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Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - IV. Economics - 17. The Mechanics of Economic Discrimination as a Practical Problem - 3. Migration Policy - 4. The Regular Industrial Labor Market in the North
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388 An American Dilemma
a comparatively low educational level trained into attitudes and customs
which are not favorable for easy adjustment to Northern city life. Even
this migration could be steered by rational planning. There may perhaps
be some Northern and Western centers which do not have many Negroes
but which would be tolerant of a migration of Southern Negroes. Planned
migration could be adjusted to employment trends in various localities.
Positive measures should be planned for directing this new labor into
suitable employment. A program of adult education for the crude Southern
Negro laborers coming North should be instituted to familiarize them with
the general culture and ways of life of the North and to give them the
rudiments of vocational training.®
These are practical tasks for a federal employment service working in
close collaboration with other private and public institutions for education
and social welfare. They are of paramount importance, but until now have
been almost entirely neglected. Even under such auspices the Negroes will
have to watch the activity carefully through their organizations. The
problem is not, let it be stated clearly, whether or not Negroes should
migrate. Southern Negroes will continue to migrate under any circum-
stances, and they are compelled to move out of the South in considerable
numbers. But without direction they will migrate to localities which are
not best suited to receive them. The problem is rather whether Negro
migration should continue to be determined by an irrational tradition,
which brings the Negroes haphazardly to a restricted number of places
where the Negro population quickly outgrows the existing employment
opportunities j
or whether it should be expertly planned to cause a mini-
mum of friction and human wastage and a maximum of labor utilization
and human efficiency.
4. The Regular Industrial Labor Market in the North
The situation in the large Northern cities where there arc many Negroes
is not altogether different from that in the small Northern cities where
there are practically no Negroes, Even in those cities in the North where
there is a substantial Negro population, Negroes do not work and have
never worked in most industrial plants. Taking on a Negro worker sets a
precedent and will ordinarily be avoided if possible.
Workers are usually conservative. An attempt by an employer to intro-
duce Negro workers into a hitherto all-white plant will usually be met by
more or less active resistance on the part of the workers. This resistance is
likely to become more intense if Negroes are to get a share of the skilled
jobs. Even a change in the Negroes^ position in such plants where they
have already been accepted may cause trouble—as, for instance, if Negroes
arc promoted to higher jobs than they previously have been allowed to
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