Index Numbers

1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940 US BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS

EXHIBIT NO. 39

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1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940

US BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS

Dr. LUBIN. Here is "Woolen and worsteds" where, throughout the period from 1935 until the middle of 1937, employment was as high or higher than it had been in 1929.

Senator KING. Isn't it true, however, that it isn't fair to compare locomotives, and the diminution in their production with the other industries, because they belong to a very sick industry, our transportation industry?

Dr. LUBIN. That is the thing I am trying to bring out, that the variations have a definite relationship to specific problems of the economy. The reason the cement figure did not go up is because we never got back to our previous building levels. As a matter of fact, in 1935 every other bag of cement in the United States was purchase either by the Government or by a contractor engaged in Gov

ernment construction.

Senator BORAH. Did the price of cement change significantly?

Dr. LUBIN. Mr. Oliphant, I think, can tell you more about that. The CHAIRMAN. What is the answer to the Senator's question? Dr. LUBIN. It didn't change.

The CHAIRMAN. Isn't it a fact that a very large proportion of the output of cement is now being used in the construction of roads?

Dr. LUBIN. The Public Works Program and W. P. A. program are big consumers of cement even today.

The CHAIRMAN. So that "Exhibit No. 39" on cement should not be taken to indicate that construction has come back to the extent that the use of cement has come back?

Dr. LUBIN. We want to bear in mind that public construction, State, Federal, and municipal, has always been a relatively small portion of the total, but at the moment it is a very important one. The final contrast, Senator, is cigar and cigarette employment. (Referring to "Exhibit No. 41".2)

I have already shown you what happened to cigarette production. Here is employment. It has never returned to its 1931 level, despite

1 Supra, p. 51.

Supra, p. 53.

the fact that output has been going up. Some of this is accounted for by cigars going from hand work to machine work.

Mr. HENDERSON. You have, Dr. Lubin, the chart on production of cigarettes?

Senator KING. That is the most concentrated of all industries, isn't it? Nearly 99 percent of the production is in the hands of six or seven big producers.

Dr. LUBIN. Here is the production curve and here is employment and pay rolls.

Mr. ARNOLD. Have prices dropped on cigarettes?

Dr. LUBIN. Retail prices have. I don't know about wholesale prices. The two-for-a-quarter price went into effect some time ago and has stayed in effect in a good many parts of the country.

Senator KING. I might say the Government gets nearly $600,000,000 in taxes out of the tobacco industry through the tax on cigarettes each year.

Dr. LUBIN. The pay-roll level has never gone back to where it was. Indeed it has kept consistently below past levels.

Now, if we move from these specific industries back to the whole economic system again, we might look at these figures of employment and pay rolls in terms of the amount of work that wage earners have had, and their hours of employment.

(The chart referred to was marked "Exhibit No. 43" and appears on this page. The statistical data on which this chart is based are included in the appendix on p. 222.)

EXHIBIT No. 43

CHART II

EMPLOYMENT AND AVERAGE WEEKLY HOURS

IN MANUFACTURING, MINING AND STEAM RAILROADS

Dr. LUBIN. It is rather significant that the number of wage earners in the United States in manufacturing, in mining, and steam railroads combined, increased between 1914 and 1919 by 26 percent. Then it fell during the post-war boom. It never returned to its former peak. Manufacturing, mining, and steam railroads combined never got back to the employment levels of 1920. The closest they approached it was in 1929.

Senator KING. That was because of the war and the post-war problem?

Dr. LUBIN. Yes. Similarly the number of hours worked by all of their people put together has never returned to that peak level. The length of the average workweek has fallen by 26 percent during this period from 1914 to 1937.

Senator KING. From 56 hours down, as a maximum?

Dr. LUBIN. This shortening of hours work per week isn't accounted for entirely by the fact that people voluntarily agreed to a cut in hours. The amount of work available was such that in some weeks there were only 36 hours of work available; in other weeks 32, and in other weeks 40. You will notice that between 1934 and 1937 there was an increase in the hours worked per week due to the fact that there was more work to be done, with the result that the men worked longer hours.

The next chart translates the hours worked and average hourly earnings into weekly earnings.

(The chart referred to was marked "Exhibit No. 44" and appears on p. 57. The statistical data on which this chart is based are included in the appendix on p. 222.)

Senator KING. Doubtless your reports show the fact that the oil industry fluctuates. A field will be worked out, like the Signal Peak. There will be a great boom and when the reservoir has been drained dry, they cease to operate, and many will be destroyed, and the workers will go to other fields which may open up, and efforts will be made to revive the industry by securing greater production in Texas or elsewhere. So you would expect to find, in view of the uncertainty in oil production, the diminution and finally the drying up of the reservoirs, that there would be great fluctuation, not only in production but wages and number of hours worked..

Dr. LUBIN. That is true of all industries dealing with a waning resource. The same is true of lumber and mining. In mining the best ore gets worked out first. You know that only too well, Senator.

The first thing I want to point out on "Exhibit No. 44" is that at the low point of the depression the people in our factories were averaging about 38 hours of work a week; today they are averaging 37 hours a week. They averaged 41 a year ago last spring when industry was moving at a fast rate. This means that the decrease in hours was primarily affected by the amount of work available, because, when there was work available last year they worked as much as 41 hours a week on the average in the manufacturing industries as a whole. Many of these industries were paying time and one-half for overtime over 40 hours, whereas in the earlier days they weren't doing that. The change in the number of hours worked, plus the increase in the wage rate from less than 50 cents an hour on the average in 1932 to 67 cents on the average last year, at the high point of production-it has fallen to 63 cents since-affected the weekly income of our wage