employing 85 per cent of the total number of employees reporting, close at or before 1 o'clock Saturday afternoon." Only a little over 10 per cent of the employees received no time at all off on Saturday. That is a survey affecting half a million office workers; it is a representative cross section, really, of the office work in the United States, and I believe it is a sufficient answer to the statement that the Saturday half-holiday policy is confined solely to those employed by the hour. The Postmaster General stated, further, that it was the practice now to grant time off to employees when that can be done. To a certain extent, that is true, but I wish to call to the attention of the committee the fact that there are at least 30,000 post-office clerks that do not work Saturday afternoons at all, by virtue of their assignment to night work or to tours of duty ending before noon. Unless legislation of this kind is enacted, they have no hope for any relief under the existing permissive order. Citing Congressman Sproul's home office of Chicago, at present out of a clerical force of about 7,000, there are 1,000 who have no time off whatsoever; so you can see the inequity under the existing order of things. You can realize, unless legislation is enacted, that there will always be dissatisfaction among the employees. The Postmaster General further said-and I agree with him as a fundamental precept-that wages should come out of production. And we can base our case entirely on that, because the productivity of the postal employee has increased tremendously in recent years. Congressman Kelly covered the subject thoroughly in his speech in the House on January 15. I judge most of the committee members have read it and you are familiar with the figures and facts that he submitted. Congressman Mead, also in a speech on January 23, in the House, pointed out just in what respect the postal employees productivity had increased in recent years. In this brief, which I submit for printing in the record, we go into that phase of it also rather exhaustively. The Postmaster General said he had an abhorrence of red ink. His background is business. Business is expected to produce a money profit and we can all understand his feelings; yet I do not believe that abhorrence is general so far as the American people are concerned in their concept of a Postal Service. I do not believe they want or care much about a financially self-sustaining service. If they do, it appears to me there are two things that should be done. Congressman Hogg indicated one of them in his interrogatories to the Postmaster General, namely, that the service should get financial credit for many of the free and policy services that it now performs. Mr. SPROUL. Right there, Mr. Flaherty, the Postmaster General said he was giving credit for that in the statement he made here. Mr. FLAHERTY. Yes; correct. A start has been made in that direction in the last report of the Postmaster General to Congress, but something further can be done along those lines. But I believe even more important is this fact-and everyone who has studied the subject realizes it-that postal rates have not been permitted to go up with the price level that obtains in private industry. That price level from 1914 to 1930 has gone up 40 per cent; if postal rates had been permitted to go up accordingly, we would now have a surplus of $273,000,000, instead of a deficit. Mr. SPROUL. Yes; but postal rates have been going down all the time. Mr. FLAHERTY. Correct. Mr. SPROUL. And every time we made an increase in salaries, the postal rates were decreased. Mr. FLAHERTY. The department must buy its supplies and every other factor that enters into the service according to the 1930 basis, while it sells its product, namely, Postal Service, at the 1914 or pre-war price. Any one can understand it is certain to have a deficit if that is continued. I repeat that I do not believe the American people are much concerned whether there is a money surplus or a deficit; they are concerned with an efficient Postal Service and they are getting service cheaper to-day than at any time in the history of the service. Mr. SPROUL. Or than any other country in the world is getting it. Mr. FLAHERTY. Cheaper than any other country in the world; yes. As I say, the brief we are submitting covers this subject, Í think, exhaustively and I have no desire at this time to take up the time of the committee, and we ask that other witnesses be heard. The CHAIRMAN. Are there any further questions? If not, thank you very much. BRIEF FOR THE SHORTER WORK DAY ON SATURDAY Submitted by the National Federation of Post Office Clerks-The Railway Mail Association I. REDUCTION IN WORKING HOURS IN POSTAL SERVICE The National Federation of Post Office Clerks and the Railway Mail Association jointly submit this brief in support of the Kendall bill (H. R. 6603) which is similar in text in most respects to the Mead bill (H. R. 2898) and identical in text with S. 2540, introduced in the Senate by Senator La Follette. As far as clerks not in the Railway Mail Service and assigned to road duty are concerned, a shorter day on Saturday is already permissive, but not mandatory. This practice was inaugurated as long ago as May 14, 1924, by an order of the Postmaster General applying to the summer months, and by an order of September 3, 1924, it was extended to the winter months. These orders set forth that since the practice of the Saturday half-holiday was in force in many localities served by the post office, the same privilege might be granted to some postal employees without curtailment of service or increase of expense. Only where service and expense would not be affected, however, did the department have the legal right to act in this matter, without specific legislation by Congress. The orders necessarily left the decision to the discretion of individual postmasters. The Postmaster General acknowledged that inequalities in treatment were bound to result, but stated that further action must await legal authorization from the Congress. The present bill would provide this requirement. Except in the cases of railway-mail clerks assigned to road duty, it makes mandatory either a 4-hour work day on Saturday or compensatory time on one of the five working days next succeeding. Only on the last three Saturdays of the calendar year the Postmaster General may authorize the payment of overtime for Saturday service in excess of four hours, in lieu of compensatory time on a following day. Since railway postal clerks assigned