The New International Encyclopædia/Labor, Bureaus of
LABOR, Bureaus of. The first bureau of statistics of labor in the world was created by act of the Massachusetts Legislature in June, 1869. While political expediency may have had influence in establishing this bureau, its functions were defined by law for the general good of the State as follows:
"The duties of such bureau shall be to collect, assort, systematize, and present in annual reports to the Legislature, on or before the first day of March in each year, statistical details relating to all departments of labor in the Commonwealth, especially in its relation to the commercial, industrial, social, educational, and sanitary condition of the laboring classes, and to the permanent prosperity of the productive industry of the Commonwealth." This expresses the purpose of every State bureau of similar character in this country, the United States Bureau of Labor (later the Department of Labor) and similar offices in other nations.
The United States Department of Labor was organized in 1885 as one of the bureaus of the Department of the Interior, and Carroll D. Wright, who had been signally successful as Chief of the Bureau of Statistics in Massachusetts, was selected as Commissioner. He declared its policy to be chiefly educational, by judicious investigations and fearless publication thereof to enable the people to comprehend more clearly and more fully many of the problems which now vex them. After the bureau had been in existence three years it was changed to the Department of Labor with independent functions. Since November, 1895, a bimonthly bulletin has been published. Since its organization it has issued annual reports, nine special reports, and the bimonthly bulletins. The annual reports have been on the following subjects: Industrial Depressions, Convict Labor, Strikes and Lockouts, Working Women in the United States, Railroad Labor, Cost of Iron and Steel and Cognate Products in This and Other Countries, Industrial Education in Different Countries, Building and Loan Associations, Work and Wages of Men, Women, and Children, Economic Aspect of the Liquor Traffic, Hand and Machine Labor, Water, Gas, and Electric Light Plants under Private and Municipal Ownership, Wages and Hours of Labor in the Principal Commercial Countries of the World. The special reports deal with similar topics. Congress now appropriates more than $175,000 annually for the administration of the department, exclusive of printing.
Thirty-one of the States in this country have offices similar to that initiated in Massachusetts in 1869. Thirteen of the State bureaus of labor publish a biennial report, and eighteen an annual. The Association of Officials of Bureaus of Labor Statistics of America meets annually to promote the objects of the bureaus by discussing methods and presenting subjects for investigation. The Federal and State bureaus have published over 400 volumes. Several of the State bureaus conduct free employment agencies, notably those of New York and Connecticut, while the inspection of factories and mines is an important function of many of them.
Increased authority has recently been granted a number of State bureaus for conciliation and arbitration in labor disputes, by providing for special commissioners under the direction of the bureaus. The bureaus have been kept free from partisanship, and the exact information they have given has been extremely valuable in adjustments of labor difficulties.
France was the first European country to follow the example of the United States. A bureau for the collection of statistics and information concerning labor was created in 1891, and has become the general statistical bureau of the country.
In 1892 Germany established a labor commission which possesses to a large extent the permanency of a labor bureau. It has published more than ten volumes of reports giving the results of its investigations relating to the conditions of labor in various industries. In 1893 a 'Labor Department' under the direction of a 'Commissioner for Labor' was instituted in connection with the Board of Trade in England, and its duties are similar to those of other countries. Austria was the last of the Continental countries to organize a bureau. This was done in 1898 and placed under the Ministry of Commerce. Belgium, Italy, Sweden, New Zealand, New South Wales, the Dominion of Canada, and Ontario also have bureaus. Some of these are largely employment bureaus, others concern themselves chiefly with publishing statistics, but all are modeled more or less closely after the American plan.
Consult: Wright, "The Working of the Department of Labor" and "The Value and Influence of Labor Statistics," in Monographs on Social Economics, vols. i. and ii. (Washington. 1901); Annual Reports Association of Officials of Bureaus of Labor Statistics of America (Washington); Bulletins of the United States Department of Labor, the Annual and Special Reports, particularly the Second Special Report, "Labor Laws of the United States" (2d ed., Washington, 1896); Reports of Labor Department of England (London); Office du Travail, France (Paris); Kommission für Arbeiterstatistik, Germany (Berlin); Secretariat Ouvrier, Switzerland (Bern); and similar agencies of various States and countries.