On the payroll of the city of San Francisco, a brawny back assures a job applicant of more pay than does a trained brain. A city laborer, the San Francisco Examiner reported in a roundup last week, earns about $465 a month. By contrast, librarians (with five years of training required) get $390-$450 a month, registered nurses $350-$410, bacteriological lab assistants $31 $-$360, X-ray technicians $345-$400, dietitians $360-$420.
Lest any scholars chuck their books into the bay, the paper noted that laborers were required to be able to lift 140 lbs., and that so many applicants wanted laborers' jobs that the city...