Evening star from Washington, District of Columbia • 28

Italy Is Doomed to Dependency by Its Population Problem By Joachim Joesten the proud 19th century motto, will manage on her own," ever has had any validity at all, it certainly no longer holds good today. The best-informed observers here are convinced that Italy never will be able to stand entirely on its own feet. Its basic economic problem appears to be insoluble, at any rate on a strictly national level. Apparently leaders realize this full well. For they are among the most enthusiastic sponsors of the federation-of-Europe idea to be found anywhere on the continent.

In fact, just about the only determined Italian opposition to this new concept comes from the Communists, who are, of course, guided by interests unrelated to the welfare of Italy. In the nation-wide elections next Sunday the voters of Italy will have a chance to show whether they agree with their appraisal of European benefits. One of the important things which will sway the judgment, of course, will be the state of their own Individual economic positions. The oft-heard question whether or not the average Italian is better off materially than in the days of Mussolini cannot decisively be answered one way or the other. One probably comes closest to the truth by saying that the Italians in some respects never had it so good economically, but that in some other respects they were better off under the Fascist regime.

Same Old Problem By and large, however, there has been neither substantial Improvement nor worsening in the complex of Italian ills resulting from overpopulation. Her population and employment problem is as pressing today as it was at the turn of the century or in the One important element has changed radically, though. Italy is no longer a country with a high birth rate. birth rate since prewar days has declined from a high of 23.7 per thousand Inhabitants to a present low of 17.6 per thousand. As a result, Italy, which once led almost all other European countries in this respect, now ranks with the least prolific nations on the continent.

Even birth rate currently exceeds that of Italy by a substantial margin. In spite of this marked demographic decline, the national economy, though in some quite incapable of absorbing the natural increase in job seekers. In particular, it is noteworthy that the nan-working sector of the population is exceptionally large. Os a total population of 47.2 million (September, 1952), only 19.4 million were gainfully employed, while 27.8 million were listed as dependents. Actually, the disproportion between the active Root of Our Scientist Shortage Is in Secondary Schools Recent concern over a prospective shortage of scientists in the United States was emphasized anew recently with release of the National Manpower report.

The country must provide more financial aid to education to avoid the shortage, the commission concluded. It is easy to demonstrate how important the problem is. Another war will be, above all else, a war of scientists, and the United States is now reported to be lagging behind Russia in scientific talent. The Soviet Union already has manpower superiority. If it also achieves industrial superiority through high scientific achievement, the end would be clearly in sight.

Part of the trouble, of course, is that scientific educational facilities in this, the most industrialized of nations, are limited. But this is only part of it. More fundamental is the fact that students who enter the Institutions are ill-prepared for what is offered. Dr. Gutenberg's Cose The case of Dr.

Beno Gutenberg is a good example of how American education deviates from the ideal. A professor of geophysics at Caltech, Dr. Gutenberg recently won the Bowie Medal, about the highest honor a man in his field can receive. In his acceptance speech, Dr. Gutenberg reviewed briefly how he got a Ph.

D. from the University of Goettingen when he was 22. A poor German boy, he did it with very French Cabinet Crises Cause Less Confusion Than We Think What happens in France when a cabinet falls, such as happened 10 days ago for the 17th time since the end of World War Do the government offices close down? Does panic prevail? Do the bureaucrats go on a frantic hunt for new jobs? Or do they go off on happy holidays until a new regime takes over? The most striking thing about a French is that not much of anything happens, so far as the everyday life of the citizens and government employes is concerned. All the government offices stay open; the bureaucrats continue to do whatever French bureaucrats do; the incredible Paris taxis honk their way through traffic as noisily and recklessly as ever; the sidewalk artists ply their trade uninterrupted, the haut couturier goes on making dresses for the rich of three continents; the government-operated railroads keep running, right on time. Discredited Remain The country is not actually without a government.

