ABSTRACT
This classic study of the effect of unemployment and of the ways of relieving it upon actual, typical families of the 1930s and 1940s is a vivid, startling picture of the demoralizing influence and consequences of America's relief policies during the Depression years. The study comprises an incisive interpretation of the problem and a series of absorbing human interest stories of representative families on relief cases selected from experiences of relief, including the records of families from various religious groups in an exhaustive study conducted in New York City.
Most research on unemployment of the 1930s conspicuously lacks studies of the unemployed themselves. Yet, this is the crux of the matter necessary to truly understand the cbnsequences of unemployment then and now, so as to deal with it intelligently and efficiently. This book deals with what employment does to people. It answers important questions about the unemployed that are rarely asked. Who are they? Did they fail to earn a living even in prosperous times? What precipitated their unemployment? Do they prefer relief to work? Did unemployment bring about changes in how they think and feel? This is a volume of continuing relevance, and will be of interest to legislators, economists, social scientists, social workers, and psychologists.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part Book One|198 pages
Interpretation
part I|28 pages
Before Relief
part II|15 pages
The Interim Period
part III|70 pages
Relief
part IV|22 pages
Re-Employability
part V|58 pages
Policy
part Book Two|2 pages
Case Studies
part I|63 pages
Home Relief
part |52 pages
II WPA
part III|56 pages
Closed to Private Employment
part IV|12 pages
Private Employment