this period have been found to be in violation of one or more of the basic provisions of the amended act. Overtime violations have been found in 45 percent and minimum wage violations have been found in 22 percent of the establishments inspected. Violations of the child labor provisions increased to 9 percent, a 50-percent increase during this period. Voluntary restitution of back wages found due increased from 35 percent prior to the amendments to a current figure of approximately 58 percent. OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY I have asked for an increase for the Office of the Secretary to provide funds for the position of Assistant Secretary for Management, also for administrative assistants for two of the Assistant Secretaries and for clerk-stenographers for these positions. I have also requested funds for two additional positions for the Assistant Secretary charged with administering international labor affairs for the Department. The position of Assistant Secretary for Management is in line with the Hoover Commission recommendation and is authorized by Reorganization Plan No. 6. The administrative assistants for two of the Assistant Secretaries are required because of the increased tempo of activity of the Department. The only staff they now have are their secretaries. The amount of time that these Assistant Secretaries must devote to program review and to representing the Department at various meetings, involving travel which takes time away from the office, makes it desirable to have a responsible person closely associated with them to handle original and follow-through contacts in the manner which would be in keeping with their wishes. INTERNATIONAL LABOR AFFAIRS The two positions requested for the Office of International Labor Affairs will provide for a Foreign Service specialist and a clerkstenographer. I am told there are 29 full-time labor officers abroad now while in September 1949 there were only 20. That is a 25-percent increase. American trade-unions are becoming increasingly active in foreign fields. The Foreign Service Area Counselor Conferences all included labor items in their agenda, and in general there is an over-all increase in labor emphasis in the Foreign Service which places more work on the Department to keep pace with and recommend labor policy abroad. I might say that the backbone of our fight to keep France and to keep Italy in the democratic nations column, rather than to have them go Commie without the firing of a shell, was in the trade-union field. The long, long efforts in Italy are bearing very good fruit by the resignations that you have been reading about in the Parliament. Two years ago in France the Commies could call a political strike on 5 minutes' notice and get observance of the strike. They pulled down the metro system in the city any time they wanted, and they were doing it regularly. The mines of the country at a critical time, the start of the Marshall plan, were down for long periods of time. Gradually, as a result of the Marshall plan, there has been a shift. Nearly full employment has come to the country. The trade-union movement has played a great part in it. When the war terminated almost every principal union headquarters in France and Italy was in the hands of Commie leaders. They had taken over practically lock, stock, and barrel the old traditional unions. With help from America, and a great deal of private funds from the American unionists, who believed in the democratic way, the old-line, loyal trade-union leaders set up competing unions. Finally, under the leadership of the United States, Canada, and Great Britain, there was a conference called of the free trade-unions of the world in London. All of the free trade-unions pulled out of the Commie-dominated international organization and the new international organization is now working to build these free trade-unions in Western Europe. The two countries we are worried most about in the North Atlantic compact area are Italy and France, and I think France is in much better shape at the present time. Italy is also in a decidedly improved condition. The real purpose of this-and it is certainly little to ask for, only one man for Mr. Kaiser's office, an assistant-is not only to give greater emphasis to that work, but also on these economic studies that we want to make in the Arab countries, since we do not cover those countries at the present time, and in Asia, this work is vital to the job our Central Intelligence is doing, and this work will be in conjunction with a supplement to the work that they do. It is vital also in our economic foreign-aid program and our military-aid program, but it is most vital from an intelligence point of view, because our Government should have every last bit of information about the living and working conditions of the people that we are going to try to convince to be on the free side. We know definitely the Commies are working on them from the other side. The best way to counter them is to know the conditions under which these people live and how to approach them. This concludes my statement-I trust I have been informative. I know it is your usual practice to obtain from the bureaus much more detail about the programs and estimates than I have given you. Mr. Dodson will keep me informed as the hearings progress. If I can be of any further assistance please call upon me. Thank you for this opportunity of appearing before you. Mr. FOGARTY. Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. Appropriation or estimate... "Salaries, Office of Administrator, Federal Security "Salaries and expenses, division of service operations, Federal Security Agency" pursuant to Reorganization Plan No. 19 of 1950... "Salaries and expenses, office of solicitor, Department of "Salaries and expenses, Bureau of Labor Standards, De- "Revision of consumers' price index, Bureau of Labor "Salaries and expenses, division of service operations, Federal Security Agency" pursuant to Reorganization Plan No. 2 of 1949.... Transferred to "Salaries and expenses, Wage and Hour Division, Department of Labor" pursuant to Public Law 141..... Adjusted appropriation or estimate... Mr. FOGARTY. For 1952, you are asking for an increase of $49,177 over what you had available in fiscal year 1951. How is that broken down? Secretary TOBIN. I described to you the additional help for the Assistant Secretaries. Mr. DODSON. On page 2 of the justification we give you the details of the plusses and minuses to our present base. Within-grade promotions, $25,132. The extra day's pay for the current staff, $4,890. Secretary TOBIN. Why not explain that? There is one more day on which the workers of the Government will have to be paid in this fiscal year. Additional personal service lapses required to offset cost of above items, $30,022. In other words, we will have lapses during the year, increased over those for the current year, which are equal to the two previous items of increase. The lapses wash out those two increases. Elimination of surcharges by the General Services Administration. Certain surcharges are not going to be made that have been made in the past, which will reduce the estimate by $300. NONRECURRING ITEMS DELETED The elimination of nonrecurring miscellaneous nonlabor items, $10,300. That would be mainly for equipment or repairs to equipment or such items as that. ADDITIONAL POSITIONS To provide for the positions of Assistant Secretary for Management, two aids to the Assistant Secretary, and secretarial assistants for these positions, a total of six employees, we estimate that the net cost of those employees will be $38,005. The Secretary has talked to you in detail about the need for the administrative assistants to the Assistant Secretary. To provide for the demands of increased workload in the international labor activities we are requesting two employees, and the net cost for those two employees is $8,870. We are also asking for an increase in personnel administration of two employees, with a net increased cost there of $8,862. INCREASE FOR PERIODICALS To provide for an increase in subscriptions and periodicals we are asking for an increase of $3,200. The rates which we must pay to the publishers for periodicals have gone up considerably. Of the $3,200, $2,000 would be for the increased costs of the periodical subscriptions, leaving about $1,200 for additional publications that are needed because of the expansion of the department activities. The total increase here of $3,200 is for the central library of the Department. Secretary TOBIN. That is attached to the Secretarys' Office, but is used by all of the bureaus. INCREASE FOR SOCIAL-SECURITY TAX Mr. DODSON. To provide for the full-year cost of the social-security payroll tax, for temporary employees, $840. That is a new item this year. All employees who are not permanent employees now have a tax deduction so that they will receive some benefits under the socialsecurity law. Secretary TOBIN. It is apart from the Federal Retirement System. SPECIAL FUNDS FOR DEFENSE WORK Mr. FOGARTY. In the Department of Labor itself, Mr. Secretary, what funds are you getting other than your regular appropriation? Secretary TOBIN. We are doing special work for a great many of the economic agencies. I will give you the set-up in a moment. Mr. DODSON. At the present time we have had allotments for the Office of Defense Manpower, which covers 11 positions. These allotments are made on a quarterly basis. The allotment for the second quarter was for $52,850. The Office of the Secretary, 21 positions, $34,150. Those 21 positions in the Office of the Secretary are positions that might be termed facilitating to the activities of the Bureaus, such as people for payroll, mimeographing, telephone operators, and general service employees, personnel work, budget and management work. We have an allotment for the Bureau of Apprenticeship which provides for 240 employees. The amount there is $341,000 for the third quarter. |