A BILL TO REGULATE THE METHOD OF DIRECTING MARCH 30, 31, APRIL 1, AND 4, 1916 WASHINGTON GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 1916 METHOD OF DIRECTING THE WORK OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES. COMMITTEE ON LABOR, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Washington, D. C., March 30, 1916. The committee met at 10.30 o'clock a. m., Hon. Edward Keating (acting chairman) presiding. Mr. KEATING. Gentlemen, the committee will be in order. This meeting was called for the purpose of granting a hearing on H. R. 8665, introduced by Mr. Tavenner. This bill, as you know, has been favorably reported, but the acting clerk of the committee telephoned the members of the committee and arranged for this hearing. STATEMENT OF MR. JAMES A. EMERY, COUNSEL NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MANUFACTURERS AND OTHER ORGANIZATIONS, WASHINGTON, D. C. Mr. EMERY. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, with the permission of the committee I should like to incorporate the bill as part of my remarks, in order that you may appreciate the objections addressed to its form. Mr. KEATING. There will be no objection to that. [H. R. 8665, Sixty-fourth Congress, first session.] A BILL To regulate the method of directing the work of Government employees. Whereas certain executive departments are installing in their respective establishments new systems of shop management, known by the generic term of "scientific management," which have for their purpose the attainment of the maximum efficiency from both plant and workmen; and Whereas a stop watch is used in timing workmen while at work to ascertain the maximum amount of work possible for the most capable man in a given time and making this the "standard time" in which work must be done, and by a system of premiums and bonuses, together with disciplinary measures sufficiently severe to enforce the system, this "standard time” is the speed to which all workmen must eventually attain if they are to retain their employment; and Whereas experience has shown that the American workman by his exceptional celerity performs about twice the work performed by the manual worker of other countries, with the concomitant condition that the ratio of accidents here is from three to four times as high as in other countries; and the tendency of so-called "scientific management" through the above timing and bonus features will be to further aggravate the accident disabilities and mortality aforesaid and reduce the workman to a mere mechanical, instead of a social and moral, relation to his work, and, moreover, are unnecessary to secure adequate efficiency of labor; and Whereas by a stop-watch time study you maye be able to determine the time in which a piece of work can be done, but you do not thereby determine the time in which it ought to be done: Therefore Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That it shall be unlawful for any officer, manager, superintendent, foreman, or other person having charge of the work of any employee of the United 3 |