Steve, Welcome to the Lake today.

Tula, Thank you for Hosting today’s Book Salon.

Hi, Everyone:

Please help me welcome Steve Greenhouse to talk about his book, The Big Squeeze.

It’s a great combo of hard data and personal stories that a longtime journalist like Steve does so well.

Steve:

Let’s start with an obvious question: Why did you title your book The Big Squeeze and what does the title tell us about what you’re trying to convey in it?

I first want to thank firedoglake — and Tula Connell — for hosting me in this salon. I am a big fan of firedoglake for sponsoring many intelligent discussions about so many issues.

Now to answer your question. For those not familiar with my book, I should briefly explain what this big shift is. This shift, this big squeeze, is that in many ways, things have grown considerably worse for American workers in recent decades. Wages have not kept up with prices, even as corporate profits and employee productivity have grown strongly. The two most important employee benefits — health insurance and pensions — have been growing steadily worse. All this points to a serious breakdown in the social contract of old in which corporations shared their prosperity with their workers, helping to build the world’s largest middle class.. According to the Census Bureau, median income for the typical working age household has fallen by nearly $2,500 since 2000, after factoring in inflation.

In another unhappy trend, job security has been shriveling as we see wave after wave of layoffs and downsizings. And at the same time that wages remain stagnant and benefits have grown worse, workers are being pressed to work harder and faster. As an example of this, I write in detail about a heroic hotel housekeeper in Chicago, Jackie Branson, who has to clean fourteen rooms a day. That’s the same number she had to clean a decade ago, even though there is far more to do in each room. There are now three sheets on a bed instead of two and five pillows on a bed instead of three. Now there’s a coffee maker and hairdryer that she has to clean. And all those nice Crabtree and Evelyn shampoos and soaps she has to put out. Jackie says her muscles ache so much from doing her job that she takes a Motrin 800 nearly every day.

Okay – so why this big shift?

There are many reasons that, taken together, are making things tougher for workers. Wall Street has put much more pressure on companies to maximize their stock price and their profits, and that in turns has caused many corporate executives to exert far pressure than before to cut costs, including labor costs. That has translated into a squeeze on wages and benefits.

A second factor is globalization. In the 1980s, globalization, in the form of imports, badly hurt blue-collar workers as waves of steel, auto, tire and electronics imports caused many factories to close and caused many companies to tell their workers, “We have to freeze wages and hold down benefits, if we’re going to remain competitive.” This decade, white-collar workers have also started to feel the sting of globalization as hundreds of thousands of jobs — in engineering, high technology, banking, architecture, accounting, finance — have been moved to India and other countries. Management warn white-collar workers that unless their companies can press down wages and benefits, then they will move jobs offshore.

Then there’s deregulation. Deregulation in many industries – trucking, airlines, banking and telecommunications – has led to far fiercer competition. As a result, many once-insulated companies have gone under and those that survive are fighting hard to remain competitive and that, too, translates into a squeeze on wages and benefits. Indeed, in many industries – whether it’s retailing or banking or auto manufacturing – companies are feeling far more competition than before and that is pressuring them to minimize labor costs.

Another reason for the squeeze is that unions are not nearly as powerful as before. Just 7.5 percent of the nation’s private sector workers are in unions – that’s about one-fifth the level a half century ago. Back in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, unions were far more powerful and were able to pressure companies to be more generous in sharing their profits and prosperity. Nowadays in many industries unions no longer have that power, and as a result, unions are not effective in pressuring companies to be more generous with their workers.

As part of their overall strategy to cut payrolls costs, many companies have grown far more aggressive in fighting to keep out unions – and many companies unfortunately break the law in fighting organizing drives, often by illegally firing the workers who had unionization drives. And the federal government — in the form of the National Labor Relations Board — is no longer as aggressive in protecting the rights of workers seeking to unionize.

Another factor is that managers at many corporations are just plaint tougher, sometimes even nastier, than before. It’s as if many companies like for tough-as-nails managers to make sure costs are cut to a bone.

Lastly, I don’t think society pays nearly as much attention to workers as it used to. Newspapers and television devote fewer reporters and energy to workplace issues. It seems that politicians largely ignore workplace issues except during the presidential primaries. In my view, workers have too often growninvisible. Society has often forgotten to pay attention to their problems and plight. And that has made it easier for many companies to squeeze their workers. It’s easier for companies to squeeze their employees when unions are weaker and when politicians, the news media and society are not paying much attention to how workers are faring.

