OCR Text |
Show Sharp Rise in Total Costs of Public Relief Costs of public relief in March continued th erise recorded for the 5 preceding months .according to figures issued today by the Social Security board. Total Federal State, and local costs incurred for aid to the needy in March, including in-cluding earnings under the Works Program, amounted to $234,800,000 an increase of approximately $18,-000,000, $18,-000,000, or about 8 percent, over the total for February. Figures reported by the Board are compiled regularly in collaboration colla-boration with other Federal agencies agen-cies and State and local authori- to dependent children. In March there were 1,6566,053 recipients of old-age assistance in 47 States, the District of Columbia, Alaska, and Hawaii, comprising approximately 21 percent of the estimated population popu-lation aged 65 and over. The average av-erage payment per recipient was $19.30 for that month, ranging from $4.58 in Mississippi to $32.67 in California. In 36 States, Hawaii, and the District of Columbia, making mak-ing payments under the program for March, aid was extended to 36,423 blind persons. The average payment for the month was $23.98. In 38 States, the District of Columbia, Co-lumbia, and Hawaii, aid was provided pro-vided for March on behalf of 573,923 dependent children in 231,-663 231,-663 families. The average monthly payment was $32.45 per family. ties. The March figure includes amounts for the various programs as follows: Public assistance io the needy aged, to the needy blind, and to dependent children from ' Federal, State, and local funds under the Social Security Act, and other public assistance of these special types, $41,244,000; earnings under the Works Program, including the Works Progress Administration and other Federal agencies through which wages were paid to persons certified as in need ot re-lief, re-lief, $124,528,000; Civlian Conservation Conserva-tion Corps, $18,558,000; subsistence grants under the Farm Security Administration, $2,583,000; general relief in cash and in kind, by States and localities, $47,887000. These sume represent substantally all public aid received by the needy with the exception of aid to transients. Administrative costs are not included. On the basis of reports received by the Board it was estimated, after allowance for duplications, that in March approximately 6 3 million different households, probably pro-bably comprising about 19.9 million mil-lion persons, received public aid of one or more of the types mentioned men-tioned above. As compared with February, there was an increase of 5 percent in the number of different dif-ferent households in receipt of public aid. In each of these major types of public aid except the Civilian Conservaton Corps, costs for March were higher than for those in February. There was a rise of nearly 17 percent in earnings under un-der the Works Program, while subsistence sub-sistence grants under the Farm Security Administration increased by 4.4 percent. General relief pro- vided by States and localities for March increased by less than 1 percent over the total for the preceding pre-ceding month. The total cost of Federal, State, and local aid to persons in need for March was about $16,57,000 above the total for March 1937. It was emphasized that the figures reported indicate only the amount of aid provided and are not necessarily a measure of the extent of need for relief, since in some communities funds may not have been available for aid to all persons who were eligible eli-gible to receive it under Federal, State, or local programs. According to reports from States cooperating in public assistance programs under the Social Security Secur-ity Act, costs of $40,353,950 were incurred in March for payments from Federal, State, and local funds to recipents of old-age assistance, as-sistance, aid to the blind, and aid |