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From International Socialist Review, Vol.23 No.3, Summer 1962, pp.87-90.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
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“When looms weave by themselves slavery will end.” – ARISTOTLE |
* * *
One trade union newspaper asks the question, is automation “A blessing for the industrial giants of America, or a curse for millions of working people who earn their daily bread through their labor?” The Trainman News says “Automation, a fearful word among workers up to this point because of its connotation to them of resultant unemployment as technological changes take place in industry, can and must be a boon to us all if harnessed properly.”
A large part of the effects of automation on the working class and the unions lies in what the unions themselves do about it. What are the various approaches of unions to the problems of automation?
The first is the obvious do-nothing, business-as-usual policy of some unions. Their methods are the same as the business unionism of Samuel Gompers or William Green in their heyday – as if there had been no qualitative or quantitative change in the mine, mill or office in this century. This type of leadership is best exemplified by John L. Lewis of the United Mine Workers and David J. McDonald of the Steelworkers. Their policy is to negotiate a new contract periodically which usually includes some fringe benefits and an hourly wage increase which helps maintain a relatively high wage for the fewer and fewer workers who still have jobs. The recent 3% agreement in steel shows, however, that even this neat business arrangement is coming to an end as a desperate American capitalism brings pressure to bear on these labor lieutenants of the capitalist class.
What does the union do for the tens of thousands of workers who are displaced by automation in these industries? Nothing – nothing whatsoever, because industry is given a free hand to rationalize production at the expense of the workers. Industry has a free hand to automate where and when it wants to. It can automate old plants or close them down and build new streamlined plants at will, without let or hindrance from the union, and without throwing so much as a bone to those workers who are displaced and will never again work in the industry.
Is there any reason to wonder why production has gone up, while employment has dwindled in these industries? The real wonder is that the bureaucracy of these unions doesn’t lift a finger to alleviate the plight of these workers, let alone prevent it. Under this leadership 200,000 coal miners in 1959 produced more coal than 1,000,000 in 1949, and the membership of the United Steel Workers declined from one million to 796,000 while production increased 50%.
Another approach to the problem of automation is more humane and makes an attempt to alleviate its impact; but the end result is the same – fewer workers with greater production. This approach is, in essence, no layoffs when automation is installed, but transfer to another vacant job made available because of sickness, death, retirement or injury.
Generally speaking, this is the approach of the Transport Workers Union under Mike Quill, and, with some variations, of Harry Bridges and the International Longshoremen and Warehousemen Union on the West coast. With this “humane” approach the number of transport workers in the New York City subway system has decreased from 30,000 to 20,000 since 1945. The ILWU membership on the docks had already declined from 25,000 to 18,000 when it signed a 5% year “mechanization pact” in 1961 which allows unbridled automation, but some consideration for displaced workers. The transport worker is guaranteed 52 weeks a year employment, while the longshoreman has a guarantee of 32 weeks a year or $4,692, with severance benefits of up to $7,000. (The airline pilots in the TWU have a similar provision of up to $40,000.) It remains to be seen if this provision will hinder automation, but it is highly doubtful.
“In exchange for these benefits – employers are relieved from restriction in the contract and working rules dealing with sling loads, first place of rest, multiple handling, gang sizes and manning scales, so as to permit them to operate efficiently, change methods of work, utilize labor saving devices and direct work through employer representatives, while explicitly observing the provisions and conditions of the contract.” [1] This sounds like the worst possible type of speed-up imaginable. That there was a substantial opposition to it is shown by the vote on it of 7,862 to 3,695.
Finally, there is the approach of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 3 in New York City. There are 34,000 members in this local, with varying scales of pay and hours. In its construction division, this local has 6,750 members working in the building industry who have had a 30-hour week for over 25 years. These members are the cream of the labor aristocracy, with a father-to-son inheritance of jobs, and college scholarships for their brighter sons and daughters. To the chagrin of President Kennedy and Arthur J. Goldberg, who openly opposed it and to the consternation of George Meany and Walter Reuther, they struck for and won with ease a 25-hour week at approximately the same wages as before. The only concession Local 3 gave the employers was an agreement to allow more apprentices into the union in case of a future “shortage” of skilled labor.
