooperation of industry, labor, communities, schools, and all levels of government in strengthening the contributions of secondary schools, improving vocational training, vocational guidance, and training facilities and methods, and suggested that industry spend at least some of the money it now spends on personnel recruitment to promote training and skill development within industry. Bureau of Employment Security Deputy Director E. L. Keenan moderated the forum, “Skilled Man
power for Economic Growth and Mobilization,” and Assistant Director Louis Levine asserted, “We are in the midst of an amazing industrial transformation such as has never been experienced before in our history.” He stressed that ES workers must create awareness in communities, schools, and industry of the importance of skill development. "Our private enterprise system places upon industry the primary responsibility for the expansion of the supply of our skilled workers,” he said, adding that ES must understand manpower problems and provide the labor market facts upon which industry can base its training programs and that ES counseling and placement services should continue to aid in uncovering latent abilities needed in many professional fields. “Two thousand years of technical progress have occurred within our life-time, if we measure progress by the standards of any previous generation in history,” J. Lewis Powell, member of the staff of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Supply and Logistics), told the conference. Mr. Powell stressed how, in 1945, “we revolutionized our thinking. We made progress a product which could be achieved by the application of mobilized brainpower.” He contrasted progress in speed, explosives, and the range of missiles and said that mature industry and government executives needed to liberate themselves from “Model-T Technology” in order to keep abreast of the on-rushing avalanche of technological advance which is constantly changing the dimensions of both the business and geopolitical world. He said that military preparedness and industrial readiness were heads and tails on the same coin and that a well-informed military-industry team in-being was essential to continued national defense. Director W. C. Christensen of the Labor Department's Bureau of Apprenticeship and Training asserted that the responsibility for developing skills and talents in employed workers rests with industry, with management in particular, and in part with labor. He detailed the Bureau's operations in developing skilled workers in highly skilled trades and pledged cooperation in the total problem of finding and helping to produce more and greater skills in the Nation's work force. Arthur Jakeman, industrial relations manager for Courtaulds (Alabama), Inc., keynoted three concurrent panels which considered responsibilities of
Employment Service—Total New applications.. 740, 300 +5 Referrals: Agricultural. . 822, 400 +265 Nonagricultural 932, 500 +10 Placements: Agricultural.. 785, 300 +315 Nonagricultural. 533, 800 +11 Men. 313, 500 +14 Women.. 220, 300 +8 Handicapped.. 28, 900 +12 Counseling interviews. 145, 200 -2 Individuals given tests. 134, 800 -6 Employer visits... 154, 800 +10 State Unemployment Insurance Initial claims, except transitional .. 992, 100 - 9 Weeks of unemployment claimed... 6, 151, 000 -6 Weekly average insured unemployment 1.. 1, 332, 100 -8 Weeks compensated ? 5, 517, 300 -4 Weekly average beneficiaries ?. 1, 199, 400 -8 Average weekly benefit pay ment for total unemployment. $27.43 -1 Benefits paid... $143, 233, 100 -6 Funds available as of May 31, 1957.... $8,571,801,800 +2
management, supervision, professional and staff workers and career employees in ES plans for the future. Speakers included BES Deputy Assistant Director Forest L. Miller, who said that professional workers have increased as ES services have expanded and that top management must have the ability to see ES programs as a living and whole organism. Myer Freyman, BES chief of staff development and training, reported that training should be planned to fit the needs of management-not “to keep up with the Joneses”—and that training prospers when it promotes the growth of the individual. Richard C. Brockway, New York agency administrator, asserted that management should let everyone in the organization know just what kind of an outfit they want. Miss Margaret Jane Gay, interviewer in North Carolina's Kinston office, said, “When a supervisor yields a portion of the planning and programing to the worker, both parties are benefited as well as the organization as a whole." Canada's Unemployment Insurance Commissioner C. A. L. Murchison, kicking off a series of workshops concerned with ES operating problems, emphasized the importance of leadership, integrity, and service and pointed up the growing need for placement officers with special knowledge to serve employers and workers in 'an age of specialization. Samuel C. Bernstein, Chicago, president of the Interstate Conference of Employment Security Agencies, gave a report of Conference activities and said, “The Conference and IAPES have a mutual interest in the competent discharge of our responsibilities in the field of employment security." Vincent P. Hippolitus, liaison officer and field representative for The President's Committee on Employment of the Physically Handicapped, detailed the purpose of the EPH Committee, “to create an employment climate favorable to the physically handicapped-to gain public and employer understanding of these workers as qualified members of the normal labor market” and said ES staff will be called upon to assist employers in setting up in-company programs of selective placement. IAPES President W. Garnett Johnson of Frankfort, Ky., in his formal stewardship report, said that IAPES has members scattered over seven continents with "other free nations from Indonesia to Central America, and from Finland to India, not just aware that IAPES is, but literally begging us to widen our family circle of communications. . .. They frankly look to us for leadership." Governor Luis Munoz Marin of Puerto Rico was awarded the IAPES Citation of Merit for his contributions to the field of employment security and his part in “Operation Bootstrap,” Puerto Rico's highgeared industrialization program. Miss Mildred Powers, Boston, Mass., received the Association's Award of Merit; Philadelphia, Pa., Service and Domestic Office won a group merit award; Herman Slavin, Brooklyn, N. Y., received top award in essay (Continued on page 12)
Page 12
MUCH has been written about the burgeoning electronics industry and its importance to national welfare and industrial progress. It has been described as the fastest growing major industry in the Nation, approaching such giants as steel, automobiles , and petroleum in the value of products manufactured. Whereas electronics production was confined primarily to communications equipment prior to World War II, the industry now embraces such items as navigation aids, control systems, computers, and instrumen Southern California had only 15 "electronics" firms with annual sales of $4 million in 1941. Present esti
mates, based on projections of the 1955 figures, indicate that over 90,000 persons are engaged in electronics occupations, with an annual payroll of perhaps $355 million. Over 500 firms are now making electronic products and sales exceed the billion dollar mark. Much also has been written about the manpower shortages to be expected as a result of the mushroom growth of the industry. Secretary of Labor James P. Mitchell gave a Congressional committee his ideas of the dangers inherent in the evaporating manpower pool. He has strongly urged that young men apprentice themselves to
become skilled workers, and that industrialists give on-the-job training and support vocational education. He indicated a serious long-range concern about the shortage of skilled workers—not only engineers and scientists, but electronics technicians, draftsmen, and machinists. Employer complaints about the shortage of electronics technicians in the area served by the Van Nuys office of the California Department of Employment were met with the repeated rejoinder that the employers should prepare for a more serious shortage by establishing formal apprenticeship training programs. By October of 1955, the interchange of information and ideas between the Veteran's Employment Representative of the Van Nuys office and several employers in the area had reached the stage where it was felt that an exploratory meeting of interested employers, the schools, and the Division of Apprenticeship Standards of the State Department of Industrial Relations could take place. A series of meetings was held at which the Division of Apprenticeship Standards consultant for the area described the program of apprenticeship in terms of its operation for a group of employers. An interim committee appointed subcommittees to develop apprenticeship standards, rules and regulations, job descriptions, job specifications, and training requirements. Representatives from the Division of Apprenticeship Standards, the Department of Employment, and the schools acted as consultants to the employer committee and served on the subcommittees to help develop the materials. The need for an aptitude test battery to aid in selecting potentially qualified apprentices was apparent, but, for a number of practical and technical reasons, it did not seem feasible to develop such a battery using a group of apprentices. It was decided, therefore, that a study of employed workers should be undertaken.
The first tentative approach made by the Department's occupational analysts to a large employer met with immediate affirmative response. The Northrop Division of Northrop Aircraft, Inc., Hawthorne, Calif., had had a most satisfactory experience with the Department's Inglewood office in hiring testselected women workers for electronic assembly jobs. The firm was interested in the application of a test battery for the selection of electronics technician trainees. One of the problems involved in conducting this study was the identification of the specific job. The job titles and terminology used in industry to classify electronics workers differed considerably from plant to plant. Fortunately, one of the assignments of the Van Nuys program's subcommittees had been to develop a job description which would identify and describe the job in a manner agreeable to all interested parties. This material was useful in identifying the group to be studied at Northrop. A second problem was the matter of scheduling the technicians for testing. Both the company and the State agency were loath to schedule workers off the job in such numbers as to interfere with production. This problem was solved by scheduling small groups from two different shifts in three departments in order to minimize the hardship to any one department or shift. A total of 57 electronics technicians were tested in this manner. Seven were dropped from the sample after a review of their work assignments indicated they were not performing duties comparable to those established as the work of an electronics technician, or because of inability to secure adequate ratings due to insufficient tenure on the job in this plant. The decision as to type of criteria to be used to differentiate the more satisfactory from the less satisfactory workers posed a problem. The preparation of ratings involved estimates by seven first
and second-line supervisors from three departments for two shifts. It was decided to use an adaptation of a descriptive rating scale developed by the Bureau of Employment Security to apply to situations involving large numbers of raters. All levels of supervision were carefully briefed in the planning, organizing, and execution of the study. Special effort was necessary to select only those workers actually performing the work of electronics technicians. Heads of departments participated in early planning conferences and were aware of the requirements for a proper sampling. The department heads and subordinates were given an oral briefing and written instructions pertaining to the ratings. In addition to these careful preparations, arrangements were made to have the raters come to a central point to prepare the ratings. Here a test development technician again reviewed the written instructions and orally emphasized the importance of rating on quantity and quality of production and skill and ability in doing the job. Cooperation by the company at all stages of the study was exceptionally good. Analysis of the data presented no particular problems, no doubt because of careful preparation, proper sampling, and clear understanding of what was required in the ratings. This analysis involved a careful study of all the data gathered, including correlations obtained between the aptitudes and supervisory ratings of the workers. Based on this analysis, California State Employment Service technicians selected norms which were soon approved by the Bureau's national office for use as a selection battery. The Van Nuys apprenticeship group was ready to begin operation and the battery was installed in the Van Nuys office for use in screening apprentice candidates. The first apprentice indentured was a paraplegic veteran of World War II. Of the 23 apprentices
accepted in the program, only 2 have left; 1 because of illness, and 1 because of a personality problem. At Northrop, the Industrial Relations Director arranged a meeting with top officials to discuss the outcome of the study and its application to future needs for technicians. As a result of this meeting, a 2-year formal in-plant training program was inaugurated. Whereas the minimum specifications for hiring previously had been specific training or experience in the occupation, the requirements now were for high school graduates who demonstrated aptitude for the work. The battery was installed in the Inglewood office November 19, 1956 and a week later a group of seven high school graduates were on their way to becoming skilled electronics technicians. The program is continuing at Northrop with a new group of 10 trainees added in June of this year. The Hughes Aircraft facility in El Segundo, another community served by the Inglewood office, was approached to discuss the application of the GATB tests to their selection program for apprentices. Hughes had established a formal apprenticeship program under the State standards. Although the firm was already using a series of tests for screening, they were interested in the results shown by this study. The company requested test-selected applicants for their apprenticeship program and the Inglewood office added these openings to its list. Meanwhile, the publicity given to the Van Nuys apprenticeship program had attracted the attention of employers in other parts of southern California. At the request of local office managers in Pasadena and Santa Barbara, the area test development technician met with interested groups of employers in these cities and explained the development and application of the specific test battery and the general background of the apprenticeship program which had been developed in the San Fernando Valley. In (Continued on page 8)
Maryland's Sick-Claim Program
By ROBERT E. KAISS Maryland Department of Employment Security
THE eligibility requirements for unemployment insurance which concern a claimant's ability to work are relatively minor. The addition of such terms as “physically able” or “mentally and physically able” in a few States has had no significant influence on benefit decisions under the separate State laws. Maryland, however, along with seven other States, has a provision which qualifies its ability-to-work clause. The law requires of a claimant that he be able to work and be available for work, with the exception that “. no claimant shall be considered ineligible in any week of unemployment for failure to comply with the provisions of this subsection if such failure is due to an illness or disability which occurs after he has registered for work and no work which would have been considered suitable at the time of his initial registration has been offered after the beginning of such illness or disability." This provision is not to be confused with the special programs in five States for temporary disability benefits. Maryland has no such disability insurance system. Those opposed to Maryland's so-called sick-claim provision raise a question as to whether it lends itself to potential abuse by claimants. To pay the sick-claim, they contend, is to weaken the initiative and the enterprise of the individual, tempting claimants to sit at home feigning sickness while the weekly check is mailed without even so much as a trip to the local office. Proponents, on the other hand, ask what type of unemployed person in the community is most in need of unemployment insurance. Unemployment in itself, they argue, burdens the individual with financial problems enough, but unemployment plus sickness is trouble compounded. They point out that many States take care of those who are well but have neglected to set up a system for those who are not, and who thereby have greater need.
they are currently averaging about 90 a week, or onehalf of 1 percent of all claims paid. These figures include single sick-claims filed because temporary illness prevented the claimants from reporting at the scheduled time, as well as those filed by claimants with serious illnesses who are under a doctor's care. Because the sick-claim load is small, relatively speaking, most of the work has been absorbed by the regular staff. The Baltimore office, where one-half to two-thirds of the State's total claimload is handled, is at once a case in point and, because of its size, something of an exception: One Interviewer-Examiner II initiates and processes both sick-claims and dependents' allowances. Obviously, then, the administrative and benefit costs of the program have been negligible. The Maryland Department of Employment Se. curity implements the handling of sick-claims with the help of a special continued-claim form-Form U. I. 204-A (see page 7). This form assures maximum services for the claimant and eliminates much paperwork, including correspondence.
