RESPONSIBILITY FOR PROVIDING BASIC EDUCATION Senator RIBICOFF. There was quite a colloquy between various members of the Subcommittee and the representatives of the building trades, as to the responsibility for minority groups in apprentice training. The question of the difficulty of finding qualified applicants was raised. Figures were introduced to indicate that an infinitesimal portion of Negroes in many large cities are in the apprentice program. And then, of course, the representatives of the building trades said they did not think they had the responsibility of providing basic education for applicants. They asked: "How can we take a young man who does not know what an inch is, or a foot is, to be a carpenter or a plumber?" EFFECT OF AIC COULD BE GREATER Now, I read further from the report. It says the Government-sponsored apprenticeship information centers that were established to reach unemployed youngsters are having a minimal effect. The authors report: Only two of the 127 interviewees learned of apprenticeship through an AIC office. . . . Only a small number of our interviewees had any relationship at all with AIC. Few had ever heard of them. Only four of the 61 apprentices interviewed were referred by an AIC. The placement success of several other sources approaches or equals that of the interviewees who went through the AIC channel with its more accessible information, available counselors, and advanced testing facilities. Earlier, they write: There seems to be almost universal agreement that the lack of knowledge of apprenticeship training is one of the most important reasons for the fewness of Negroes in these programs and for much of the controversy that surrounds this question. Our studies indicate that this lack of information is perpetuated by high school and employment counselors who, perhaps realistically in the past, have not advised Negro youngsters to interest themselves in apprenticeship training. Will you comment on this, Mr. Secretary, and tell us if you agree with the conclusions or do you see other problems that the authors might have overlooked in this most important field? Secretary WIRTZ. The particular point in what you just read, or the particular separate point, has to do with the apprenticeship information centers. I should say that the advice that we have gotten from Dr. Marshall and Dr. Briggs has prompted our very careful review of the apprenticeship information center program. I think we have 26 of them, have we not-26. We have been talking with the Bureau of Apprenticeship and Training people about that, and they were the people who are working on these centers. Each of those centers, incidentally, has a local bipartisan group advising it from the construction industry and labor organization. But my answer should be short here, rather than long. I would be in full accord with the general statement of Dr. Marshall and Dr. Briggs on this point. I would feel that with respect to the apprenticeship information centers it is quite clear that there is a much larger functions that they should be playing than they have played. BASIC NOTION OF APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM IS WORTH WHILE Senator RIBICOFF. Now, Marshall and Briggs were favorably impressed by the apprenticeship program on the whole, and they wrote as follows: We are persuaded that although there are many improvements that could be made in the nation's apprenticeship program, the basic apprenticeship concept is a good one. The better programs probably turned out skilled craftsmen who have higher incomes and more stable employment because they are better able to adjust to different work situations and to technological change. Although this question needs to be studied in greater detail, apprenticeship training probably is a relatively low-cost method of acquiring skills and probably yields higher return to individual craftsmen, unions, employers and the nation. To the extent that the apprentice-trained craftsman is more productive he helps reduce labor costs and increases the nation's economic welfare. Now, the apprenticeship route, of course, is not the regular route for membership in the building trades. Negroes do not have relatives in the trade, and this is often the only point of entry many apprentices have. Do you agree with the Marshall-Briggs evaluation of the program? And if you do, do you have any plans to expand the apprenticeship training program? Secretary WIRTZ. The answer to both questions is: Yes, I do agree with the evaluation of the value of the apprenticeship program; agree very strongly with the suggestion for expansion of the idea. I point not only to the efforts to expand the apprenticeship program but also to new emphasis on the on-the-job training program also administered by the Bureau of Apprenticeship and Training which carries the same idea, in our judgment, further and more effectively. I should note that there are some who believe that the on-the-job training program involves an erosion of the standards of the apprenticeship program. That should be avoided. I do not think that that erosion is necessary. I think that there will be an increasing reliance on the private training resources of employers, and in some of these industries on joint private resources of the employers and the employees. I would affirm completely that basic validity of the apprenticeship program and the value of the expansion of the idea. QUALITY OF PRIVATELY RUN APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAMS Senator RIBICOFF. Now, the report gives good marks to apprenticeship programs run by private industry. The authors believe them to be superior to those run by Government agencies. Will you want to comment about apprenticeship programs in the private sector vis-a-vis Government programs, whether one is better than the other, how you coordinate both, and what your general plans are to involve to a greater extent the private sector in apprenticeship training? Secretary WIRTZ. I should perhaps be referred to that part of the report, Mr. Chairman, because I do not remember it, and it does not coincide with the fact that there are no public apprenticeship programs, so far as I know. Senator RIBIDOFF. Well, let me read you what the authors say: Although Governments could do more than they do to train apprentices in their own facilities, it is doubtful that Government can provide an adequate apprenticeship program without private support. It would be easy enough for Government to provide the academic part of apprentice training but this is much less important to most apprentice programs that on-the-job training. Then they go on to say: We also feel that the control of apprentice training, including the implementation of non-discrimination policies, should remain primarily with the industry through the Joint Apprentice Committees or through individual employers where no union exists. Industry representatives are in better positions than outsiders to devise training programs suited to their particular and peculiar needs. Industry representatives also are likely to be highly motivated to devise and conduct realistic and effective training programs. This is what I was referring to. Secretary WIRTZ. Well, that involves several other things, and there is a context for the last part of what you have read, Mr. Chairman, to be called to your attention or to the subcommittee's attention. PRIVATE SECTOR CAN COPE WITH MINORITY GROUP PROBLEM Dr. Marshall and Dr. Briggs also emphasize quite strongly what they feel is a further followup through the Government agencies with respect to the minority group problem. They even go so far as to suggest an internal administrative change within the Department of Labor which would take that function out of the Bureau of Apprenticeship and Training. So, they do make the point to which you referred, that the best administration of a complete equality program is private administration. And with that I agree fully. They also make the point that there is a necessary public function here of pressing more strongly to see that that is done. I agree with that, too. On the first part of that statement that you read with respect to the relationship of the public and the private responsibilities in the general apprenticeship program, they should be basically private. I think they should be as completely private as they possibly can be, and I would affirm in general that part of the statement, too. Senator RIBICOFF. At this point I would like to insert a portion of the Marshall-Briggs report, "Negro Participation in Apprenticeship Programs," in the record. (The document referred to follows:) EXHIBIT 262 NEGRO PARTICIPATION IN APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAMS A Report to The Office of Manpower Policy, Evaluation and Research Manpower Administration U.S. Department of Labor In Fulfillment of Contract No. 81-46-66-01 F. Ray Marshall, Project Director Vernon M. Briggs, Jr., Associate Department of Economics The University of Texas December, 1966 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION A number of developments during the 1950's and 1960's focused attention on the project of equal apprenticeship opportunities. The clashes between increasingly militant civil rights organizations and discriminatory unions during the 1950's drew attention to the absence of Negroes from many unions and apprenticeship programs.1 While the unions' motives for exclusion were not based entirely on racial considerations, the vigor with which they defended their restrictive policies, and the fact that there were few, if any, Negroes in their unions, made it difficult to avoid the racist conclusion. These contests gave the apprenticeship issue a symbolic significance which often obscured the quantitative importance to Negroes of the jobs they were likely to get through appren ticeship training. As presently constituted, apprenticeship programs are not quantitatively very important. For a discussion of these see Ray Marshall, The Negro and Organized Labor (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1965). |