American Jewish Youth is Urged to Seek Occupations Outside of “glamour Professions”

Job competition is becoming increasingly keen and only a careful appraisal of individual talents combined with a realistic choice of a career will lead to personal security, more than 500 New York City youths were told at a Career Conference for Jewish Youth yesterday.

The Conference was called by the Federation Employment Service, an affiliate of the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies of New York, which sponsors a group ?idance program jointly with the B’nai B’rith. The other sponsors were the B’nai B’rith Youth Organization and the Inter Center Jewish Youth Council of the city’s Jewish Community Centers. 180 B’nai B’rith youth groups and 80 Community Centers were represented at the Conference.

“There are now more people seeking jobs than there are jobs available,” Maximilian Moss, president of the New York City Board of Education, told the assembled youths. Consequently, Mr. Moss and Federation Employment Service president Walter Millor pointed out, individuals must make careful use of guidance agencies and techniques in picking a career. Equally important, the youths were told by authorities representing 16 occupations in a series of job opportunity panels, is to pick a career in one of these fields which is expanding.

Mrs. Caroline K. Simon, a member of the New York State Committee Against Discrimination, noted that in New York State it has been illegal for the last four-and-a-half years for any firm to discriminate in selecting employees. “We have made great progress in elininating discriminatory practices,” she said, “but it would be unrealistic to believe that in four and a half years discrimination has been completely eliminated.” She urged any students who encounter discrimination in their search for jobs to report these acts to the New York State Committee Against Discrimination.

One of the main points made in the occupational panels was the fact that it is becoming increasingly difficult to receive training and make careers in many of the professions. In the field of law, for example, a conference spokesman pointed out that 87% of the 1949 graduates of a New York law school have not been able to find employment in their field. Other professions which are becoming increasingly restricted or in which opportunity is already limited are: engineering, writing and journalism, commercial art and photography, teaching, accountancy, radio and television and pharmacy.