I should also note that many of these factors were squeezing workers long before the recent economic downturn in which unemployment has jumped wages have fallen further and further behind inflation.

Steve: You note that employer attacks against unionization efforts are among the key factors putting The Big Squeeze on workers.

You’ve covered labor issues for many years at the New York Times. Have you seen an increase in the virulence or number of employer attacks against workers seeking to form unions?

Welcome Steve!

Ok folks, spread the word, Digg this post

Welcome Steve, and thanks Tula. I just want to note that, in Steve Greenhouse, the NY Times has one of the few remaining journalists in the U.S. assigned to the “labor beat.” And happily, the Times also has one of the best.

Despite Tula’s great introduction, in order to get the real flavor of the book — and the condition of workers in the US today — you need to read it. It’s full of depressing story after story — but also a few optimistic ones. But it’s hard to believe the conditions many Americans are asked to work under, and how those conditions remain hidden to most Americans.

So why did I called my book The Big Squeeze? I’ve been covering labor and workplace matters for the New York Times for more than a decade, and as I traveled around the country writing stories about what I saw happening to the nation’s workers, be they farm workers or Microsoft workers, I couldn’t help but see that things have grown tougher for workers — in many, many ways. As I said, wages have not kept up with inflation and benefits have grown worse. Then there’s been a squeeze on job security.

Second, I’ve seen many, many companies squeezing their workers by breaking the law — and I write a good deal about this. Managers at Wal-Mart making employees work off the clock. Managers at Toys R Us secretly erasing hours from workers’ time cards. At many companies, managers do the most dastardly things to immigrant workers — whether it’s paying them less than the minimum wage or not paying them overtime or, sad to say, sometimes taking sexual advantage of female workers.

A third thing I saw is that many companies and managers squeeze their workers by treating them with a shocking lack of respect. I think of the computer engineer who was laid off on the day he brought his eight-and-a-half-year old daughter in for Take Your Daughters to Work Day. I write about a software engineer just outside Seattle whose company told her that so long the company was doing well and so long as she worked hard, she would have a job. This engineer, Myra Bronstein, told me that she often worked 16-, 17-, 18-hour days. Then one day she and 17 other engineers were suddenly called into a meeting and were told they were being laid off — even though their company was doing very well. Making things worse, the human resources manager told Myra and the others that if they wanted to receive any severance pay they had to agree to spend the next four weeks training the workers from India who were being flown in to replace them. Myra said the workers were left shocked and speechless.

All this amounts to a squeeze, a very big one — in how workers are paid and in how they are treated.

Steve: Why is it that newspapers don’t devote more time to worker issues? These are life and death, make-it-or break it issues to most people in the US. David Barstow at your paper even won a Pullitzer for his workplace safety series. Seems like it’s just what the American people need to hear. So what gives?

Welcome Steve to the Lake.

Have not yet read your book but will not miss it. I have often wondered if this “diminishing” of the social contract is, in part, tied to the relatively recent ubiquity of the MBA.

There are now legions of analysts and number crunchers who can manipulate the financials to “say” whatever management desires. Mgmt. can then approach unions with said figures and can count 1) union leaders not having access to the raw data, 2) supposedly not understanding the numbers, as presented.

As an example, investment banks and private equity firms would never adequately explain their fee structures and debt arrangements to the employees of a company that’s being bought. It’s all about the stock price, the deal and subsequent asset selloffs, not the product and the company’s longterm viability.

My favorite stat of the last few years is the multiplier of the highest to lowest paid in a company (and board pay).
That’s showing how far we’ve moved in terms of who “adds value”.

Is there any way to highlight/address this shift?

Steven, in your research, what do you find as the views of most workers towards the Employee Free Choice Act?

Do the views differ significantly in the various regions?

What about the white collar types? Are they softening their attitudes toward unions now that out-sourcing is happening on such a large scale? (Not that out-sourcing wasn’t happening before, it was “just” the blue collar jobs going overseas)

(Note: I do tend to have mixed emotions when I see the factory workers in areas of the South complaining about the jobs going away as I don’t recall them being overly sympathetic when the jobs first came into the South out of the unionized North and northeast)

Tula,

There’s a huge amount of employer virulence against unions, but I’m not sure whether I’m prepared to say that there has been an increase in the past few years. Labor relations experts who have written extensively on this, have found that the increase in virulence came in the 1980s and continued in the 1990s and this decade. My sense is from the 1950s through 1970s, American companies may have disliked unions, but they realized that they had to live with them.

