AUTOMATION: The Full Measure

Full of foreboding, C.I.O. President Walter Reuther* stepped before the Joint Committee on the Economic Report in Washington last week to talk about the future. As far as Reuther could see, the horizon was cloudy—and the blackest clouds of all bore the label "automation." Citing the example of an automatic engine-block assembly line on which 41 workers now do a job that once required 117, Reuther foresaw the day when "entire plants, offices or departments in much of industry and commerce will be operated by electronic control mechanisms." The Administration, he cried,...

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