United States Employment Service
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The United States Employment Service (USES) is an agency of the federal government of the United States responsible for "assisting coordination of the State
public employment service A public employment service is a government's organization which matches employers to employees. History One of the oldest references to a public employment agency was in 1650, when Henry Robinson proposed an "Office of Addresses and Encounters" ...
s in providing labor exchange and job finding assistance to job seekers and employers".


History

In around 1890, both the United States and European governments created government-funded employment offices to provide work for unemployed unskilled laborers. These services proved to be unsuccessful. In 1933 during the
Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
, with the Wagner-Peyser Act, the USES was reinstated “to set minimum standards, develop uniform administrative and statistical procedures, publish employment information, and promote a system of "clearing labor" between states.” Then President Franklin D. Roosevelt had created many government-funded work projects to help boost the economy and the USES was responsible for hiring the workers on those projects. The USES operated originally in only a few states but by World War II, it was operating in all states and played a major role in providing jobs during the war. In the
United States home front during World War II The United States home front during World War II supported the war effort in many ways, including a wide range of volunteer efforts and submitting to government-managed Rationing in the United States, rationing and price controls. There was a gen ...
, the service coordinated employment of
prisoners of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held Captivity, captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold priso ...
(e.g., using German POWs at Gettysburg for local pulpwood cutting). Like many labor organizations of its time, the USES officially stated a belief in racial equality in the workplace, yet it provided fewer jobs for its African American workers. Historian Eric Arnesen from the University of Illinois argues that, “although the agency stated its general opposition to racial discrimination, it referred very few African Americans to jobs in war industries, defense training courses, or youth work-defense projects. In fact, the central administration encouraged its branches, especially in the South, to oblige employer preferences by accommodating racial discrimination.” In the
Bureau of Agricultural Economics The Economic Research Service (ERS) is a component of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and a principal agency of the Federal Statistical System of the United States. It provides information and research on agriculture and economi ...
instructional manual for the USES during wartime from the 1940s, it reads that the USES policy was, “to make all referrals without regard to race, color, creed, or national origin except when an employer’s order includes these specifications which the employer is not willing to eliminate,” and if the employer had no racial preferences “but community custom or past hiring practices of the employer indicate that he may refuse to hire individuals of a particular race, color, creed, or national origin, the employment office interviewer shall ascertain whether or not he has any restrictive specifications.”Study 49, at 22, 23, Bureau of Agricultural Economics (BAE), Division of Program Surveys, Project Files, 1940-1945, National Archives, Record Group 83; Gunnar Myrdal et al., An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1944), 417-18 (quoting instructional manual).


See also

*
Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (H.R. 803; 113th Congress) The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) is a United States public law that replaced the previous Workforce Investment Act of 1998 (WIA) as the primary federal workforce development legislation to bring about increased coordination amon ...
* Employment and Training Administration


References


External links


Employment and Training Administration

State Unemployment Insurance and Employment Service Operations
account on
USAspending.gov ttp://www.usaspending.gov USASpending.govis a database of spending by the United States federal government. History Around the time of the Act's passage, OMB Watch, a government watchdog group, was developing a site that would do essentially eve ...

Training and Employment Service
account on USAspending.gov
Job Corps
account on USAspending.gov {{Authority control Employment agencies of the United States United States Department of Labor Public employment service 1933 establishments in the United States