A Reappraisal of Federal Employment as a Career

A NYONE recently associated with the federal government and, indeed, any sophisticated visitor in Washington, could not fail to be aware of the fact that very poor morale is a present characteristic of government personnel. It is easy to identify a number of the principal immediate causes of this poor morale. First in importance of actual impact has been the shift from the dimensions and character of wartime government to the dimensions and character of postwar and peacetime government. During the war, the number of personnel required by the government was of necessity enormously increased. Throughout the war years it should have been plain to all concerned that the end of the war would bring a very great reduction in the number of employees required by the government. One incidental feature of the situation was provided by the fact that a very considerable number of career employees, because of their relative rarity and the importance of their familiarity with governmental processes, were moved into positions classified well above the levels of their normal qualifications; later downgrading for many of those persons was to have been anticipated, and down-grading and poor morale are inevitably associated. Another incidental feature of the situation was the establishment in many positions of persons with war-service status whose services were so satisfactory as to lead them and their superior officers to hope for their continuance in favor of displaced career workers. Another feature was the establishment of reemployment rights for those career workers who