In addition to the President, whose function is largely honorary, the discredited Premier and his fallen cabinet remain in office. The cabinet steps down only after a new cabinet is sworn in. In fact, the members of the outgoing cabinet sign the docupment setting up the new cabinet. During the period each member of the holdover Cabinet who beads a government ministry continues to run that department. He wmm fr jJHH This postwar slum along the Tiber faces fashionable Parioli district.

and inactive sectors of the population was even greater, for the number of included 1.3 million persons currently out of work. Moreover, Italy has a large unemployment and underemployment problem. In addition to the registered jobless, close to 2 million people are believed to come under the heading of unemployment. One of the disturbing aspects of the unemployment total is a steady increase in the number of young people who have not found their first jobs yet. Effective action is needed to develop new job opportunities at a rate adequate to take care of the increasing work force, now growing at the rate of approximately 150,000 a year.

Dark Spot Agriculture is by far the darkest spot in the Italian economic picture. It appears from official data that since 1938 agricultural production has increased by only 3 per cent, while industrial output has risen by 42 per cent and the population has grown by 7 per cent. Emigration in recent years has not been sufficient to reduce substantially the heavy backlog accumulated during the war, or even to keep pace with the continuing increase in population. In view of the small immigration quota set and little financial assistance. The key was the fine preparation he got in high school, a notably weak link in the American educational system.

Dr. Gutenberg learned to read and write four languages in the high school he attended in Germany. He had been through differential calculus. In Latin and Greek he had advanced to the point most American college students reach in their junior year. This was not extraordinary.

Most of his classmates had made equal progress. It would have been hard to get into a German university with much less. The point of reciting Dr. high school background is to show that America sends its young people to college ill-equipped to pursue basic studies. Students fritter away four years on non-essentials A.

B. and B. S. degrees from a good many American colleges do not indicate as much advancement in learning as Dr. high school diploma.

Perhaps by the time they are through college some of them have developed a strong interest in some field, such as geophysics. But by that time they often are thinking about getting married. It will cost money to support a wife pertinent Just G. I. money has run out.

If they any service connections their parents are tired of supporting them, or they themselves are weary after four years of semi-starvation and an ultramonastic life. Here another factor comes into acts largely as however. Routine business goes on as usual in each Ministry, but no major decisions are made. No new policies are launched. Legally Rene Mayer, the Premier whose Cabinet just fell, could represent his government at the forthcoming Bermuda conference with President Eisenhower and British Prime Minister Churchill, if a new French Cabinet had not been formed by that time.

But in practice such an action would be say experts on French politics. The purpose of the three-power conference is to make major decisions on major issues, and tradition would bar M. Mayer from doing this. would be like the United States sending a lame duck President to the the experts say. President might still be in office.

But if he was going to be succeeded soon by another President, maintained by tjie United States annual quota is only 5,600 persons), the population overflow at present is directed primarily toward Australia and Brazil, which in 1952 admitted 26,510 and 17,797 Italian immigrants, respectively. Economic Conditions Poor On the whole, the economic conditions among individual Italianshousing, employment, living costs, wages and very difficult despite all endeavors of the government to raise living standards. The cost of living in Italy at present is among the highest in Europe. It has risen without letup from one year to the next and is still going up steadily, though its pace has been slowed down. Italian and foreign economists alike are watching with serious misgivings the new inflationary pressures set in motion by increased defense appropriations and the state-sponsored program of economic development projects.

The factor chiefly responsible for the persistent upward trend in the Italian cost of living index is a steady rise in food prices. By official count, the average family in Italy spends about 60 per cent of its budget on food, with bread, pasta, wine and olive oil making up some of the chief staples in the Meat is a luxury few Italians can By Thomas R. Henry the basic American culture pattern. It is somewhat different from that in which Dr. Gutenberg attended Goettingen.

However it may be denied, a success in life here in America is measured more or less by the money he makes. If the college graduate decided, at whatever sacrifice it may go on to the Ph. D. degree which is almost a minimum requirement for original scientific work, it -means an expenditure of at least added to which he will have no earnings whatsoever for four years. Family Problems What waits him at the end? Seldom more than a college Instructor job at $3,000 or $4,000 a year.

