Decontrol of Wages

Report Outline
Decontrol of Wages
Operation of Wage Controls
Earnings During and After World War Ii
Special Focus

Decontrol of Wages

Final Decontrol of Wages, soon to be ordered by President Truman, will place squarely on the shoulders of labor and management the responsibility for preventing another inflationary race between pay and prices. For the first time in more than four years, wages will be the subject of free collective bargaining, with no limits set by public authority to increases in rates of pay.

Early removal of all wage controls became a virtual certainty when President Truman announced the decontrol of meat, Oct. 14, and told the country by radio that the lifting of other price controls would be accelerated. Controls have since been removed from a very large number of food items. Since August, 1945, wages have been controlled indirectly through the regulation of prices; without price controls, it will obviously be impossible to hold wage rates under government regulation for any extended period.

The prestige of wage control suffered a severe blow in September when Stabilization Director Steelman overruled the Wage Stabilization Board by granting over-ceiling increases in pay to striking A.F.L. maritime workers. The two industry members of the board submitted their resignations in protest, Oct. 9, and pressure has been mounting steadily ever since for complete abandonment of government controls over workers' compensation.