to road duty are, by the nature of their work, deprived of the possibility of a regular Saturday half-holiday, the present law which reads "that service of clerks shall be based on an average of not exceeding eight hours daily for 306 days per annum, including proper allowances for all service required on lay-off periods. Clerks required to perform service in excess of eight hours daily, as herein provided, shall be paid in cash at the annual rate of pay or granted compensatory time at their option for such overtime" must be amended so that these railway postal clerks who work on an average daily basis will receive the same consideration as other employees included in the bill. The present law directs that the proper allowances for duties on lay-off periods are to be determined by the administrative official. After the present law was passed in 1920 administrative officials endeavored to determine what would be a proper allowance for these duties on lay-off periods. Official determination of such allowances was promulgated in an order of the Post Office Department under date of May 21, 1921, and such order is still in effect. Under the present law the fixing of these allowances is administrative, but they have not been changed since 1921 and the pending bills propose to continue the present allowances for duties on lay-off periods and in that way guarantee to these employees the same consideration as is proposed for the other employees who, from the nature of their work, can be given four hours off either on Saturday or on some other calendar day of the week under certain conditions. This is covered by inserting in lines 17, 18, and 19, page 2 of H. R. 6603 and in lines 17, 18, 19 of S. 2540 the words "As provided in Post Office Department circular letter numbered 1348, dated May 21, 1921." II. THE WORK OF THE CLERKS 1. The post-office clerks.-The post-office clerks perform a large variety of work which requires high native intelligence, a wide range of accurate knowledge, great manual dexterity, and an unusual steadiness and responsibility. This work is performed under conditions of unusual strain and pressure. The pace is maintained, not as in many modern manufacturing operations, by automatic machinery, but depends on the individual efforts of each clerk. Imagine the enormous and miscellaneous total of letters, circulars, periodicals, newspapers, and parcel-post packages which are dumped into a post office during the day-most of them arriving late in the afternoon. All this mail must be individually handled. Most of it must be postmarked. It must then be sorted and distributed according to its innumerable destinations, prepared in time for specific mail trains. The clerk must read the addresses accurately and quickly. He must know where each letter or other piece of mail is to be placed in the distribution case, or bag or rack, and act instantaneously on that knowledge. "Distributing' is grinding work to do either day or night. Mail postmarked before a certain time must be quickly sorted to catch a train leaving at a certain time. Then another batch must be made ready for another train. Then another. Mail must be thrown into compartments, row on row, that look just alike. The clerk's mind must not waiver. His eyes can get no rest. He is on his feet all the time. For a moment he can lean against a rest bar and "throw" letters. Even this relief is denied him in rush periods. How seldom is a piece of mail lost or missent, or even delayed! Those who mail and receive letters, accustomed to the smooth operation of the postal system, can scarcely appreciate the skill and effort necessary to separate each letter out of the mass, in accordance with its destination, and to speed it on its way. Much of this work must be done at night-a fact which enormously increases its difficulty and strain. More than half of all the clerks in first and second class offices must work at night. Further, all distributors must spend many hours at home in preparation for their office work. They are examined periodically on their schemes and must always maintain a high standard of efficiency. In addition, of course, the post-office clerk must perform many duties about the office involving financial responsibility and accuracy. He must handle stamps and money, keep records and accounts, and attend to countless details, too numerous to mention, which contribute to the functioning of so vast and complex an organization as the postal system. 2. The railway mail clerks.-The Railway Mail Service is an almost independent unit of the Post Office Department. Its function is the transportation of mails and their distribution while en route. Through distribution en route, mails are made up for dispatch to waiting trains at junction points where railroads cross each other or at great railroad centers; and even for letter carriers in the larger cities. This is the only means by which a letter may be kept moving from the time it is mailed until delivered to the addressee. Were this not done, there would be serious delay while mails were being handled at central distributing points for further dispatch. The nature of the work of railway postal clerks was investigated thoroughly by the joint postal wage commission in 1919 and 1920. That investigation and report shows that the correct dispatch of the mail from the ever varying standpoints of the trains of the Railway Mail Service demands expert knowledge and alert minds on the part of railway postal clerks, acquired only through constant study and long training. It must be remembered that in handling mail on a moving train the dispatch of much of it changes with each railroad junction passed. This means that railway postal clerks are required to have an instant and accurate working knowledge of differing connections covering thousands of post offices. This absolutely necessary knowledge is acquired through practical experience and rigid study requirements covering railroad connections and the exact location of thousands of post offices over a wide scope of territory through which the railway postal clerk runs, as well as a knowledge of the territory through which connecting trains run. As constant changes are being made in railroad schedules which affect the dispatch of mails, as well as many changes among the small post offices, railway postal clerks are required to take from two to four examinations each year as to their knowledge of these matters. A grade of 98 per cent for accuracy and speed must be made on these examinations; and the actual average