United States Employment Service

The United States Employment Service (abbreviated as USES) is an agency of the United States government responsible for "assisting coordination of the State public employment services in providing labor exchange and job finding assistance to job seekers and employers". In around 1890, both the United States and European governments created the first federally funded employment offices. These offices were made to provide work for unskilled laborers that were unemployed. Due to the high number of economic depressions in the United States and Europe in the late 19th century and early 20th century in addition to high immigration rates to the United States, many people were unemployed, illiterate, and unskilled in terms of the workforce. These services proved to be unsuccessful and required more government interaction. Therefore in 1933, with the Wagner-Peyser Act, the USES was reinstated “to set minimum standards, develop uniform administrative and statistical procedures, publish employment information, and promote a system of "clearing labor" between states.” The USES was helpful during the Great Depression, providing work for those that had lost their jobs. President Franklin D. Roosevelt had created many government funded work projects to help boost the economy during the Great Depression and the USES was responsible for hiring the workers on those projects. The USES operated originally in only a few states but by World War II, it was operating in all states and played a major role in providing jobs during the war. In the United States home front during World War II, the service coordinated employment of Prisoners of War (e.g., using German POWs at Gettysburg for local pulpwood cutting).