Two Ways to File An individual who has actually registered for work, who is in claim status, and who subsequently becomes sick or disabled may continue to file claims in one of two ways: (1) By mail by means of the special continued-claim Form 204-A, which will be supplied by the local office upon request, or (2) by the individual's representative, who will file a claim for him in person at the local office. An individual who was unable to register for work on the first day of unemployment because the local office was not open or because of the reporting system in effect at the local office in question, and who became sick or disabled before the day on which he could report and register, is deemed to have actually registered for work on the first day of his unemplovment, provided he files a claim in person or by one of the methods mentioned above within 7 days of his first day of unemployment. Such a claim is considered to be the same as a registration for work. If there is no other registration in the files of the Applicant Service Division, one is prepared from information on the appropriate claim form. This registration remains active for 30 days following the day on which it is filed. Claims may be filed by or on behalf of the sick or disabled individual at any time within 30 days of the claim week in question, provided the claimant
What Are the Problems? In considering the establishment of such a program, States quite naturally will wonder about the difficulties of administering it, as well as the associated costs and the number of additional people needed. The experience of the Maryland Department of Employment Security in 12 years of administering this program provides some interesting answers. We find that the number of sick-claims paid is relatively small. They average less than 1 percent of the total number of claims paid in 1955 and 1956, and
was actively registered for work during the week for which the claim is filed. No claim, however, is permitted for any period during which the claimant's registration for work was not in active status. The processing of a sick claim begins when Form U. I. 204-F, the regular continued-claim form, and/or a letter is mailed to the local office to give notice that the claimant is sick. Records are then requested from the active file and held by the interviewer-examiner until the next day the claimant is scheduled to report. If the claimant reports, a determination is then made as to whether the claim involved can be paid immediately or whether the case should be handled through the normal sickclaim procedure. If he does not report on his next report-day, Form 204-A is prepared in duplicate. The original is sent to the claimant to be completed and returned. The duplicate is sent to the Employer Service Division for a check on possible work opportunities. The original copy of the Form 204-A, as completed by the claimant, and the duplicate copy,
as returned by the Employer Service Division, are checked to determine if work was available. All cases are reviewed to determine whether the sick-claim requirements have been met. Reasonable evidence of the data of the disability is required in all instances, and, in cases of prolonged sick claims, additional certificates are requested. Where the claimant's regular employment is of an intermittent nature (clothing worker, packinghouse worker, etc.), the employer is checked frequently to determine whether work is available for the claimant. If no work is available and all other requirements are met, the claim is processed and the check mailed to the claimant. Both copies of the Form 204-A are kept in the sick-claim folder. The same procedure is followed during succeeding weeks. When Form 204-A is returned by the Employer Service Division showing that work is available or when information is received from the employer that he will rehire the claimant, the case is referred to a claims specialist for determination. The claims Page 13
interviewed on the show each week. We use only the first names of the applicants, since it seems to make them more at ease. The manager of the Little Rock Commercial and Professional office and his staff select the applicants each week from their files. A member of the Little Rock office staff is chosen to appear on the program each week as guest interviewer. Special programs have been devoted to the physically handicapped, older workers, and to youth interested in summer jobs. We have had a wide range of applicants on the show, including secretaries, receptionists, general office workers, art directors, public relations directors, newspaper reporters, engineers, medical doctors who were handicapped, fashion models, bookkeepers, radio announcers, dental and medical technicians, laboratory assistants, and nurses. Stations KTHS and KTHV hire their personnel exclusively through the local office. Except for prepared opening and closing announcements for the agency, the entire show is unrehearsed and spontaneous. Just prior to going on the air, we give our applicants an idea of the questions we are to ask, tell a few jokes, and make them feel at ease. This always helps to get the program off to a good start. On special occasions, as a community service, we mention different groups, such as Civitan International, the Community Chest, Red Cross, Cancer Society, Polio Foundation, and Heart Fund. In this way, the agency has made new freinds and cemented relations with old ones. In February 1954, Radio KTHS was cited by the President's Committee on Employment of the Physically Handicapped for its outstanding work in behalf of the handicapped, through “Can You Use Me?” On our first anniversary on the air, the program was awarded an engraved plaque for outstanding community service by the Arkansas chapter of the
International Association of Personnel in Employment Security At the same time the program was commended by the Governor and the Mayor of Little Rock. Other offices in the State became interested in the program. With our help, similar programs were set up in El Dorado, Fort Smith, Malvern, and Fayetteville—with good results in each. Since the title "Can You Use Me?" is the property of Radio KTHS, the programs in other areas were called “Will You Hire Me?” which is the property of the Arkansas Employment Security Division. When the management of Radio KTHS obtained a television permit, the manager declared “Can You Use Me?” a TV natural. We made our television debut on Station KTHV in September 1956. The station gave us a 30-minute public-service spot on Sunday afternoon at 1:30. At first we believed that the time was too soon after church; however, it proved to be a good time slot. We changed the format of the television show to include the appearance of an employer, usually the personnel director of a local firm. The TV show opens with a “shot” of one of the applicants, who says: “My name is Mary Ann Smith. I am a secretary. Mr. Employer, can you use me?" Then the title of the show flashes on with appropriate theme music. After the title fades out, the announcer presents the moderator. The moderator (the writer) gives a brief résumé of the purpose behind the show and then interviews the first applicant. After the second applicant has been interviewed, the employer is called into camera range. He is asked about his business, employment practices, and hiring methods and is then asked to give some job-interview tips. After 6 months on television, the program has hel 57 of 74 applicants interviewed to find work. Currently the show is on summer vacation, but the radio show goes on 52 weeks a year. Page 14
Expanded Services to Reservation Indians
Prepared by staff members of the Arizona State Employment Service*
BUM reservation road comes a truck, shuddering to a halt before a beehive-shaped hogan. From the dark doorway steps a sturdy man, levis, boots, and colored shirt showing the wear of a hard land. He has come out to listen to the man fiom the yellow house,” the man who will tell him of cash work in the sugar beet fields of Idaho, Colorado, Utah; cotton in Arizona; perhaps work in an ore mill, sawmill, or new manufacturing plant. The "man from the yellow house" is one of the Arizona State Employment Service interviewer-interpreters stationed on the Navajo reservation. Repetition of this recruitment scene many times each year has brought to thousands of Navajo men and women, and to Indian workers of other reservations in Arizona, access to jobs in quantity and quality not previously available. From this extension of public employment service has come supplemental income needed by many of the State's reservation Indian population to sustain a reasonable standard of living. Enrichment and increase of the domestic labor force available to employers is also a definable result of the service. Scattered among Arizona's 114,000 square miles are 19 Indian reservations whose 37,000 square miles exceed in land mass the States of Maine, New Jersey, Indiana, or West Virginia, or the combined land area of Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Rhode Island. About half of all Indian lands in the Nation are within Arizona, and 80,000 Indians, about one-fourth of all reservation Indians in the Nation, live within the boundaries of the State. The tribes vary widely in size—5,000 Hopis, 7,000 Pimas, 8,000 Papagos, 8,000 Apaches, and 50,000 Navajos, the largest of all Indian tribes. Service to reservation Indians by the public employment service in Arizona began before World War II; recruitment for agriculture, railroad, and mining work was its principal objective. A major change in responsibility to reservation Indians occurred with the agreement signed in July 1950 by Robert C. Goodwin, director of the Bureau of Employment Security, and D. S. Myer, commissioner of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. This agreement was super seded by another concluded in July 1955 by Mr. Goodwin and Glenn L. Emmons, the present commissioner. Service to the Navajo The Navajo Indian reservation sprawls across the northeast portion of Arizona and spills into New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah. The Navajos were
originally hunters, engaging in some farming of corn and beans. In more recent times, raising of sheep became the major economic factor. Enlarged flocks through the years led to overgrazing of the land. A stock-reduction program, started in the early 1930's, made a serious impact on the life of the Navajo who had become greatly dependent upon sheep as his main source of food, clothing, and barter. Offreservation employment became, and continues to be, a necessity for many whose flocks were reduced. The Navajo Tribal Council has worked to improve all phases of the Navajo welfare and most recently has appropriated $600,000 from tribal funds for industrial development to create jobs on or adjacent to the reservation. A full-time professional staff of three now function in the Tribe's Industrial Development Department. An electronic manufacturing firm in Flagstaff, using Employment Service test-selected Navajo women and men, is a recent achievement of this program. Development of oil production, uranium and other rare metal mining and ore processing, and tribal enterprises such as tourist accommodations on the reservation are also opening new jobs. Leases on oil land and royalties on oil-well production may eventually make the Navajo one of the richest tribes. Currently, however, reservation income and job openings are not enough, and off-reservation employment continues to present the most abundant source of supplementary income. In the fall of 1951, the Arizona State Employment Service decided to center principal plans for expanded services to reservation Indians with the Navajos and with the Hopis, whose reservation is surrounded by that of the Navajos. Equipment and trained staff were fundamental to a full-functioning public employment service in this extensive area of widely dispersed population. Farm labor trailers had been used on the reservation previously, but desk space in trading posts at Ganado settlement on the eastern side of the reservation and Tuba City on the west were the first full-time identifiable suboffices established by the Employment Service on an Indian Reservation in Arizona. This arrangement had advantages but a more suitable method of housing was necessary for maximum service. Plans were developed early in 1952 for the design, construction, transportation, and erection of portable suboffice structures to be located at principal trading points on the Navajo reservation-Tuba City, Kayenta, Chinle, and Ganado—and in the spring of that year, suboffice structures were erected and opened for service, Page 15
First International Conference
By GEORGE F. ROHRLICH Chief, Division of Actuarial and Financial Services * Bureau of Employment Security
FROM November 3 to 11, 1956, about 200 social The welcoming address by the Belgian Minister of security specialists from 32 countries convened Labor and Social Welfare sounded the keynote of the in Brussels, Belgium, in daily work sessions devoted Conference: to discussing statistical and actuarial problems of “Considering the specific character of the techsocial insurance. The conference was called by the nical problems posed by social security . . . it was International Social Security Association (ISSA), natural that the International Social Security Assowith the cooperation of the International Labor ciation, thought of appealing to specialists who are Office (ILO) to which it is linked by organiza- social minded yet, at the same time, steeped in the tional ties. Some other international organizations, actuarial disciplines and statistical methods. such as the Inter-American Committee on Social “... they must suggest the formulas and find Security, were also represented. The Belgian National the proper means which contribute to the well-being Social Security Office acted as host. and emancipation of a Nation's productive forces in conformity with the precepts of contemporary social Organization and Purpose philosophy. "Perhaps it is within the domain of social security The ISSA, founded nearly 30 years ago, is an that science finds its noblest justification in the service organization of governmental and nongovernmental of man. social insurance carriers in 45 different countries. It counts 112 institutions among its members. In The Work Sessions type, these institutions range from government departments administering social security programs to Four overall topics made up the Conference agenda. fully or partly autonomous national social insurance In order of discussion they were: (1) General orientainstitutes and funds, and to mutual benefit societies tion of social security actuarial and statistical work, of lesser scope. Among them, these various insti- (2) statistical sampling methods applied to social tutions claim coverage of about 200 million insured security techniques, and (3) actuarial problems of persons. sickness and maternity insurance. A fourth general Over the years, the ISSA has called numerous topic “Other" served as a catchall for contributions technical and program conferences on various aspects dealing with subjects not covered by any of the other of social security and has published the proceedings topics. However, no discussion time was assigned thereof. Also, the Association publishes a monthly Bulletin which is printed in several languages, and The papers prepared in advance and discussed at from time to time special monographs on selected the meeting covered technical topics drawn from topics. many phases of social insurance. Subjects treated While the ISSA does not count among its members ranged from reports on new findings regarding the any social security institutions in this country, the incidence of various risks and actuarial method and United States Government has in recent years sent cost studies, papers on the theory and application of observers to several of its meetings. The November sampling techniques, to broader questions such as meeting was attended by Robert J. Myers, Chief the social responsibilities and professional ethics of Actuary for the Social Security Administration, social security technicians. Abraham M. Niessen, Chief Actuary of the Railroad Despite the wide range of subject-matter covered Retirement Board, and the writer. and the diversity of approach, one could not help *Currently detailed to serve as Chief, Division of Program and Legislation. Page 16
in informal contacts with individual members of other delegations at lunch, dinner, or during a reception.
being struck with the community of interest and concern among the professionals authoring these reports based on their necessarily diverse experience with various programs in their respective countries. Two reporters opened the discussion on each topic by summarizing the papers submitted in advance, relating or contrasting different treatments of comparable problems, or the application of similar techniques (e. g., in the sampling area) to different problems. Their discussion also included the evaluation and formulation of tentative conclusions regarding the material submitted and its significance in broad perspective. The meeting was then turned over to a discussion from the floor, each contribution by a discussant being called on “intervention”-a designation carried over from the French and definitely without implication of aggressive tendencies.
Belgium Eliminates Duration of Benefits Provision To give examples: Who among employment security personnel in the States would not be start!ed to find that all limits on the duration of entitlement of bona fide unemployed workers to unemployment insurance benefits have been eliminated under the Belgian system? (This move has been accompanied by a strong drive to retrain workers who have lost their skills or have lost a ready market for them.) Our coverage specialists will be interested in a recent innovation in the Italian program providing some kind of unemployment insurance for agricultural workers. (As one learns more about the features of this program, it turns out to be a sort of minimum-income guarantee from all sources combined, especially for the work force in the poorer rural sections of the country.) Likewise, those not quite up to date in international developments will perk up their ears to hear of the reintroduction in Yugoslavia of an unemployment insurance program following its abolition in all the
Papers Presented Will Be Published
No attempt can be made here to render the contents of the contributed papers even in summary fashion. However, both the prepared texts and the recorded discussion will become available in print before long. Not to become generally available in this form, yet of equal interest, were some of the things one learned
Communist countries on the ground that work aplenty was available for all able-bodied job-seekers. Or take the attempt made under the Dutch system to compute and project cost rates under unemployment insurance industry by industry, and to differentiate tax rates accordingly.
Many inquiries concerned various phases of old-age and survivors insurance, notably the newly-established program of paying benefits to insured persons with long-term total disabilities. Likewise, workmen's compensation came in for its share of attention. Certainly, there was as much opportunity for us to interpret to representatives of other nations our institutions and ways of doing things as there was for them to acquaint us with theirs. As a followup to this Conference, plans are being completed by the ISSA for the issuance in several languages of an international technical magazine devoted entirely to expert treatment of the methodological and other technical aspects of social insurance, and to professional discussions of problems encoun. tered in the design, operation, and control of social security programs.
Related Matters of Interest To an observer from the States, particularly one whose work and contact with the State programs involves for the most part a concern with their present and future fund solvency, a feature common to practically all foreign unemployment insurance systems is particularly striking: The very limited concern with long-range costs. Most frequently, cost estimating periods are limited to the span of the budgetary period, usually no more than a year or so ahead. Various reasons account for this limited perspective. The one mentioned in first place is the present substantially full employment, coupled with a well-nigh universal trust in the government's determination and ability to maintain it. Another reason cited is the residual financial responsibility incumbent upon the government under many of the European systems to foot any deficit incurred at least temporarily. Finally, the fact that in a number of countries unemployment insurance is part of a much broader social insurance program, centrally administered and jointly financed, seems to detract further from any incentive which might otherwise be present to provide specific unemployment insurance cost estimates for extended future periods.
THE COLLEGE GIRL LOOKS AHEAD, Marguerite Wyckoff Zapoleon, Harper Brothers, 1956, 272 pp., $3.75. This guide gives frank, practical answers to questions that girls ask most frequently when planning their college lives and postcollege careers. It does not glamorize women's vocations but gives comprehensive information and counsel on methods of planning for the future in terms of maximum flexibility and more complete personal satisfaction. It presents pertinent facts on scores of occupations in terms of required training. interests, aptitudes, temperamental demands, and salaries. This down-to-earth career guide should be of value to students, parents, vocational guidance counselors, and teachers, not only for its factual data, but also for its clear presentation of woman's role in our changing society. Mrs. Zapoleon, a special assistant to the Director of the Women's Bureau, Department of Labor, points out that the most important step in planning for the future is for a girl to know herself. She tells where to go for objective tests, mentioning on page 250 the General Aptitude Test Battery available at public employment offices, where and how to find part-time work, and which activities will test temperamental adjustment, talent, and potential in a given career. "The College Girl Looks Ahead” shows how to use college years for maximum vocational preparation. A comprehensive list of sources additional information on each field follows each section. There is also a helpful discussion of where and how to do postgraduate work.
Many Questions About Electronic Equipment Great, sincere, and varied was the interest shown in things American. The Belgians proudly invited inspection by all delegates of their IBM setup, including an electronic computer. Questions were asked about our own machine installations. Technicians from one country were interested in all facets of supplemental unemployment benefits plans which have come into operation in the United States. Yet another group of questions concerned our Federal-State relationships. Interest did not stop at unemployment insurance.
By LUTHER J. LCCKETT
'HIS is a story of only one placement, but it involves so many instances of cooperation and coordination of effort that it becomes much more. It is a story of he placement of a handicapped worker and is typical of the fine results being accomplished through renabilitation training, alert placement service, emplover acceptance, and courage. It starts with a Second Lieutenant of the Third field Artillery, Ninth Armored Division, at the ittle town of Berg, Germany, on March 1, 1945. It was there that Raymond E. White suffered the wounds which necessitated amputation of both legs and sentenced him to a wheelchair for the remainder of his life. Raymond White was 28 years old. He had been in the armed services for 11 years, having gone into the Army after graduation from high school. He had seen 5 months of combat and had received a "battlefield commission” for valor and meritorious service. Then came long painful months of surgery, shattered dreams, and adjustment-physical and mental. And he has adjusted so well that neither he, nor anyone around him, ever thinks of him as being handicapped. He is simply a bright, intelligent, likeable fellow who holds up his end of any situation and asks no odds.
orders but found no suitable opening. She turned for help to the Employer Contact Section and called in McDonald Pond. Together they reviewed Ray's application and then Pond went through the list of employers whom he knew. The search for suitable employment for Raymond E. White, office worker, was under way. The secretary of Local #200, Allied Industrial Workers, AFL-CIO, needed a capable office manager. He needed more free time for work on the outside, and he wanted someone who could keep the books straight, type letters, handle the banking, and assume full charge when he was away from the office. Many of the union members were veterans, so they preferred a veteran. Some of their members were also physically handicapped and they knew first-hand what handicapped workers could do. So they preferred a handicapped veteran if one was available. This was the last link in the chain. The Veterans Administration had furnished the rehabilitation training, Raymond White had furnished the courage, the Missouri State Employment Service had furnished the liaison between the handicapped worker and the employer, and Local #200 furnished the recognition and understanding necessary to see beyond the wheelchair. The rest was detail. Ray White drives his own car, taking his wheelchair with him. He drives 25 miles between his home and the office twice a day regardless of weather. The only concession made to him on his new job was a wooden ramp which was built to help him get his wheelchair from the rear parking area to the office. On the job, he receives dues, enters and credits all payments, and handles the banking at a drive-in bank. Ray is a solid citizen and, with a little help and understanding, is contributing his full measure of citizenship to his community, State, and Nation.
A New Type of Livelihood a Must
EXPANDED SERVICES TO RESERVATION INDIANS (Continued from page 18)
When he left the military hospital he had to find a new way of making a living for himself and his family. The Veterans Administration gave him tests to determine the fields for which he was best suited. He was counseled, given vocational guidance, and sent to a business school for 272 years to study accounting, bookkeeping, typing, and business methods and administration. But even with training and ability it is hard for a man confined to a wheelchair to find a job. So Ray White went into business for himself in Kansas City, Mo. He did accounting, bookkeeping, and tax work. He built up a good business but decided to move back to his old home town of Sarcoxie, Mo. It was a small town, full of old friends and a good place to bring up children. But agricultural Missouri was in the midst of one of the worst droughts in history and business was poor. After 22 lean years, Ray decided to “sell” his abilities to an employer but he needed help in marketing them. At the Joplin local office, Ray was directed to the desk of Mrs. Neva Oehring, an Employment Security counselor. She checked through the current
Indian Tribal Councils, U. S. Forest Service, employers throughout Arizona and in other States, Employment Services of our neighboring States, and the regional and national offices of the Bureau of Employment Security. Arizona's experience has proved that the investment of public funds in providing employment services to its reservation Indians is a sound expenditure. The interest accruing from the investment is evident in the gradual and evident economic improvement in Arizona's reservation Indians.
NORTH DAKOTA is a sparsely populated State as a whole and, because it is, our local offices must serve large areas. The Dickinson office serves eight counties with an area of approximately 100 square miles. It would be impossible to give adequate service to the farm employers and workers in this area from the local office with a staff of a manager, two interviewers, and a receptionist. As a quence, we must utilize every means of assistance and cooperation available to meet the demands of our area. The Volunteer Farm Labor Representative Program was initiated in the State in 1937 to provide better service to the farmers and the farm workers. Each year, under average crop conditions, this program has become more effective and now has reached the point where it is a necessity. It is recognized by farmers and workers who seek the services of the Volunteer Farm Labor Representatives in each community during the farming season. These representatives serve as the link between the Employment Service and the worker or employer. If we are to gain the respect and confidence of employers and workers and get the job done properly, we must choose the potential Volunteer Farm Labor Representative with care. He represents our office even though he is not a paid employee. We must screen for this position as we would for an interviewer or receptionist. In seeking information which will help us choose
our representatives, we must solicit the aid of the community to be served. Areas where our representatives are located are usually small villages or towns so it is not difficult to get this information. In selecting our men, we must look for a person: 1. Who is not already overloaded with civic duties, 2. Who has a sense of responsibility, 3. Who has a desire to help other persons and his community, 4. Who is well received in his community-one who commands the respect of businessmen, farmers, and the public, 5. Who has a knowledge of the agricultural activities of his area and, preferably, one whose business is connected with agriculture, 6. Whose business quarters are in an acceptable location and able to accommodate the amount and type of traffic involved in the program, and 7. Who shows consideration and diplomacy in his dealings with others. If these conditions are found, we have the beginning for good representation and service. Our next step is to sell the program to the person selected. If the program is poorly sold to a recruit, he may flatly refuse with many excuses for not accepting, or accept the job without full knowledge of its responsibilities, and thus accomplish little. The latter is the most damaging to the Employment Service under whose name the representative is going to operate. A full explanation of and orientation to our farm program, the local office operation, and his part in the program is not sufficient. We should point out his opportunity to perform a needed public service,
ne community goodwill he will acquire in helping cal employers and workers to harvest essential and rofitable crops and the fact that this goodwill may le to his financial advantage if he is engaged in a local usiness. In selling our man on the program we must make ure he realizes that: 1. Here is a job with plenty of work to be done—not ust another task in name only. 2. In his performance he can help neighbor, friend, community, and stranger alike; his business may or nay not be helped as a result of this service. 3. Even though we aid him as much as possible, he will have to use his own ingenuity and the available resources of the community to give the service and to do the job right. 4. The Employment Service as the sponsoring igency will have to exercise some control of operations--not just for control's sake, but rather to give him information and assistance. He should be helped to understand that he belongs to and is a part of a big operation which goes beyond his own community. 5. When his job is done well, it will be recognized by the community, the sponsoring agency, the employers, and the workers. We do not beg or promise anything to the potential representative either in selling the program to him or in keeping him as an agent. If he does his job well under ordinary circumstances, we will benefit by his participation and in a great majority of the cases he will want to retain his position with a feeling of pride in a job well done. For example, Emmett Dorgan, manager of an oil station, is our volunteer in a small town of approximately 500 inhabitants. He has held this position for 7 years and the entire community thinks of him as Mr. Employment.