But beginning in the 1980s, there was a real shift in attitude and many corporations concluded that they saw no reason to put up with unions. Indeed, many companies began fighting tooth and nail to keep out unions. And that was when we saw a real increase in corporate illegalities in fighting unions.

Some labor historians date this change in employer attitude to 1981 when President Reagan fired 11,000 air traffic controllers after they began their illegal strike. President Reagan took another unusual step — he used thousands of permanent replacement workers to keep the airports running. Those moves, many historians say, emboldened corporate America to get far more aggressive — and to use your word, Tula, virulent — in fighting unions.

After 1981, many well-known companies — Greyhound, Phelps Dodge, Louisiana-Pacific — embraced the strategy of using permanent replacement workers to defeat strikes.

At the same time companies began using far more aggressive tactics to stop organizing drives. The whole union busting industry began to grow and flourish.

I describe such aggressive, even illegal, tactics in writing about a young mother of two named Kathy Saumier who worked in a plastics factory in upstate New York. At that factory, 4 of the 190 production workers had fingers amputated over a 13-month period. Not only that, there was horrendous sexual discrimination and harassment at the plant. Nineteen of the 20 top jobs on the factory flor — machine technicians — were held by men. Nearly 95 percent of the lowest-level, lowest-paying jobs, machine tender — were held by women. Kathy Saumier filed a safety complaint with OSHA and a sexual discrimination complaint with the EEOC. She also headed a unionization drive at the plant.

But the company took all the wind out of the organizing drive by illegally firing Kathy, who was the most active, most courageous worker at the plant. The company accused her of pulling down the pants of two male workers and touching them improperly. Later, both a federal district court judge and an NLRB judge ruled that the company had fired Kathy illegally — and had concocted that story of sexual mischief just to get rid of the worker who was most courageous in standing up to management in leading a unionization effort. Companies know that one of the best ways to kill a unionization drive is to fire workers like Kathy Saumier.

In my years of writing about workplace matters, I have come upon dozens and dozens of companies that have broken the law in seeking to keep out unions. Not just by firing union supporters like Kathy Saumier, but by threatening to close the plantif a union is voted in or by barring union suppoters from even talking to other workers. Companies are very creating in finding ways — often illegal ones — in fighting to defeat unions.

Steven:

Can you explain the general disdain that Americans seem to have for “workers”? It’s almost as though there is a double-standard: I am not a worker, even though I work. Those people are workers, but they are not like me, even though we both work. I deserve respect because I am me; they deserve no respect because they are only workers.

In a nation filled with people who are supposed to be the philosophical descendants of Puritans, where did this come from?

I fear that unions and EFCA (Employee Free Choice Act) are getting swiftboated, claiming that secret ballot elections somehow automatically translate into “free and fair” elections. And the op-ed opposing EFCA by George McGovern (!?) in the Wall St. Journal last week didn’t help.

More on EFCA at Firdoglake here and here.

hi Steven–

what role has privitization of prisons, schools, roads, civil service nad military jobs played in breaking up unions?

Hi, Jordan. In responding to comment number 9.

I feel sad that as far as I can tell only two daily newspapers still have fulltime labor and workplace correspondents: the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. I’m puzzled as to why so many papers have stopped assigning someone to cover workplace matters. Many newspapers have 10 or 20 business reporters, but no one to cover the nation’s 145 million workers. In my view, there are thousands of good and important stories to write about the nation’s workers — whether it’s stagnating wages or sexual harassment or safety problems at the nation’s coal mines. And as the Pulitzer that David Barstow won shows, there are a whole lot of important, even prize-winning stories out there about the nation’s workplaces.

I remember once seeing a front page of the New York Times from the late 1940s in which there were six — count them six — labor-related stories on the front page. Back then labor unions were more powerful and were making more news. So I think the decline in the power and aggressiveness of unions is one reason for the decline in the number of workplace reporters.

