Memorandum, Opinion of Labor Members

OPINION OF LABOR MEMBERS The Board's recommendations have not given recognition to many of the Union's requests or to the compelling arguments which supported those requests. Nevertheless, in keeping with labor's traditional sense of social responsibility and its devotion to the overriding needs of our country, we voted for most of the resolutions offered by the Public Members of the Board. We voted in favor of the Public Members proposals regarding the general wage increase only in this spirit. A wage increase of 166 an hour would have been required on January 1 of this year simply to enable the steel workers to catch up with the increase in cost of living since their last contract was negotiated. The Board's recommendations would provide only a 121/ general wage increase; and even after July 1, 1952, the additional increase recommended would still leave the Steelworkers le an hour short of the increase which has already taken place in the cost of living. Furthermore, the Public Members of the Board have admitted that the Steelworkers are entitled to recognition for their contribution to the consistently increasing productivity of the industry, which, by the industry's own figures, approximates 3% annually. This amount al one applied to the Steelworkers' wage rates would justify an additional wage increase of 52c per hour for each year since 1950. Even after the 226 to be paid on January 1, 1953 is added to the wage increases, the Steelworkers will not have received full recognition for the rise in the cost of living which has already taken place and the increased productivity of the industry, since the total recommendation of 1726 falls far short of covering these factors. Moreover, the Steelworkers, under the Board's recommendations, are not protected against the hazards of further increases in the cost of living during the 18 months of the new contracts because the recommendations would foreclose use of the six month wage reopenings customarily permitted by the Board for this purpose. Yet, we have voted for this inadequate wage increase proposal in order to assure the steel production our nation must have. For this same reason we also voted with the Public Members on other issues although their proposals are not, in our judgment, adequate to meet the situation. Thus, we voted to eliminate 5+ of the geographical wage differentials but to retain the remaining 5c, although nothing in the record offers any justification for the retention of any differential. Similarly the Board has recommended that the longstanding inequity suffered by the Steelworkers through the denial to them of premium pay rates for Saturday and Sunday work be fully retained. The proposal that only after January 1, 1953 shall they receive a meager concession of 1/4 time premium pay for Sunday work, is a far cry from the double time for Sunday work and time and one-half for Saturday work now generally enjoyed by American workers. Nevertheless, we have reluctantly voted for this recommendation.