Two men, Vernon Burwick and Lawrence Schmidt-act as Volunteer Farm Labor Representatives in Mott, N. Dak.
Our Responsibility Continues Let us suppose that we have selected an individual, he has accepted our offer, and we have oriented him well on his duties. Can we then relax and visit him only occasionally to encourage and straighten him out in his record keeping? Not at all. That would be like finding a potential mechanic who has no previous experience and handing him the necessary tools to accomplish the job, telling him what has to be done, and then expecting him to do it. The local office has meetings to train its staff in the types of service and cooperation that must be given to the Volunteer Farm Labor Representative. For example, the VFLR demands for labor listed with the local office are given priority over other local office orders. If we fill the demands for workers in our immediate locality before answering VFLR calls for assistance, we fail to fulfill part of our obligation to him. Under tried procedures, we have cut recordkeeping a minimum. We have devised a simple form for recording employer information, applicant information, and results. This same report form has a perforated section which the representative fills out giving
information on activities in his area. He needs only to tear this section from the regular sheet and mail it to us on a specified day each week. Some representatives take pride in their reporting and we let them know of our appreciation. Many have seen results of good reporting in timely migration into their areas of an adequate supply of labor as needed. The representative is furnished with farm bulletins which keep him informed about the demand and supply of labor, the current wage rates for agricultural services, crop conditions in his State and surrounding States, and State requirements for movement of harvest equipment. Each week our local office sends to all the representatives a special report showing accomplishments of other representatives in our immediate area. This creates a little competition and usually a desire to improve activities. This form also indicates who has sent in reports so that each man can see whether he is falling down on his job. A regular program of publicity is planned for the entire area. Notices of appointments are published in all county newspapers and announced on radio stations. Other news stories on labor supply and demand in specific areas give the Volunteer Farm Labor Representative's name and his location as a contact point. In all publicity releases, the name and location of the representative is highlighted. Some of the representatives carry on publicity on their own especially on recruitment. Gerhard Christenson, the Volunteer Farm Labor Representative and manager of an oil station at Hettinger, has appeared on a radio program entitled "Current Events As I See Them” in which he reviews the progress of the harvest and demands for labor of his community. As a byproduct of his public service there was a sharp pickup in his early morning gaso Page 17
Guam Employment Service With approval on July 23 of the plan of operation, Guam became the 53d State and Territorial Employment Service to affiliate with the United States Employment Service. The new Employment Service affiliate is a division of the Department of Labor and Personnel of the Government of Guam. Under present legislation, there are no unemployment insurance activities.
job is not the development of electronic brains bu the full development of our human brains and human skills.” The Secretary asked Key Club members to exert their influence as school leaders to persuade their fellow students of the importance of finishing school as a means of preparing for a career. Refugee Relief Program When the 3-year Refugee Relief Program ended on December 31, 1956, the State Department had issued visas to 190,235 persons for admittance to the United States. The final total fell about 19,000 short of the program's goal because the law did not permit the visa allotments to be shifted to categories where they were needed. The final breakdown showed these visas issued: 60,000 Italians 38,932 Germans 15,403 Dutch 35,000 Expellees residing in Germany and Austria. 17,000 Greeks 3,000 Asiatics 900 European refugees living in the Far East 10,000 Escapees residing in NATO countries 2,000 Palestine refugees 2,000 Chinese Nationalist refugees 4,000 Orphans2,000 Former members of Polish Army living in Great Britain. The BES Clearance and Immigration Division under authority and grants of funds from the State Department processed over 109,000 job orders for refugees in the United States and Employment Service representatives stationed in embassies overseas interviewed over 112,000 employable refugees and escapees to determine the qualifications occupationally for the job vacancies in the United States.
Secretary Mitchell Calls on Youth to Prepare for Future “LIFE has reserved unique responsibilities and opportunities for today's teen-agers,” said Secretary of Labor James P. Mitchell speaking before the 14th Annual Convention of Key Club International in Washington recently. Key Club International is an auxiliary for teen-age boys of Kiwanis International. Secretary Mitchell urged his audience to get the most possible education and to encourage their fellows to do the same. He told the boys that in the years ahead, workers in every occupation will have to have a tremendous capacity for learning.” The Secretary said that the United States population will reach 193 million by 1965, requiring a 40 percent increase in the gross national product. To achieve such an increase in production, "every person must develop his best talents and abilities to the utmost.” Millions of additional professional, technical, and skilled workers will be needed by the time today's teen-agers are in their middle twenties. New machines and techniques will help to achieve the needed increase in production, but "our biggest
Although the special team of Employment Service people from the national and State offices working at Camp Kilmer in the occupational classification of Hungarian refugees was disbanded in the middle of May, the Bureau and some of the State agencies have continued to assist in several aspects of this work.
Employment Security Activities at a Glance, June 1957 United States and Territories
For example, the National Academy of Sciences, which selects scientific and research workers for admission to the United States, called on the Employment Service for assistance. Voluntary agencies working on the resettlement program also asked for placement assistance. The Bureau arranged for the New York Employment Service to detail interviewers to help. From June 1, to June 26, 100 refugees were assisted in finding employment, primarily in the New York metropolitan area. Plans call for the arrival of about 150 refugees a week, and part-time placement assistance will continue.
+69 - 1 - 3 +1 - 15 -16 -17
Employment Service - Total New applications. 832, 200 Referrals: Agricultural. 1, 379, 300 Nonagricultural 896, 300 Placements: Agricultural.. 1, 325, 100 Nonagricultural 528, 300 Men. 305, 400 Women. 222, 900 Handicapped. 24, 600 Counseling interviews. 121, 500 Individual given tests. 111, 200 Employer visits.. 145, 400 State Unemployment Insurance Initial claims, except transitional. 873, 200 Weeks of unemployment 5, 189, 700 Weekly average insured unemployment 1. 1, 233, 900 Weeks compensated 4, 686, 400 Weekly average beneficiaries 2. 1, 171, 600 Average weekly benefit pay ment for total unemploy- ment. $27. 40 Benefits paid. $121, 335, 900 Funds available as of June 30, 1957. $8,514,584,600
More than 500 teachers from the United States and 37 other countries will participate in the 1957-58 program of exchange teaching arranged by the U. S. Office of Education, Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. On August 10, 100 American teachers from 31 States and the District of Columbia sailed from New York to exchange positions with 100 teachers from the United Kingdom. The teachers from the United Kingdom arrived in New York on August 13. An additional 44 teachers from other countries Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands Norway, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada-arrived in the United States between August 12 and 19. An equal number of teachers from the United States exchanged positions with them. The teacher exchange program, a part of the United States International Educational Exchange program of the Department of State, began in 1946-47 with an exchange of 74 American and 74 British teachers. With this year's exchange, 4,273 teachers from the United States and 57 other countries will have participated in the program. In announcing this year's program, Commissioner of Education L. G. Derthick said, “An opportunity is provided by this program for the teachers of the United States and those of other nations to extend the frontiers of international understanding and goodwill throughout the world. Those who participate are true embassadors for their countries and their people, all of whom seek new knowledge and ways to happier living and progress in a world of peace.” Seventy-six American teachers attended seminars in France, Germany, and Italy during the past summer. Another 125 Americans will teach in foreign countries on one-way assignments, and 26 foreign teachers will teach during the year in the United States on one-way teaching assignments. Commissioner Derthick said the exchange teacher program is the forerunner of another program of international education arranged by the Office of Education. Under this program more than 475 additional (Continued on page 32)
Initial claims. claimed.. Weekly average insured un employment. Benefits paid.. New applications. Referrals, nonagricultural. Placements, nonagricultural Placements, handicapped. Counseling interviews..
Unemployment Compensation for Federal Employees + Initial claims, including tran sitional. Weeks of unemployment claimed.. Weekly average insured un employment. Benefits paid.
E aspect of service to the
handicapped. This year the thread running through the issue is TEAMWORK.
Really effective teamwork in serving the handicapped is seldom achieved easily. It goes far beyond expressions of good will. Teamwork is, rather, a practical consequence of accepting the fact that the other fellow can do some things better than we. Teamwork is a disciplined refusal to go it alone when the recipients of our services need more than we alone can give them. It requires an understanding of resources other than those of our particular organization, and carefully developed methods of using them in conjunction with the things that we can do ourselves. More than half of the articles in this REVIEW describe successful teamwork. Some of them contain heart. ening stories about difficult problems of vocational adjustment of seriously handicapped people which have been solved through the cooperative efforts of community or other groups. Most of those articles describe special kinds of community organizations or special interagency arrangements which have come into being as a result of intelligent teamwork and which use team methods in their operations. Other articles describe or give pertinent information about particular agencies which, by their natures must work in close relationship with other groups which serve the handicapped, and with which, for that reason we should be familiar. Finally, at the end of the issue, is a prediction of the status of the science and art of selective placement of the handicapped as it will be 20 years from now.
Placing the Emotionally Handicapped Veteran
Supervisor of Counseling, Massachusetts Division of Employment Security
Veterans Employment Representative for Massachusetts
TODAY. in Massachusetts the mentally and emo tionally handicapped veterans are finding their way back into community life and into jobs in industry, agriculture, and commerce in ever increasing numbers. This happy circumstance is due in large measure to the effective cooperative efforts being extended to the veteran by the Veterans Administration hospitals, the Massachusetts Division of Employment Security, and the Veterans Employment Service. The program has as its ultimate objective the placement of the discharged patient in a job commensurate with his skills, knowledge, and abilities. But it also involves the integration of the activities of both hospital and employment service to better reestablish the occupational potential of patients for gainful employment and to assist them in the necessary transition from hospital to community. The program is now in operation in practically the same degree in the three Veterans Administration hospitals (Bedford, Brockton,
and Northampton) which serve the neuropsychiatric patient. Patients being treated in the neuropsychiatric section of the large Boston VA Hospital (primarily a general hospital) are also included in this cooperative program. However, since it had its beginning at Bedford, this article will attempt to outline the cooperative program there. The Bedford VA hospital is in the typical New England town of Bedford about 16 miles from Boston. Within a 30- to 50-mile radius of the hospital are a majority of the larger cities of the State, including Worcester, Cambridge, Lynn, Lawrence, Lowell, and Haverhill. The majority of its some 2,000 patients come from this area. The program at Bedford can be said to have started in early 1953 when, encouraged by Dr. Winthrop Adams, then manager of the hospital, staff members in the Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Service and the Vocational Counseling Service invited rep
registered for placement service by the Division of Employment Security and subsequent job development could be undertaken for them. Within ? months, 8 of these 10 veterans were returned to the community and placed in jobs by the local offices of the Division of Employment Security. From this experience, a number of procedures were developed. 1. A Counselor-VER from the Lowell Division of Employment Security office (in whose area the hospital is located) was assigned to visit the hospital on a regularly scheduled basis to take applications for work; to obtain necessary medical, psychiatric, and social information; and, after joint conference with the veteran and the chief of the VA counseling service, to arrive at a suitable job objective. 2. Provision for transmittal of the veteran's completed application card and other pertinent information to the local Division of Employment Security office in whose area he seeks employment. 3. Development of a special "referral form" for notifying the State VER and the counseling division of the Division of Employment Security of the specific activity and providing them a means of followup. 4. Development of an "introduction card" for the veteran to present to the local office to which his application had been sent (this card is actually an introduction to a specific counselor or veterans employment representative in the local office). 5. Spelling out of areas of responsibility for the VA hospitals' vocational counseling service, the ES local offices, the Division of Employment Security counseling section, and the State VER. 6. An effective method of followup on results of referral and placement activity by the local office to the State VER and through him to the Lowell local office counselor and the State agency counseling section, and the VA hospitals' vocational counseling service. The procedures also provided that if a veteran appeared at a local office without prior referral, as
resentatives of various institutions and agencies to a meeting to discuss the need for integration of effort in the rehabilitation and placement of the emotionally handicapped and, in this instance, the veterans particularly. At this meeting the Division of Employment Security was represented by the State supervisor of counseling and service to the handicapped, and several counselors and veterans employment representatives from Boston and other metropolitan local offices. The State veterans employment representative was present for the Veterans Employment Service. Spontaneously from this meeting came a committee for the rehabilitation of the emotionally handicapped. This committee has continued to hold meetings almost monthly from its inception and the Division of Employment Security and Veterans Employment Seryice representatives have continued to be members. At the second meeting of this committee, representatives of the Bedford VA Hospital, the Division of Employment Security, and the Veterans Employment Service decided to set up a program to assist the emotionally handicapped veterans at the Bedford VA Hospital. At the outset, the effort was directed toward setting up a twofold program to assist the veterans about to be discharged from the hospital and to make available to the hospital, labor market and occupational information for use by the Vocational Counseling Service in guiding patients toward job decisions. To start the project, the State supervisor of counseling and service to the handicapped and the State Veterans Employment Representative spent a day at the hospital to learn about its workings and the facilities available for conditioning and training veterans for their return to the community. Included in this day of orientation were actual interviews with a group of 10 veterans about to be discharged from the hospital. Subsequently, these 10 veterans were part of a pilot project to test the best means by which they could be
outlined above, and it was ascertained that he had previous treatment at Bedford, the local office counselor or VER would contact the chief of the counseling service at the hospital and the necessary background information would be supplied. When the procedures were approved by administrators, a day's in-service training meeting was held at the Bedford hospital in September 1953. At this meeting counselors and VER’s from the local offices in the areas served by the hospital were given background information on the history and treatment of mental illness and the changing attitude brought about by greater knowledge and better techniques of treating and returning the individual to the community. Then came a tour of the hospital, including wards, various shops, and the clinics used for conditioning and training or retraining of veterans. This was followed by a discussion of the eight cases which had been successfully placed by the cooperative effort of the Division of Employment Security, Veterans Employment Service, and the counseling service of the Bedford hospital. The new procedures were then reviewed and an opportunity given for an open discussion to iron out any difficulties, real or fancied. The result was a mutual understanding of procedures, the remedying of preconceived ideas of mental illness, and a recognition of the unreal limitations which many coun
selors and VER's previously had concerning the emotionally handicapped. The results of this phase of the program, namely the assisting of the veterans being discharged from Bedford, have been most satisfactory. Guesswork and placement effort without sufficient background information have been eliminated, thus building up the employer's confidence when the local office refers an emotionally handicapped veteran to him. The chief of the counseling service at the hospital is relieved of the necessity of personally taking a veteran to a local office to get him registered and placed in a job. The veteran feels more confident in approaching the local office—the road has been paved for him. He knows that his application card is there ahead of him and, moreover, he has in his possession an introduction card to a specific person in the local office. There are many more advantages to this phase of the program but space does not allow for their telling. As the procedures for the placement of the veteran ready for return to the community advanced, the staff at the hospital, particularly in the physical medicine and rehabilitation service and the vocational counseling service, began to review their ever-present problem of conditioning the veteran for eventual return to the community and the job while still in Page 18
Again the three agencies went to work-Division of Employment Security, Bedford VA Hospital, and the Veterans Employment Service. The physical medicine and rehabilitation service and the vocational counseling service of the hospital took over the appraising and selecting of patients who would work on the progam. In addition, they acted as contacts and coordinators among the various services in the hospital (Dietetics, Nursing, Financing, etc.) so essential to the success of the program. The local office, through its counselors, VER, and its farm visitor, in company with the State VER, visited farms in short labor supply and told the owners of the possibility of getting workers who were patients at the Bedford VĂ Hospital. Potential employers were told that the patients would work in groups and the hospital would supply an aide who would act as a liaison between the patients and employer. He would also be present to see that the patients did not engage in hazardous work or that they were not exploited in any way. In September 1954, a farm employer agreed to try some of the patients in harvesting his celery crop. A group of 11 patients were selected by the hospital staff. A 6-hour day was decided upon in order to allow the patients to adjust more gradually to the full 8-hour day (actually, however, it was an 8-hour day since transportation to and from the hospital required 2 hours). The patients were to be paid the going rate for farm laborers. The Community Work Project was off the ground. Soon another farm employer contacted the local office farm visitor; he wished to get some Bedford hospital patients to harvest his carrots and beets. Before the 3-month season was over, some 15 patients had worked all or part time on the two projects. At the end of the harvesting season, the first employer, who had previously wholesaled his celery crop in bulk, decided he would experiment in packaging his product. Since his experience with the patients had been so satisfactory, he requested that a group of patients be made available to him for this purpose.
Need for Realistic Tryout The hospital staff felt that many patients needed a realistic tryout experience in a practical work situation before they became applicants for employment in the community. They recognized that it would not always be possible for the potential applicant to get conditioning experience in the “tryout” occupation following release from the hospital. Hence, the patient would be greatly assisted if he could work at a task for approximately full time, learning to get along with fellow workers, accepting directions and instructions from supervisors and employees-all away from the hospital for 6 to 8 hours a day. Apart from the individual patient's need, but related to it, was the need to educate and train employers to deal effectively with the person with emotional illness and to break down resistance to giving such a person an opportunity for employment. A corollary was the need to educate workers themselves that persons with emotional disabilities are not necessarily threatening or objectionable. These ideas were foremost in the minds of staff members of the physical medicine and rehabilitation service and vocational counseling service when in the early summer of 1954 the assigned local office counselor paid his usual weekly visit to the hospital. In discussing labor market trends, he stated that the many market garden farmers in the area were hard pressed to find farm labor. Here was born the Community Employment Project as it is now known at Bedford VA Hospital.
Employers Well Pleased At the close of 1954, the Community Work Project was evaluated and reports from the employers indicated that the patients worked willingly and consistently; the work performance compared favorably with that of others employed by the farmers. The patients in turn had a feeling of accomplishment and enjoyed the community setting. Their reaction to the receipt of pay was most rewarding. Their morale was boosted by the knowledge that they could actually compete with other workers. Even reports from the wards to which the patients returned in the evening told of a renewed spirit of confidence as the men related their experiences of the day and, as it turned out, created an interest in this work so that other patients subsequently requested that they be allowed to join in the project.