The main catalyst in this tremendous victory was the gradual mechanization (not automation) of the industry in the form of time-saving tools and devices. One example of mechanization was the introduction of a machine appropriately named “The Powercrat” which pulls heavy cable through a building with one man operating it instead of the 6 to 10 men previously required for the same job. Another example is the introduction of a powder-actuated gun which shoots studs into steel in 30 seconds instead of the 30 minutes it formerly took. The net result of these and other improved production methods was that in the last 25 years the output per worker more than tripled.
There was some unemployment and consequent discontent and grumbling from the membership, but the main exponent and chief inspiration for the 25-hour week came from the bureaucracy in the person of Harry Van Arsdale, president of the IBEW Local 3. Harry Van Arsdale is a conservative, old-line labor leader who formed the Brotherhood Party in New York to support Kennedy and Mayor Wagner in 1960, and is now endorsing Tammany Democrats Powell and Buckley in preference to more “liberal” Democratic Party opponents.
The logic behind this tremendous victory was twofold. Foremost is the fact that a small number of strategically important workers can bring an entire industry to its knees. Second is the fact that a bureaucracy (Van Arsdale and other officers of the union) must have a corresponding membership to justify and support their existence. While a McDonald or a Lewis has an ever-decreasing membership base, they still have hundreds of thousands of members left to support them. But a small craft union leader cannot afford this “luxury.” All indications are that the other craft unions in the building industry in New York will follow the example of the Electrical Workers and attain, without too much difficulty, a 6-hour day to replace their present 7-hour day.
The leadership of the craft unions is much more sensitive and responsive to the needs of its membership than the national mass trade unions. For one thing, they have closer day-to-day personal contact with the membership. Secondly, as indicated, they cannot as readily afford to idly sit by and see the disappearance of their whole raison d’être – a dues-paying membership. Finally, like any Roger Blough, Chairman of US Steel, they are hard-headed capitalist business men who look out for their own interests. That is why, unlike McDonald, they don’t (and can’t afford to) listen to the pleadings and siren songs of Kennedy or Goldberg to be “reasonable” and hold the line on wages and hours in the “national interest.” They support the Democratic and Republican parties wholeheartedly, and the US State Department too, but they evince no desire to attend their own funerals a la John L. Lewis. That is why Meany, who comes from the building trades and is therefore more responsive to the craft sector of the AFL-CIO finally came out for the 35-hour week, May 17, 1962, while Reuther is still hedging and holding the line.
This tragic paradox of the conservative AFL being miles ahead of the once militant mass unions of the CIO on this issue is explained not by the class interests of the respective memberships, but by the personal and bureaucratic vested interests of their respective leaderships. Meany is the classical representative of the bureaucrat whose job is the only thing that matters; while Reuther and McDonald represent nothing but themselves as the defenders of a declining capitalism and its State Department. Nation’s Business, Wall Street’s magazine, knows how this operates. In a June 1961 article entitled, Who Would Pay for Shorter Hours, it says, “Mr. Reuther’s interest in a shorter workweek has been hot and cold over the years. In 1953 he opposed it on the ground that the need was for more houses, schools and other goods, and that 40 hours’ pay won’t buy more if only 30 hours output were available. UAW leadership branded attempts within the union to press for a 30-hour week as ‘a communist trick to weaken our might and reduce our standard of living.’
“Four years later, Mr. Reuther began to push for shorter hours. But the Russians launched their first sputnik and the American people became concerned about our military strength. That was not the time to push for more leisure. So the idea was dropped from the union’s 1958 demands ...” Big business gets what it wants and needs from big unionism. We hope, for Reuther’s sake, that it is appreciated.
