The chart on page 988 illustrates the relative placement results in 1935 and 1936 for the 6-month period February through July, and indicates the activities of the State employment offices and National Reemployment Service offices in each month. Reports of private placements for the month of August were not available at the time this was written but are included in the report of activities which immediately precedes this discussion. Table 6 shows the number of field visits and private placements made by public employment offices. Table 6.-Cumulative Field Visits and Private Placements, July 1933 to July 1936

A

Development of Junior-Placement Services

SPECIALIZED junior-placement service is a relatively new addition to the public-employment office. Among the questions raised concerning this innovation is: Why should not juniors entering the adult occupational world be treated as adults? The following résumé of the experience of a number of public and private junior-placement agencies, which is based on findings presented in a report of the administration and program of the National Youth Administration, indicates the importance of the need for such agencies.

1. The experience of youthful applicants at a public-employment office established solely to deal with adults is frequently so difficult and disturbing that these young people do not stay or do not return

1 As of April 1936.

after their first registration. They are too agitated to make a favorable impression on the interviewer or to enable him to assess accurately their real aptitudes.

2. Ordinarily, adult workers are placed in employment on the basis of their previous experience. Young people have usually had no occupational experience or if they have, it is often not in line with their aptitudes or interests. To appraise properly the employment possibilities of youthful applicants, it is frequently necessary to discuss their educational and avocational achievements in order to get an actual insight into their aptitudes and interests. While a large number of interviewers are able to do this, the constant shift from adult to junior interviewing is not easy. Different records should be used for young people. Moreover, their requirements for occupational and employment information are much greater than those of adults and of a wholly different character.

3. The average adult-employment office arranges its records by occupations. Such a practice is a disadvantage for junior applicants, as they should not be limited to one arbitrary occupational classification. According to one employment executive-

If juniors are in the adult files they are lost-they cannot compete with adults. The junior cards are a dead file.

The segregation of junior records, on special cards, filed alphabetically, with occupational and personal characteristics recorded on a cross-index file, is therefore essential if proper information on young applicants, and a suitable opportunity to compete for job openings is to be given to them. If they do have experience comparable to adult experience, a copy of their record is also put in the proper adult file.

4. In contact work in connection with junior placement it sometimes is necessary to deal with an entirely different member of the establishment's staff from the man who employs adults. In any event, contact with private industry with a view to junior placement calls for a different procedure "a selling of potentialities rather than experience." Contact men who have tried to combine the quest for private jobs for juniors with employment work for adults have always found under such circumstances the juniors are at a disadvantage. As a consequence the accepted procedure is to have special contact resources for the junior division of the employment office, of course in close coordination with the contact work of other divisions of the employment office. The National Youth Administration, Division of Guidance and Placement, cooperating with the United States Employment Service, has acted as technical adviser on junior-placement methods to various State employment services which desire to avail themselves of such assistance. In addition to the training of personnel and preliminary organization work, the junior-placement services set up under the auspices of the National

Youth Administration in cooperation with the State employment services are operating as demonstration and training centers for State offices which in most instances have already manifested their desire to take up junior placement in their State services when their budgets make it possible.

This demonstration of junior-placement requirements and procedures, however, has an educational and social importance far beyond the present limitations of the National Youth Administration's program, as such demonstration introduces viewpoints, techniques, and methods which will be continued, and which, the Administration hopes, will be the beginning of "a Nation-wide development of well organized, well staffed junior divisions of public-employment services."

A memorandum of July 28, 1936, from the National Youth Administration, states that, according to the junior-employment counselors maintained by that Administration in cooperation with 10 State employment services, 9,788 new young persons were registered in June of this year.

Fifteen thousand seven hundred and seventy-four interviews were held with young people.

One thousand six hundred and twenty-six placements in private industry were made.

One thousand three hundred and two employers were visited by these counselors.

Of the group of 9,788 new applicants, only 10 percent were on relief. Thirty-nine percent were under 18, 51 percent between 18 and 21, and 9 percent were between 21 and 25.

Almost exactly half had worked before and half had never worked.

Seventeen percent of the new applicants had had less than 8th-grade education, 39 percent had had some high school, 43 percent were high-school graduates or had had some college education, and 1 percent were college graduates.

TREND OF EMPLOYMENT AND PAY

ROLLS

Summary of Reports for August 1936

AINS in employment from July to August were widespread,

G being shared by 71 of the 90 manufacturing industries surveyed

and by 9 of the 16 nonmanufacturing industries. The net estimated increase in factory employment was 2.3 percent, or 173,000 wage earners, and in the nonmanufacturing industries there was a net gain of approximately 1,000 workers.

Increases in pay rolls were shown in 71 of the manufacturing and 10 of the nonmanufacturing industries, resulting in a net addition of $7,300,000 to weekly wage disbursements, of which amount $6,600,000 went to factory workers.

Class I railroad employment was also at a higher level in August than in July, according to preliminary reports of the Interstate Commerce Commission. The gain in number of workers, exclusive of executives and officials, was 4,100.

Employment on construction projects financed from regular governmental appropriations showed a substantial gain during August. Less pronounced increases in employment occurred on projects financed by The Works Program. Decreases were reported on the emergency conservation program, construction projects financed by the Reconstruction Finance Corporation and on projects financed by the Public Works Administration.

Industrial and Business Employment

A SUBSTANTIAL increase in factory employment between July and August, combined with gains in 9 of the 16 nonmanufacturing industries surveyed, resulted in a net gain of 174,000 workers over the month interval. Weekly pay rolls in these industries increased by approximately $7,300,000. The corresponding gains when comparing August 1936 with August 1935 were 976,000 workers and $41,500,000.

The gains in factory employment and pay rolls were shared by 71 of the 90 manufacturing industries surveyed. The increase of 2.3 percent in factory employment indicated the return of approximately 173,000 workers to jobs in the manufacturing industries and marked