With the coming of the spring season in 1955, the Community Work Project was extended to additional farm employers and before the end of the season over 30 patients had engaged in the program with some five different farm employers. Actually, there were requests for more workers than the hospital staff was able to make available, due largely to inhospital problems of professional care, lack of aides, etc. Distance of farms from the hospital, of course, was another problem and the hospital had to decide early that a 15- to 20-mile area was the limit in which the day-haul operation could be set up. At the close of the harvesting season in 1955, except for the one farmer who again kept a crew on to package celery, activity in the Community Work Project came to a close.
through cooperative effort and mutual respect and understanding on the part of all agencies involved. The value of the program is not quickly measured; the mere recitation of the number of placements does not in any way tell of the worthwhile results for individuals who make up the total. To say that individuals placed back in the community without return for further hospitalization total a little under 100 from Bedford since 1953 and 275 from the four hospitals combined perhaps, on the surface, will fail to greatly impress those unacquainted with the problems of the emotionally handicapped.
Program Extended to Industry It was then that the hospital chief of vocational counseling service and the Division of Employment Security local office counselor decided to extend the program into industry, since a number of new industrial concerns had begun operations in the area and had a demand for workers. Many of the patients had interest, skills, and abilities more related to industrial work than to farm activities. Again the program was cleared with administrators at the Bedford VA Hospital and the Division of Employment Security. Before the close of 1955, the first break in the program came when the local office field visitor found a new fruit juice concentrate manufacturer who needed seasonal workers for packaging operations. With the assistance of the hospital chief of counseling, the local office counselor, and the State VER, the employer agreed to try out a crew of six patients from the hospital. Again a day-haul operation was set up and within a week the employer was talking of the excellence of the workers both as to quality and amount of production.
Statistics Don't Tell the Real Story To report that since the inception of the Community Work Projects no more than 150 patients have taken part might likewise be unimpressive. However, an individual case history which reveals that a veteran with 11 years of hospitalization was so motivated by the experience of other patients that he asked to be included in a crew working at an industrial plant and after that experience was so much improved that he was recommended for discharge and then actually placed in a job in the community through the cooperative working arrangement of the VA Hospital and the Division of Employment Security is meaningful and full of connotation of the real worth of the program. Moreover, any program which is accomplishing the objectives listed here is well worth the effort which is being extended: 1. Conditioning the patient to the physical and emotional problems associated with full-time work, 2. Weaning the patient from complete dependency on the hospital and gradually introducing him back into the community through experience in the work situation, 3. Educating and training employers to deal effectively with the person who has an emotional illness and breaking down the resistance to giving a patient in remission an opportunity for employment, 4. Educating fellow workers and associates with the facts that patients with emotional illness are not necessarily threatening or objectionable and enlisting their cooperation in aiding in the rehabilitation, and 5. Bringing the community together in a directed effort to assist the emotionally handicapped.
More Opportunities Each Year The year 1956 brought opportunities from an additional three employers and 1957 added two more. Thus for the past several years, crews of from 6 to 10 patients have been engaged on almost a full-time basis working on many and varied tasks with the following types of businesses in the nearby area of the hospital: wood products, importing, prefabricated houses, windows and closet doors and other furnishings for houses, fruit juices, and fine furniture. This, then, is the story of the cooperative effort being extended to the emotionally handicapped veterans in the Bedford VA Hospital. They are duplicated in both agriculture and industry at the Brockton VA Hospital, in industry at the Boston VA Hospital, and in agriculture at the Northampton VA Hospital. It is a program that could be done only
Hopes for the Future The staff at the Bedford, Brockton, Boston, and Northampton VA hospitals are encouraged and enthusiastic over these positive efforts which are being made to assist emotionally handicapped veterans. They realize that they have made but a beginning but they sincerely hope that through slow and patient effort more and more emotionally handicapped veterans can and will be returned to the community and to a job.
Use of a Simulated Work Environment in Vocational Rehabilitation
By SIMON B. FRIEDMAN, Assistant Director and WALTER S. NEFF, Supervisor, Vocational Adjustment and Evaluation Center Jewish Vocational Service and Employment Center of Chicago
MANS CANY rehabilitation counselors agree that the customary guidance techniques (interviewing, aptitude testing, specialized job placement, etc.) have limited applicability in dealing with certain kinds of severely handicapped persons. This seems to be particularly true of individuals who present mental retardation or emotional disorder as the chief determents to an employment adjustment. Individuals with these disabilities, as well as other handicapped persons, often show disturbances or inadequacies in the important sphere of interpersonal relations, are fearful of work, and tend to display unpredictable or unintegrated behavior in a work setting. These individuals often face psychological barriers which prevent them from using their abilities in a work situation. During a period of relatively high employment, 1947 to 1950, the Jewish Vocational Service & Employment Center of Chicago could not find employment for certain handicapped clients who, though physically capable of working, lacked motivation for work. Their history was one of chronic or intermittent unemployment. Intensive vocational counseling accompanied by job solicitation and supplemented by aptitude and personality testing, trial work experiences in industry, vocational training, and psychotherapy did not increase the employability of such “apparent unemployables." It occurred to the staff of the JVS that one method of pin-pointing the work potential of handicapped clients was to observe them in a work situation. Since it was impossible to secure a clearly defined and controlled work environment in the open labor market, it was decided to create one. It was through this process that the Vocational Adjustment & Evaluation Center of the Jewish Vocational Service of Chicago first came into being in 1951. In developing the Center, the JVS worked closely with the Illinois State Employment Service, the Illinois Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, the State of Illinois psychiatric facilities, and the Illinois Department of Public Welfare.
because of an inadequate work personality are deemed "apparently unemployable" by health, welfare, or vocational agencies. Its structure permits both the assessment of work capacity and the adjustment of the client to work, through the control and manipulation of the psycho-social factors in the work situation. The VAEC is not a sheltered workshop in the conventional sense. Clients remain in the program for a limited time period. The emphasis of the program is on placement in the open labor market. All aspects of the workshop, therefore, are designed to facilitate an efficient appraisal of the client's work potential and a speedy transition to work. The important aspects of the program follow. Simulation of a true work atmosphere. -All work performed is on real commodities, secured on contract basis. The Center simulates a true work situation with regard to wages, hours, conditions of work, employer-employee relations, and absence of obvious medical and recreational therapeutic services or devices. Output records are maintained and clients are made aware of production norms. There is emphasis on the quality of work, as one would find in industry generally. The Center does not offer nonvocational services. Clients requiring medical, social, or recreational therapy are referred to appropriate facilities. Limited time period.-Clients generally enter the program for a 2-week period of work evaluation. This may be followed by an 8-week adjustment training program. All clients are made aware of these limited time periods. Provision for controlling and varying psycho-social and work factors.--In actual practice, stress is placed upon the "work personality" and the derivation of satisfaction from work, rather than the development of specific skills. Fairly elaborate techniques have been devised for varying supervision, coworker relationships, work pressures, etc. Intensive supervision and limited capacity.-All staff acting as shop foremen are professionally trained vocational counselors. A ratio of 5 to 6 clients per supervisor is maintained. The present workshop capacity is 23 persons per week, with an annual intake of 2010 clients for the evaluation program and 100 clients for the adjustment training program. Integration of the workshop into the vocational counseling process.-All workshop clients are seen weekly by a
Purpose and Design of the VAEC
The VAEC is a vocational rehabilitation workshop designed to facilitate the employability of emotionally, mentally, or physically handicapped persons who
is of a relatively simple nature, machinery and equipment are kept to a minimum. The staff consists of eight professional and two nonprofessional persons. The professional personnel are: the workshop supervisor, who directs the program; an assistant supervisor, who also serves as intake counselor; four workshop counselors, who act as foremen; a placement counselor, whose load consists solely of the workshop clients; and a clinical psychologist. The training and experience of all these people is in psychology, guidance, and related areas. The nonprofessional staff members are an office secretary and a stock clerk.
A JVS staff member interviews a potential worker before making a specific assignment to a job.
vocational counselor on the staff of the JVS. The agency follows through from the initial intake interview to job placement and includes 1 year followup activity. Thus, the workshop does not function as an isolated process without reference to counseling. During his weekly counseling sessions, the client's reactions to the workshop are explored, his behavior with respect to supervisors and coworkers is discussed, and toward the end of the program, possible job preferences and possibilities are realistically evaluated. The counselor has at his disposal the observations of the workshop staff and is in a position to discuss concretely with the client problems revolving around his work. The weekly counseling session is seen as the instrumentality through which the client may be helped to better understand his feelings in relation to his workshop experiences. A counseling session serves to focus everything that happens in the workshop program, and relate this to the always present goal of the future job. Individualized workshop program.--Each client's program in the workshop is planned specifically for him, and developed through an intake staffing which integrates the vocational, physical, social, and personality data secured through interviewing, psychological testing, medical reports, and social casework material. During the course of his program, the workshop plan is modified in accordance with the progress of the client. Observations of shop supervisors and interview material secured by the vocational counselor determine the nature of such modifications.
What the VAEC Aims to Achieve The central concept of the VAEC program is that many "unemployable" clients are prevented from adjusting to work, not so much by physical or mental inability, but by a variety of negative work attitudes. Our experience shows that the most serious barriers to a work adjustment are anxiety, hostility, fear of authority figures, lack of confidence, lack of understanding of appropriate work behavior, awkwardness in relationships with coworkers, and similar interpersonal variables. It follows that the facilitation of an adequate work adjustment should arise through the development of an adequate "work personality.” As these ideas work out in practice, the VAEC staff operates with the concept of the “vocational pattern,” in which five areas of the work personality are studied and manipulated: (1) interpersonal relations with supervisors and coworkers, (2) use of abilities in a work situation, (3) derivation of work satisfaction, (4) adjustment to work pressures, and (5) concept of self as a worker. The professional activities of the staff are designed to provide an objective picture of the client's performance in these five areas of work competence, which are then pooled to make an estimate of the client as a potential worker. Specifically, the staff attempts to determine four things: 1. The level of employability, defined as the capacity to perform productive work in general; 2. The degree of placeability, defined as the ability of the client to secure work in the current labor market; 3. The quality of vocational adjustment, defined as the resources of the client for adapting on a job which he is capable of securing; and 4. A concrete picture of the client's work behavior.
Sources and Kinds of Client
Physical Facility and Staff The VAEC occupies 2,200 square feet of space, including workrooms, stockrooms, office space, and conforence rooms. Individual counseling and psychological testing take place in offices of the JVS. To approximate a true work setting, the workshop has a timeclock, work tables, chairs, and lighting of an industrial nature. Since most of the work performed
All clients must be referred to the Center by an accredited social agency. During the last few years of operation, the Illinois Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, the Illinois State Employment Service, and the mental health agencies of the Illinois Department of Public Welfare have been the primary referral sources.
The client group at any given time is extremely heterogeneous with regard to type of disability, age, sex, level of intelligence, social adequacy, and education. A study of 138 persons served during 1953 and 1954 indicates that approximately one-half were male. The age range was 16 to 67, with 75 percent of the clients falling below 27. The tested intelligence was low, with median IQ of 77, though the scores ranged from 35 to 137. Work experience was limited, Almost 55 percent had never been employed. The remainder had been unemployed for periods of 1 to 10 years with two-thirds having been unemployed for more than 1 year. Most clients had multiple handicaps. Major handicaps were as follows:
Approximately 70 percent of the clients became employable. The table which follows summarizes the results of a followup study made to survey the outcome of the vocational adjustment process for 102 clients who completed the adjustment training program during the 2-year period, 1953 and 1954. The criterion of success utilized by the Center is the client's employment history during the year following the completion of his program. The term "successful adjustment” refers to clients who were able to complete 1 year's practically continuous employment in the ordinary labor market after leaving the Center.
The adjustment process proved to be most successful with the epileptic clients. Next in order of relative success were the mentally retarded clients, followed by the emotionally disturbed. The program appeared to be least successful with physically handicapped clients who had associated marked emotional problems. A followup study of 119 clients served in the adjustment program during 1956 indicates approximately the same results as those reported in the followup study of 1953–54. A Typical Case Alice was 18 years old when the Illinois Division of Vocational Rehabilitation referred her to the VAEC. Her problem was mental retardation. She was frightened at the idea of seeking employment, and the State rehabilitation counselor had been unable to do anything for her. Psychological testing Page 19
had made several friends, had begun to "date,” and gave the impression of being a happy, well-adjusted young person.
Publications About the Employment Center Gellman, William "Job Adjustment of 'Apparent Unemployables' Through a Vocational Adjustment Workshop," Workshops for the Disabled, Washington, D. C., U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, 1956. Gellman, William; Gendel, Herman; Glaser, Nathan M.; Friedman, Simon B.; Neff, Walter S., Adjusting People to Work. Chicago: The Jewish Vocational Service and Employment Center, 1956.
showed an IQ of 71, with a good deal of “free-floating anxiety," but a rather positive personality development with a strong desire to succeed. When Alice entered the program it was noted that she was motivated, but a number of problems at once appeared. The chief problem was distractability. She was so overjoyed at being with young people in a productive situation that she quite lost herself in conversing and socializing, and her output suffered wide swings as a consequence. The workshop staff concentrated on giving her a positive work experience, and at the same time controlling her distractability. She was able to grasp what was desired of her, and by the end of the program she talked much less on the job and concentrated her attention on the work to be done. She was adjudged able to meet minimum production standards in simple, repetitive assembly work, and recommended for placement. After two brief placements, from which she was discharged as “too slow,” Alice was placed on a factory assembly job (1 month after leaving the Center) which she held for 10 months. The placement counselor noted, in closing the case, that Alice's general adjustment seemed much improved. She
Relationships With Other Agencies As a community agency, the Center has close working relationships with the fabric of social agencies, both public and private, located in the city of Chicago. A Professional Advisory Committee was developed for the Center in 1955. The Committee serves the function of program development, evaluation, and the strengthening of cooperation. The following agencies are represented on this committee: the Illinois State Employment Service, the Illinois Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, and the Illinois Department of Public Welfare. Interest of the Illinois State Employment Service in the workshop project was manifest from an early date in the development of the program. The desire on the part of both agencies to work together on the project led to the development of a formal procedure for the referral and handling of clients who have completed the Center program. The Illinois Division of Vocational Rehabilitation has worked closely with the agency since the inception of the program. The DVR is a major source of referrals for the workshop program and at the present time has one of its staff members assigned on a fulltime basis to work with the project. The professional personnel of both public and private agencies involved in the Center program feel that a rehabilitation workshop, emphasizing work adjustment, opens new possibilities for many people hitherto deemed "unemployable."
REHABILITATION—A Community Project
By GEORGE F. DODGEN, JR. Analyst I, Dallas Local Office
REHABILITATION of the disabled members of the work force is a problem which should be of vital concern to all agencies and groups of their community. It is inherently a community concern because the solution of the problem, together with the resultant recovery of otherwise lost talents and skills, benefits to some degree almost every element of society comprising the community. This, then, is the story of how one community has faced this problem-of how the cooperative efforts of varied elements of the community were set in motion to discover and develop new talents and achieve final rehabilitation. It probably is not too
different from rehabilitation programs which have been carried out in numerous communities, large and small, and it certainly is no different from what can be accomplished in many other communities through dedicated effort and teamwork. If there is any peculiar distinction in the Industrial Therapy Program organized last year in McKinney, Tex. (a northcentral Texas town of 13,700, center of a rich farming belt), it is perhaps the fact that it was not directed solely toward recovery of talent from disabled persons among the city's regular inhabitants. Instead it was far more likely to rehabilitate temporary patients of a local institution to the ultimate benefit business establishments and also for rehabilitated patients discharged from the hospital—including special processing and case referral to the TEC office in or nearest the patient's home locality, and (4) provision of on-the-job training facilities by local businesses for specially selected patients.
Proper administrative controls were established to insure that no phase of the industrial therapy program would prolong the period of hospitalization of any patient. Controls and forms were also devised to secure weekly reports from local employers providing training, so that the hospital staff could evaluate the patient's progress and discontinue any training which might prove misdirected as to potential ability or otherwise unsuitable. Patients given training in the hospital's facilities are similarly evaluated.
of other communities to which these patients were most apt to return. In May 1956, Dr. Martin Stephenson, Chief of the Tuberculosis Section of the Chest Service at the Veterans Administration Hospital in McKinney, conceived the idea that local industries could provide special services which, when coordinated with the hospital's rehabilitation programs, would lead to speedier and more complete rehabilitation of many patients at the institution. After considerable discussion with staff physicians and the Rehabilitation Coordinator at the hospital, a tentative plan for a community industrial therapy program evolved. It was decided to seek participation from local industrial concerns. Dennis R. Scott, manager of the McKinney office of the Texas Employment Commission, was contacted for assistance in securing the cooperation of local businessmen and in placing hospital patients selected for training under the industrial therapy program. The local TEC office contacted most business leaders of the community and invited them to meet with staff members from the VA hospital. A sizable group of businessmen responded. The hospital staff members explained their proposed program. They hoped that local business concerns would make available, where possible, 4 hours per day of on-the-job training in new vocations for patients selected by ward physicians and the Medical Rehabilitation Board of the hospital as ready for and adaptable to such industrial therapy. The businessmen accepted the program with enthusiasm and promised cooperation to the limit of their ability to provide space and facilities for training
Patients Selected With Care
Why Not Use Hospital Facilities?
A question raised at the same meeting uncovered the fact that the VA hospital facilities were not being used for any formal type of industrial therapy. The proposed program was amended to include industrial therapy training within the various units of the hospital as well as in local business concerns. Since the VA hospital at McKinney is a selfsustaining institution, with its own maintenance and service facilities, the potential for industrial therapy there is very diverse. This activity has since become an integral part of the overall hospital program, thus increasing rehabilitation services provided within the hospital itself. As finally established, the community industrial therapy program embodied several phases: (1) Industrial therapy in many fields of work within various departments of the hospital, without pay, (2) a separate “member employee” program under which patients become domiciliary members and receive approximately one-third of the base pay (up to a maximum of $800 per year) for the work in which they are being trained, (3) special placement services provided by the local office of the Texas Employment Commission for patients selected for training in local
Patients are selected for training in the city's business establishments only after study and evaluation of their work tolerance and vocational preference has established that such training is advisable. Emphasis is placed on patients whose past employment experience has been in the field of manual labor and who will hereafter be limited to less physically demanding jobs. Extensive use is made of the hospital's educational therapy, occupational therapy, and manual arts therapy classes in selecting patients for participation in any phase of the industrial therapy program. Patients sent to the Texas Employment Commission for training with a local employer remain under control of the hospital at all times, and their treatment continues. While training in the city, the patient is furnished transportation to and from work by the hospital. Upon completion of treatment the coopera. tive training arrangement is cancelled. Since the primary purpose of training provided by local employers is to develop new skills and abilities and thus enable the patient to secure permanent employment, the Veterans Administration strongly recommends that the patient be paid no salary while training. Patients selected understand and agree to this arrangement before training in the city is begun. A typical case of rehabilitation achieved by industrial therapy provided by a local business concern is that of a 33-year-old veteran of World War II, whom we shall call Johnnie. He is married and the father of a 12-year-old son. Johnnie, whose home is in a small West Texas community, was formerly an arc welder by trade. In June 1956, a pressure vessel he was welding exploded, shattering his left knee and severely burning both legs. Though he responded to treatment satisfactorily, the nature of his disability necessitated a change of occupation. After evaluating his case. hospital staff members selected Johnnie for industrial therapy training in a local industry and submitted his problem to the local office of the Texas Employment Commission. Since Johnnie was a wheelchair patient, TEC contacted three business concerns before a training place was found for him. The owner of an electrical appliance store provided a work bench and furnished hand tools for repair of small electrical appliances. Johnnie continued in this training for 14 weeks until his treatment at the hospital was completed. The appliance store owner has only praise for Johnnie and the manner in which he applied himself to his training. He says Johnnie was a very good worker and a congenial person who was well liked by everyone in the firm. He learned quickly, seldom had to be shown things more than once, and turned out first-class work after only a short time. The owner felt that the value of the work Johnnie did while he was there far outweighed the cost of providing the facilities and training him.
