 There are a hundred million of us, men and women of working and fighting age. To fight this war, ten million more people must go to work by the end of 1943, before the war half of us worked. The other fifty million kept house, went to school, played, or looked for work. Today employment offices are deserted. For every machinist available, for example, twenty-two are needed. For every riveter available, four are needed. Employers, faced with this crisis, pirate workers from other war plants by promising higher wages. One idle machine can halt an entire production line. Chaos exists on the labor side, too. Workers hear rumors of high-paying jobs fail to ask what skills are required and rush to critical areas. Uprooted, homeless, they are an added problem. Men to live are so scarce that men sleep in shifts in what are known as hotbeds. Plainly such confusion will not speed our war industry. We organize ourselves for this war. We set up an agency headed by Paul V. McNutt. One of my first steps as chairman of the War Manpower Commission was to appoint a policy committee of representatives of labor and management to help locate and solve our manpower problems. Overcrowded Baltimore is the test area. Manpower and army experts decide that such production centers have unused labor sources to uncover before calling in migrants, business, labor, and government meat. Union delegates pledge to curtail job switching among war workers. We do not want any man in the essential war industry to leave his job without first clearing through his union. If our workers are in places where they are of greatest service, that's where we want them to stay. Employers sign anti-labor pirating pledges. Now manpower has two tasks, locating skilled men and training new labor. First the Selective Service Skill Survey is used. A beer salesman was once a pipe fitter. I've been with this company ten years, it's a lot of senior artie to give up. Well we'll see what can be done about it. His employer is contacted. We feel that you're going into war work is the same as joining the armed forces. Your job will be waiting for you. Thank you. Now he builds ships. Guaranteed seniority on this pattern will free thousands of trained men for war jobs. A second large source of skilled ex-workers is found among storekeepers. I've got a nice little store build up. What shall I do with it? Well, maybe you can sell it. As their establishments are transferred to folk without critical skills, many small businessmen discover they can earn more at war jobs than they did in business. There is no time to train men in skills that take years to develop. Manpower's next move is to list all non-war enterprises which can be called upon to give up skilled workers. The commissioner informs the department store manager that a gun carriage plant urgently requires men. Boys, the war manpower commission wants some of us to change over to war industry. Well, you want a job? Okay, with me. Within the war plants, skills are spread. An experienced machinist breaks down his job so that parts can be handled by new men. The second phase of manpower's program is to find and train people for the millions of jobs that do not demand long-time skills. Unemployed or employed below their best capacity are a million Negroes. Do you want to learn one of these jobs, Hubert? Well, that's the one for me. In government schools all over the country, such workers train for jobs of vital importance. Day and night classes are conducted. Do these free schools also come men who have lost their jobs as a result of the shutting down of peacetime enterprises affected by priorities on materials? Salesmen, clerks, clothing workers in specially affected areas learn new trades. In a month or six weeks, a man can go to work as a welder on ships, tanks, guns. What I'm doing? Okay. With every man utilized, we are still short millions of hands. We must call upon women. At first, women go into service jobs, releasing men for the army and for war industries. Out of 50 million women at the beginning of the war, 10 million were working. In war towns all over the United States, women are called upon to leave their homes and take jobs. Among our young, unmarried women and among older women whose children are grown, we have a large reserve. They discover that factory work is usually no more difficult than housework. Employers find that women can do many jobs as well as men. Some jobs, better. Training schools are open for women. Life metals used in aircraft are easy for women to handle. But they undertake every form of shop work, even invading such fields as welding, hitherto reserved for men. Machine operations requiring patience and accuracy attract them at once. How do you like it? So great is the need that employers come to the schools to select and hire women before they complete their course. Those who wish to remain and finish their schooling. Tens of thousands of women are already at work in aircraft, more of being added as fast as they apply. This solves the bread-winning problem for many families whose men are at war. The government's policy is that women should get the same pay that men get for similar work. What do you do with your money? Save it! Where necessary, machinery is adapted for women's use. When a hand drill weighs heavily on feminine muscles, the lazy arm drill is introduced to take off the strain. As women are urged to take factory jobs, the army assures them this will not necessarily affect the draft status of their husbands, so long as they're maintaining a bona fide family relationship in the home. By the end of 1943, one out of every three women will be at work. When married women with small children have to take jobs, everything possible will be done to provide daycare for the children. In the meantime, as men are drawn from the farms into our armed forces, America's youth finds its place in the war effort. Thus the Manpower Commission utilizes voluntary means to organize our entire population for war. But we've already indicated through a national poll that we're willing to have such a program enforced by law. Today, a vast network of government employment agencies acts as our war manpower clearinghouse. If you are retired, your local U.S. Employment Office may arrange to train you for work right in your own community. Should you be physically handicapped, you will find your country is making special efforts to adapt your abilities. 4,500 local offices of the United States Employment Service are guiding us to our places in the war effort. Don't move around on your own. Consult a government agency first. If you're a woman who has never worked, you will find courses ready for you. Prepare now. You will be needed. By the end of 1943, one out of every two active Americans will either be in war production or in the fighting forces. The rest of us will be feeding, clothing, housing, the frontline fighters and workers. Only then will we be fighting with every muscle. Only at that point can we say that all work is war work.