Senator CLARK. Do you know where it is? Mr. RICHARDSON. St. Petersburg, Fla. Senator CLARK. Do you have occasion to get together from time to time with the personnel directors of the other plants of the company? Mr. RICHARDSON. Yes, I do. Senator CLARK. Do you ever discuss this employment practice problem? Mr. RICHARDSON. I never discussed it with them, no. Senator CLARK. Have never brought it up with you? Mr. RICHARDSON. Well, our St. Petersburg plant asked, for example, when the brochure was to be published. They were most interested in this. I talked with the executive secretary, I believe he is called, of the Tampa Urban League, which is adjacent to St. Petersburg, last year at the National Urban League Conference, and he told me that he was working with the St. Petersburg facility of Honeywell on the problem. I cannot testify as to the nature of their discussions. Senator CLARK. Did they show enough interest in this brochure to get some copies and disseminate them? Mr. RICHARDSON. Yes. Senator CLARK. Do you happen to know whether the Minneapolis policy in your plant is the companywide policy for your company. Mr. RICHARDSON. Yes, it is. Senator CLARK. And do you have any information at all as to whether it is equally effective in other plants as it is in Minneapolis! Mr. RICHARDSON. No, I could not say, Senator. It would be very difficult for me to testify to that. I just do not know. Senator CLARK. I interrupted you, I don't want to cut you off. If you have anything else to say, we will be glad to hear it. Mr. RICHARDSON. I was going to give you some information on our work force and the kinds of jobs that nonwhite minority group members held. Just to rattle off a few. We have chemists, engineers, scientists, administrators, managers, technicians, maintenance electricians, inspectors, tool and diemakers, personnel representatives, receptionists, accounting clerks, stenographers, electronic assemblers, machine repairmen, stockmen, janitors, and so on. So that there is quite a dispersion in our work force of nonwhite minority group members. We have nonwhites in high levels of management in my own division. I give this as another example of the degree that they are spread through the work force. There were some other things that I don't know if you are interested in exploring or not, and this is some comments that I might have on my own experience in the employment setting relative to Negroes, such things as characteristics of applicants that I have interviewed Senator CLARK. I would like very much to hear them. We are a little pressed for time, but I would like very much to have you deal with it. Mr. RICHARDSON. Well, I do not pretend to speak for Negroes, of course, but in my own personal experience I have found that in an employment setting, Negroes tend to be a bit self-conscious, a bit uncomfortable, perhaps even shy, and therefore they tend not to present what they have to offer. Most applicants that I have interviewed come to you anxious to sell themselves but I have found that frequently Negroes will not do that. They will be hanging back sort of, in a self-conscious way. Relative to test scores. We use aptitude tests, verbal ability tests, and, of course, typing tests and the like for clerical jobs. It has been my experience that with the exception of professionals, engineers and scientists, for example, that Negroes tend to score lower on verbal tests than one would assume from their conversation and their apparent intelligence when you talk to them. I don't know what cause is of this phenomenon but I think it is true. Senator CLARK. Has it occurred to you that it might be due to the fact that their education has not been comparable in result although they might have gone through the same number of grades of school? Mr. RICHARDSON. I would think that would probably be a very important factor, yes. Partly because of that and partly for other reasons, therefore, I thing any company has to take that into account when they interview a Negro applicant who has taken a verbal skills test. In general, we are not using tests as much as we used to. We do not lean on them since we are not certain they are as good as they are supposed to be. Senator CLARK. By the way, the Minneapolis schools are completely integrated, are they not? Mr. RICHARDSON. Yes, they are. There is another factor too. We have, I believe, a good reputation in town from the standpoint of nondiscrimination in employment and this tends to bring minority group members to you which, of course, can, if you are having problems we are not-if you are having problems, this tends to multiply those. We have many Negro applicants, minority-group applicants, and-well, I do not know if there is anything else now that you might want to ask. Senator CLARK. Thank you very much, Mr. Richardson. I certainly appreciate your coming down here. Your testimony has been quite valuable. I hope you will carry back word to your executives in Minneapolis and elsewhere that we are most grateful to the Honeywell Co. for having permitted you to come down here and that the friendly attitude of your company is not unique, at least unusual in being willing to give us the benefit of corporate experience in this area. Senator Javits? Senator JAVITs. Mr. Richardson, I would like to join the Chair in stating that whenever an American company shows an enlightened sense of the national interest and its self-interest, it is most gratifying to us in the Congress, and I hope you will carry that message back to the highest officials of your company. Mr. RICHARDSON. Thank you. Senator JAVITS. What would you advise any American corporation that desires to move along the same lines to do? What is the central technique which you believe a company desiring to move along the same lines should pursue? Mr. RICHARDSON. That is a difficult question to answer, Senator. I know from my own experience that it was not until I began to move