In fact, upon Johnnie's discharge from the hospital, the owner offered to employ him permanently or even set him up in a repair shop of his own.
home ties called strongest, and Johnnie returned to West Texas. Once back home, Johnnie set up a small repair shop and the local TEC office helped him work out an arrangement with a local hardware store to send repair work to him. Johnnie writes to staff members at the McKinney VA hospital, indicating that he is doing pretty well financially repairing electrical appliances and guns (an additional vocation he was taught at the hospital). He seems happily adjusted to his new work and appears well on the road to complete rehabilitation. The industrial therapy program in McKinney, as exemplified by Johnnie's case, clearly illustrates the extent to which rehabilitation can be achieved—to the benefit of both individuals and communitieswhen the problem is faced as a community project and tackled with the teamwork of various community groups.
Cooperation - The Persistent Kind
By CYRUS G. FLANDERS
OHN BARTISK wore extremely thick glasses; one of his eyes had a tendency to roll; he had a speech defect; he spoke out of the corner of his mouth; and he was an epileptic! John had a long record of short-term jobs. He was quick to turn down work that was apparently“made to order” for him. He "had a chip on his shoulder" and "was his own worst enemy.” In spite of these severe handicaps, John has become a well-adjusted individual and is making good in a job where he has established an excellent attendance record. This all came about because of cooperation close cooperation-between the Bureau of Vocational Rehabilitation and the Employment Service over a long discouraging period. This cooperation might not have been successful if busy employers had not been willing to give of their time to learn of the problem and to give of their ideas to help in placing Bartisk. John came from a broken family. His mother had been overprotective and was unwilling to accept the fact that her "child,” now a man of 44, was born with petit mal epilepsy. She had regarded it as a dread affliction (which of course it is) which must be concealed at all cost. Only the family physician knew the secret. The condition was partly controlled through medication. When John came into the New London office of the
Connecticut State Employment Service, there was nothing to make Morgan Haven, employment counselor, suspect that epilepsy was a part of his problem. True, there was a long record of short-term jobs. He had been timekeeper on construction jobs, many of them with out-of-the-area companies. He was laid off when the local job was finished. He had worked as timekeeper for a while at one of the bigger wartime employers in the area. He was laid off with many others at the war's end. John explained that his very thick glasses were necessary because of surgery that had been performed to remove congenital cataracts. They did not interfere with his ability to do timekeeping and other clerical duties for which he had been trained in high school. The very first placement that Morgan got for John “blew up” after 1 day. Morgan had done a lot of work on that placement and he was curious to learn why it had not "taken." "John is an epileptic. He had a seizure. We had to let him go,” said the employer. When John came into the office again he “had a chip on his shoulder.” “It's just the natural reaction to his bitter experiences," thought Morgan. Some time later, after more placement attempts had proved fruitless, John's belligerence made Morgan think that he might need psychiatric help. He talked Attending the New London NEPH subcommittee meeting to suggest placement possibilities for John Bartisk were, left to right: (seated), Mrs. Catherine Albo. nese, personnel director, Sheffield Tube Co., Fred Shurts, insurance broker; Mrs. Elizabeth F. Drew, manager, New London local office; Rev. A. A. Garvin, pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church; (stand. ing), H. Clay White, Jr., counselor, Bureau of Veterans' Reemployment Rights; M. B. Haven, VER and CSES counselor; Peter Carpenter, director of personnel, General Dynamics Corp.; and R. E. Duflocq, personnel director, Chas. Pfizer Corp.
with Clay White, Bureau of Vocational Rehabilitation counselor, who agreed to see John. A complete physical and psychological examination was made by BVR doctors. White and Haven discussed the results. While John suffered from a persecution complex, it was not severe enough to require extensive treatment. The epilepsy seemed to be under moderately good control. Eyesight was good enough to permit him to continue at his former type of work. The speech defect could not be corrected. It was agreed that selective placement efforts should be continued to find clerical or similar types of work. The search began again. Morgan turned up a job opportunity that seemed made to order for John. Clay White went with John to see the employer and discussed the situation with him. John was hired. The employer got a place for him to live where he could cook his own meals. John turned the job down; he would not leave his mother. Morgan found another job for him. Again he discussed the situation fully with the new employer who agreed to interview him. John would not be dealing with the public but, since he would be in plain sight of the employer's customers, he was not hired. There were many other such incidents over a considerable period of time. Morgan and Clay talked it over again. “Let's take the case to the subcommittee of our NEPH Committee," said Morgan. “Maybe they can come up with an idea that we have overlooked.'' The committee meets periodically to_discuss severely handicapped workers whom the Employment Service and the Bureau of Vocational Rehabilitation have not been able to place, even after long and concentrated effort. This group is often able to come up with suggestions that result in successful placement of the severely handicapped workers. The idea for such a committee is new. It originated with Louis
Pizer, manager of the New Britain office of the Connecticut State Employment Service. Morgan discussed the problem with the committee frankly and in detail. He told of all the efforts that had been made to place John. Clay gave the medical and psychological data. Mrs. Drew, manager of the Employment Service office, told of her talks with John's mother and of her efforts to assist in his placement. There were many pointed questions and much discussion but no suggestions. Morgan and Clay went back to work on the case, disappointed, but not discouraged, that the committee meeting had produced nothing. A few days later Morgan's telephone rang. “This is the personnel director at voice. “Will you please send John Bartisk to see me tomorrow? I have been thinking over what you told us about him at the committee meeting the other day. I've been looking over the jobs in our plant. I've found one in the shipping department that he can do. I've discussed John with the foreman of the department and he is willing to give him a trial. This foreman is the sort of fellow who will do all he can to help John.” Elated, Morgan called John, told him about the job, and referred him. At last, John was hired where there was sympathetic understanding of his problem! The next morning Clay White received a letter from John which read: “I can't accept the job you offer. It will endanger my condition!” Clay called John's doctor and explained the whole situation to him—what the demands of the job were, where the work was to be performed, everything, “That job is all right for him. His difficulties are all in his mind,” was the doctor's reply. Clay was on his way again. He called on John and told him and his mother what the doctor had said. He urged John to give the job a fair trial. Reluctantly John got into Clay's car, rode with him out to the plant, and went to work.
Reports were that he grumbled at first and was inclined to be belligerent. Gradually his fear subsided and his confidence grew; now he is well adjusted and well liked in the plant. Cooperation is no "once-over-lightly" affair. It is day-by-day persistent long-term sharing of a
problem even when the results are often times discouragingly meager. Cooperation involves the efforts not only of two agencies, but of all agencies, all committees which can be induced to help and have ideas to offer. That kind of cooperation pays off.
Employers Advisory Committee Takes
That Crucial “Second Look”
By JAMES H. SEARS and EDWARD J. BUCKLEY
“This company is lucky to have Ed Lewis as an employee.” Committee members feel that the provision for a "second look” is the really significant aid that this kind of auxiliary body can give to Federal and State offices which have the full-time responsibility for helping handicapped jobseekers. Beyond the first assistance of locating jobs normally difficult to find, the Advisory Committee helps to make sure these employees stay employed, and at jobs to which they can make a real contribution while they earn the good wages they and their families sorely need.
THE "HE successful placement of handicapped worker Ed Lewis is a story with three chapters. All three parts of Ed's story help to illustrate the special role played by the Delaware Employers Advisory Committee in support of the efforts of the Delaware State Employment Service to find employment for jobseekers whose disabilities make the search for gainful work difficult if not impossible. Ed Lewis, a paraplegic, first appeared before an eight-man panel, representing more than 60 Delaware employers, as one of five handicapped jobseekers scheduled for interview at the regular monthly meeting. During the 20-minute interview, one of the panel members was strongly impressed by Ed's potential. When he returned to his office, this member initiated a systematic search through the several departments of his company for an opening Ed might fill. As is so often the case in trying to place handicapped applicants, no jobs were immediately available. But the all-important followup was maintained, and, after several weeks, Chapter I of Ed's story ended happily when he began work as a key-punch operator. At the end of Ed's 3-month trial period, the Advisory Committee reviewed his case. They found that the placement had not been a good one. Despite Ed's earnest attempt to master his assignment, he could not operate his machine at a satisfactory rate. Since neither Ed nor his employer wanted to settle for second best, Chapter II ended in a disappointing recognition of failure.
Function of the Employers Advisory Committee It was the desire for a stronger program of cooperation with government employment services, and for a more continuous and careful supervision of handicapped employees' adjustments to the jobs, that led to the formation of the Delaware Employers Advisory Committee in October 1954. Under the leadership of Mason E. Turner, then Chairman of the Governor's Committee for Employment of the Physically Handicapped, the new committee was made up of about 45 employers from various industries throughout the State. Drawing in part on the experience of local committees in neighboring Pennsylvania, the Chairman of the Governor's Committee coordinates the activities of this committee to maintain liaison with the Delaware State Employment Service, and to head rotating panels of five or six personnel specialists delegated by participating employers. The panel usually meets once a month in space provided by the Chairman-Executive Director of the Unemployment Compensation Commission at the Commission's combined central office in Wilmington. An average of five applicants are interviewed at each session.
But as a result of this review of Ed's case, the original panel member responsible for his placement made a new search for opportunities within his company. Soon Ed was on a different job, performing his clerical duties so well that, in the words of his supervisor, Page 20
Prior to the meeting, a résumé of each applicant's work history, age, education, physical condition, and abilities is prepared by the Employment Service and sent to panel members selected for the current month by the chairman. Before each interview begins, the individual's résumé is reviewed by Edward A. Mulrooney of the employment security office and Secretary of the Governor's Committee. He gives any further explanations that the panel may request. During the interview itself, the applicant is told that the panel members are not there to offer him immediate employment, but to learn just how the Committee may be able to help him locate work in the future. He is encouraged to talk about the kinds of work he could best perform and to define the limits which his handicap may place upon his employment. After each interview is completed, panel members discuss among themselves possible ways in which employment may be found to fit the applicant's needs. When the meeting is over, copies of each applicant's résumé are sent to all members of the Governor's and and the Advisory Committees.
of a present or potential opening in his own company Or, because his service on the Committee has in. creased his sensitivity to the problems of the handicapped, he may think of potential jobs in some of the many small businesses not represented on the Committee and begin a canvass of merchants or other businessmen he knows personally. Several jobs have stemmed from casual conversations, overheard remarks, and tactful buttonholing of fellow church or club members. The circulation of résumés may also result in job offers, sometimes many months after the interview Here again, the special nature of the committee is crucial. Because representatives of the 60 industries have come to know each other through service on the panels, they feel free to call the particular members who interviewed an applicant whose résumé has reached their desks. They think longer and harger about the possibilities of employment, even to the extent of revising certain job duties or job conditions to utilize the skills and talents summed up in these résumés while providing for the physical limitations of the applicant. The record, of course, is not one of unalloyed success. Some handicapped jobseekers still remain unplaced despite unremitting efforts to find suitable jobs. Many handicapped workers have been forced (Continued on page 23)
Help in Finding Jobs As a result of the interviews conducted by the panel, several possible avenues of employment may be opened. Occasionally, a panel member may know
Members of the Employers Advisory Committee, Governor's Committee on Employment of the Physically Handicapped, interview applicant Edward L. Lewis, (fourth from right). Seated around the table, left to right, are: Edward A. Mulrooney, secretary, Governor's Committee; F. B. Drumheller, National Vulcanized Fibre Co.; Warren Walker, Pusey & Jones Corp.; C. J. Fleps, Rollins Leasing Corp., James H. Sears, chairman, Governor's Committee; Mr. Lewis; Vernon M. Schneider, General Motors Corp., James Maxwell, Colorado Fuel & Iron Co.; and O. E. Waller, Delaware Power & Light Co. Page 21
Committee lay out the program for the next 12 months. Each year a small committee of local personnel managers and another of labor representatives appeal to their respective groups for small contributions to take care of the modest expenditures of the Committee. Here again cooperation prevails as Committee members move to bring everyone into the act and make each feel his responsibility. When civic luncheons are planned, the Personnel Administration
Forum and the Southern Alameda County Personnel Managers Association always join with the Committee as sponsors. Through the Governor's Committee for Employment of the Physically Handicapped, ideas used by the Alameda County Committe have been passed along to other communities in the State. But no community has benefited more than Alameda County itself.
ES and DVR Take a “Look-See” at Relationships
By JOHN E. HAY Florida State Employment Service
F EVERY handicapped person is to experience a smooth transition from rehabilitation and training to placement on a job, it is very important that the Vocational Rehabilitation agency and the Employment Service have good operating relationships. In Florida we have always had good working relationships but recently we asked ourselves: “Can working relationships be improved, and if so, how?” To find the answer, we decided that three steps would be necessary: (1) Develop an objective method of evaluating working relationships so that comparisons can be made among various areas of the State and from year to year in the same area; (2) review relationships in detail in an office with good, established relationships to identify specific practices which engender good relations; and (3) encourage other offices to adopt practices which have been found effective in this and other areas. Our first joint survey, initiated by the Bureau of Employment Security and the Office of Vocational Rehabilitation, was held in Miami last December. The review team was composed of representatives from the Bureau and OVR in Washington, the Supervisor of VR from the State DVR, the State Supervisor of Counseling and Services to the Handicapped from the FSES, the Miami district supervisor of VR, and the local office manager of the commercial office.
cepted, when the rehabilitation plan was completed, the rehabilitation objective, whether the ES was consulted in this objective, what rehabilitation services were provided, if referral was made to the ES, if not, why, etc., are listed here. In the other section, data from ES records are entered, such as the ES case status at time of study, occupational titles and codes assigned, whether VR was consulted if the vocational goal was changed, what services were provided by the ES, if these services were provided in cooperation with VR, what efforts were made by the client-applicant, the results of followup, etc. The form also has space for identifying information about the applicant. Case information about VR clients was obtained from materials in the case folder which is kept for each VR client. Information concerning service provided by the ES was obtained from the ES application card and counseling control card.
A Special Two-Way Form The case-review method was employed to evaluate working relationships. A special form was developed to summarize information from both ES and DVR records. This form is divided into two sections. In one section, data from VR records are entered. Such items as VR status at time of study, whether the case was referred by ES, actions taken by VR, date ac
Each Case Is Reviewed Each completed summary was discussed by the review team and agreements were reached as to the nature, appropriateness, and adequacy of the procedures followed and results obtained. Over 100 cases in Status 6 (active, ready for employment), Status 7 (working), and Status 12 (closed) were reviewed. After reviewing all cases, the team arrived at general conclusions and formulated a series of recommendations for actions to improve the joint services of the two agencies. A group meeting was held on the last day to discuss selected cases and general findings. The group consisted of ES selective placement interviewers and counselors and DVR counselors, plus the review team. A roundtable discussion of cases was followed keeping and forms and the reasons for some of the procedures utilized by the ES.
Staff members of the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation and Florida State and local employment security offices confer on mutual problems. Left to right: Jennings Rehwinkle, State DVR, James Bush, DVR, John E. Hay, author, FSES; Ruby Brobston, counselor, and L'Engle Hartridge, manager, Tallahassee local office, FSES; and Dana T. Leitch, chief of Programs and Methods, FSES.
Extended to Local Offices
by the chairman's presentation of major findings of the survey team and recommendations for improved working relationships. Specific practices which advance good working relationships were also identified and brought out in the group meeting. After this general meeting, a special meeting was conducted by the review team to discuss the survey itself. The group agreed that in large offices time should be divided as follows: Review of cases by team. 3 days Preparation for group meeting by team. 1 day Group discussion... 1 day Summary evaluation by team. 12 day It was felt that cases which represent different problems encountered by various counselors should be selected for discussion with the counselors before the group meeting is held. The form used by the team to record data for each case was also evaluated and suggestions for improvement were made. Data recorded on this form lend themselves to certain interesting types of analysis. Among the questions which can be asked are: Is there a difference between rehabilitation objectives and subsequent employment? What is the relationship of educational level to placement success? What is the average time between date accepted by VR and referral to ES?
After the first joint review in Miami, we agreed that a joint survey should be made of working relationships with each ES local office and VR agency on a scheduled and continuous basis to review day-to-day operating procedures and to determine whether the needs of individual handicapped persons are being met. The procedure employed is somewhat different in small offices. In larger offices, the team reviews cases and discusses selected cases with the counselors on the last day; in small offices, cases are discussed with the counselors by the team the first day. The procedure used in the smaller offices is as follows: (1) Meet with the group and discuss the purpose of the meeting; (2) each person in the group reviews several cases by himself and summarizes information from the case on the special form; (3) each person presents a case which is then turned over to the group for a roundtable discussion of suggestions and comments concerning actions taken on each case; (4) at a final group meeting, a summary of methods to improve working relationships is presented by both ES and VR supervisors at the State level. In addition, certain questions are asked of the group for general discussion. Some are: Is any special form utilized in referrals? If not, does the group feel it is desirable? Is the Physical Capacities Appraisal Form, ES-571, completed by DVR and forwarded to the ES for most referred clients? How are referral forms sent to the ES? Is there any delay? Is there joint effort for planning training and job solicitation and referral to employers? Does ES notify DVR when a client fails to appear, and vice versa? If the applicant is not placed within 60 days, is the situation of the client reappraised together with the VR counselor?
