Technology & Men
Most publicized feature of General Motors' 1935 Pontiacs and Oldsmobiles are their "turret tops," which are exuberantly compared to the gun turrets of battleships. Immensely strong, sleek, graceful, they are shaped in a single mighty operation from single sheets of seamless steel. To whip them out the company's Fisher Body division has 18 giant new presses, largest of the kind ever built. Glowering edifices of gears, shafting, cable, motors and massive slides, the tallest of them tower 27 ft. above the floors, extend down another 12 1/2 ft. into concrete pits. They deliver against the blanks a working pressure of 2,000,000 Ib. The triple-action stroke will not start until four men use both hands to push starting buttons, will automatically stop unless each operator keeps both his buttons down.
Last week President Roosevelt's NIRB committee, headed by Economic Adviser Leon Henderson, made public its report on conditions in the automobile industry. It did not mention Fisher Body's 18 giant presses but had many another marvel of technological advance to reveal. Ex- amples :
P: In 1930, 250 men finished 100 motor blocks in a unit time. Now 19 men finish 250 blocks in the same time.
P: A new photoelectric inspecting machine dispenses with 10 to 20 human inspectors.
P: A device operated by liquid air puts ring-inserts in cylinder blocks, downs labor cost 60%.
P: In 1929 the labor cost of one manufacturer's door was $4. In 1935: 15-c-
P: Since 1029 body framing has dropped from $3 to 30-c- in labor cost, hand finishing from $3 to 20-c-, trimming from $12 to $4. If used full time, an automatic buffer in a hardware plant can displace 150 men.
P: Welding machines enable three men to do what 18 did six years ago.
P: Six years ago three skilled machinists did a certain job requiring accuracy within .0005 of an inch. Now one unskilled man does it.
P: A lock manufacturer has buffing machines (for the final polishing operation) which need no human help except for starting & stopping.
Despite these engineering triumphs, the Henderson report was not a paean of praise but a gloomy indictment which furnished powder & shot to the critics of technology.
In 1929, 54% of all cars sold were priced under $500 wholesale. By 1934 this lowest price class was 81% of the automobile business. Because today the motoring public expects $500 cars to be as good as or better than the $1,500 cars of five years ago, production has been speeded up to the human breaking point, and the morale of the workers is suffering, their economic situation close to chaos. Thus spoke the committee.
It also found that although hourly wages are high, yearly incomes are low because of irregular employment; that espionage systems exist to spot foci of unrest and agitation; that foremen are potent autocrats who are not above favoritism and may lay off men for any whim of their own. Long lines of men form daily to seek employment, and charges are rife that some lines are company "props" to keep the men with jobs working at top speed. The "speedup" is so great that a tendency exists to consider workmen worn out at 40. Even younger men, when they are laid off, know there is little possibility of being rehired soon, none at all if the foreman has written "Do not rehire" or "Agitator" in code on his layoff slip.
"There is no blinking the fact," the committee concluded, "that industrial relations in this industry call for constructive treatment." The report was privily received last fortnight by President Roosevelt who last week was revealed as not in favor of its suggestion that a new supervisory board be formed.
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