122 FLIGHT FROM THE CITY 



gaged in manufacturing staple and established prod- 

 ucts, so style changes with their shifts in demand 

 from wool dress goods to silk, from short skirts to 

 long skirts, from crockery to glassware, and from 

 phonographs to radios, create unemployment for 

 workers in some industries even though employment 

 is created for other workers in other industries. 



And quite without regard to whether the cause is 

 seasonal, or cyclical, or technological, or style unem- 

 ployment, all these victims of unemployment are 

 alike in this respect, that they are periodically unable 

 to support themselves and their families through no 

 fault of their own because of their dependence upon 

 what they earn as a cog in some part of the complex 

 machinery of our factory-dominated civilization. If 

 the period of unemployment proves to be a short one, 

 their savings are reduced or wiped out and debts ac- 

 cumulated which impair their ability to save for some 

 time after they are again employed, while if the period 

 proves a long one as long as the period through 

 which twelve or thirteen millions of Americans are 

 now struggling they are apt to become social 

 charges, to become utterly demoralized by public 

 charity, and in the end not only to loathe but to be- 

 come revolters against a social system which subjects 

 them to such treatment. 



The popular formula of social reformers for miti- 

 gating the evils of unemployment is unemployment 

 insurance which deals with the effect of the trouble, 

 and the popular formula for ending unemployment 