A Worthwhile Project A detailed report, including recommendations for improvement of working relationships, was submitted to the local district supervisor of VR and managers of the local employment service offices in the Miami area. The group felt that the joint survey was worthwhile and a valuable experience. Materials and forms in the VR folders clarified ES staff conceptions of procedures used and problems encountered by VR. Likewise, it was felt that the rehabilitation people gained in their understanding of ES record
Other questions asked are: Does the counselor feel that the clients are trained in occupations for which there are opportunities in the local labor market? Is DVR being supplied with copies of occupational and labor market publications by ES? Have joint meetings between the local ES and local DVR been held for the purpose of agreeing on referral and reporting procedures? What suggestions do the counselors have for improving working relationships? Application Cards Chosen at Random Application cards of handicapped applicants, pulled at random from the active and inactive files of the ES office, are distributed to members of the group. These cases are presented by members of the group and a determination is made as to whether referral to the VR agency is desirable if this action has not already been taken. In the beginning of this article, we stated that one purpose of our joint reviews was to identify practices which promote good working relationships. Some of these practices or principles are as follows: 1. Referrals made by the DVR should be accompanied by the rehabilitation objective. If the ES feels that the objective should be changed, the VR agency should be notified. 2. Referrals by both agencies should be scheduled by appointment. When a client-applicant fails to appear, ES should inform DVR and vice versa. 3. The DVR should keep the ES informed of any new skills acquired by the client-applicant. Both agencies should fully utilize the GENERAL APTITUDE Test BATTERY to identify aptitudes. 4. The training of handicapped applicants should be jointly planned and the rehabilitation objective mutually discussed. 5. Periodic joint staff conferences should be held between the two agencies at the local level. 6. The selective placement interviewer periodically should review cases in the active file to determine whether handicapped applicants handled by regular interviewers are receiving all the services, including referral to VR, that are necessary. 7. A physical capacities appraisal report on applicants is essential. In one office, every person referred to the ES as ready for work by the VR was placed. In this office no DVR counselee placements were attempted without a physical capacities appraisal of the applicant from DVR. In another office we found that very effective referral letters were being exchanged between the two agencies concerning the physical capacities of clients. Samples of these letters, with identifying information removed, have been reproduced and distributed to all local ES and DVR offices. Each office has been encouraged to consider the feasibility of using these types of letters in their day-to-day referrals. 8. A standard method of transmitting the VR objective, test results, and physical capacities information should be used.
9. Each agency should understand the tools and techniques employed by the other agency. 10. Each agency should know how services are provided by the other agency and who provides them. 11. When one agency performs followup on a case, the other agency should be informed of the results and each agency should tell the other about any change in status of a case. It is important to develop prompt reporting-back procedures. 12. Both agencies should work cooperatively on placement activities and not depend solely on the other agency for this function. 13. Application cards of handicapped applicants should not be placed automatically in the ES inactive files at the end of the validity period. They should be routed through the ES counselor or selective placement interviewer who will decide whether they should be made inactive, or held for further placement attempts. 14. It is desirable for one person in the local office to specialize in services to the handicapped. This is the most satisfactory arrangement because the VR agency prefers to deal with one person in the local office rather than several placement interviewers and experience indicates that more VR placements result when one person in the local office is designated to perform job development for the handicapped. Another reason for specialization is that selective placement interviewers must keep abreast of developments in their field and work on the same footing with the professional staff of other organizations—with social workers, therapists, psychiatrists, physicians, psychologists, etc.-in order to obtain information that will help the disabled person in his job adjustment. In May a joint followup review was made of the Miami joint survey held last December. This followup was useful, since a mutual plan was formulated by the team and the general group to carry out some of the recommendations which had not been accomplished. Cases originating since December were also reviewed to determine what effect, if any, the recommendations had on the handling of specific cases. It is our feeling that these surveys are useful and result in improved service to handicapped individuals. We believe that benefits to disabled persons are in direct proportion to how well our agencies work together, and how strongly they feel that the rehabilitation job is too big for any one individual or any one organization.
THAT CRUCIAL “SECOND LOOK" (Continued from page 16) to return to the Committee for that “second look": because their first jobs were only temporary or proved too difficult. But because the Employers Advisory Committee is able to take that second look, and to maintain close and continuing efforts to help all handicapped jobseekers, many Delaware employers today are able to say, as Ed Lewis' supervisor said of him: “We're mighty lucky to have this fellow as one of our employees.”
Illinois Analyzes Its Handicapped Applications
State Specialist, Services to the Handicapped Illinois State Employment Service
WHEN meeting with employer groups, social welfare agencies, and health associations, employment security personnel frequently are asked what disabilities predominate among handicapped job applicants and what types of work these applicants can perform. To obtain such data, the Illinois State Employment Service took an inventory of all the physically handicapped applicants in the active file as of July 31, 1956. This was accomplished by completing a special form for each disabled person, giving the handicapped code number, a brief description of the disability, cause of the disability, occupational title and code, whether applicant had any work experience in the primary occupational classification assigned, sex, age, and veteran status. The inventory data were tabulated at the State office and the resultant statistics compiled into several tables and charts. Before looking at some of the facts derived from the study and how some of the information has been used, let us review briefly the scope of the inventory. For 7,672 handicapped applicants-6,124 male and 1,548 female (2,121 veterans)-data were compiled for three areas: the Chicago and suburban area; the “Downstate” area, consisting of all of Illinois except the Chicago area (Dupage and Cook Counties); and the total for the State. In the Chicago and suburban area, there were 4,060 disabled applicants, or 53 percent of the State total. Handicapped workers were registered in all occupational categories from professional to agricultural, including a group which was designated as “C” uncoded, which comprised those handicapped applicants for whom no occupational classification could be assigned until receipt of additional information such as medical physical-capacities reports, test results, or completion of vocational training. The table in the next column gives figures for the State by age brackets and occupational groupings. In June 1956, the Illinois State Employment Service announced during a meeting of the Steering Committee on the Handicapped of the Welfare Council of Metropolitan Chicago, that a statewide inventory of handicapped applicants was contemplated. Great interest was evidenced by the committee members and by representatives of other
agencies who were in attendance. In particular, the Chicago Heart Association expressed a desire to be apprised of the results of the study as they had beer. interested for some time in such a study. The Heart Association had figures on cardiac cases but they did not have access to figures on other disabilities in order to make a meaningful comparison. The inventory revealed that heart disease ranked fourth in Illinois in total number of applicants registered with that disability. The actual number of applicants with heart disease was 473, with the total in the cardio-vascular group being 877, or 11 percent of all the handicapped applicants in the study. The Heart Association was particularly concerned with the breakdown of occupations in which the cardiacs were engaged. In most cases, the heart patients who contacted the Association did so to determine their work capacity before seeking emplo:ment. Thus the Association had no record of the jobs the patients finally secured. The following table shows the occupational classifications of the applicants with heart disease, 88 percent of whom had work experience in the occupation.
Professional 28 6 Sales.. 35 7 Clerical. 10 Skilled. 62 13 Semiskilled. 125 Unskilled. 76 16 Service. 17 Agricultural 6 1 *C" Uncoded, 15 3 These figures substantiated the opinion of the Chicago Heart Association that heart disease was one of the major disabilities among the physically handicapped applicants actively seeking employment who were capable of performing some useful occupation in competition with the able bodied in the labor market. As a direct result of this inventory, a Workshop on Employment Problems of the Cardiac was arranged and presented by the Chicago Heart Association for the Illinois State Employment Service personnel serving the handicapped in the Chicago Metropolitan area. The purpose of the workshop was to give ISES counselors and interviewers a better understanding, in lay terms, of the more common forms of heart disease, their effects and limitations on workers, and what services are available to assist in determining the physical capacities of cardiacs. Members of the faculty of Northwestern University Medical School and doctors from the Department of Medicine of Presbyterian Hospital of Chicago presented various phases of the program. The entire staff of the Work Classification Unit, Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, a cooperative project with the Chicago Heart Association, participated in the program, explaining their individual roles in classifying victims of heart disease according to the severity of their condition and the degree of their work capacity. How and where to refer applicants with heart disease to obtain a work classification appraisal was clearly established in order to improve the placement service rendered by the Illinois State Employment Service to such applicants. If the necessary details can be arranged, similar workshops may be presented by the Illinois Heart Association in 2 or 3 other areas for ISES personnel outside the Chicago area. Everyone who has tried to develop job openings for disabled workers has encountered employers who firmly believe that the handicapped have lost all skill and are incapable of acquiring proficiency in any job classification above the lowest level. The occupational table on page 24 shows the number of handicapped applicants registered in the various general occupational categories covering all levels of skill. The inventory also brought to light the fact that 6,944 (90 percent) of the handicapped applicants had work experience in the primary job classification assigned. These facts and figures presented to business and industrial organizations and individual employers is another tool used in demonstrating that the big majority of workers with disabilities have definite
skills and have been employed in jobs utilizing those skills. This has added emphasis to the slogan “It's Ability That Counts-Not Disability.” A table was compiled of the 63 individual handicap codes used by the Employment Service and arranged according to the frequency of incidence. An analysis of this table showed that the first 10 handicaps accounted for 3,954 disabled persons or 51 percent of all the handicapped. These 10 handicaps can be roughly grouped into 5 general categories: (1) impairment of hands, arms, and/or feet, (2) defective vision, (3) heart disease, (4) defective hearing, and (5) arthritis. Future training and cooperative agreements with other agencies can be focused on these five handicap groups with benefits affecting more applicants now that we have an idea on what handicaps to concentrate. An analysis of the tabulations indicated that certain general types of disabilities had characteristic causes. The types most frequently caused by industrial or other accidents were orthopedic and in order of rank they w upper extremities; trunk, spine, and abdominal; and lower extremities. All other types of disabilities ranked relatively low. In contrast, the types of disability caused by disease ranked as follows: cardiovascular, lower extremities, and hearing. The highest ranking types of congenital disability were: vision, hearing, and speech. Further study showed there were considerable shifts in the rankings of the types of disabilities with the advancing ages of the applicants. For the group under 26 years of age, the rankings were: (1) vision; (2) lower extremities; (3) upper extremities; (4) trunk, spine, and abdominal; (5) hearing; and (6) cardiovascular. By way of contrast, the high ranking types of disability of applicants between 56 and 65 years old were: (1) cardiovascular; (2) hearing; (3) lower extremities; (4) trunk, spine, and abdominal; (5) vision; and (6) upper extremities. Although the same types of disabilities rank among the six highest in both age groups, their order of ranking is nearly reversed. The study also indicated a relationship between the frequency of certain types of disability and the occupational classifications of the applicants. For professional workers the high ranking types were: lower extremities; cardiovascular; trunk, spine, and abdominal; vision; and hearing. On the other hand, the types of disability of unskilled workers ranked: vision; upper extremities; lower extremities; hearing; and trunk, spine, and abdominal.
Only the Highlights The above are only a few of the highlights of the findings resulting from the inventory of handicapped applicants. Many other tabulations and comparisons can be made depending on the particular question about the handicapped on which data is desired. To date, Illinois has used the inventory to impress on employers, business and industrial groups, and social Page 22
MOTORISTS driving near the Washington- will be properly identified with the student's name, Oregon border on the outskirts of Lewiston, address, name and location of the school, and the Idaho, will observe a colorful and interesting bill- name of the instructor. board. This same billboard may be seen in Pocatello, Prizes in the poster contest total $250. The first or Baltimore, or spots along highways throughout the prize is a $100 U. S. Savings Bond, with $75, $50 entire United States. It may even be seen in Puerto and $25 bonds for second, third, and fourth place Rico and the Virgin Islands or along the new high- winners, respectively. The theme of the 1956 Poster ways of Alaska. Passers-by may be struck with the Contest “It's Good Business to Hire the unique message of this particular billboard. It is Handicapped.” not an advertisement for the latest de Mille spec- The winning poster in the 1956 contest was entered tacular, not an appeal for a charity fund, but a simple, by Richard H. Gettier, an art student at the Maryland forthright, and telling appeal in behalf of the Institute. All 1956 entries seemed to excel those of handicapped. previous years in imagination, color, and design. The posters went through the normal procedure of How It All Came About being displayed in a window of Baltimore's leading public library and exhibited at the luncheon honoring How the Nation came to be dotted with this bill contest winners. board is an interesting story. It all began simply Let's Use a Billboard enough when the poster, later incorporated into the billboard, was entered in a contest sponsored by the In the early summer of 1956, the Governor's Maryland Governor's Committee to Promote Em- Committee met with advisors from their advertising ployment of the Physically Handicapped. For agency to discuss new ways to focus attention on our several years the Maryland Committee has sponsored disabled citizens and to emphasize that it's good a poster contest. Its purpose is to focus attention business to hire the handicapped. Someone at the of the young citizens of Maryland on handicapped meeting suggested a billboard for this purpose. There persons in the hope that they will gain in under- were some doubts about this, as there always are standing of their problems and in knowledge of the when an idea is new and untried, but finally it was services available to the disabled. agreed upon. Naturally, the next discussion conEleventh and twelfth grade high school students cerned what should go on the billboard. It was and undergraduates of any college, university, or art decided that the winning poster would be the focal school in the State of Maryland may submit entries. point. With that settled, the poster was enlarged and Rules of the contest require that the poster be hand incorporated into an attractive four-color billboard. drawn and have an appropriate illustration which The Maryland Governor's Committee purchased carries out the theme. It must be size 15" by 20" four billboard sheets and a Maryland outdoor adand unmounted. Any lettering or slogan used must vertising agency donated the space and installed the be in keeping with the contest theme. The poster billboards on Maryland highways. *Also Executive Secretary of the Maryland Governor's Committee to Promote Employment of the Physically Handicapped. Page 23
becomes unemployed and files a claim for unemployment insurance benefits? Will he, as well as more able-bodies workers, receive benefits? What about the requirement that an individual be “able to work” if he is to receive benefits? Let us see how such individuals fare under State unemployment insurance laws and their interpretations.
Statutory Requirements In general, the provisions of State laws under which the claims of handicapped workers are decided are those governing the receipt of benefits by all other claimants. Courts and administrative appeal tribunals often have made it more than clear that unemployment insurance laws are not disability laws. The principal question involved in deciding the claims of handicapped workers, as we refer to them here, is whether such individuals meet the statutory test of being “able to work, and available for work.” It is not too difficult, ordinarily, for claims examiners and referees to find that the refusal of a particular job, which the handicapped claimant was physically unable to do, or could perform only with undue difficulty, or which might constitute an extraordinary hazard to him or to his fellow worker, is a refusal of unsuitable work, or one for "good cause.” Similarly, in the case of a “leaving” of work, “good cause” or even “good cause connected with the work” often is found when the work left is adjudged unsuitable in view of the individual's handicap. A contrary result may be reached in those States in which the only *good cause” which will ward off disqualification for leaving is that "attributable to the employer" or "good cause involving fault on the part of the employer.”
to receive benefits. In general, therefore, ability to do “suitable” work is required. This leads to a paradox. The more handicapped an individual is, the greater the number of jobs which are unsuitable for him. Presumably, if an individual is so handicapped that he can do no work, any job which he might be offered would be considered unsuitable for him. But, he would not be either able to work or available for work, since he could not possibly be considered to be in the labor market. In applying the “able to work and available for work” provisions, the State unemployment insurance authorities have resolved this paradox by requiring that claimants, to be eligible for benefits, be in a position to accept and perform a substantial amount of work existing in the local labor market. Thus, in the case of a claimant who had suffered a heart attack, and who was terminated when, upon his doctor's advice, he refused a transfer to the third shift, the Virginia Supreme Court stated: The requirements of the Act, of course, are not met by a claimant whose ability to work and availability for work are so limited because of ill health that he is not able to accept some substantial employment. The Act was not intended as health insurance; but reason and justice demand that the words “able to work," as used in the statute, should mean no more than that an applicant possess physical and mental ability to perform some substantial, saleable service. The availability requirement of the Act is satisfied where a claimant, as in this instance, is willing, able, and ready to accept suitable work which he does not have good cause to refuse. A similar approach appears in the Oregon agency's Manual of Precedents (1952): “Ability” means, generally, ability to do work as an employe under conditions as ordinarily exist for employes. It implies such ability as is necessary to obtain employment and perform work in an ordinary manner. It is not enough to show that the individual is physically able to follow some occupation if he had the skill and training necessary, or that he could do some work if it were brought to him. On the other hand, it is not necessary that he be able to compete in the labor market with able-bodied men. His chances of obtaining employment under general economic conditions and ccmpetition in the labor market are not the test of capability. Incapability of work in his previous or customary occupation is not the test, but whether he has lost generally his power of labor. Considerable leniency has often been shown in deciding questions of this nature. Claimants so crippled or otherwise incapacitated that there is little possibility of their ever again being employed have been held to have fulfilled the statutory condition when it was proved that they had actually worked while under such disability. However, benefits have been refused where the individual's powers of work were so reduced that no one could be expected to hire him except from motives of charity. As the Oregon Manual indicates, the fact that a claimant has in the past worked, while under the particular handicap or disability, frequently is the determining factor in deciding his entitlement to benefits. For example, a decision of the Rhode Island Board of Review concerned an electrician who, after an accident, could not stand on his feet more than 32 hours a week. The claimant worked on this basis until the employer required a greater work capacity and had to let him go. The limitation did not affect the performance of his work.