Unfortunately most of the nation’s newspapers are cutting staff across the board, and one result of that is that some top editors who saw the labor beat as not terribly important saw little reason to preserve that beat when they were cutting their newsroom by 20 or 40 or 80 or 100 bodies.

Some friends tell me they think another reason that many newspapers no longer have a labor and workplace reporter is a corporate mentality that someone who writes about those matters is going to stir things up and focus on issues that are sympathetic to workers and not so sympathetic to corporations. I can’t say that I’ve seen that. Maybe that’s true at some media companies, but I haven’t seen it. What I do think is happening is there are some up-and-coming editors in their 30s and 40s who know very little about unions and care very little about unions. They think unions are largely irrelevant, and they see little reason to devote a body in the newsroom to cover labor and workplace matters.

I think another reason that newspapers have fewer workplace reporters is that labor unions and worker advocacy groups have not done a terribly good job pushing worker issues to the center of national discussion. Not only have they not done enough to get the news media to focus on worker issues, but they haven’t done enough to get politicians, religious leaders, society, etc to focus on those issues. If politicians and society were to focus more on worker issues, then I believe newspapers would more readily assign reporters to cover the workplace beat.

Yeah, I’m a McGovernite from long ago and that one bothered me. Although I did see someone pointing that organized labor in ‘72 tended to be fairly virulently anti-McGovern so it could just be a short-sighted case of really cold revenge.

McGovern’s WSJ article is unfortunate, but apparently fueled by money.

The worker advocacy group American Rights at Work has uncovered an unfortunate reason why McGovern wrote that article: He’s a front guy for lobbyist Rick Berman, the leader of a $30 million front group interfering in key Senate and House races this cycle.
http://blog.aflcio.org/2008/07…..ee-choice/

McGovern sits on the board of FirstJobs, another Berman initiative and front group, alongside DOL head Elaine Chao, and the head of Sam’s Club: http://www.firstjobs.org/participants.cfm

And in 2006, right when Berman started his purposely-misnamed “Center for Union Facts,” McGovern took to the LA Times op-ed page to both bash unions and the multiple anti-Wal-Mart intiatives in full swing at the time:

http://articles.latimes.com/20…..mcgovern22

Isn’t there some irony to that? I think some of the most anti-union newspapers in the country have reasonably strong chapters of the Newspaper Guild.

Or do the reporters and editors just not see the connection between the guild and the rest of the working world?

Coming back to the issue of labor and the media, what can bloggers, labor and other activists do to encourage the nation’s media to do a better job of covering labor issues?

Looks like a must, must read.

Responding to diablesseblu, comment 10

Thanks for your kind words. I think the rise of the MBA, per se, is not a reason for the decline of the social contract, but you’re on to something. As many Americans increasingly see themselves as more individualistic, more independent, more entrepreneurial — and what better symbol of that than the ubiquity of the MBA — those Americans see less and less need for the social contract (or for labor unions). These more entrepreneurial-minded Americans are convinced that they will build their own brilliant careers and pull themselves up by their own bootstraps and will get their health coverage and pensions on their own — and don’t need a safety net if they fall. They’re proud and independent — they’re MBA’s — and they’ll take care of themselves.

One thing that’s been happening since the waves of white-collar downsizing in the 1990s and the waves of white-collar offshorings tihs decade is that many MBAs and engineers who thought they would build foolproof careers for themselves have ended up getting laid off and they have discovered how hard life is when the social contract and safety net are disintegrating. And that of course is especially hard when one is laid off when one has kids.

Part of the MBA and business school mentality is that financial risk is good — and that workers should fend for themselves, should be independent– and should not rely on their companies for health insurance and pensions and other parts of the social contract. I think more and more workers are seeing that those assertions are highly problematical — and leave workers and their families high and dry when workers get laid off.

I have a whole chapter about the rise and fall of the social contract. And I explain that one of the main reasons is that we have become a more individualistic, more entrepreneurial populace where there has been less of a sense of social solidarity. I think the sense of social solidarity — and the importance of re-establishing a safety net — has been growing in recent years because the massive waves of layoffs, the fast-rising number of Americans without health insurance, the soaring number of foreclosures, and the fact that many Americans are discovering that their 401(k)s are a poor substitute for the solid pensions of old. For millions of Americans 401(k)s are going to mean retirement insecurity instead of retirement security.