Meanwhile, what are the prospects for the future, both for the workers and their trade unions? While the total number of workers has increased from 61.6 millions in 1953 to 65.8 millions in 1962, much of the rise was the result of the artificial war economy and increased government spending. Of this 4.2 million increase, government employment accounted for 1.9 million, or 45%. In spite of a tremendous increase in production, the number of factory workers has declined since 1951 from 13.2 million to 11.6 million in 1961. In the same period the number of white collar, professional and service workers increased from 28 million to 37 million, of whom 24 million are white collar workers.
It is in the white collar area that most bourgeois economists and labor leaders saw a hope for the future. They contended that automation would create new industries, new skills and more jobs. When it finally came, the awakening was quite a shock. As Albert Whitehead, Director of the Industrial Union Department of the AFL-CIO said, April 22, 1958,
“We were told that while there might be a decline in the number of production workers, this would be more than offset by the number of higher paid workers required for more skilled non-production jobs.
“This simply didn’t happen. Maintenance requirements in automated plants appear to be no greater than in non-automated plants. In fact, the evidence seems to point in just the opposite direction. The National Industrial Conference Board study found that there was a drop in the proportion of maintenance workers in automated plants, as well as a decline in the number of production control and security personnel involved.”
It is precisely in the office and white collar field that it is the easiest and cheapest to automate, and where automation is proceeding at the most rapid rate. It is here that the automation of already automated processes is taking place in the form of “thinking machines” called computers.
To cite one example, the US Census Bureau was able to use fifty statisticians in 1960 to do the tabulations that required 4,100 in 1950.” [2] The President of the Office Employees International Union testified that “Computer Sciences, Inc. estimates that 10,000 computer installations will be made in the year 1961. [As against 2,000 in 1959 – E.B.] Based on studies made by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, it is estimated that each computer will affect 140 jobs. It is, therefore, easily seen that in the year 1961 1.4 million workers will be affected by these new installations.
The President of the Office Employees International testified that the “BLS has also indicated that 25% of the jobs affected will be eliminated. We therefore, can anticipate that 350,000 white collar positions will be permanently abolished by virtue of computer installations in the year 1961.” [3] According to the IUD of the AFL-CIO, “For every job that automation adds, it eliminates 5 others.” [4]
While the trade union leaders have talked a great deal in recent years about organizing the unorganized in general and the white collar workers in particular to replenish their diminishing membership (and coffers of their treasuries) they have done virtually nothing to implement these threats.
The reason for their ineffectualness can be concretely shown in the recent New York City teachers’ strike. The Wall Street Journal, April 5, 1962, reported that “Mr. Reuther, his aides say, believes that the methods used until now to lure white collar workers are not enough. What’s needed, in Mr. Reuther’s view, is a good case exhibit of successful organizing combined with an improved salary contract.” While Reuther and Meany were literally dying verbally to organize them, they gave no assistance either verbally or physically when 20,000 teachers April 11 walked out. “The strike, carried out in the teeth of the Condon-Wadlin Law which forbids strikes by public employees and imposes heavy penalties for violations, was enjoined by the Board of Education.” (N.Y. Labor Chronicle, April, 1962.) Even when this “textbook model of an anti-labor injunction” was issued by the courts, the silence of the New York and national labor leadership was unbroken and the teachers went back to their desks with a semi-victory which could have been the very thing Reuther claimed he wanted – “a good case exhibit” for all white collar workers.
Is it any wonder, then, that only 2.2 million of the 24 million white collar workers are organized, and that from 1958-1960 only 8,000 were added. Incidentally, a good part of the organized white collar workers are government workers and union employees which are lobbying organizations rather than effective unions.
In the industrial portion of the labor movement the picture is no brighter. The tremendous gains of the 1930s and 1940s are being dissipated by the ne’er-do-well inheritors of a vast amount of trade union wealth which was accumulated by the sacrifice of the millions of militants who have been isolated, discouraged and demoralized by the inept policies of their leadership. In this area, unlike the craft union sector where the main impetus thus far comes from the bureaucracy, the leadership in the fight against the decimation-through-attrition of the working class must at the start come from below, through the fighting spirit that the workers are capable of.
