Another sort of conversion planning should be done by the professional societies whose concern is the set of service activities that would surely be enhanced by conversion from military work. These include most importantly education, social work, recreation, and health services. In each of these areas, the professional bodies should prepare realistic budgets for the requirements of the Nation showing the way from present levels of activity to desirable performance. COMMUNITIES SURROUNDING MILITARY BASES Across the face of the United States, since the Second World War, a network of communities has grown up serving as satellite towns for military bases. The economic future of these communities will surely depend on what alternative uses might be made of present military bases, or what alternative activities may be established in or around these communities. My opinion is that the planning for these communities must be a local and a State matter. The Federal Government should participate only in making available backstopping support in the event that local planning is not competent to cope with predictable problems. I think it would be a great error to require the Federal Government to take direct responsibility for planning the conversion of the military-based communities. For reasons of general economy and to avoid overcentralization, local communities should be encouraged to undertake their own studies and their own planning. If State and Federal support will be needed, then the nature and the magnitude of the problem will be revealed only after competent work has been done in each locality. OCCUPATIONAL TRAINING AND CONVERSION Managers and engineers of military-producing firms have had extensive training in meeting the functional requirement of the Defense Department. These requirements do not usually include cost minimization either in the design of the product or in the production system. Accordingly, if these men are to become competent in servicing the civilian market they must be retrained in the economics of design and in the economics of production engineering. The relevant courses for these purposes are the usual ones that are available in schools of engineering or business administration throughout the country. Marketing men are another group in the defense-serving industries that will require extensive retraining, for these men have acquired the specialized experience of selling to the Department of Defense. This experience is far removed from the skills necessary to sell in the commercial-civilian market. For this retraining, courses in business schools and special seminars staffed by competent marketing men from principal firms would be effective devices. One of the strategic occupational conversion problems of the next years can involve the training of many men and women with technical degrees for work as public school teachers. During the last decade the competent men and women who would otherwise have staffed our public schools were drawn away by salary and prestige inducements to work in the military and the allied aerospace industries. I estimate that a well-designed training and practical teaching course of 1 year's duration can be designed to retrain such people to perform competently in the public schools. A half year of formal classroom work-partly in their field of substantive specialization-can be followed by a half year of supervised teaching. By this means we will be able at one stroke to satisfy the urgent job requirement of many technicians now engaged in military work, and also to recoup some of the losses we have suffered through the understanding of our public school system. The dean of a major teacher's college has advised me that this plan is feasible. He also reported that many thousands of high-grade teaching opportunities exist for appropriately trained men and women. THE LEADTIME PROBLEM One of the pervasive aspects of all conversion planning is the requirement of leadtime between the decision to carry out some activity and the beginning of the work itself. In the case of planning for occupational conversion of engineers and others to the teaching profession the leadtime includes the requirement for planning the required curriculums, arranging for supporting funds, preparing estimates of possible scope of interest in this work, and arranging for the neces sary public announcements for recruitment of such programs. In the case of large-scale construction activity the leadtime includes all the activity of obtaining permission of various public bodies for a particular set of plans, and the drafting of blueprints for the performance of work, as well as negotiation of contracts. Only then can the work itself be undertaken. For industrial planning a period of not less than 1 year is required for preparing a set of blueprints for conversion of the factory from military to civilian work. This must include product planning and designing, designing new production systems, designing the changeover of present equipment, planning the retraining and relocation of people for the new work. For conversion planning, it will be necessary to calculate the leadtime in every sphere of industry and service, for this will be essential to the preparation of workable plans that could be set in motion on relatively short notice. HOW CAN A FIRM BEGINNING BE MADE FOR CREATING CAPABILITY TO CONVERT FROM MILITARY TO CIVILIAN ECONOMY? On August 2, 1963, Senator George McGovern, of South Dakota, presented a masterful analysis on the floor of the Senate, entitled "New Perspectives on American Security." The Senator included a