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employment agency:

and trickery on the part of the private Labor Committee, illustrated this point by quoting two flagrant cases which had come to the attention of his society.

"One contractor had hired three hundred men one week and sent them out about one hundred miles on the railroad, had kept them three days, and discharged them. These men were charged two dollars for their registration. One dollar each for the three hundred-which made three hundred dollars-went to the men who hired them, and the other one dollar each-three hundred dollars for the three hundred employes-went to the private agencies. Then he sent to the agency and said: 'Send me more men; I cannot use these any longer'. So he made another change and during the week his fee was six hundred dollars, and the contractor of the railroad got six hundred dollars out of it. We do not know how we are going to reach them, because the contractors from another State come in and send their orders across the border line.'

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A group of eight men were sent out by an employment agency of New York to a steel mill in Pennsylvania. They had been promised, according to their contracts, "construction, machinist, and contract work," and given assurance that adequate provision for board and lodging had been made. On arrival they

were placed in front of furnaces. Since most of them were physically unable to do such work, they applied to the associated charities in the vicinity for assistance in obtaining work at their regular occupations. One of these men had been a printer, another a painter, and the third a clerk. Although an investigation was made, New York State was powerless to take any action, as none of the complainants was within its jurisdiction.

Again, an immigrant in Chicago, Illinois, wrote to Mr. Mayper's association that he was sent to North Carolina by an agency in New York. Conditions were so utterly misrepresented that he left his employment, gradually working his way back to Illinois.

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VICTOR MURDOCK HAS INTRODUCED A BILL TO DEAL WITH THE PROBLEM

Joseph Mayper, representing the legislative committee of the North American Civic League for Immigrants, testifying before the House

The reason fraudulent agencies can exist and wring dollars from almost . dollarless men is that there are menless jobs and jobless men who should be brought together. For example, consider the agricultural situation this

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WHERE THE LABOR PROBLEM STARES
YOU IN THE FACE

Every man in the bread line has the right to help
himself to a generous portion.

year in the middle west. The wheat crop of the state of Kansas this year, instead of being the normal seventy-five million bushels, is, according to the United States Department of Agriculture estimates, the greatest in the history of the country. The States of Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma, advertising in the St. Louis papers on the eve of the harvest, pleaded for some eighty-five thousand extra harvest hands to save the crops. This may be an unusual number, due to the unprecedented crops, but every summer is attended by a similarly imperative cry from the farming districts for harvest hands to save the crops. At the same time in our great cities there are many men capable of doing the work which needs to be done in the fields. Very many of the foreigners coming to the United States are agriculturists and tilled the land in their home countries. But because no system exists for bringing these men into touch with the waiting jobs, most of them remain in the ports of entry, glutting the labor

market in the seaport cities, instead of supplying the needs of the fields.

And just behind, pressing hard on the problem of bringing the manless job and the jobless man together, is the general problem of unemployment; the social and economic fact that there are times when there are not enough jobs to go around.

In 1901 the Federal Bureau of Labor made an investigation of twenty-five thousand families to obtain statistics as to the cost of living. As an incident to that investigation, the agents of the bureau found that out of twenty-five thousand heads of families, forty-nine per cent were idle part of the year. These were all able-bodied citizens, classified by the bureau as receiving less than twelve hundred dollars a year.

The Commission on Unemployment of New York in 1909 made a report on the conditions in New York City. Their conclusion was that in normal times of business activity, in all seasons of the year, except winter, the

average unemployment among ablebodied men is three per cent. During the winter the percentage is estimated by the commission at from eight to ten per cent, and during periods of industrial depression the figures range from fifteen per cent up as high as thirty per cent. These percentages are given for skilled workers-for unemployed, not for the unemployable.

. How to reduce the percentage of the unemployed is the problem. In attempting to solve it, two methods. have been tried-the private employment agency and the state employment agency. Both these have failed.

The private agency has failed because it is run for

AUTHOR OF A HOUSE BILL ON EMPLOYMENT

W. J. McDonald is a lawyer of the Michigan copper country.

NEXT DOOR TO THE GIRLS' IMMIGRANT HOME

The employment agency is the first thing that would be noticeable to the foreigners.

private profit; the state agency because it lacks power outside the boundaries of the State.

