Statistics of unemployment in 12 cities in the Rocky Mountain and Pacific Coast States during June or July, 1915, are just, available as the result of a study made for the Bureau of Labor Statistics by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. The canvass was made during June and July, 1915.

This is the third report on unemployment in the United States published by the bureau. The first of these investigations was made in New York City in February, 1915, and published in Bulletin 172 of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The second was made in 15 cities outside of Greater New York in March and April, 1915, and given to the press on May 31. The results of the survey in New York City, made in January, 1915, by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., tallied so closely with the results obtained from an independent study by the Bureau of Labor Statistics that this company was employed by the Commissioner of Labor Statistics to make similar investigations in other cities. The families holding industrial policies were visited by agents of the company and the number of partly and wholly unemployed was ascertained. The data secured furnish the basis for the statistics of unemployment in these cities outside of Greater New York.

The survey just completed covered 36,537 families, in which were found 49,333 wage earners. Of this number 6,373, or 12.9 per cent of all wage earners in families visited, were wholly unemployed, and in addition 9,971, or 20.2 per cent, were reported as part-time workers. The highest percentage of unemployment was found in Portland, Oreg., where 20 per cent of the wage earners were out of work, and 17.3 per cent were working part time only. The lowest percentage of unemployment was found in Ogden, Utah, where only 4.5 per cent were unemployed, and 14.3 per cent working part time only.

The cities showing the largest percentages of part-time workers were: San Diego, 29.2 per cent; Oakland, 26.9 per cent; San Francisco, 25.4 per cent; Los Angeles, 24.1 per cent; and Sacramento, 23.7 per cent. The average for all 12 cities combined was 20.2 per cent. The leading facts in regard to the individual cities are shown in the following table:

UNEMPLOYMENT IN 12 CITIES, AS SHOWN BY INVESTIGATION MADE DURING JUNE

It is interesting to note that the unemployment found in these 12 cities at the time the canvass was made was slightly in excess of the unemployment found in 15 cities outside of Greater New York in the East and Middle West in an investigation made during March and the first part of April, and published in May, 1915, this earlier survey covering 399,881 families having 644,358 wage earners. Of the wage earners in these families 73,800, or 11.5 per cent, were wholly unemployed, and in addition 106,652, or 16.6 per cent, were reported as having only part-time employment. The highest percentage of unemployment was found in Duluth, where 20.3 per cent of the wage earners were out of work and 17.8 per cent were working part time only. The lowest percentage of unemployment was found in Bridgeport, where only 4.3 per cent were unemployed, but 19.9 per cent of all wage workers were reported as working only part time.

The cities showing the largest percentages of part-time workers were: Wilkes-Barre, 32.3 per cent; Pittsburgh, 29 per cent; Milwaukee, 28.9 per cent; Bridgeport, 19.9 per cent; Philadelphia, 19.6 per cent; Duluth, 17.8 per cent; Toledo, 17.5 per cent; and Boston, 17.3 per cent. The percentage for all 15 cities combined was 16.6 per cent. The details for the individual cities are shown in the table immediately following:

UNEMPLOYMENT IN 15 CITIES AS SHOWN BY INVESTIGATION DURING MARCH AND

For comparison with these results, the unemployment in New York City, as ascertained in the investigation of the bureau during February, 1915, is given as follows:

The figures as shown by the bureau's own investigation differ but slightly from the survey in January, 1915, made by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. in the families of persons holding industrial policies. The company's survey covered 155,960 families, in 37,064 of which unemployment was reported. These families contained 252,912 wage earners, and 45,421, or 18 per cent, were reported as unemployed.

OCCUPATIONAL DISEASE CLINIC OF NEW YORK CITY HEALTH DEPARTMENT.

BY ALICE HAMILTON, M. D.

We know very little about the effect of different occupations on the health of the workers. In general, of course, we know that certain substances are poisonous and therefore dangerous to handle, that exposure to great heat or to extremely humid air must be weakening, that great exertion kept up too long results in chronic fatigue, that if irritating dusts are breathed in for a long time the lungs are injured and pulmonary tuberculosis is likely to follow, but we do not

know how far these factors actually affect men and women in the different industries. Yet it is most important that we should know. Think what an advance could be made in the protection of working people if we had detailed information as to the strain of each occupation on the human system.

The only way to gather such information is to carry out intensive studies, on a large scale, of people in different occupations, dealing with hundreds, or better, thousands, for conclusions based on small numbers are always open to criticism. There is no dearth of material for these studies; any one of our large cities could undertake an examination of such trades on a large scale. It is natural that the largest city, New York, should be the first to do this, and fortunate that she is doing it in such a way as to encourage other cities to follow suit, for the expense involved in the system she has adopted is not great.

About six months ago Dr. Goldwater, commissioner of health of New York City, authorized the opening of a clinic for occupational diseases, placing it under the department of communicable diseases as a division of industrial hygiene, with Dr. Louis I. Harris in direct control. There was no appropriation for this new department, but Dr. Harris has without any appropriation managed to organize a clinic in which 150 or 175 persons are examined every day by 17 to 20 physicians. He utilized a large loft in a building owned by the department of health and "begged, borrowed, or stole" furniture from the other offices or wherever it could be found. Naturally, the laboratories of the department are at his service for chemical and microscopic tests. Eight of the physicians are civil service appointees of the department of health and nine are volunteers who give their time, three hours a day, partly for the sake of the experience, partly in hope of being taken on regularly as soon as there is an appropriation. These physicians can do all the necessary work, but a very valuable addition to the clinic has been made possible through a grant by Mrs. E. H. Harriman, who pays for the services of four physicians to carry out more thorough examinations on a smaller group.

After the clinic was organized the question was how to get the people for examination, for the department has no authority to require workpeople to be examined. However, under section 146 of the Revised Sanitary Code, the bureau of food inspection is empowered to insist upon an examination of any person employed in places where food or drink is handled in order to determine whether he has any communicable disease and to withhold the permit to work in such places if examination is refused. This places at the discretion of the food-inspection department about 5,000 peddlers, 15,000 bakers, 90,000 cooks and waiters, as well as an, as yet, unascertained number

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