He will achieve no particularly enviable place in society. The folks in his home town may look on him as a failure in life. The four years will be almost certainly a bad investment, from any practical point of view. To offset this is only the sense of accomplishment and the fact that he has prepared himself for a life work more interesting and spiritually rewarding than the better-paid professions. All this is something that appeals only to the most idealistic of men in a culture which is not entirely oriented to such idealism.

So what? the United States got the atomic bomb? we hydrogen bomb? Are we not on the point of running a submarine around the By Isabelle Shelton any commitments he made mean very The only people whose jobs are affected when a French cabinet falls are the Prime Minister and the members of his cabinet, plus each cabinet small personal staff of ten or so (basically secretarial). Actually, the faces around the table when a new cabinet meets are pretty much the same faces which were there in the old cabinet, and perhaps in several cabinets before that. Prime ministers come and go. But many of the other members go on from one cabinet to the next, year after year. Thy top cabinet posts are shuffled back and forth between a relatively small group of men, who are the leaders of the various political parties.

2 Ministers, 17 Cabinets A man may be Minister of Interior in one cabinet, Minister of Defense in the next. Either Robert Schuman or Georges Bidault has been foreign minister in each of the 17 postwar cabinets. This obviously has helped to maintain continuity in the conduct of the foreign affairs. Retention of the same ministers in some other departments further minimizes the impact of a cabinet upset. The size of the cabinet is likely to change each time, too.

The Mayer Cabinet had 38 members. That of Antoine Pinay, who preceded Mayer, had 29. One Premier may name one man minister of national afford more often than perhaps once or twice a week. Large numbers of people have to get by with practically no meat at all. Even in terms of United States dollars, retail prices for meat are very high.

Here are a few samples, picked at random among price tags exhibited on meat counters and in delicatessen stores at Rome and Naples: Choice cut of veal, $1.25 a pound; ham, $1 to $1.60 a pound; salami, $1.25 a pound; liver, sl.lO a pound; tripes, 35 cents a pound; small chicken, $1.60. Lower Pay, Too Actually, however, these prices weigh much more heavily on the Italian family budget, than they would in the United States, because of substantailly lower pay scales. The average monthly take-home pay of industrial workers, for example, ranges from 40,000 to 50,000 lire, or terms of dollars, roughly, $64 to SBO. Clerical take-home pay averages S7O a month. In many lower middle class families the single provider earns little more than the equivalent of SSO a month.

Government employes in particular are very poorly paid. A top-ranking administrative official may earn as little as sl60 month. Many people do And ways and means of adding to their regular income, however, through evening work or world, more or less, on a few ounces of uranium? True, but was it American scientists who produced these things? Money and 'Plumbing' Americans supplied the money and the Certainly the greater part of the basic science involved was European. Both, of course, were essential. The trend in this country, however, has been to underestimate the importance of the latter.

There is just no denying that scientific achievement in the United States is over-rated and (b) is bound to deteriorate if it continues along present lines. The problem affords no easy solution. Fellowships, of course, could be increased. That would be, after all, a matter of very little money. It would make no really consequential difference in the Federal budget, even with the present economy program.

But the major difficulty is not financial. It lies in the mind and the ideals of a generation and a culture. Boys and girls must start in college better grounded in the basic elements of all if it is a little too much to hope that many will leave high school in their late teens, as did Dr. Gutenberg, able to read and write four languages and having mastered differential calculus. Moreover, American education at the college level probably must be reoriented away from superficiality economy, industry and The next Premier may name a separate minister of national economy, minister of industry and minister of commerce.

Under the first arrangement the three ministries technically become one for the duration of that cabinet. But each department continues to function as before, in its own separate buildiing, with all its bureaucrats undisturbed. The prime own title actually is President of the Council of Ministers. Custom prescribes that during his term and forever after he shall be addressed as le Onetime presidents of political parties also have a lifetime claim to the presidential salutation. Given the sizable number of French political parties and the high mortality rate for premiers, there very many leading French politicians who en.PSJ by engaging in all kinds of business on the side.