The private employment bureau agent is interested solely in collecting his fee for furnishing the job. These fees, as fees, as shown by statistics from United States Labor Bulletin No. 109, run from fifty cents up as high as fourteen dollars for secur

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ing a position.

Out of

fifty

JOB-FINDING AND MAN-HUNTING

181

nine agencies listed, three charged fees from eleven to fourteen dollars for securing a position; twelve charged from six to ten dollars; twenty-three agencies charged from three to five dollars; three charged between two and three dollars; thirty-eight charged from one to two dollars; while fifteen charged between fifty cents and one dollar. Employment agencies perform a social service; they are supposed to put the man and the job in touch with one another to the mutual advantage of employer and employe. But a social service performed for private profit always results in abuses in many of the agencies, as shown in exorbitant charges, fraudulent acts, and impositions of all kinds.

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BRINGING THE JOB AND THE MAN TOGETHER
"The reason fraudulent agencies can exist and wring dollars from
almost dollarless men is that there are menless jobs and jobless men
who should be brought together."

Seventeen of the States have sought to mitigate the evils of private employment agencies by establishing state agencies. The difficulty which they meet is the fact that they have no control over laborers sent across state lines. Interstate commerce in labor is beyond their jurisdiction.

The problem is clearly a national one, and the remedy is one which can be applied by the federal government alone. And there is at the present time every indication that the House Committee on Labor will report out and bring up on the floor some bill for a national labor exchange, under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of Labor.

Three propositions are actually before the committee. One is a series of suggestions made by the United States Commission on Industrial Relations, of which Frank Walsh of Kansas City is Chairman; the second is a bill introduced by Representative Victor Murdock of Kansas; and the third is the bill introduced by Representative MacDonald of Michigan.

The MacDonald bill is unique in the

field of such legislation. While the other suggested legislation covers merely the establishment of an employment bureau within the Department of Labor, which would seek to cooperate with the various private and state employment bureaus, the MacDonald bill proposes, at practically no considerable additional cost, to utilize the already existing machinery of the postoffice department to establish 57,839 labor exchanges in the postoffices of the country. The plan is entirely new, but apparently so practicable, that it seems certain the Labor Committee will adopt the main features of the bill. This is also indicated by the fact that MacDonald has been made chairman of the sub-committee to consider the legislation.

The MacDonald law would create a National Employment Bureau, with

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headquarters in Washington, and branches in large labor centers, under the jurisdiction of the National Employment Bureau Commission of three members, two to be appointed by the Secretary of Labor and the third by the Postmaster General. Every postoffice in the United States would be made a labor exchange, and the postmasters would be constituted "labor exchange agents". The United States, under this bill, would be divided into zones not greater than ten thousand square miles in area. Certain postoffices within these zones would be designated central labor exchanges, with jurisdiction over the other offices within the zone. The bill provides that any person, company, or corporation may make application, on payment of a fee of fifty cents, and ten cents extra for each employe additional, for the services of any trade, calling, profession, or occupation, to the nearest postoffice, stating the nature of the labor required, the compensation, the hours of labor, and a declaration whether a strike or lockout is in prog

ress or pending in the establishment where the work is to be done.

On the other hand, any person, male or female, over sixteen years of age, may make similar application for work, on blanks provided, containing means of identification, the work desired, and other information required. For persons not having an immediate income of one dollar per day, the service is free. For others, the fee is to be fifty cents for each application. The exchange agent at the postoffice posts daily in a conspicuous place the two lists-one of jobs open for applicants; the other of persons seeking jobs.

Any application not filled within twenty-four hours from filing is automatically forwarded to the central labor exchange of the particular zone involved. The central exchange tabulates and sends to every postoffice in its district every day the lists that come in to it. Thus the applicant for work is given an opportunity to find a job near at home; if he fails in this, his opportunity is extended to all the other points within the zone in which

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A CORNER OF THE BIG DINING ROOM AT ELLIS ISLAND WHERE THE IMMIGRANTS ARE RE

CEIVED BY THE GOVERNMENT

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