is above 99 per cent. These examinations are required year after year, regardless of how many years of experience a railway postal Iclerk has had. The The physical demands on a railway postal clerk are equally exacting. very nature of the work makes it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to change these conditions to any great extent, except through employing additional clerks, giving 15 days' vacation and the relief that may come by granting the shorter work-day on Saturday, or its equivalent. To a large extent railway post office runs must be from one large railroad, or mail center, to another. It would be practically impossible from a service standpoint for a railway postal clerk to run out from his initial terminal and then be relieved by another clerk after eight hours. Experience has proven that it is far better, both from the standpoint of cost and efficiency, to run railway postal clerks through from one natural center to another, as from New York to Boston, Washington to Pittsburgh, Chicago to Kansas City, Chicago to St. Paul or Minneapolis and simliar runs. This means that the greater part of railway postal clerks are working from 12 to 16 hours continuous duty when on their runs. Of course, they are given compensatory time off for the excessive hours, in order to equalize their period of duty with that of other postal employees. But as Doctor Work, former Postmaster General, once said, equal compensatory time off for time in excess of eight hours in any one day falls far short of repaying the energy and nervous strain required of a postal employee when his period of duty runs beyond the 10-hour period. Particularly is this true in the case of railway postal clerks who are working against time, on the rocking, swaying floor of a swiftly moving mail car, with all their energy, to complete the distribution of certain mails before reaching a given point where the mail must be dispatched to a connecting train. III. EYESTRAIN AND OTHER HEALTH HAZARDS 1. Eyestrain. The degree of eyestrain of clerks resulting from their intensive work, largely under artificial light, was revealed by a study made by the United States Public Health Service of conditions in two New York post offices. (Public Health Bulletin No. 140, July, 1924.) Some of the findings of this report follow: When men become postal clerks 92.7 per cent of them have normal vision in one eye or both eyes. When they have been at work six months only 79 per cent of them still have it. When they have been at work three years only 71 per cent still have it. In those two and a half years the number with normal vision drops off 10 per cent. If they are employed in intensive eye work, as letter distributors are, the number with normal vision drops off still more sharply 13 per cent. Persons with defective sight are not usually eligible for the Postal Service, and persons entering the service average 92.7 per cent normal vision. But after they take up postal work their eyesight falls off so much that only 62.4 per cent of the indoor postal employees are normal in one or both eyes. The only occupations that are harder on the eyes than indoor postal work are the garment and chemical industries. Normal vision is 42 per cent more frequent among cement workers than among postal clerks. The eyes of night workers deteriorate more than the eyes of day workers. The letter distributors, who are used for night work more than the average indoor postal employee, suffer most heavily. Of the 2,449 employees examined, 45 per cent were letter distributors or else newspaper distributors, whose eye work is nearly as intensive as that of the letter distributors. The report says: "A letter separator reads on the average between 30 and 40 addresses a minute. His work may require adjustment of both the external and the internal muscles of his eyes 80 times a minute. If the intensity of light on the letter is different from the intensity of light on the case, he has to adjust his eyes not only for distance, but also for difference in illumination." 2. Other health hazards-In Public Health Bulletin No. 162, published June 1926, the United States Public Health Service gave the results of a statistical analysis of a health study of 10,000 industrial workers in 10 industries. One of these industries was the post office. The analysis showed that in numerous respects those in the Postal Service were suffering from more health troubles than those in other industries. This is in spite of the fact that before employment, applicants for postal work must pass a rigorous physical examination. The high morbidity rates of postal employees are due almost entirely to the effects of the work. In Table 62 in the above-mentioned study are listed the industrial diseases and defects, by industries, of those industries with high rates for each condition. This table shows that post-office employees rank, among the 10 industries, as follows: Largest rate of diseased tonsils, 44 per 100. Largest rate of enlarged lymphatic glands, 31 per 100. Third largest rate of slight arteriosclerosis, 17 per 100. Third largest rate of marked arteriosclerosis, 7 per 100. Fifth largest rate of constipation, 15 per 100. Another table (63) in the same study reveals the progression of physical defects and diseases with length of service. This shows that diseases of the heart are 133 per cent greater for those with more than 10 years' service in the post office than for those with less than 5 years' service. The only industry showing a greater increase in heart trouble is the foundry industry. As compared with the general population, post-office workers suffer from more impairments than the average in a number of respects. The United States Public Health Service determined this when they examined 985 postal employees a few years ago. The workers who volunteered for examination were actively employed and apparently in good health. Nevertheless the Public Health Service found the following physical defects per 1,000 men : There is a "high ratio of impairment" among postal employees, says Doctor Fisk, medical director of the Life Extension Institute. He bases this on impairments which the Public Health Service found. Of 1,000 postal workers: One hundred and forty-two had serious physical defects requiring immediate medical or surgical attention. Two hundred and thirty-four had advanced physical impairments requiring systematic medical or surgical attention. Three hundred and forty-one moderate defects requiring medical supervision as well as hygienic correction. |