Page:Walter Renton Ingalls - Wealth and Income of the American People (1924).pdf/39

Rh Steam railway men............... ccc cece eeaee 1,875,000 Street railway men.................00 00 cee eees 300,000 Expreassmen.........0.00 00sec cece cee cee ee 75,000 } 2,750,000 Mariners... 02.0... ccc cc cece cee ence eens 250,000 Longshoremen................0. 0.0 ce cece eee ees 250,000 Telephone and telegraph operators............... 290,000 Building mechanics.....................00.0005 1,250,000 Building laborers...........0.0..0.0sc0e0es ss 1,750 000 | 3,000,000 Electric light and power...............:.....00. 100,000 Federal employees............. 000.0 c cece eeeees soeopo | 750.000 Government service (not elsewhere included)...... 300,000, Laundry workers............ 0.0.0. cece eee cece 175,000 Private servants........0.0.0.. 000. cece eee eee 3,500,000 Genera! laborers (not elsewhere included)......... 1,500,000 Clerks (not elsewhere included).................. 3,000,000 Managers, merchants, etc..............0.0000 00 4,000,000 Prefessional men............. 0... c eee eee 2,000,000

Total. 2... e ene 41,090,000

Dr. King, some of whose figures I have used in the above enumeration, gives a different total, his figure being 38,100,000. The difference is explained largely by the matter of farm laborers. I have used a much larger figure than he does, meaning to include all the men who work at some period on the farms. This embraces the large class of floating population that is habitually idle a good deal of the time in each year, the class from which the harvest hands are largely drawn. The census of Jan. 1, 1920, will show about 41,615,000 workers, or about 39.4 per cent of the total population. The same ratio would work out to about 40,350,000 for the end of 1916. With these data we may be reasonably content.

With the steady increase in the population and consequently in the number of workers there should be normally a steady increase in production. This may be checked or accelerated by the following factors, grouped as accelerating or retarding.