Able To Work and Available for Work
Typically, State laws require that, to receive benefits, an individual must be “able to work and available for work.” Few variations exist in the "able to work” requirement. There are some noticeable differences in the language in which availability is set forth, however. For example, several States specifiy that an individual must be available for work in his usual occupation or for work for which he is "reasonably fitted.” Although only a few of the statutory provisions refer to availability for suitable work, most of the States have construed their provisions to require availability for suitable work only. One of the mandatory tests of "suitability,” found in many of the State laws, is the individual's “physical fitness” for the job offered or to which he was referred. As noted before, State agencies find little difficulty in concluding that a claimant should not be disqualified for refusing, as unsuitable work, an offer of a job of which he is physically incapable, or which would be injurious to his health. In actual practice, State agencies have not required that an individual be "able” to perform more, or other types of work, then he must be “available” for, if he is
unemployed and perhaps in even greater need of benefits than other unemployed, but able-bodied workers. An opposing consideration is the need for achieving the purpose of paying benefits only to individuals who are in the labor market, but who are unemployed for lack of suitable job opportunities. The need for careful, even meticulous, distinctions between those "able” to work and those unable to work would be obviated partially by the enactment, in the remaining 47 States, of disability insurance. I Such a program would contribute greatly to the objective of compensating involuntary unemployment while, at the same time, relieving some of the strain resulting from the conflicting considerations noted
In holding the claimant available for work the Board said: In this case in order for claimant to receive benefits we must find that his unemployment is attributable not to any physical incapacity which he has, but rather to the fact that there is no employment for him. We note that claimant's disability does not prevent him from working as an electrician to the same extent he always did. There is no shortening of the workweek hours which he can perform. However, it appears to us that claimant is a desirable worker; that there are a number of employers who would hire him notwithstanding the fact that he is limited to 32 hours per week. . . . The fact that he is employable notwithstanding his physical limitations, has been demonstrated by his previous employer engaging him on a 32 hour a week basis for a considerable period of time. Considering all of the facts, therefore, we feel that claimant's availability conforms not only to the language but also to the spirit of the Employment Security program. The fact of a claimant's having to leave his work, because of physical inability to continue on the job, on the other hand, inevitably tends to create more of a question concerning the individual's actual work capacity. A Washington decision involved a Navy Yard machinist who took a leave of absence, beginning in January 1957, in order to have an operation on his back. By early March, he could get around without too much difficulty except for stiffness resulting from the wearing of a body cast. Upon his doctor's advice that it would be almost a year before he could resume work as a machinist, but that he could do work that would not involve lifting, stooping, and bending, he sought other work consistent with his physical limitation. He had no success, however, until the end of March, when he was re-employed by the Navy Yard for work of a sedentary nature. A determination, dated March 14, ruled that he was not able to work, or available for work. Upon appeal, the referee reversed this determination, noting that, unlike the claims examiner who made the initial determination, he had had an opportunity to observe the claimant's activities during the months intervening between the time of the determination and the decision.
It is also evident that unemployment insurance supplements the special services, rendered by the Employment Service to handicapped applicants, by giving recognition to the fact that many handicapped workers are self-supporting members of a community to whom benefits become payable as a matter of right, not charity. Additionally, unemployment insurance decisions involving handicapped workers contribute to a much better understanding, by employers and the public generally, of the extent to which handicapped persons are employable, thereby furthering the national policy of promoting employment of the physically handicapped.
teachers and school administrators will arrive during the fall months. They will participate in the International Teacher Education Program of the Technical Assistance Program, administered byt he Office of Education in cooperation with the International Educational Exchange Service and the International Cooperation Administration, respectively, in the Department of State.
The distinction between the physical limitations of the average person, so called, and physical impairments of those commonly referred to as “handicapped” individuals is one of degree. The former, although not normally considered as handicapped, may be physically incapable of certain types of work. A handicapped person may have to be more selective. Ability to work and availability for work, however, is not tested by the quantity of jobs a person can do, but rather by whether the jobs a person can do exist in the local labor market. This principle governs decisions of eligibility in all cases but, often times, is very difficult to apply. Especially in the case of handicapped workers are there conflicting concerns. On the one hand, there is the natural and humanitarian desire to award benefits to individuals who are
Immigrants and Agriculture Of all the immigrants coming to the United States to establish citizenship, more Italians will enter agpicultural work than any other group, according to the 1956 annual report of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Of the 321,625 people coming to the United States last year, 39,789 were Italians; of this number 4,618 will enter some phase of agricultural work. During fiscal year 1956, some 65,050 permanent immigrants entered from Mexico. Of this number 3,562 were permanent agricultural workers (1,003 farmers and farm managers and 2,559 farm laborers).
Personnel in Work for the Blind
Chief, Section on Area Unemployment Studies Bureau of Labor Statistics
Educational services are provided principally by the residential schools, but by 1955 some public school systems in 18 States had established programs of education of blind with sighted children. Only twofifths of all agencies, however, furnish instruction in cane travel techniques. Over three-fourths of the agencies stated that they serve the multihandicapped blind, mainly the deaf and/or crippled.
THE 'HE American Foundation for the Blind estimates that there are 333,000 blind individuals in the United States in 1957. A varied network of services, provided by both voluntary and public agencies, is offered to these individuals. Little comprehensive or systematic information has been available, however, about the extent and kinds of services rendered, or about the training, experience, and general background of the paid personnel employed by agencies in this field. To fill this need the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in late 1955, undertook a contract from the American Foundation for the Blind to make an intensive study ísee box at bottom of page) of agency services and policies and of the occupations, earnings, education, and major personal characteristics of professional, administrative, and technical employees of those agencies that either devote themselves exclusively to work with the blind or, in the case of agencies with more extended objectives, which employ specialized personnel to furnish services to them. There are some 400 such agencies (181 private, 219 public) which employ an estimated 4,500 persons in professional, administrative, or technical positions. Eighty percent of the agencies replied to the Bureau of Labor Statistics questionnaire and nearly 3,200 individuals, or 70 percent of the estimated employees in these job categories, replied to an additional questionnaire designed especially for them.
Job Descriptions An important aspect of the study was an attempt to classify the almost 300 job titles reported by either agencies or individuals. These finally narrowed down to 100 distinct jobs, in 69 of which there were sufficient employees to warrant separate presentation of salary or occupational data. New job descriptions were prepared to define these jobs. A somewhat unusual method was followed to gather the information on which these job descriptions are based. Each agency engaged wholly or primarily in work for the blind was asked to state the major duties of each professional, administrative, and technical position in its organization, the minimum educational and experience requirements, the supervisory responsibilities of the job, and the supervision received by the incumbent. In addition, each professional, administrative, and technical employee was asked to describe his major duties and supervisory responsibilities, and to name the position in his organization occupied by his direct supervisor. The job descriptions were developed from both sources, and are intended to show not necessarily what these jobs ought to be but rather what they generally were in the agencies covered at the time of the survey. A comparison of the agency data and the employee data indicates that agencies concerned with services to the blind have manpower problems similar to those in the country as a whole. The shortage of teachers shows up plainly in the numbers of well-trained but inexperienced young persons hired right out of college and the numbers of older teachers getting the required training by summer school and single courses taken concurrently with employment. Schools for the blind usually require that their teachers have valid teaching certificates from the appropriate State, and their practice in hiring those not completely qualified parallels the practice in most State public school systems which are forced to issue "temporary” or “emergency” cer
Fifty distinct kinds of services were offered by the agencies studied. Among the principal ones were medical diagnosis, counseling of parents of blind children, distribution of braille and “talking” books, and home teaching services. The most significant vocational services are evaluation, counseling, training, and the operation of sheltered workshops.
The full study was published in two volumes. The text's 150 pages include 103 tables. An appendix covers job descriptions, agencies surerped, and questionnaires used. The study is available from the BLS or American Foundation for the Blind, 15 West 16th Street, Nee Pork. Reprints of a 7-page article on the survey which appeared in the MONTHLY LABOR REVIEW for July 1957 are available from
tificates to persons not yet fully meeting the requirements. The current shortage of secretarial help affects the teaching of typing. These teachers are usually older women who have returned to the labor force. Younger women trained as typists evidently prefer jobs other than teaching this subject. The Braille printing presses are operated by either young persons of high school age who have left school before graduation and are working full time, or older women with limited education. In the shortage occupations, agencies have undoubtedly found it necessary to employ persons who have less education and experience than may be desirable, but hiring officers everywhere have had to make similar compromises.
The great majority of these blind or otherwise visually handicapped workers have had such impairments from infancy or youth. The different degrees of impairment, however, showed quite different ageat-onset concentrations. The heaviest concentration of onset for those who were totally blind was between 6 and 17 years, while age-at-onset for those with less severe impairments was heavily concentrated at under 5 years of age. The comparatively low incidence of onset in the higher age brackets may appear strange in light of the fact that half of the blind population in the United States is 65 years of age or more. It must be kept constantly in mind, therefore, that this report relates to employed persons only and does not apply to thos: persons who are beyond working age, to those visually handicapped persons who, although of working age. are out of the labor force for one reason or another, or to those who hold jobs in sheltered work shops. vending stands, or other types of economic enterprise established especially to provide work for the adult blind. What it does reflect is the situation of those persons employed in a specific type of work who have been able to adjust successfully to visual impairments that occurred mainly during their childhood or youth. and whose training, in the light of those impairments, was probably geared toward eventual achievement in professional, administrative, or technical fields.
Employment of Handicapped Personnel
One question that frequently arises in general discussions of personnel policies and recruitment problems is whether existing employment opportunities are available to handicapped persons. This is a particularly pertinent inquiry for agencies whose objectives include the training of handicapped persons for employment and their placement in jobs. Of the 301 agencies reporting their policy on this point, threefourths reported employing handicapped personnel. More of them maintain this policy for persons with some type of visual disability than for other disabilities. For example, 60 percent employ the totally blind compared with 30 percent employing those with nonvisual handicaps. There is very little difference in policy between public and private agencies, although somewhat higher proportions of public than private agencies employed persons with other than visual disabilities. There is also some indication that larger agencies are more apt to employ handicapped persons. Since agencies were not requested to state the number of handicapped persons they employed, but only their policy in this respect, the information on visual impairment furnished by employees themselves has a direct bearing on the question of employment opportunities for handicapped workers. Thirty percent of the employees reporting indicated that they had some form of visual handicap. Half of these, or 460 persons, were totally blind. The incidence of all types of visual handicap was considerably higher among the professional than among the administrative or technical workers, i. e., 35 percent compared with 20 percent. The occupations in which the totally blind were most concentrated home teachers, grade school and music teachers, case workers, vocational counselors, directors of private agencies, and braille instructors and proofreaders. Because of the nature of the duties of the home teacher, i. e., teaching the house-bound blind the techniques of daily living, total blindness or a severe degree of visual handicap less than total blindness is considered almost a necessary qualification for this occupation.
Occupations and Earnings The full report carries employment and earnings information for 69 occupations of which 33 were professional, 13 administrative, and 23 technical. Ninety-two percent of the 3,534 employees whose och cupation was identified by their employing agency were full-time workers. The most important occupations numerically were teachers (mainly in residential schools), social case workers, home teachers, vocational counselors, agency directors, and house parents in residential schools. Among distinctive occupations in work for the blind, though fewer persons are employed in them, were “orientors, various braille occupations, vending stand representatives, and guide dog trainers. The concentration of occupations was found to be substantially different as between private and public agencies, a situation growing out of the quite different functions, in many cases, of these agencies. For example, all but 26 of the 901 teachers are found in public agencies; similarly house parents were employed almost exclusively in the residential schools, while 83 percent of the vocational counselors were found in specialized State agencies. On the other hand, the training of guide dogs is entirely in private hands. Some important occupations, such as social case workers, home teachers, agency directors, work shop occupations, and others appear in both types of agency but in quite varying proprotions. About 60 percent of all the workers were womentwice the proportion of women in the national labor
force in 1955, the time of the study. The high proportion of women is accounted for by the large numbers of teachers and house mothers in residential schools and by their predominance in the occupations of social case worker and home teacher. Men were predominant in the administrative jobs. Two sets of wage data are presented in detail in the full report-salary ranges by occupation from the agencies, and actual monthly earnings as of September 1955 based on replies from 3,078 employees. The median monthly cash salary for 1,911 professional workers was $301, with 11 percent earning less than $167 per month. These low earners, however, were mainly part-time medical and teaching personnel. Much higher proportions of administrative than of other workers earned at a rate of $5,000 a year or more, with 10 percent of them earning $9,000 or over. Technical workers as a group had a median monthly salary of only $234, although 7 of the 11 most important occupations in that group paid between $300 and $378 per month. Moreover, sub
stantial numbers of technical employees, mainly in the residential schools, received maintenance in addition to their cash salaries. Supplementary wage benefits do not diverge very much from the general national pattern. For example, only 5 of the 304 reporting agencies did not contribute to retirement plans. All the private agencies reporting participation have elected to come under the OASI system with a fourth of them contributing to some private plan as well. The most common paid vacation plan was 2 weeks after 1 year of service. The median number of annual paid holidays was 7 in private and 10 in public agencies. Ninety percent of all agencies make some provision for paid sick leave, although in a fifth of them such leave is granted on an individual basis rather than a stated number of days per year. The report as a whole is expected to serve as the take-off point for agency review of programs and personnel practices in order to improve the calibre and expand the coverage of services to blind individuals in the United States.
Migrant Worker Transport Regulations
By ERNEST G. COX Interstate Commerce Commission
THE "HE place of migrant workers in serving American agriculture has been recognized for many years. Migrants may be described as workers whose principal income is earned from temporary farm employment and who in the course of a year's work move one or more times, often through several States. It must be recognized that the migrant labor supply is essential to the American agricultural economy. Although the contribution of these workers is small when measured in total man-days of employment, their service comes at the critical times when the supply of labor determines the success or failure of a crop. These people must arrive at the place where the work is to be done and at the time when it is to be done. Their work is important not only to the grower but also to the workers themselves because of their need for seasonal employment. Migrant workers move in very large numbers. In 1956, the Texas Employment Commission arranged work schedules in 34 States (including Texas) for over 35,000 workers. Including family members, these groups totaled more than 49,000 people who traveled in 2,000 trucks and 2,800 cars. About threefifths left Texas to follow the crops. The total number of Texan workers in the migratory stream is estimated at 115,000. Large numbers also moved from Florida and other Southeastern States to the Virginias, the
Carolinas, and the intervening States as far as New York. The fruit and vegetable growers of Oregon, Washington, and Wisconsin depend heavily on these people as does the sugar beet industry in Colorado, Minnesota, Michigan, and other States. Through the years, several tragic accidents have occurred in various parts of the country in transporting these workers from job to job. Some accidents have been of unusual severity and have resulted in multiple fatalities and numerous serious injuries. Accidents which have attracted national attention occurred near Del Rio, Tex., in October 1954; at Agate, Colo., in May 1955; near Hempstead, Tex., in May 1955; at Chadron, Nebr., in May 1957; and near Fayetteville, N. C., in June 1957. In each of these accidents the human cost in death and serious injury was high. Furthermore, each of these accidents was characterized by excessive crowding and improper operation of the vehicle transporting the workers. Incompetent driving, poorly maintained vehicles, and badly crowded conditions have been elements in many accidents involving the transportation of these workers. The laws of some States and the regulations of others have recognized the need for more adequate safety provisions in transporting these workers. Connecticut and New York in 1945, Oregon in 1948, Page 24
8. At this hearing the views of people who supported, and those who opposed, certain provisions of the regulations were expressed before a Hearing Examiner. On June 17, 1957, the Commission adopted its regulations in the light of the representations of all parties to the proceeding, and the testimony of witnesses at the hearing. The regulations became effective August 1, 1957, with provision that the requirements as to seats and seating space in trucks would be observed on and after November 1, 1957.
and California in 1949 adopted provisions intended to serve this purpose. However, because of the extent of the transportation through many States and at the behest of the U. S. Department of Labor, the President's Committee on Migratory Labor, the National Consumers' League, the National Council of Churches of Christ, State officials, and other groups, Congress in 1956 charged the Interstate Commerce Commission with establishing reasonable requirements with respect to the comfort of passengers, qualifications and maximum hours of service of operators, and safety of operation and equipment. In enacting this legislation, identified as Public Law 939, Congress provided that the authority of the Commission to prescribe such regulations would not apply in the case of any migrant worker transporting only himself and his immediate family. The jurisdiction does not apply to the transportation of workers in passenger automobiles or station wagons. The Commission's authority is also limited to cases of transportation of any migrant worker for a total distance of more than 75 miles and then only if such transportation is across the boundary line of any State, the District of Columbia, a Territory of the United States, or a foreign country. ICC Regulations Following approval of Public Law 939, the Commission drafted proposed regulations which were patterned largely after the ICC safety regulations which have been in effect for several years for interstate truck operations, although simplified to some extent. Consideration also was given to regulations suggested by the President's Committee on Migratory Labor, to provisions of the migrant labor agreement between the United States and Mexico, and to the provisions of State regulations where such existed. Opposition to some proposals developed on the ground that they were unduly restrictive and would tend to discourage the movement of migrant workers, thus interfering with the agricultural labor market and depriving workers themselves of needed employment. The Commission set the matter for hearing on May
Qualified Drivers The regulations establish basic requirements for qualifications of drivers. The principal provisions are that the driver shall not be less than 21 years old, shall not have suffered the loss of a foot, leg, hand, or arm, and should have visual acuity of not less than 20,41 in each eye, either without glasses or correction with glasses, should have not less than 140 degrees field of vision, and be able to distinguish colors. Drivers will be required to have a physical examination at least each 3 years and to be in possession of a certificate signed by a licensed doctor of medicine or osteopathy. In addition, drivers must be able to read and speak the English language sufficiently to understand highway traffic signs and to respond to official inquiries given in English. Each driver must also possess a valid permit qualifying him to operate the type of vehicle driven by him in the jurisdiction by which the permit is issued. Certain basic driving regulations have been adopted, including one that vehicles shall be driven in accordance with the laws and ordinances of the jurisdiction in which they are being operated. A driver may not drive or be in active control of the vehicle when under the influence of alcoholic beverages. The driver shall satisfy himself that the vehicle and its accessories are in proper working order. This includes brakes, lighting devices, windshield wipers. horn, steering mechanism, fire extinguisher, and road warning devices. Rest and meal stops are required. Meal stops of at least 30 minutes' duration shall be made at intervals
not to exceed 6 hours and at least one rest stop shall be provided between meal stops. Workers may be transported only on a bus, a truck with no trailer attached, or a semi-trailer attached to a truck-tractor, provided that no other trailer is attached to the semi-trailer. One of the bad 1957 accidents occurred when a trailer attached to a truck overturned, resulting in loss of control of the truck. When workers are transported in trucks for distances
in excess of 600 miles, stops are required for a period of not less than 8 consecutive hours either before or upon completion of 600 miles travel, and either before or upon completion of any subsequent 600 miles of travel to provide rest for drivers and passengers. Passengers must be protected from inclement weather. Stops are required upon approaching railroad grade crossings and vehicles must display a sign reading "this vehicle stops at railroad crossings."
