Senator Warren often sends out emails about what she is working on, but this one in particular strikes me as a no-brainer, so I actually took the extra couple of seconds to click through and sign her petition. This is one of those things where it is obvious there needs to be a law to guard against abuse, but also should be obvious that you shouldn’t treat someone this way law or not. Why can’t people just have standardized shifts working the same hours every week? If someone calls out sick time could be traded or it should ultimately be for the manager to cover. There should also be certain days like Thanksgiving where a worker should have the right to veto his or her assignment that day without question or consequence. Here is Sen. Warren’s message:
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Christopher, Do you have to work on Thanksgiving? For some retail, restaurant, and fast food workers, the answer to that question could still be: “I don’t know.” Half of low-wage workers say they have little or no say over the hours they are scheduled to work. 20-30% are in jobs where they can be called into work at the last minute. Others might think they’ll be working four hours – and getting paid for four hours – then are sent home after one or two because there aren’t enough customers. Think about how much of a challenge it is to plan for anything – childcare, doctors’ visits, parent-teacher conferences, classes – without knowing when you’ll be working next week. Look, I get it. Sometimes employers need flexibility – and the bill allows for that. But routinely placing workers on-call with no guarantee of work, sending workers home early without pay, and punishing workers who request schedule changes all hurt working families. There’s lots of talk about personal responsibility. But how does someone who depends on every paycheck plan a budget when her work hours can fluctuate 40-70% from week to week? How does a mother arrange for childcare if she doesn’t know if she’s working Thursdayor Saturday or Monday? And how does anyone get ahead – going back to school to qualify for a better job or getting a second job to close the gap – if they don’t know when they will be available? The Schedules that Work Act is about basic fairness:
Workers have always had to fight for a level playing field every step of the way. A minimum wage. Basic workplace safety. A 40-hour workweek. Now it’s time to fight again for some basic fairness in scheduling. Thank you for being a part of this, and Happy Thanksgiving to you and your loved ones! Elizabeth |
I was sixteen, maybe seventeen and still in high school. I worked as a clerk/janitor at a large department store after school and Saturday. Back then, the only stores open on Sunday were mom & pop operations. Drug stores were open but they were not the mega big boxes we have today.
Then the law was changed. I wrote my first ever letter to the editor of the local paper, and it was published. My objection was not on religious grounds. I objected on humanitarian ground. I argued that it was good for the community to have one day of rest, where we could all make plans to be together, to have picnics, community projects, events, and so on, all without questioning who would be off and who would have to work. I saw opening stores on Sunday as a weakening of our communities and our social bonds.
Now this. Now it’s even harder for us to get together. Now fewer and fewer of us will know when we can be assured of “freedom” to be detached from work. Even those who are off still check emails, answer call, text their co-workers in order to not been seen a a slacker and run the risk of losing that job (been there lately, done that & doing it now).
If you watch Morning Joe, or similar programs, you’ll see advertisements for SHRM or Society for Human Resource Management. It touts itself as is “the leading provider of resources to serve the needs of HR professionals and advance the professional practice of human resource management.” As if human beings are akin to any other basic resource like electricity, packaging supplies, or some raw material like coal. They view humans as Tyson Foods views chickens, a resource for profit.
What’s happening today is just a continuation of the hammering of labor and the middle class. Will we ever fight back?
after 35 of non-union private sector exploitation — stagnant wages, shitty or no benefits, irregular work schedules — I left.
For the last 10 years I worked for a unionized state government agency. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. 🙂 The contrast was amazing — better work environment, supportive colleagues and supervisors, better pay, great benefits, annual performance reviews with raises, vacations, personal days, sick time and on and on.
It still mystifies me why only 10% of the workforce is unionized.
Fred Rich LaRiccia
I am not against the unions that exist, but I’ve come to the realization that unions are not the answer. The problem with unions is that they sat up an us versus them mentality. Then there is the problem of inflexibility. If I am a union worker and I drop my case of wine, creating a mess, I have to wait for the union custodian to mop it up. That’s his job, not mine. Mind you, I have been a member of a union and seen the up side and down sides.
What we need is an entirely new paradigm that does not have unions or management. There is a book I strongly suggest you all read. It’s The Citizen’s Share by Blasi, Freeman, and Kruse. It’s recommended by Thomas Picketty (Capital in the Twenty First Century)
In short, it advocates for stakeholders not shareholders. There is far too much information in the book to go over on one post here. The book does more than recommend, it traces the history of stakeholders, all the way back to Washington and Jefferson.
American workers need to have ownership in the means of the production of wealth, not just union workers who provide labor for the small class of those who own the means of production. No, this not socialism, it’s better understood as shared capitalism.
It is not unions that have an “us v them mentality” as you posit — it is American law that forces them into that mentality. When you look at German law, for example, it forces labor and management to work together in the goals of the company. The only way labor has to get gains from management is to oppose them, to sue them, etc. Were labor guaranteed a significant number of seats on a board of directors, that would change.
I know that the anti-labor side (not you, john), is casting about desperately for new buzzwords to cover their assault on working families. The right to work people cloak themselves in talk of worker freedom and involving all stakeholders, instead of special interests.
Unions are the answer. Working together is how you get things done — in a country, a workplace, or a family. No amount of “new thinking” changes that…it only distracts from the simple truth of an organized society.
Want a better life for you and your neighbors? Unionize.
I want the employees to own a percentage of the company they work for.
Check this out:
The John Lewis model and what others could learn from it
And this:
American Heart: Owner of Multi-Million Dollar Company Hands Over Business to Employees
Not to get too theological here, but there is a long time strain of Catholic Social Teaching around issues of solidarity and subsidiary that fall for cooperative ownership. Chesterton, Day, Merton and other luminaries backed it. Secular German economists incorporated it into the post-war planned social market economy called orodoliberalism. So in a way, the model sabutai and you both want comes from a similar origin.
It was quite frequent in the US in the plains states and Midwest. I am heartened that the fastest growing grocer in America is a cooperative based out of Idaho called WinCo that pays living wages and undercuts Wal-Mart on prices. Hoping to see more
flourish like that, and it’s something Artie T should consider. I think he’d much rather report to his employees than a board or shareholders.
This guy is brilliant.
in a country about to nominate an anti-union Trump Fascist for President.
Let’s get real people.
Fred Rich LaRiccia