Rent and fuel costs, while they have less relative weight, have also moved up substantially in recent years, as the government reluctantly had to permit successive increases in controlled rents and utility charges. About the only relief to the Italian housewife has resulted from a downward trend in clothing prices since the middle of 1951. As in some United States cases, industrial workers are best protected against continuing inflation, as basic wage rates in most cases are tied to the cost-of-living index through clauses. One has also to take into account that most workers and salaried employes are given a 13 th month pay at Christmas time. Vast Discrepancy A vast discrepancy in standards of living is still apparent in the verious regions of Italy.

In industrial and relatively prosperous Milan, for example, the average person is much better fed, clad and housed than in Naples and other South Italian cities with their stark look of poverty. The land reform program and long-range public investments, particularly in the south, are beginning to gain momentum. Tangible results have become more apparent. To supplement these more basic programs, the government also has adopted a number of emergency measures to provide work. Nevertheless, the capacity of the country to absorb its growing population and at the same time to raise significantly the average standard of living depends in great part on its ability to develop and exploit its resources at a much faster rate than has prevailed in recent months, competent observers hold.

A good deal of controversy has been raging in the Italian press lately about suitable measures, other than government-sponsored projects, designed to expand the national volume of production and to raise the general standard of living. Turin Rotary Club Here are some interesting remarks recently made by a speaker to the Turin Rotary Club, as reported (not without some derisive hoots) in the newspaper 11 Mattino of Naples (March 18, 1953): still exist many sectors of production capable of substantial expansion. Consider, for instance, the number of apartments which still lack heating, sanitary facilities and modern utilities; or the many cases and restaurants that do not even possess a washroom. could also be a substantial increase in automobile traffic, which now is hamstrung by bureaucratic and fiscal fetters; and if all those who can afford it sought to supply themselves with refrigerators, washing machines and other modern household equipment, there would be work for and toward fundamental research planting in the minds of students that mathematics is more than a stepping stone toward a degree but something far more significant. The National Science Foundation is doing what it can to increase the interest in science.

College students must be inspired to a new devotion toward certain sciences. Their teachers must be able to inspire this devotion. The foundation is supporting two colloquiums for college physics teachers this summer, one at the University of lowa and one at Minnesota; one for mathematics teachers at the University of Colorado and one for biology professors at the University of Oklahoma. The idea is to reinspire these men who must inspire others and who too often have found their own interests growing dull. The Big Problem The even more important secondary school problem, as one staff member of the National Foundation expresses it, "is so big one hardly dares start thinking about The basic task is to turn pleasureloving young Americans away from some of their pleasures and toward the basic sciences which will unlock new probably lead to new pleasures and conveniencesfor future generations.

Right now the need is not for more gadgets. The need is for increasing scientific superiority over an enemy dedicated to subjugating us. titled to the honorary greeting. found the safest way to get along was just to call them all Monsieur le says one former official at the American Embassy in Paris. like calling a colonel Even if wrong, he loves Bureaucrats Roll On The French bureaucrat (using the word to include just about everybody who works for the French government except the members of the National Assembly, from whose ranks the cabinets are chosen) is little concerned about the recurring cabinet He can afford to be serene and unflurried because there is no French counterpart of the situation in this country, where a Government job may be in jeopardy if he a member of the seems to be an American another experienced observer of the French scene commented dryly.

operate a spoils system in a country with an eightparty system, especially with frequent cabinet he added. "That really would be The Frenchman in the street, a philosophical fellow, is equally unruffled by the frequent cabinet shakeups. He has a dim feelingwhich has been growing in recent this is not the way to run a country. But he has seen so many cabinets fall that he figures his government will weather this crisis just as It has all the others. THE SUNDAY STAR, Washington, D.