out and other members of my company began to move out and learn more about the situation through contact with the Urban League, for example, we began to get some grasp of the problem. This I think, gave us a new awareness of the total nonwhite minority group employment situation. I think it might well have helped overcome some potential fears and so on. And so I would say that contact with organizations such as the Urban League is certainly a good first step to give my company a feel for the kind of programs that are necessary for them to move out into their own communities. Senator JAVITS. Was any resolution or any action taken by the board of directors of your corporation commiting the whole corporation to this policy? Mr. RICHARDSON. Well, the plan for progress was signed for the corporation by the vice president of employee relations. Whether or not there was action by the board of directors, I do not know, but the total corporation is committed. Senator JAVITS. So you feel the two steps you would recommend would be, first, a total official commitment as a matter of corporate policy, to a conscious and planned effort to have a greater degree of opportunity for Negroes and other minorities in employment; and second, contact with agents able to give technical advice, guidance, on the plans of other companies, how it has been done elsewhere, in order to facilitate your own? Mr. RICHARDSON. Yes; I would think that would be a very good start. Senator JAVITS. And third, I assume implementation in good faith of the basic corporate policy. Mr. RICHARDSON. Yes, indeed. Senator JAVITS. And fourth, can you tell us from your experience that it can be done successfully and at the same time with benefit to the company in the commercial sense? Mr. RICHARDSON. Yes, I would say so. Senator CLARK. Thanks a lot, Mr. Richardson. Mr. RICHARDSON. Thank you, sir. Senator CLARK. Our next witness is Mr. Leslie Dunbar, executive director, Southern Regional Council, Atlanta, Ga. Mr. Dunbar, we are happy to have you here, I have read your testimony, which I think is most interesting, I will ask to have it placed in full in the record at this point, and we want to extract the greatest amount of benefit we can from you in the limited amount of time, will you please proceed in your own way. (The prepared statement referred to follows:) STATEMENT OF LESLIE W. DUNBAR, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SOUTHERN REGIONAL COUNCIL 1 President Kennedy in his message to Congress of June 19, 1963, combined in one discussion the goals of "fair" and "full" employment. I believe that this is the right approach and the only one on which sound national policy can be built. In his Manpower Report of March 1963. the President made the startling statement that, "There are 32 million Americans who are still on the fringes of poverty, and worse. There are differences of opinion as to how "poverty" should be defined and measured, but by almost any criteria we may use, there are an enormous lot of Americans who are poor. For example, in 1960 when 15 Forsyth Street NW., Atlanta, Ga. 2 Manpower Report of the President, etc., March 1963, p. xx. the median money income of families was $5,625, 5 percent of our families had incomes less than $1,000, and another 8 percent had incomes below $2,000. In the same year, when the median American over 25 had completed 10.6 years of schools, 6.7 percent of our whites over 25 and 23.5 percent of our nonwhites had less than 5 years of schooling. Without reciting more of statistics that are already generally familiar to you, I think we can recognize the very deep, the very complex and involved reality of a sizable fraction of our people living in or near poverty, and therefore contributing little to the national wealth. I think we all know also that far too many of these disadvantaged persons are Negro. In the Manpower Report, the situation of Negroes was described in these terms: An unemployment rate twice that of white workers; An unemployment rate for Negro males 21⁄2 times as great as that for white males; Heavy concentration in unskilled and semiskilled occupations peculiarly susceptible to unemployment; Unemployed longer than are whites; and Victims of jobs and educational discrimination.' We need national policies that will help eradicate the racial imbalance within our economy, but also ones which will constantly search for the causes and remedies of poverty in America. We need, as a nation, to grasp the vastness of the problems, and to realize that to cure them we must prepare our people better to be productive. But I think there is bountiful evidence that racial discrimination bars Negroes from economic productivity which no amount of job training or professional education will insure. The Area Redevelopment Act of 1961 and the Manpower Development and Training Act of 1962 are steps toward the full and fair use of our manpower. So, too, are the President's 1963 recommendations for expanded programs. But we might keep in mind the painstaking analysis and conclusion of Prof. Gary S. Becker: "There is abundant evidence that [economic] discrimination against nonwhites systematically increases with their age and education. Many barriers to the education of nonwhites will probably be taken down in the future, and this will increase their education relative to that of whites. This would also increase their income relative to that of whites if there were no discrimination; but, since discrimination rises with education, an increase in the education of nonwhites may increase only slightly their incomes relative to those of whites."" Prof. Ralph Turner has reached a similar conclusion. He found that "approximately two-fifths (39 percent) of the occupational deficiency of nonwhites may be attributed to the factor of education. "The residual three-fifths is attributable to discrimination and types of qualification not indicated by educational attainment.'" Dr. Turner also stated that "close to three-quarters (74 percent) of the Negro's excess unemployment must be attributed to discrimination and qualifications not indicated by education."" The President rightly said in his June 19 message that complete elimination of employment discrimination would not put to work a single unemployed Negro worker who is without marketable skills. But I think we must add that unless discrimination can be brought under control, skills will not beget employment. The dreary economic indexes of Negro Americans become doubly alarming when one considers that Negroes have actually lost ground, relative to whites, in the past few years; in 1952, the median family income of Negroes was 57 percent of the median family income of whites, but 10 years later it had dropped to 52 percent. 