Meanwhile automation proceeds apace in the mass production industries. An ironic example of this was seen at the recent opening of a plant in Ravenswood, W.Va., where the Kaiser Co. was induced by the Chamber of Commerce to open a $3,000,000 automated rolling mill. “Federal, State and Local officials turned up for the opening to make speeches lauding Kaiser and to snip pink ribbon for the photographers. When the ceremonies concluded, 10 men in overalls walked into the plant to begin work. In other words it cost $300,000 to provide one job for one man in today’s automated industries.” [5] (The average capital investment per worker in 1961 was $13,000. – E.B.) Hundreds of similar examples could be cited, but by now it is an old story published almost daily.
In the mass industrial field the logical place for the struggle against unemployment and for some gains is in the UAW and in Detroit where the struggle for better conditions and against speed-up was accompanied by strikes and sit-downs that really got the CIO off the ground. In 1955 Reuther welcomed automation and said that “... automation can and should make possible a four day week, longer vacation periods, opportunity for earlier retirement, as well as a vast increase in our material standards of living.” [6] This sounds fairly good, for 1955, and even perhaps today. But by 1961 Reuther not only did not progress past these modest requests, but even retrenched. In 1961 he asked for an improved minimum wage, (how much?) reduction of the work week (to how many hours?), area redevelopment (where and what kind?), improved employment services (?), assistance to workers in relocating (to where?), improvement of educational opportunities (for whom?), and – God save the mark – strengthening of collective bargaining (by whom?). No mention whatsoever of longer vacations, of earlier retirement, or the most important proposal of 1955, for a 4-day week. [7]
At every convention and each contract year this demagogue comes up with a brilliant “solution” for the auto workers and sidetracks them into a blind alley. One year it’s “open your books, no increase in the price of cars.” The next it’s the guaranteed annual wage and share the profits. Now it’s retraining of unemployed auto workers for white collar jobs and – fight the communist trade unions in Europe, Asia and South America.
To top it all off, the 3% formula of Kennedy and Goldberg which was foisted on the Steelworkers is acceptable, it seems, on earth where wage increases are “inflationary,” but couldn’t they make an exception for space and missile workers where price increases are not passed on to the public? The Salvation Army with its pie in the sky couldn’t do one whit better than that.
Reuther is so convincing that he has had more than just the auto workers befuddled all these years. In 1957, an English writer said, “British Trade Unions have been surprisingly slow in recognizing the simple fact that the benefits of automation have to be fought for. They could learn a lot from their American counterparts ... The UAW, for example, has been running a great campaign of education and propaganda to explain the problems to its members and to the general public. It has fought for a guaranteed annual wage. ... They have been preparing the ground for the 35 or even the 30 hour week ...” [8] At the time there were 160,000 unemployed auto workers in Detroit. Reuther leads a charmed life and has the best public relations man in the world – himself!
But this situation cannot last forever. The inevitable effects of automation in auto can be traced by an analysis of the membership figures of the UAW, which decreased from a peak of 1,418,000 in 1953 to 995,000 in 1961. The sharpest drop, during relatively high production was a loss of 135,000 members from 1960-61, or 12%!
There are some sounds of grumbling from the rank and file. Even in the most undemocratic, steam-rollered, “automated” convention in UAW history there were portents of discontent with the bureaucracy. There was opposition to the Reuther proposal to use $3,200,000 of the union’s strike fund to combat communist trade unions abroad. Reuther did handsprings and even amended the constitution to push this proposal down the delegates’ throats in a desperate effort to curry favor with Kennedy and the State Department. But more important to the future life of the UAW was the slogan of 30-40-60 (30 hours work for 40 hours pay and retirement at 60), which was raised by John De Vito, president of Local 45, G.M. Fisher Body in Cleveland, who led this movement. It is a pretty safe prediction that this slogan will gain momentum and that it will become popular not only in Cleveland and Detroit, but throughout the country. Reuther’s response to this was for a “flexible adjustment of the work week” based on the level of employment at any particular time plus double pay for overtime.” On paper it sounds good, but, as usual, it is typically Reutherian – an unwieldy, complicated, impossible formula designed to sidetrack the workers once again.