Specifications for Vehicles Vehicles are required to have smooth floors, side walls, and ends above the floor at least 60 inches high and, after November 1, 1957, must be equipped with securely attached seats. Seats are to be not less than 16 inches nor more than 19 inches above the floor, at least 13 inches deep, equipped with back rests at least 36 inches above the floor and designed to provide at least 18 inches of seat for each passenger. Gates or doors are to be provided and equipped with fastening devices. Ladders or steps and handholds are to be provided to facilitate entering and leaving the vehicle without hazard. Safe means of protecting passengers from cold are to be provided, but certain types of heaters are prohibited. No person will be permitted to drive more than 10 hours in the aggregate (excluding rest stops and stops for meals) in any period of 24 consecutive hours, unless he is afforded 8 consecutive hours rest immediately following the 10 hours of aggregate driving. Vehicles are to be systematically inspected and maintained to insure that the vehicles and their accessories are in proper operating condition. The Interstate Commerce Commission has field offices in 79 cities thoughout the country which will have copies of the regulations available for distribution. Copies will also be made available through State Employment Service offices to those who are affected. The staff of the Interstate Commerce Commission recognizes that responsibility for enforcement of these regulations presents a particularly difficult problem. The rules will apply to many people who have not heretofore been accustomed to such regulations. We have no list of the people who will be subject to the rules. The problem is one which will require the ICC to obtain the maximum degree of assistance and cooperation from related Government agencies, from State authorities, and from other groups interested in promoting the safety of transportation of migrant workers. In issuing its report concerning the tragic accident at Fayetteville, N. C., on June 6, 1957, in which 21 workers were killed, the ICC expressed the hope that State authorities will give favorable consideration to adopting identical regulations for application to intrastate movements. We earnestly seek and hope for the cooperation of all interested agencies and persons.
Front panel of a widely distributed leaflet released in 1956 by
What Is Past Is Prologue: You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet
By CLYDE W. GLEASON* Division of Counseling, Selective Placement, and Testing Bureau of Employment Security
HE Washington taxi driver credited with the bit
piece, had it at least partly straight. The inscription carved in the granite of the National Archives Building does, indeed, make the point that we have a great future. What the driver missed in his translation is that the future derives from the past; that its glory depends upon what we did yesterday and what we do today. There are, in the United States in this year 1957, some thousands of professional people who are devoting their working lives to the task of helping the handicapped choose, prepare for, and establish themselves in suitable jobs. A few years ago there were not nearly so many engaged in this enterprise, and it is safe to predict that in the years to come their number, like the tribe of Abou Ben Adhem, will increase. Helping the handicapped find work is an activity with a long history and, as far as any of us could know, a prehistory back to the time that the caveman with a broken back was assigned to shaping spearheads for the active warriors of the clan. But in spite of its long history, there are those now living, including this writer, who can well remember when people engaged in all aspects of vocational rehabilitation, like the aviators of a generation ago, flew "by the seat of their pants.” There was little that could be considered scientific about it. The principal requirements were devotion to the job, some acuteness in sizing up and dealing with people, some familiarity with local industry, and a circle of friends among employers.
nicians. He found that he had to refer many of his cases to medical specialists or risk the moral responsibility for failure. His contribution to the field of medicine cannot be overemphasized, and like the horse in the machine age, we trust he will never bee! come extinct. His past is prologue. Out of it has evolved the tremendous complex of scientifically grounded modern medicine which we hope) will never lose its heart, its intuition, and its common sense, but from which we now demand much more. Like the general medical practitioners of yesterday, we who are helping disabled people to find jobs have relied, perhaps more than we should, upon the builtin toughness, resiliency, and adaptability of our clientele. Also, I believe, we have been forced too often, by pressures of a dozen kinds, into narrow concepts of our function and our responsibility. Too often, in 2 particular case, we have been caught off balance br some brute fact that has seemed at the time to override every other consideration.
A Solution-Not a Stop-Gap
Need for a More Scientific Approach We might recall the example of the old general medical practitioner who in the course of his practice preserved many lives and buried many errors. He, too, was devoted; he, too, was a good “practical" psychologist; and he, too, had his contacts. But the time came when he himself became conscious that he was stumbling in his diagnoses and his treatments for lack of scientific techniques and the aid of tech
One of the commonest pressures has been the client's financial emergency. Unless we are very careful we find ourselves concentrating upon job relief rather than vocational readjustment, salving our professional consciences by reflecting that the poor fellow was hungry and that (as Gertrude Stein might have said), for a hungry man a job is a job is a JOB. Sometimes, of course, one has no choice and does what must be done. More often, however, the emergency, acuie though it may be, points to the need for a really thorough effor: to study the individual's problem and characteristics in depth, explore the vocational possibilities in breadth. and continue placement efforts at sufficient length to reach not a stop-gap but a worth-while solution. It is a good thing for the ultimate progress of our calling, as it has been for the medical profession, that some of the victims of our errors return to haunt lis. Sometimes it is no worse than their coming back to tell us that the work we suggested just didn't pan out, and that they are ready for another go-round. But the real haunters are those who do not return in the flesh. They are the sensitive people who stay
buried in the secure but unrewarding jobs we have found for them. As the years pass, and such failures accumulate, they weigh the more heavily on the conscience. We cannot help but think that if we had studied their assets with the same care that we gave to their liabilities, if we had explored their vocational potentials more broadly and more systematically, if we had been a little less opportunistic about the marginal job openings that bobbed up conveniently in the order file, the lives of those people might have been directed into happier and more productive channels. It is out of such soul-searching that progress is made. We analyze our mistakes. We resolve to make more of our resources; to use more effective methods. This has been the long, tortuous course of evolution of the science and art of medicine, and it is the course that our own field of selective placement must take as it evolves into a respected branch of the science and art of vocational rehabilitation. I can mention here only a few areas in which we have made progress in recent years: 1. We have learned more than we used to know about the functional effects of disease and injury; and, while they are still crude, we have means of translating medical information in terms of capacity for representative types of job activity and working condition. 2. We are doing a better job of capitalizing upon the impaired person's psychological assets. We use measures of aptitude more frequently and more intelligently, and we are beginning to assess personality, temperament, and interests in their relations to job demands. 3. We are translating thousands of job descriptions in terms of the requirements of each job with respect to physical capacity, aptitude, educational development, and other worker traits. 4. We are developing techniques for analyzing the demands of jobs in specific industrial and other establishments to discover those in which workers with particular limitations would not be handicapped. 5. We are making at least sporadic surveys of the kinds of work in which people with specific impairments are employed successfully. 6. We have made some progress in reengineering jobs and in devising prostheses so that persons with certain impairments can do work that otherwise would be closed to them.
Prologue to What? It is a chancy undertaking to prophesy the future of employment services to the handicapped. Attempts at prediction may, nevertheless, help us to set our sights above the immediate milieu, clarify our perspectives, and give us a glimpse of our ultimate goals. This, and the fact that it has been just 20 years since the writer entered the field of rehabilitation via an Employment Service assignment, are his excuses for projecting the curves of present tendency to a point 20 years hence. What, then, may we expect? As to the demands of work.—It is pretty safe to assume that in 20 years, automation and other dynamic forces now operating in our economy will make a much larger proportion of all jobs suitable for physically disabled workers. The trend will continue for work, even in heavy industry (perhaps particularly in such industry), to require less muscle and mor brain. Work environments in general will be greatly improved. One likely consequence is that it should be easier to find suitable employment for the physically handicapped.
Psychological Disabilities On the other hand, the increasing demand upon the worker to operate complex, power-driven machines, to control or trouble-shoot variable or delicate processes and inspect or test their products, to compute, calculate, plan, etc., impose mental burdens that cannot be met by many persons who are deficient in intelligence or emotional stability. For this and other reasons, we may expect in the years ahead, a heavy emphasis in our program of services to the handicapped upon problems of psychological disability. Those who fear it must nevertheless face it, and all who are in the program at that time will need to be much better grounded than most of us are today in mental pathology and its vocational implications. As to the makeup of our clientele.-In addition to this emphasis on the mentally disturbed and deficient, we may look ahead to problems, both physical and mental, associated with aging. There will be many more elders in our population, consequently more degenerative disorders among those who need our services. We shall learn much more than we know now about the vocational potentials and rehabilitation prospects of older people. There may be, however, no big increase in the proportion of older to younger disabled recipients of counseling and placement services, partly because, in the years to come, we shall be in closer and more effective contact with the schools and other organizations that deal with youth. We can look forward to earlier detection and better medical and educational rehabilitation services from them, upon which we can base our employment counseling and job placement activities. Finally, our clientele 20 years from now will almost surely include many people of all ages who today
Part of a Broader Vocational Rehabilitation
These several lines of advancement, and others that probably deserve mention, are building-stones for the foundations of a science and art of selective placement of the handicapped. This emerging discipline will become a vital segment of the broader field of vocational rehabilitation. It is badly needed. Inadequate (sometimes downright sloppy) methods of personal appraisal, of selection of employment objectives, and of placement in competitive employment have been weak links in the chain of rehabilitation services.
would be considered unemployable or very hard to place because of the forbidding nature of their disabilities. One reason is that, with the further advance of medicine, we may expect that in 20 years some presently incurable diseases (possibly, for example, epilepsy, schizophrenia, multiple sclerosis) will have their cures or can be effectively controlled and that prostheses not yet developed will reduce the disabling effects of other severe conditions. A second reason is that there will be a big increase in the number and capacities of sheltered workshops for the very seriously disabled, many of which will gear their activities closely to the processes of industry so that more of their clients can graduate into competitive employment. It will be up to us to cooperate with the workshops in helping their people make this transition. A third reason is that industry itself will be more receptive to the employment of the seriously disabled, and there will be much more information available to us concerning the kinds of employment in which persons with specific types of serious disability have been and can be successfully employed. As to their mobility.-There seems to be a tacit but deep-seated assumption that most handicapped people should stay put. In sedentary communities the forces that keep them close to home are particularly strong. There are obvious reasons why some handicapped people must stay close to the home base. On the other hand there are equally cogent reasons why many others should get away from it, not the least of which is lack of local opportunity. I believe that 20 years will see a further increase in the mobility of our whole population, and of the handicapped among them. As we grow up professionally we shall acquire and make more effective use of reliable funds of information about occupations and employment possibilities far beyond the given locality, and we shall make much more extensive use of “clearance" and other means of bringing geographically separated jobs and workers together. In our counseling and placement of the handicapped we shall resort less and less to stultifying local compromises, and concentrate more upon the person's potentials and upon the vocational outlets, wherever they may be, that will use them to the greatest advantage. As to techniques.--I have mentioned some technical beginnings. In the years ahead our techniques should improve steadily. One major breakthrough that we may expect is a carefully engineered conceptual bridge between “worker” and “job.” It will be a system of describing both jobs and workers in terms of significant worker traits, and will involve a universal occupational classification structure that will enable us to identify readily all occupations and groups of occupations for which given worker traits (or patterns of such traits) are significant requirements. Once we have such a wealth of organized information about job requirements expressed in terms of physical capacities, levels of aptitude, general educational development, and directions of interest and temperamental proclivity, we shall be powerfully moti
vated to appraise individuals in the same terms. This will make employment counseling more thorough, sia tematic, and purposeful than would otherwise be possible, and enhance the confidence of both clieno and employers in the suitability of the employment objectives that are chosen. We shall also see marked improvement in our tool for appraising the capacities and other traits of the handicapped. We shall learn to do a better job of translating medical information in usable terms. Our present activity and working condition checklists will be improved and supplemented so that physicians (including, of course, psychiatrists) can readily supply the data we need. We shall extend the occupational coverage of our aptitude tests, and, before 20 years have passed, we should be using effective techniques for the detection and measurement of temperamental, personality, and interest factors which in so many work situations are more important to success than aptitude. As to those who serve.--If the foregoing projections are even partly correct, the next 20 years will find us i with a clientele having generally more difficult and elusive adjustment problems, seeking employment in a world of work that will have grown far more complex and intellectually demanding than it is today. Their need for greater mobility will demand much more than knowledge of local resources on the part of those who serve them. The more complex and sensitive instruments that will be in general use for appraisal of the individual, for occupational exploration, and for the evaluation of specific employment opportunities will require more thorough backgrounds in psychology and related disciplines, and rigorous 1 training in their use. No longer will it be tolerable to create an employment counselor or a selective placement specialist by the deceptively simple proces of designating someone to be one. Every profession has to fight its way to recognition Today we seem to be somewhere in the awkward stage of early adolescence. But, at the rate that the world now spins, it seems to me that 20 years should carry us into lusty maturity. As to teamwork.—Twenty years from now, in all but the smallest localities, the full range of services to the handicapped will no longer be attempted by single individuals, and seldom by single agencies. As our ' profession comes to fuller stature, the long conflict between the specialist and the general handyman will be resolved. There will be continuing problems of coordination, failures of communication, jealousies and some persistence of the old (one-time useful habit of going it alone. But we are learning, and we shall continue to learn. We learn that the other fellow in our own or in a sister organization, concentrating upon a particular function that he has mastered, can perform it better than we. We come to realize that sharing the total task gives us the freedom to concentrate upon what we ourselves can do best, and that the final outcome of our combined effort-the welfare of one who needs our help-is reward enough for everyone.
U. S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1937 Page 25
torily retired after 30 years of service. p. 28. Two articles from Washington tell of the work of the VER and the part he plays in local office operationsCharles H. Walker of Yakima for the medium-sized office and Lester W. Holmberg of Seattle for a large office. pp. 30–33. The Idaho State agency has employed a series of meetings with management and supervisory personnel of large employers to broaden the knowledge of each other's employment programs and policies. The article by Earl W. Davis of the State agency describes such meetings with The Mountain States Telephone & Telegraph Company
WILLIAM J. SOLODOW of the New York attract or aid potential employers who agency tells of his State's approach to might settle there through surveys of qualitative evaluation of local office unemployed worker skills. pp. 15-20. operations. The primary aim is to determine whether applicants, employers, THE collection and dissemination of and claimants are receiving the services labor market information must be carthey need. p. 3. ried on by the entire staff of the local SHOULD a new full-time year-round office if it is to serve effectively in implacement office be established in com plementing the ES six-point program, munity X? Does the need really justify L. F. Shebel, manager of the Tampa, it? How can we find out? The an Fla., local office, gives a few "tips" on how these activities can be handled swers to such questions are hard to come by, especially in a State where popula. tion and industrial growth is marked. Robert B. Beasley of the Florida agency The local office in Lawrence, Mass., speaks from experience when he tells can be proud of its role in the comof the criteria established and the sur- munity's recovery from the industrial veys required in determining where to disaster which befell it in the early establish a new office to provide place 1950's. . By coordinating its claims and ment service. p. 6. placement activities, the office was able to find new jobs—at first outside the Today the New Jersey SES is well area and later in new industries right pleased with its decentralized claims at home--for the thousands who beprogram. But many problems and came unemployed when worsted goods much reorganization faced local office plants were forced to close their doors. managers when the decentralization of John J. McKenna tells how the local claims functions began in 1950. New office helped revive the economic life Jersey's experiences, as related by Ar- of the community. p. 23. thur J. Lynch, Jr., may be helpful to other State agencies considering THE Employment Service plays a decentralized claims system. p. 9. part in serving a rather unusual industry WHEN Hurricane Audrey paid its un in the New York City Metropolitan welcome visit to southwestern Louisiana area--the Letter Shops. This industry this past June, it was the first time in 39 in New York is made up of 550 firms years that such a disaster had struck which employ workers for short periods the area. With no experience to guide to reproduce, insert, address, and mail them in this emergency, the Lake advertising and promotion literature. Millicent F. Nunn and Evelyn C.
A GRADUAL but noteworthy change is taking place in the life of Mississippi agricultural workers. Partly as a result of technological and economic developments, the native farm work force is no longer required locally on a year. round basis. Steps being taken to effectively utilize these workers during slack periods are described by Robert Pressley, the farm placement interviewer, at the Clarksdale local office.
When the "beep" sound begins on the telephone in the Bradenton, Fla , local office, the daily 5-minute broadcast is on the air. This method of recruiting for specific jobs, begun in 1956, has brought good results says Manager J. D. Yallowley. P. 39. Page 26
Employment Service- Total New applications. 737, 600 Referrals: Agricultural.. 1, 387, 300 Nonagricultural 893, 400 Placements: Agricultural 1, 357, 400 Nonagricultural. 533, 400 Men. 306, 600 Women. 226, 800 Handicapped. 23, 600 Counseling interviews. 109, 400 Individuals given tests. 90, 100 Employer visits.. 146, 300 State Unemployment Insurance Initial claims, except transitional. 1, 255, 300 Weeks of unemployment claimed. 5, 818, 900 Weekly average insured unemployment 1, 265, 700 Weeks compensated ? 4,882, 600 Weekly average beneficiaries 2 1,061, 400 Average weekly benefit pay ment for total unemployment. $27. 55 Benefits paid. $127, 915, 500 Funds available as of July 31, 1957.. 5 $8,558,779,500 Veterans 3
Korean GI Bill 5 Years Old Public Law 550, commonly known as the Korean GI bill, is 5 years old this fall. Under the benefits provided by this act, nearly 2 million Korea veterans have furthered their education, while almost 13's million have filed claims for unemployment compensation. The Veterans Administration reports that 4 out of every 10 of the Nation's 5,100,000 Korea veterans have availed themselves of GI training to date. Nearly 1 million have gone to college; more than 600,000 attended schools below the college level, such as trade and business institutions; the rest took their training on the job and on the farm. Korea veterans thus far have received 22 million months of GI training-an average of nearly 1 year apiece. This average will go up since thousands of veterans have not yet completed their courses. Because of the Korean GI bill, the veteran still is very much a part of the American college campus. One-quarter of all male college students are veterans. And even by 1960, VA predicts, 1 out of every 7 men in college will be there under the Korean GI bill. Bureau of Employment Security reports show that since October 1952 some 1,300,000 Korea veterans used Unemployment Compensation for Veterans to assist in their readjustment to civilian pursuits. Korea veterans have shared in the generally good economic conditions of the country during the past 5 years, as is evidenced by the fact that the average period of unemployment for this group has been about 774 weeks. It is further graphically shown by the fact that less than 20 percent of the veterans filing claims have exhausted their full rights under the program. State employment security agencies have paid out about $345 million in benefits for over 15 million weeks of unemployment during this 5-year period. Employment Policy Council Established in Japan AKIRA NAKAHARA, of the Employment Security Bureau, Japanese Ministry of Labour, reports that an Employment Policy Council has been established in Japan. The Council, which began operation on June 12, 1957, is similar in nature to the United States Council of Economic Advisers. Article 1 of the Law for the Establishment of the Employment Policy Council states that it was “established at the Prime Minister's Office as its auxiliary organ, with a view to contributing to the operation of the Government measures to attain the goal of full employment.” Mr. Nakahara was in the United States from January through May 1956 under the International Labor Office Expanded Program of Technical Assistance and studied employment security and unemployment insurance administration. He had an important part in the development of recommendations for the Japanese Employment Policy Council. |
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