3 Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1962, pp. 332 and 117. Manpower Report, p. 43. 5 "The Economics of Discrimination" (University of Chicago Press, 1957), p. 130. Melvin M. Tumin, "Segregation and Desegregation" (New York: Antidefamation League of B'nai B'rith, 1957), p. 68. The author is abstracting from Ralph T. Turner, "Foci of Discrimination in the Employment of Nonwhites," American Journal of Sociology, LVIII, 1952, pp. 247-256. 22-287-6328 There is a belief abroad that Negroes are advancing economically; the above statistic casts doubt on its validity. With your permission, I would like to enter into the record the page proofs of a study soon to be published by the Southern Regional Council. It is titled "The Economic Status of Negroes: In the Nation and in the South," and is by Prof. Vivian W. Henderson. I refer you particuarly at this point to where Dr. Henderson carefully analyzes the relative economic progress of whites and Negroes, and concludes: "*** Negroes made their greater income gains between 1940 and 1954. Since 1954, they have not progressed in income as well." In 1950, the dollar gap between Negro and white median family income was $1,080; in 1960, it had grown to $1,522. And the position of Negroes in the South is even worse. Negro family income in the South is only 46 percent of white family income. In only one Southern State, Florida, have the earnings of Negro male workers gained in relation to those of white male workers. In each of 10 other States, not only did the dollar gap increase, but Negroes also lost percentage ground, ranging from a 6 percent negative change in Virginia to a 25 percent negative change in Arkansas for male workers; and a negative change in the income of all persons, ranging from a low of 7 percent in Georgia to 21 percent in Tennessee. In other words, although Negro income between 1950-60 did increase sharply, the gap between white and Negro income was growing. The fact is that most of the gains registered by Negro employees between 1940 and 1953 were in unskilled and semiskilled jobs, or in routine clerical positions and it is precisely this kind of work which is being progressively outmoded by our changing economy. There are those who contend that the low earnings of Negroes do not prove discrimination, but merely the accuracy of familiar stereotypes about Negroes as poorly qualified, lazy, or irresponsible. Undeniably, many Negroes do have low occupational aspirations and bad educations. But this condition is a part of the problem that must be overcome, not a justification for doing nothing about it. Segregated and inferior schools, denial of equal access to apprenticeship and other job training, and lack of opportunity to gain on-the-job experience necessary to promotion, these are aspects of discrimination so deeply woven into our practices that they blind many of us as to who is to blame for the hardships of the Negro. The most important manifestation of discrimination in the South is the unwritten yet thoroughly codified division of the labor market into a dual track system of "white" and "Negro" jobs. This means that a virtually impenetrable job barrier stands between Negroes and many jobs traditionally understood to be for whites only. Negroes are sometimes accepted in occupations normally reserved for whites under abnormal circumstances-during a war, for example, when there is a shortage of white manpower-but even then there is a marked tendency for employers to utilize white women, wherever possible, rather than Negro men.' The job barrier has also been raised at the threshold of many jobs once considered in the domain of Negroes. The group most seriously affected by outright denial of employment, of course, are those highly qualified persons who cannot find a position commensurate with their skills in the South. 7 The difficulties of the Negro worker in obtaining entry into the job market are just the beginning of his travail. Since the dual track system of job organization in the South decrees that Negroes shall neither work side by side with whites on the same type of job, nor rise to a position of authority over whites, "direct personal competition between individual whites and Negroes is limited largely to isolated jobs where a man is on his own-as in truck driving. And *** these isolated jobs are also dead-end jobs." The mechanisms utilized to block Negroes from job advancement range from the ingenuous to the ingenious. Many foremen and employers doubtless accept unthinkingly the stereotyped image of Negroes as "hands" who neither want nor are capable of filling positions of skill or responsibility. Negro protest is fast ending such notions. But lack of on-the-job experience, exclusion from apprenticeship training programs, from business and vocational training, from the services of private employment agencies, from a host of other advantages which whites have-these are obstacles which protest will not overcome without the help of governmental policies. Donald Dewey. "Southern Poverty and the Racial Division of Labor," New South, XVII, 5 (May 1962), p. 12. |