C. SUNDAY. MAY 81. 1953 Federal Achieving Even a Cut of 240,000, Through Attrition, Will Be Hard By Allen Drury Although the Eisenhower Administration is steadily whittling down the Government payroll, it still has not made the deep slashes in personnel which many Republican officials and members of Congress would like to see. In spite of an apparent sincere determination to cut staffs as fast and drastically as possible, biggest reductions to date have come in such special agencies as the National Production Administration, the Office of Price Stabilization and the Wage Stabilization Board, ordered to go out of business by June 30.

Cuts in these agencies, totaling more than 6,000, have been automatic. But reductions elsewhere have not been so easy. The Civil Service Commission reports an estimated decline of 50,000 employes in the first three months of the administration, but many more have left through than have felt the bite of the economy ax. To date, departmental reductions have been spotty. Interior has announced a cut of 1,222 by June 30 in its Reclamation Bureau staff.

The Office of the Secretary of Defense dropped from a January 31 peak of 2,249 to 2,205 on April 30 and the Defense Department as a whole reported a decline of 624 jobs in the Washington area between January 31 and March 31. State has lost 954 since January 1, 365 in the Washington area. A handful have been let go at Commerce, a few have been removed at Agriculture as the result of reorganization plans which are under fire on Capitol Hill. Aside from routine changes, most other departments have remained at approximately the same level as they were when the Democrats left office. Proposed Cuts It is true that the House Appropriations Committee is doing its best to remedy this situation.

But there is a saying on the Hill that when it comes to appropriations the House proposes and the Senate disposes. If the House wishes prevail, the changes will include: Elimination of more than 2,600 State Department jobs, approximately 850 of them in the Washington area. Reduction of about 300 at Commerce, including a few each at the Weather Bureau, Civil Aeronautics Authority, Census Bureau and the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce. Reduction of 1,600 jobs at the Public Housing Administration, including 300 here. Elimination of 1,200 Washington jobs at the Housing and Home Finance Agency.

Reduction of 700 at the Civil Service Commission, 300 of them in Washington. Proposed Increases At the same time, however, the committee in appropriations bills already sent to the floor has approved increases in the Justice Department, particularly FBI, Bureau of Prisons, Immigration and Naturalization Service and the administrative office of the Attorney General. It has also voted the National Advisory Committee Ultra-High Three Bidders Vie for TV Channel 20, But It May Take Years to Iron Out By Beryl Denzer Ultra-high frequency television is in the works for Washington. But it may be years before it is a success from the standpoints of both operator and viewer. What is UHF? a new group of wavelengths for television to supplement the 12 established VHF (very-high frequency) channels, the kind Washingtonians can pick up on their sets today.

Aside from additional television service, UHF offers no advantage over VHF and one distinct disadvantage: People get UHF programs on their present set unless they invest in special converters. The future operator of channel 20 only commercial UHF channel assigned to Washington by the Federal Communications Commissionwill face additional difficulties. In the District, four VHF stations nave been on the air for nearly six yeais two of them still are running in the red. (Which two is a trade secret). All local VHF stations are affiliated with networks.

network is the American Broadcasting is Columbia, is the National chain, and is Du Mont. Network affiliation is good for a station because it affords access to topflight shows. Since there are currently no other networks, a fifth station would have to produce shows of comparable excellence to win viewers. And excellence in TVmore than in other money. Or the network would have to cater to a specialized audience.

Add to this the fact that it will be at least two years before the FCC can schedule a hearing on channel 20, and the feasibility of applying for the frequency is open to question. Yet the fact is that there are three experienced radio broadcasters in this area who have filed applications for the channel and expect to fight to the finish for it. Each thinks he has the answer to the overwhelming competition provided by VHF stations here. Television experts emphasize that the candidates all have in the communications field and could succeed any one The three local bidders for channel 20 are Capital Broadcasting which now operates radio station WWDC; Washington Metropolitan Television Corp. (WGMSt and Arlington-Fairfax Broadcasting Inc.

