* * * We must act and act promptly - to solve
the problem of automation which threatens millions of Americans with technological
unemployment.
We can do this in several ways.
First, we should convene a top level conference
of industrial, union, and Government officials to seek ways of making full
use of the great productive power of automation, while minimizing the impact
on affected employees.
Second, we must make it plain that the installation
of new machines is a proper subject of collective bargaining.
Third, the Government must offer technical
assistance to companies which are trying to convert to new machinery without
undue hardship to employees.
Fourth, we should expand the activities of
the U.S. Employment Service to assist men who have been displaced by machines
to find new employment. Today State agencies supported by Federal aid try
to refer men to jobs in surrounding areas. But the problem of automation
is a national problem - and we must begin to think about it on a national
scale. We must anticipate the displacement of men by machines wherever
it happens - and alert those affected to new job opportunities across the
country.
Fifth, we must greatly expand our job training
programs, to prepare men out of work in the new skills and techniques that
will help them find new jobs.
Sixth, we must revise our outmoded unemployment
compensation laws to allow men to receive full benefit payments while they
are engaged in retraining programs.
Seventh and finally, we must restore full
employment to our schedule of national priorities - striving - for a more
rapid growth of the American economy - building purchasing power through
better minimum wage and unemployment compensation laws - having faith in
America's capacity to eventually provide a productive job for every man
who wants to work.
This is our program - a program which can
help transform the threat of automation into the promise of abundance -
a program which will require leadership inspired by both compassion and
courage - a program which will require from labor, management, and Government
a willingness to accept new concepts, new burdens and new risks to meet
the challenge of automation's new frontier. * * *