Even with the ubiquity of MBA’s, Americans want less financial risk in their life, not more.

Exploitation is not just from corporation toward their workers, it’s employers of every stripe, including professionals, architects, engineers, contractors, mom and pops. Workers are getting the shaft and the shift!

Professionals don’t want employees when they can get them as “independent contractors” who do exactly the same work, in their offices, with NO BENEFITS or ANY INSURANCE protection. It’s illegal too, but you don’t see any engineers, lawyers or architects on the hot seat. It’s a common as sliced bread.

Responding to dakine01 (comment 11)

In truth, I think that most workers do not have an opinion of the Employee Free Choice Act. I think most workers have no idea what the act is. What I’ve found in my reporting is that union members who have been educated about the act by their unions are generally very supportive of the act. These workers understand how hard it is to unionize when unionization elections are held and companies bring in high-paid anti-union consultants, make many threats and often fire the leaders of unionization drives.

My sense is that the union movement and the backers of the Employee Free Choice Act still have a long way to go in educating workers — union and nonunion — about the act. What the labor movement has done very well, however, is convince Democrats in the House and Senate about the importance of the act and how enacting the Employee Free Choice Act will make it far easier for workers to unionize. That should make the union movement stronger — and the Democrats realize that a stronger labor movement could well make the Democrats stronger.

Capital, whether corporate or just “the boss” has been waging war on the workers and winning handily. They squeeze productivity out, increase profits, use almost “free” interns (and free in some cases)… even importing them from off shore to work in their offices.

It’s greed… plain and simple.

I tried to contact “professional worker unions” about workplace abuses and they never called back. hmmmm

Responding to dmac (comment 15)

I think privatization of schools, prisons and other government activities has definitely undercut unions. How much is hard to tell. Unions have been having a hard time growing for decades now. They’ve been stuck around 16 million members for the past half century even though polls show that 53 percent of workers say they would vote to join a union tomorrow if they could.

With unions weak and on the defensive, privatization is a strategy that many government bodies are using in part to save money, in part to weaken unions.

Welcome Steve — great discussion. I was wondering whether you think the McCain proposal to change the tax treatment of employer-paid health premiums, making them income for workers, is receiving the attention it deserves. This is a pretty huge change, even if you assume the tax credit payoff works as they claim. Do you think this will make the “squeeze” even worse?

For too many people “union” is a dirty world… like socialism.

No irony at all.

If you were a publisher who was not pleased with having to deal with relatively strong unions, you might make those feelings known to the editor. “Sorry, but we don’t have the money for a labor reporter any more. But say, if you want a new sports guy, we can find the money to do that . . .”

I may have to deal with you unions to get my paper out, says the publisher, but I don’t have help you guys get your message out to the world. You want to buy an ad in my paper? Great. Just don’t ask me to pay for letting you spread your unionism gospe.

S. Greenhouse @ 22 said:

“I have a whole chapter about the rise and fall of the social contract. And I explain that one of the main reasons is that we have become a more individualistic, more entrepreneurial populace where there has been less of a sense of social solidarity.”

So, where, precisely, is all this individualistic entrepreneurialism that hates social solidarity so much coming from?

.

Responding to Jordan Barab (comment 20)

When I give book talks around the country, I have often been asked a question like the following: “How can we get labor or workplace stories in a newspaper when the paper no longer has a workplace reporter?” Excellent question.

I believe that newspapers (and broadcast folks and Web sites) all like a good story. No editor wants to miss a good story. So if you have a good story — whether you’re a blogger or a spokesman for a worker advocacy group or a union — you should approach an editor with it, perhaps your local paper’s Metro editor or Business editor. Maybe even the career columnist. Or maybe there’s a retirement advice columnist.

I personally prefer when someone tells me of a story by email rather by a phone call out of the blue. And if you’re trying to persuade an editor who is extremely busy and doesn’t know much about workplace issues to assign a story about workplace issues, it is very important to expalain why this is a good (and important) story. And it is important to do so succinctly. In an age when many newsrooms have been downsized and many reporters are feeling overstretched, reporters (and editors) might more readily do a story if you can point them to individual workers to interview (with phone numbers). And if the story you’re proposing involves immigrant workers, then tell the reporter if you have someone who can help with translation.

