Overemployment

In March 63,100,000 men and women (a record for the month) were at work, an astonishing 2,700,000 more than last year at the same time. Unemployment, at 2,800,000, was down slightly from February and about 300,000 below March 1955.

What these Commerce and Labor Department figures mean is that, except for scattered troubles, the U.S. economy is in a state of full employment. In many sectors it is too full. Not only are there severe shortages of skilled workers; unskilled help is also hard to find.

With summer on the way, Good Humor Co. of Calif, reported that it cannot find enough drivers to man its bell-ringing trucks. The report, and dozens like it, led economists for Manhattan's austere First National City Bank to an interesting speculation: "If we had figures on unfilled job requisitions, it is possible that they would show that there are more unfilled jobs than persons unemployed." And that, points out National City, "is a condition of 'overemployment.' "

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