CIO woos the Democrats –
Guaranteed weekly wage pledge asked of party
Union group wants backing for revolutionary change in American industry practices
By Fred W. Perkins, Pittsburgh Press staff writer
Washington –
CIO union leaders, now out in front of the Roosevelt fourth term movement, hope to get a Democratic National Platform Commitment that would indorse a revolutionary change in industry practices.
They want the Democratic Party to sponsor their proposal that every workingman ve guaranteed a specific weekly wage, in good times and bad, come hell or high water.
This was learned today from sources close to CIO president Philip Murray, who has made the wage guarantee a principal demand in the big wage case of the United Steelworkers before the War Labor Board.
In last week’s Cleveland convention of the steel union the statements of Mr. Murray and other officers gave the wage guarantee question an importance equal to that of the union’s demand that the Little Steel wage formula be broken to allow a pay boost of 17 cents an hour for the more than half a million employees of this industry.
The steel union, on the 17-cent demand, is up against the facts that President Roosevelt wants to make no change in wartime wage-control policies, and that under present law the War Labor Board says it cannot change its pay yardstick.
Roosevelt backing hinted
But the wage-guarantee issue is one that Mr. Roosevelt is said to be ready to regard as part of a general social security program, and the CIO forces might accept victory on this front as recompense for failure on the pay-boost question.
If the wage-guarantee theory should be enforced in one industry, it inevitably would spread through others, with the result that employers of non-white collar workers would have to revamp their financing plans. The wage would have to be paid all qualified employees during times when, according to past history of depressions, plants would be shut down.
The steel union’s proposal is that an employee’s average hourly straight-time earnings be averaged for the preceding year, be multiplied by 40 (for the legislated 40-hour week), and that the resulting sum be his weekly guarantee.
The union proposal said:
For each week during life of this contract that the employee, for reasons beyond his control, does not receive a sum equal to this minimum amount, the company shall make up the difference.
Ups and downs cited
The union pointed out that the steel industry has been subject to sharp ups and downs in activity and employment, and therefore:
There is the imperative social need to assure steelworkers that the prince and pauper era is at an end. Economic security through full employment, thereby creating freedom from want and freedom from fear, can and must be accomplished for this basic industry. This objective is not attained through the pitiful unemployment compensation payments.
Industry leaders have charged that both the political and war situations are being used by the CIO union to force adoption of a government policy that might not be attainable under ordinary conditions.
Fairless quoted
B. F. Fairless, president of U.S. Steel Corporation, testified:
A guaranteed annual minimum wage would not ensure employment, but would inevitably destroy the financial ability of the steel industry to employ. In fact, the demand for such a revolutionary change becomes fantastic unless the eventual insolvency of the steel industry is the desire.
War experience in planned production, asserted the union, makes the wage-guarantee plan feasible.
The future of every man and woman who works on a wage basis, rather than on a fixed salary, may be affected by outcome of this phase of the steel case. So may the planning of industrial operations.
The War Labor Board proceedings resume today after a two-week recess.