provided by Research Papers in Economics
LABOR POLICY AND THE
OVER ALL ECONOMY
Mrs. Aryness Joy Wickens
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Employment and Manpower
U. S. Department of Labor
The labor situation is an integral part of the general economic
picture. The long-continued record level of economic activity, with
a correspondingly high level of employment, is the key to analysis
of today’s labor situation.
Let us summarize briefly the facts on current economic activity,
even though they are familiar to many of us. The nation is today pro-
ducing a gross national product at the rate of 434 billion dollars a
year. This is a record high, even after allowing for price increases;
it is an increase in real physical volume of roughly 45 percent in a
period of less than 10 years.
The industrial segment of the economy—factories and mines—is
producing goods in the largest volume in history—again about 45 per-
cent above a decade ago. During this period, we have had a construc-
tion boom which, even with the recent small decline in home building,
is close to an all-time record.
At the same time, there has been a vast expansion in the pro-
duction and installation of capital goods—not merely buildings, but
machinery and equipment of all kinds in industry, in trade, in trans-
portation, and in the utilities.
And the driving force behind these expansions has been a phe-
nomenal increase in consumption, resulting not only from a popula-
tion increase of 27 million in the past decade, but also from a vast
improvement in actual levels of living.
WEAK SPOTS IN THE ECONOMY
This, of course, is the over-all picture. The economy has weak
spots, perhaps more than at any time in several years. The currently
extremely high levels have changed only slightly in the past year.
This implies that growth may have slackened, that the economy may
be taking a breather after its unusually rapid climb in 1955 and 1956.
The over-all stability also indicates that readjustments are taking place,
that gains in some industrial sectors are being offset by losses in others.
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