There are activities other than the Plan of Industrial Relations in which we, as men and management, have been associated together. Among them I mention

1. The Home Owning Plan whereby, at the end of 1933, 6,331 employees had been assisted by the U. S. Steel Corporation to purchase homes through loans on favorable terms, and repayable in installments.

2. At the close of last year upwards of 53,000 then employees were stockholders of the Corporation, holding nearly 90 thousand shares of Preferred and over 750 thousand shares of Common stock. Few indeed are the instances in industrial concerns where the employees and the management are to this extent the owners of the business. Coordination of effort of employees and management is not only desirable but necessary with due recognition of the problems of each, to conserve the interest in the ownership represented by these large stock holdings. 3. The Home Garden Plan, a cooperative enterprise, which last year resulted in more than 85 thousand employees securing garden plots covering 16,500 acres (or approximately 26 square miles) in which they raised produce to an estimated value of nearly two million dollars.

4. Extended credit for rent, medical service, food and clothing, to the total of more than 71⁄2 million dollars.

5. A record of accident prevention and the maintenance of favorable working places that is generally regarded as foremost in the whole industrial world.

6. The U. S. Steel and Carnegie Pension Fund, whereby those employees of retirement age who have worked 25 or more years for the company without having voluntarily quit the service during that time, or having been absent under certain circumstances, receive an income for life on retirement. There are now more than 12 thousand active pensioners on the rolls and more than 50 million dollars has been paid in pensions to date.

So far as I know, no union negotiators or extortioners have ever secured such an impressive list or extent of services from any employer, and I would expect that the terms of these plans may be still further extended through the medium of our Plan of Industrial Relations, which is so practically designed for cooperative action.

I sincerely hope that, having together withstood the trials and tribulations of these past four years with as favorable an outcome as is hereby indicated, we may be permitted to work our way to still further creditable achievements in harmony of effort and spirit.

I earnestly bespeak your aid, and I sincerely pledge you the cooperation of the management to that end.

Yours truly,

TENNESSEE COAL, IRON AND RAILROAD COMPANY,
ROBT. GREGG, President.

Prepared in collaboration with and jointly subscribed to by Mr. W. A. Irvin, President U. S. Steel Corporation.

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