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Show Where Your Taxes Go How Uncle Sam Spends Your Money in Conducting Your Business By EDWARD G. LOWRY Author "Washington Close-Ups," "Banks and Financial Systems, " etc- Contributor Political and Economic Articles to Leadins Periodicals ana a Writer of Recogniied Authority on the National Government's Business Methods. . Copyright, Western Newspaper Union vnx INCOMPETENTS ARE KEPT The annual turnover in the government govern-ment service' is something almost incredible. in-credible. No business corporation, however strongly established, could long endure the heavy annual drain ou its resources. Hundreds of men leave the government service daily; and new, untrained people have to be taken on and taught to do the work. This costs money, as every employer knows. The resignations from the government govern-ment service are chiefly from the supervisory su-pervisory and most highly paid positions posi-tions and from the very lowest grades. The men at the top, if they have any initiative or ability or ambition to make a name for themselves, are offered of-fered private employment at double or treble or more what the government govern-ment can pay them. The people In the lowest grades leave for private employment when opportunity affords because In too many Instances they actually cnnnot keep body and soul together on their government pay. It Is the people In the middle clasi who stay on the longest The whole constant process makes for a steady deterioration In the quality of the government service and tends to retain re-tain the mediocre in public employment. employ-ment. The civil service commission, through which the great bulk of government employees are brought into the serv Ice, Is acutely aware of this condition Its reports give emphasis to the difficulty diffi-culty constantly experienced in securing secur-ing and returning competent employees. employ-ees. The rotation in office has become increasingly frequent and vitally Impairs Im-pairs the efficiency of the service. During the war there was a lower rate of turnover In the mechanical forces than in outside establishments. The proposition of separations, however, how-ever, Is excessive in clerical, professional profes-sional and technical positions, In which the rate of turnover sometimes amounts to a third of the force in a year. During the nine months preceding the armistice more than 60,000 appointments ap-pointments were made In the civil service and about 2S.000 separations occurred that is, for every two appointments ap-pointments made one person left the service. For a period of similar length following the armistice only 60 per cent as many appointments were made, but there were nearly 33 per cent niore separations. In this period almost as many positions were vacated as were filled. The exigencies of the war required a great expansion of the clerical forces at Washington and elsewhere and this was accomplished by a- labor turnover severnl times above normal. The percentage of declinations of appointments ap-pointments amonp eligibles on the civil civ-il service register Increased In many instances from 30 to more than 50 per cent that is, more than half the men and women who successfully passed civil service examinations and were offered Jobs under the government refused re-fused to take them. It Is estimated that more than 050,000 of those who met the test were appointed during that time. . The civil service commission says ilatly : "Those familiar with the federal service at Washington know that the service is now hampered by the retention re-tention of incompetents whose removal re-moval Is rendered difficult by Influences which are Incompatible with the efficiency effi-ciency of the service. Preferences and exemptions increasingly clog the departments with persons who, no matter how Inefficient, are difficult to remove, and whose retention tends to destroy the discipline of the service." Among these Inefficlents, of course, are the superannuated and the physically phys-ically Incapacitated. The bureau of efficiency estimated, before the passage pass-age of the superannuation retirement law, the number of employees in the civil service of the United States seventy sev-enty years of age and over as follows : Number Railway postal clerks 1H7 Rural letter carriers 454 City letter carriers 230 Post office clerks 3S7 Mechanics 32S General employees, Dlst. Columbia.. 1.4S4 General employees elsewhere 1,613 Total 4.693 The commissioner of pensions supplies sup-plies the following compact statement of the age of the employees in the pension pen-sion bureau : Number In the classified civil service, serv-ice, 874 ; age of the oldest employee, eighty-eight ; number over eighty years of age, 26 ; number between sixty-five and eighty, 260 ; based on age of sixty-five, sixty-five, number eligible for retirement, 292; percentage of employees eligible for retirement, 33.4; average age of all employees, July 1, 1919, fifty-eight. These old men and women bear the burden of the administration of the complex, intricate and Involved procedure pro-cedure under the pension laws having to do with the disbursement of $222,-159.292 $222,-159.292 In 1920 to 600,000 and some-odd some-odd beneficiaries. |