17. Read the passage and then identify the primary content of the paragraph. * (1 Point)
Unemployment was the overriding fact of life when Franklin D. Roosevelt became president of the United States on
March 4, 1933. At the time, the government did not systematically collect statistics of joblessness; actually it did not start
doing so until 1940. The Bureau of Labor Statistics later estimated that 12,830,000 persons were out of work in 1933,
about one-fourth of a civilian labor force of more than 51 million. Roosevelt signed the Federal Emergency Relief Act
(FERA) on May 12, 1933. The president selected Harry L. Hopkins, who headed the New York relief program, to run FERA.
A gifted administrator, Hopkins quickly put the program into high gear. He gathered a small staff in Washington and
brought the state relief organizations into the FERA system. While the agency tried to provide all the necessities, food
came first. City dwellers usually got an allowance for fuel, and rent for one month was provided in case of eviction.