Employment

Abstract

Employment E and pay rolls in those industries for which current data are available declined between the middle of December and the corresponding period of January. The reduction resulted mainly from the seasonal losses in nonmanufacturing industries. These data do not include the workers employed on C.W.A. projects. The number so employed averaged higher in January than in December. Available preliminary statistics for February indicate a gain in private employment and pay rolls as compared with January. The decline in factory employment during January was slight, and was in accord with the usual seasonal trend, terminating the greater-than-seasonal declines which characterized the final quarter of 1933. Factory pay rolls during the month receded by only four tenths of 1 percent which is considerably less than the average drop during this month for the past 10 years. In January, factory employment and pay rolls were each about 8 percent below the 1933 high reached in September. Compared with a year ago, employment and pay rolls were 21 percent and 35 percent higher, respectively. Among manufacturing industries, the transportation equipment group revealed a 17-percent gain in employment and a 21-percent rise in pay rolls, due entirely to increases of 22 percent and 27 percent, respectively, in the automobile industry. As a result of the marked improvement in the boot and shoe industry, the leather group reported a 5.1-percent increase in the number employed accompanied by a 10-percent increase in pay rolls in January as compared with December. Large seasonal variations characterized the employment and pay-roll changes in many of the nonmanufacturing industries. Employment in retail trade declined nearly 20 percent, substantially the same proportionate drop as occurred between the months of December and January a year ago. Seasonal declines of over 10 percent in employment also were reported in the quarrying and nonmetallic mining, canning and preserving, and building construction industries. Increased activity in anthracite mining brought about an 18-percent rise in employment and a 65-percent gain in pay rolls for the month. It was reported that during the third week in January over 60 millions of dollars were disbursed in wages in connection with the Civil Works program. The number employed for the same week was slightly over 4,000,000. As this amount was equivalent to approximately one half of the estimated weekly factory pay roll in January, its significance in terms of workers' income may be readily appreciated. The process of gradually decreasing the number employed on C.W.A. projects was begun around the middle of February and the program calls for more to be released each week. The 377,500 dropped as of March 2, reduced the total to 2,770,000, including 160,000 engaged on Federal projects and under the emergency education program. Employment increased from December to January in 10 of the 48 States, according to the data collected by the Department of Labor. Michigan reported the largest gain—an increase of 11 percent, due mostly to the greater activity in the automobile industry.