What are those drop cords connected to -- some kind of punching or imprinting doodad?

The photo of everyone lined up at the IRS office looked a bit chaotic and disorganized. When you put all that paperwork in the right hands, it becomes nice and tidy.

If this were a normal enterprise, like a hardware store for instance, I'd much rather be out on the front lines working with the hordes of customers than keeping the paperwork neat. In the case of the IRS, though, I suspect every single one of those people out at the front counter is a dissatisfied customer. This would be one of those times when I'd opt for one of these quiet desk jobs.

The drop cords on the left power something on the desk. It's that oblong box under the clerk's left hand. I wonder what it is.

I can't help but notice how clean and organized everything looks.

I was a file clerk in the early 1970's and a lot of this scene is reminiscent of that job. We had bundles of things to file, in my case, traffic tickets or driver's license applications, all roughly the same size. we had the cabinets to file into.
To stave off boredom sometimes we had impromptu filing competitions, who got done with a bundle first won.

I look at that old industrial mill-type building and actually wish I worked there rather than in these cubicles they've got us in here at my insurance company. The great minds here have us in a beautiful color scheme of beige on beige with beige accents. Anyone else hate cubes? When I first started in this industry we had an open floor plan with desks lined up like those but in a newer, cleaner office building. Each desk had a phone and an in/out bin. No computers at all. It was better and more comfortable back then, I think.

Undoubtably, the atmosphere wasn't the best for preventing boredom, but I find it artistically pleasing to the eye. It's a nice picture even if it wasn't a nice job. Though I personally think it could have been the latter, too.

Two desk are empty. Stacks of work waiting. Both employees are rumored to be recovering from boredomitis. This malady has plagued the department's workers for some time. No known cure.

As they select the poor souls who are about to get audited here's hoping I am not one of them.

The Franz Kafka Annex. And yes, we do have your files. So glad you asked.

Same desks, same windows, same mini file cabinet on the desk. Same full tray of work for each of them. Same add-on electric cords, hanging from the ceiling.
Almost the same hair. Almost the same smocks on every woman.
These jobs make the prospect of stringing beans in a canning factory with 40 barefoot children look liberating.

All the office pictures Dave has shown from this time period seem to be so drab and lifeless. The one thing I notice is that all the desks are angled to take advantage of the window light.

I could imagine the clerical work being done by this group expressed in increments of "laptop power." This would be analogous to "horsepower" as a unit of physical work. One laptop should do everything you see here: the data collection, storage, calculation, and reporting. For better or worse, it would displace all these people and their filing cabinets. And it would save the floor from getting even more beat up from the foot traffic.