Unemployment and New Jobs

Report Outline
New Administration and the Job Problem
Full Employment Goal and Automation
Proposals for Expanding Job Openings

New Administration and the Job Problem

Kennedy's Request for Aid to the Unemployed

Special aid to the unemployed heads the list of measures proposed by the new administration to combat the recession and pave the way for increased long-range growth of the American economy. President John F. Kennedy told Congress, in his State of the Union message on Jan. 30, that “During each month some 150,000 workers are exhausting their already meager jobless benefit rights.” To meet that situation, he said he would send to Congress within 14 days “a measure to improve unemployment compensation through temporary increases in duration on a self-supporting basis.”

The President did not go into detail, but it seems clear that the plan he has in mind will closely follow provisions of the Temporary Unemployment Insurance Act of 1958. That measure offered the states loans to finance extension of benefits, under the federal-state unemployment insurance system, to a maximum of 39 weeks. Seventeen states took advantage of the offer, and five additional states independently financed an extension of their benefit payments. The amount of the weekly payments was not increased, and no such increase was proposed by President Kennedy on Jan. 30.

Urgency has been given to the unemployment problem at this time by a sharp and rapid growth in the number of men and women out of work. The total in January has been estimated at 5½ million men and women. Only a month earlier the number did not exceed 4½ million, but that total for December represented an increase over November that was nearly three times the usual increase for the last month of the year. The number of unemployed in December, moreover, comprised almost 7 per cent of the civilian labor force.