valuable formulation on how to take practical steps for conversion. He recommended the following: "First, all establishments that fulfill Defense Department or Atomic Energy Commission work for at least 1 calendar year and whose personnel are 25 percent or more so engaged, should henceforth be required-as a condition of contract fulfillment and acceptable administration-to establish in their managements an operating conversion committee. This committee should actively engage in planning for conversion of the facility from military to civilian work as required in the event of termination, cutbacks, stretchout, or other curtailment of Defense or AEC requirements. "Second, in order to estimate the support that may be required to complement local and regional conversion, an Economic Conversion Commission should be established by the President under the direction of the Secretary of Commerce and including experts from other concerned Government departments. Our Arms Control and Disarmament Agency already has a small but able group of people giving thought to this matter. "The Economic Conversion Commission shall have responsibility for blueprinting appropriate action by departments and agencies of the Federal Government that are required to facilitate conversion from a military to a civilian economy. "In addition to such activities as it should deem necessary, the Commission would prepare schedules of possible private and public investment patterns and the employment and income effects to be expected therefrom. The information would be reported to the President and to the Congress in preliminary form within 6 months after the enactment of authorizing legislation and in final form within 12 months. "The Commission would take counsel with the Governors of all States to encourage appropriate and timely studies and conferences by the States in support of conversion from a military to a civilian economy. "Third, the Commission would, within 12 months of establishment, convene a National Conference on Economic Conversion and Growth to focus nationwide attention on the problems of conversion and economic growth and to encourage appropriate study and organization in all relevant parts of the Nation's economy." At this writing. legislation along these lines has been proposed in the Senate and the House of Representatives. Without delay, action should be taken to encourage trade union programs to cushion workers in the transition to peacetime operations. Such questions must be considered as: How much severance pay should each worker receive? How much money should be spent on job retraining? How much money should be made available for transferring men to other localities if employment is to be found elsewhere? The Military Establishment must be included in planning for peace. I think studies should be made of possible constructive utilization of military organizations and personnel. For example, one of the most difficult, expensive, timeconsuming processes in the economic development of unindustrialized areas is the provision of the network of transportation facilities, communication facilities, water supply and power supply, that are essential for an industrialized society to function. Those facilities are provided with the greatest difficulty in countries undergoing industrialization, usually because of the low level of national income. Major engineering organizations should be able literally to land on the beach of such a territory and install such facilities. A kind of largescale, creative, imaginative engineering is involved that, to my knowledge, has yet to be tackled in an ordered way. Comparable opportunities should appear for the medical services. Many military men go into retirement. For most persons, retirement does not provide a living wage. In 1950, 43 percent of retired military personnel received monthly retirement pay of $100 to $200, and 30 percent were paid somewhat more $200 to $300. I propose that consideration be given to upgrading these sums. Military men should not be penalized for having accepted careers which society has regarded as useful and valuable. The veterans of the arms race can be helped to change over and adjust to new occupations. For example, we have trained large numbers of technicians for military work, thereby reducing the number of competent men and women available for teaching in our technical schools. The importance of teaching by qualified men and women can be restored by raising salaries and thus by encouraging competent ex-military technicians to fill the vital need in our public schools. In sum: conversion from military to civilian economy can be turned into a tremendous opportunity-economic and spiritual-for American society. The productive resources now used for arms can be reapplied, thereby giving our people greater economic security and a sense of well-being without precedent in this country. Even a small part of our production capacities so employed can make possible economic development with an option of freedom in the rest of the world." Senator CLARK. This concludes the public hearings which were initiated last May. The record will be kept open for 1 week in case any witnesses or others care to file statements. We are hoping to complete a draft report on the hearings shortly after the first of the year and will call the subcommittee into executive session with the hope that we can have a final report by the end of March. The hearing is adjourned. (Whereupon, at 12 noon, the subcommittee was adjourned.) 11 S. Melman, "The Peace Race," George Braziller and Ballantine Books, New York, N.Y., 1961. |