(WEAM). WGMS President M. Robert Rogers is counting on color TV to help lick the problem of conversion to UHF. He predicts that when color television is approved set manufacturers will start pushing colorequipped sets. And these, he is sure, will have UHF reception built in.

George Oleson, WEAM station manager, believes that by the time for Aeronautics enough money to hire about 1,400 extra people. And a flock of independent agencies such as the Tariff Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, Federal Trade Commission and General Services Administration have received enough to retain present employment levels. David F. Williams, chief of the Civil Service budget and finance division, told the committee during hearings on the independent offices appropriation bill that the commission estimates 000 employes leave Government service through normal attrition in the next year. Representative Phillips, Republican, of California demanded to know whether that was all that would be done in one time reduce this ant hill of Government employment and Phillips' Blast "Certainly this committee can take that as the minimum reduction and something less, we hope, than the Mr.

Phillips said. Whatever Mr. Phillips may think, however, it looks at the moment as though the Civil Service Commission may be both houses of Congress will agree to bone-deep cuts in appropriations. If the House trims and the Senate restores, the administration will do well to hit the 240 000 estimates on the nose. That Mr.

Phillips and his point of view may find an echo in the Senate despite its traditional generosity has been Indicated in the last 10 days as the upper house has begun serious work on money bills. A group of economizers led by Senator Douglas, Democrat, of Illinois has succeeded in winning moderate cuts in the Independent offices bill; these will inevitably bring some reductions in pffsonnel. But there are a lot of measures still to come. The Senate has a long way to go before it can satisfy those who believe the only way to bring the Government payroll back within bounds is to grab an ax and start swinging. Dirksen's Attack Many Republicans still seem tc agree with Senator colleague, Republican Senator Dirksen, who took occasion the other day to make a bitter attack on the slowness in bringing about promised economies.

Senator Dirksen is obviously out for blood, and so are many of his fellow party members. In spite of these pressures, however, administration officials say the process will probably be gradual, whatever cuts are made. Under the stop-order on hiring which was put into effect in February, jobs are not being refilled as vacancies occur and many employes are presumably making plans to move elsewhere. The method is less violent than Senator Dirksen and others on the Hill would prefer, but the administration believes it will accomplish the objective in the long run. channel 20 is assigned, improved films will make TV operation "much more Ben Strouse, general manager, said he would have to see the possibility of a fifth TV network entering the picture.

All three agree that if the commercial station can wait out promised educational channel 26 there will be this advantage: Some sets will be already converted to UHF by parents who want their youngsters to catch the TV classes. The educational station, however, may not come in time. The District of Columbia Board of Education has applied for it and President Eisenhower has asked Congress for $400,000 to start operation of the station. But Congress has not yet earmarked the funds and the FCC has shelved the board's application until it can show a sound financing plan. What inducements are the three commercial UHF applicants prepared to offer viewers? Mr.

Strouse of WWDC says his station would concentrate on the Silver Spring audience in an effort to produce incentive to (from VHF to UHF). Mr. Oleson says his station planned special event forums of interest to Arlingtonians. Both think more sports coverage would win viewers. But Mr.

Rogers has another idea. He would go after the highbrow market to which WGMS is currently pitched. It be all music on TV, of course. For instance, in daytime he would air programs with minimal gunplay. At night, a half-hour of the best time would be devoted to adult education.

Such a commercial UHF operation, Mr. Rogers feels, along with the educational station, a segment on the The Washington Television Circulation Committee estimated in April that about 450,000 sets were tuned in on local TV stations. It is too early to forecast how many set owners will invest in converters, which range in price from $5 for the single-channel variety to $75 for universal tuners. Some people, of course, just bother and TV manufacturers predict mad rush to Nevertheless, there is a three-way fight here for one channel in a town where only half the existing stations are making money. Likewise, in Los Angeles and New York (which have seven channels each) a total of nine stations are losing money, and there are similar scrambles for UHF licenses.

Considering that it would cost between $200,000 and $300,000 to get started, the prospective operator of a UHF station must have not only the courage of his convictions, but a pot full of money aa welL B-3.