"THE PRESTIGE VALUE OF PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT,"

Leonard Dupee White, '14, Chicago: Univ. Chicago Press. 1929. Pp. xix, 183.

"The morale (and hence in part the efficiency) of any group is affected by the group's conception of its social evaluation. ... If the prestige value of a city-hall job is high, that fact alone will tend to stimulate a desirable type of young man and woman to enter the service, and to energize a constant effort to make the real correspond to the ideal conception of public service. If, on the other hand, the prestige value of a city-hall job is low, that fact alone has a tendency to discourage the best-equipped young people to seek employment there, as well as to exercise a subtle, disintegrating influence on the standards of those who are in the city service.

"We desire to know whether the psychological matrix surrounding public employment is favorable or unfavorable; we seek a mathematical statement of the degree of its plus or negative quality; we are interested in the differentials which appear in the opinions of selected groups of Chicago citizens, whether by sex, race, age, education, occupation, or economic status; and, finally, we are interested in specific opinions on selected phases of public employment which accompany and indeed comprise the total psychological complex."

Five types of data were accumulated, conveying the opinions of nearly five thousand Chicago citizens. These citizens were asked first to check in each of twenty pairs the occupation for which they had the higher esteem. In each pair one occupation was civic, the other private: for example,

Stenographer, Treasurer's Office, Equitable Life Insurance Company.

Stenographer, Treasurer's Office, city of Chicago.

Library assistant and machinist were the only occupations for which municipal employment was preferred. In all but five of the occupations (chemist, assistant engineer, policeman, telephone operator, and detective) the difference in esteem was marked.

The citizens were asked to answer "Yes," "Doubtful," or "No" to each of fifteen questions, of which the first was: Do you get more courteous attention in dealing with city employees than in dealing with employees of private corporations? "Of those who expressed definite convictions, more than three times as many believed that private employees are more courteous than city employees; more than four times as many believed that private employees are more competent than city employees; more than five times as many believed that private employees are more trustworthy than city employees and more than seven times as many believed that private employees work harder than city employees."

A word-association test was given, with eleven of the thirty words significant to the issues under investigation. The data showed many more unfavorable than favorable associations. In response to the word Politics the most frequent association was the word "graft!" In response to the word Elections the association "fraud" was outnumbered only by the neutral associations "vote" and "polls."

A graphic rating scale for the twenty occupations mentioned in the first test revealed nothing significant for the inquiry.

A comparison of municipal and private employees with respect to efficiency, honesty, and courtesy, so planned that any one of nine answers could be checked, ranging from "invariably far more" to "invariably far less," again was most unfavorable to civic employment. Only 6.22% of the replies were favorable in any degree to the efficiency of city employees; only 4.63% were favorable to the honesty of city employees; and only 10.71% were favorable to the courtesy of city employees.

Concerning the different groups whose opinions were tabulated in this study, it is significant to note that males were less favorable to city employment than were females; older persons less favorable than younger; the more educated less favorable than the less educated; executives, proprietors, and professional workers less favorable than unskilled labor; native-born less favorable than foreign-born; and those in better economic status less favorable than those in poorer economic status.

Believing that although there are many sources of influence of opinion, nevertheless the newspaper is probably the one most significant influence, the author gathered about a thousand clippings from six Chicago newspapers, and asked five persons to rate all these clippings as favorable, neutral, or unfavorable to municipal administration. Of these ratings, 27.5% were favorable, 34.9% neutral, and 37.6% unfavorable. The newspapers varied considerably in their attitudes, from the American, with 23.2% of clippings unfavorable, to the Tribune, with 49.8% unfavorable.

Obviously, the opinions of many people are not rational: few have adequate knowledge for judgment; very often opinions are colored by someone experience, observation, or newspaper account. But it is none the less a fact that "city employees enjoy a dubious reputation. Public opinion may be misinformed, ungenerous, uncritical, and prejudiced, but the effective power of opinion is undiminished."

THE BOOK BEAKS THE FOLLOWING TRIBUTE

TOJAMES FAIRBANKS COLBYPROFESSOR EMERITUS OF POLITICAL SCIENCEDARTMOUTH COLLEGE

A scholar who invested scholarship with dignity and power, a teacher who endowed instruction with an unsurpassed clarity of mind and precision of statement, a friend whose influence has gone afar to inspire Dartmouth men for two generations, this study is dedicated by one of his grateful students.