Jackson Advocate

OLDER WORKERS NEED JOBS, MAJOR SERVICES

The climate of the economy today is difficult for older workers, their proportion is rising and their chief need is jobs. AFL-CIO union spokesmen and human resource experts have told Congress.

As they testified before a Senate subcommittee on Problems of the Aged and Aging, headed by Sen. Pat McNamara (D-Mich.), a Labor Dept. document outlined one major problem in noting that "approximately 37 percent of the labor force of the United States is 45 years of age and over and the proportion is rising."

Dir. Nelson Cruikshank of the AFL-CIO Dept. of Social Security told how this trend hits workers in their 50s and 60s:

"The ranks of jobless workers include a disproportionate share of older people, and many will never be employed steadily again in a labor market characterized by over-supply. Employers will continue to push them aside in favor of younger men and women."

Cruikshank pointed out that older workers are doubly hurt since social security pensions are geared to average earnings and if earnings fall the workers' eventual pensions fall, too. He stressed the need for full employment policies by the government, along with improved, all-inclusive social insurance and health care programs.

Pres. J. A. Beirne of the Communications Workers said the problem of 15 million people 65 and over was "acute" and worsening each year. He urged federal programs of specialized public housing, medical care, recreation and other aids to meet their needs.

Richard T. Leonard, testifying for the AFL-CIO Industrial Union Dept., charged that Eisenhower Administration policies have led to a tight labor market and lost jobs and that this encourages younger workers to press the issue of compulsory retirement.

Charles E. Odell, director of the Auto Workers' Older and Retired Workers Dept., said the UAW's experience has shown retirement can become "a meaningful, useful and satisfying period of life," but that both employers and the government must do more to meet the problems of workers in retirement.

Ike Lashed

Chairman Nathan E. Cowan of the United Steelworkers' Committee on Retired Workers criticized Pres. Eisenhower for opposing housing for the elderly in his veto message on the housing bill.

Dr. Eli Ginzberg of Columbia University said strong unions have protected especially the older worker through seniority. Unless and until enough jobs are provided there will be intensified competition between young and old for available work, he stressed. He said society must play a supportive role in off-the-job activities.

Prof. Wilbur J. Cohen of the University of Michigan expressed concern that only one out of five persons aged 65 and over had a paying job as of last December.