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impressed by the large proportion of women employed doing skilled manual labor
running machines. As time goes on, and many more of our men enter the armed forces,
this proportion of women will increase. Within less than a year from now, I think, there
will probably be as many women as men working in our war production plants.
I had some enlightening experiences relating to the old saying of us men that curiosity
inquisitiveness is stronger among woman. I noticed, frequently, that when we drove
unannounced down the middle aisle of a great plant full of workers and machines, the
first people to look up from their work were the men and not the women. It was
chiefly the men who were arguing as to whether that fellow in the straw hat was really
the President or not.
So having seen the quality of the work and of the workers on our production lines and
coupling these firsthand observations with the reports of actual performance of our
weapons on the fighting fronts I can say to you that we are getting ahead of our
enemies in the battle of production.
And of great importance to our future production was the effective and rapid manner in
which the Congress met the serious problem of the rising cost of living. It was a
splendid example of the operation of democratic processes in wartime.
The machinery to carry out this act of the Congress was put into effect within twelve
hours after the bill was signed. The legislation will help the cost-of-living problems of
every worker in every factory and on every farm in the land.
In order to keep stepping up our production, we have had to add millions of workers to
the total labor force of the nation. And as new factories came into operation, we must
find additional millions of workers.
This presents a formidable problem in the mobilization of manpower.
It is not that we do not have enough people in this country to do the job. The problem is
to have the right numbers of the right people in the right places at the right time.
We are learning to ration materials, and we must now learn to ration manpower. The
major objectives of a sound manpower policy are:
First, to select and train men of the highest fighting efficiency needed for our armed
forces in the achievement of victory over our enemies in combat.
Second, to man our war industries and farms with the workers needed to produce the
arms and munitions and food required by ourselves and by our fighting allies to win this
war.
In order to do this, we shall be compelled to stop workers from moving from one war
job to another as a matter of personal preference; to stop employers from stealing labor
from each other; to use older men, and handicapped people, and more women, and even
grown boys and girls, wherever possible and reasonable, to replace men of military age
and fitness; to train new personnel for essential war work; and to stop the wastage of
labor in all non- essential activities.
There are many other things that we can do, and do immediately, to help meet this
manpower problem.
The school authorities in all the states should work out plans to enable our high school
students to take some time from their school year, and to use their summer vacations, to
help farmers raise and harvest their crops, or to work somewhere in the war industries.
This does not mean closing schools and stopping education. It does mean giving older
students a better opportunity to contribute their bit to the war effort. Such work will do
no harm to the students.
People should do their work as near their homes as possible. We cannot afford to
transport a single worker into an area where there is already a worker available to do the
job.
In some communities, employers dislike to employ women. In others they are reluctant
to hire Negroes. In still others, older men are not wanted. We can no longer afford to
indulge such prejudices or practices.
Every citizen wants to know what essential war work he can do the best. He can get the
answer by applying to the nearest United States Employment Service office. There are
four thousand five hundred of these offices throughout the nation. They form the corner
grocery stores of our manpower system. This network of employment offices is prepared
to advise every citizen where his skills and labors are needed most, and to refer him to
an employer who can utilize them to best advantage in the war effort.
Perhaps the most difficult phase of the manpower problem is the scarcity of farm labor
in many places. I have seen evidences of the fact, however, that the people are trying to
meet it as well as possible.
In one community that I visited a perishable crop was harvested by turning out the
whole of the high school for three or four days.
And in another community of fruit growers the usual Japanese labor was not available;
but when the fruit ripened, the banker, the butcher, the lawyer, the garage man, the
druggist, the local editor, and in fact every able-bodied man and woman in the town, left
their occupations and went out, gathered the fruit, and sent it to market.
Every farmer in the land must realize fully that his production is part of war production,
and that he is regarded by the nation as essential to victory. The American people expect
him to keep his production up, and even to increase it. We will use every effort to help
him to get labor; but, at the same time, he and the people of his community must use
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