But Reuther cannot get away with this tactic indefinitely. The auto workers are restive. As the 30-40-60 movement says in its appeal:
“It is unfortunate that the negotiations of 1961 failed to win a reduction in the work week. Now time presses us. Each year intensifies the problem. Each year it becomes that much more difficult because we must make up for that much lost time. Delay is self-defeating. Automation picks up speed like a rocket heading for the moon. A sense of urgency is the order of the day. We must agree upon a program, set out aims, announce our purposes, enlist our supporters, draw up our plans, and proceed toward the goal which must be won!”
The distance that separated the leadership from the rank and file was aptly put by a union lawyer who said, New York Times, May 16, 1962,
“A very unhappy and very real gap is developing between the trade union leadership and the rank and file. Top leaders in big locals and international unions have a bureaucratic instead of a rank-and-file mentality. There is not a real understanding on the part of these leaders of what the members are thinking and wanting.”
What is the answer to automation and its consequent displacement? The obvious and instinctive answer is the shorter work week because it is the only real solution. But how short a work week? George Meany believes that the “35-hour week will solve the problem overnight.” While it certainly would help many workers now employed it wouldn’t make much of a dent into the total number of unemployed. All indications are that the quantitative effect of automation has reached the stage where it has become qualitative. By Meany’s own testimony before the Congressional Subcommittee on Automation, part-time employment has increased from 9.2 million workers in 1953 to 12.2 millions in 1960. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in spite of an absolute increase in the number of employed workers and a tremendous increase in production, the total number of hours worked in the private economy increased by only 0.7% between 1953 and 1957, and declined by 0.7% between 1957 and 1959. (The difference between industries where partial automation and more intense automation has occurred can be seen in a comparison between the food industry where employment has declined 82,000 or 8% and the textile industry where employment has decreased 246,000 or 22%).
In most manufacturing industries the full 40-hour week is academic, since the majority of the workers either do not work the full 40-hour week or a full 52 weeks a year. In the white collar field the 35-hour or 37½-hour week has been the practice for many years and the effect of a 35-hour week would be virtually nil. The only conclusion that can be reached is that the minimum demand that can absorb the unemployed is the 30-hour week.
Can the American working class achieve this step which is a prerequisite to its life as a viable force in society as we know it. It must or else it will gradually dwindle and face defeat. Automation and its consequent dependence of one machine on another’s functions, has put the worker in a strategic position. A stoppage in one factory can bring an entire industry to a halt. An entire industry (steel, oil, transportation, power, etc.) can bring a whole economy to its knees.
While this is the pragmatic answer to the practical problems facing the working class and its organizations, the tasks of the revolutionary vanguard are on a somewhat different plane. Obvious and elementary is the necessity to lead in the struggle to organize the unorganized and for the 30-hour week. Almost every economist predicts another recession within ten to fifteen months. A recession combined with unemployment due to accelerated automation can only mean mass unemployment second only to that of the great depression.
But, like most of the social and economic problems of our era, the ultimate answer is found in the political arena. The struggle for the 6-hour or 5-hour day should and can be the basis for building a labor party and the enlargement of the socialist movement in the US. The capitalist parties give lip service to civil rights, racial equality, health insurance, minimum wages, etc., but they will not adopt a shorter work day as part of their platforms within the foreseeable future. This differentiating factor could attract millions of the unemployed and part-time workers, as well as other sections of the working class to the banner of a militant program.
1. ILWU Reporter, October 24, 1961.
2. Automation, The Silent Conquest, The Fund for the Republic, 1962.
3. Howard Coughlin, Statement on Automation before the US House Committee on Education and Labor, March 29, 1961.
4. IUD Bulletin, August, 1960. Industrial Union Dept., AFL-CIO.
5. TWU Express, May, 1962.
6. Senate Subcommittee on Automation, 1955.
7. House Committee on Education and Labor, 1961.
8. S. Lilly, Automation and Social Progress, International Publishers.
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