The bottom line is editors and reporters like good stories. They don’t want to miss good stories. Bloggers and workers advocates may have to serve as the means to connect reporters and editors to good labor-related stories.

I should add that if you inundate a reporter or editor with dozens of so-so or worse ideas, then that reporter or editor might stop taking your ideas seriously. It’s important to be selective in presenting story ideas to reporters and editors. And if you build up a track record, if you build up credibility on the first story you offer, then the editor or reporter will be that much more willing to hear you out the second time around.

I pray this doesn’t sound arrogant. I’m trying to be helpful here.

And notice that McCain slipped in a hit on the “secret ballot” diversion while responding to an “values” question in last night’s “debate.” It was a gratuitous shot unrelated to the question.

Steve:
You give some examples in your book of companies that do right by their employees. What’s in it for them if they pay their workers more and treat them well?

It doesn’t sound arrogant at all — just good, common sense PR.

I know a lot of non-profits that try to get the word out about their activities and issues, and your explanation and advice hits it right on the head.

One other piece I’d add to what you said, though: spelling and grammar count. When you deal with word people like editors and reporters, take the time to craft your pitch well. The harder they have to work just to see what you are talking about, the less likely they are to make the effort to do so.

The exammples you cite all look like “unfair labor practices” that would should be brought before the NLRB, but we see almost no stories on the Board. I assume that it’s been stacked, like all other reglatory agencies, and is actively undermining the laws and people it’s suppposed to protect. How do these officials manage to stay out of the headlines?

Responding to RossK, comment 32

You ask, Where does all this individualistic entrepeneuralism come from?

Entrepreneurship is of course one of the things that has made the United States one of the most prosperous nations on earth. And when entrepreneurs shared their prosperity with their workers that helped create the world’s largest, biggest middle class and a strong social safety net. For decades, the United States seemed to balance entrepeneurship and social solidarity — entrepreneurship helped ensure that corporations thrived and the economy grew, while social solidarity helped ensure that the fruits of economic growth were shared at least halfway fairly.

In recent years, we’ve seen entrepeneurship grow and social solidarity sag. In my view, as the nation grew far wealthier in the 1960s and 1970s, more Americans grew more individualistic, independent-minded and entrepeneurial. (Not just pot smoking and Jimi Hendrix, but independent-minded MBAs and software developers) The software revolution made it easier for people to be entrepreneurial. You could start your own business with a laptop, some software and a cell phone. Many young Americans idolize Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and the founders of Google — and they want to be entrepeneurs, too. And corporate America has spent a lot of money promoting the notion that the U.S. is — and should be — an entrepeneurial nation in which there should be less regulation and less taxes that get in the way of entrepeneurship.

If union leaders had a track record that was half as successful as Bill Gates’s track record, many more people would be flocking to join unions.

Mr. Greenhouse:
Why don’t more unions, and people in general, use Henry Ford’s words against the big corporations. His idea of paying people enough to afford to buy the cars they made. Whatever happened to that?

Being a union member is not a guarantee of living wages. ALPA does little to nothing to help First Officers at Regional Airlines get a living wage. They are pretty dedicated to helping the legacy airlines like Delta and USAir, but the regionals, not so much. When I was a new F/O, there was little to no protection afforded me by the union.

An average First Officer (co-pilot) makes about $22/hour for a each hour of flying not each hour “on duty” which works out to about $300/week after taxes and other deductions if they fly their “guarantee” of 70 or so hours a month. Additionally, first-year F/Os are considerd “probationary” by ALPA and afforded only minimal union support for issues they might face and be supported on by the union (work rules issues, sick leave, pay issues or a filed grievance (best of luck with that)). Having been there and done that, I am an ALPA supporter, but would feel better about them if they would support all members and not just those that they decide that they should.

Unions? Absolutley. Unions that support all their members? Emphatically.

The trouble with this argument is that entreprenuers with ideas ultimately need workers to make their products and so this does nothing for the vast majority of people who are workers not management or entrepreneurs. You may have more entrepreneurs in the USofA but we also have workers who have been left behind by the entrepreneurs who just want to make it big and could care less for workers.

Since wealth is being concentrated in the hands of a few, we have a system which exploits workers… end of story.

Greed has no bounds here as anywhere.

Haven’t read your book, but I have a few questions. I’m Canadian, so the environment here is slightly different, but not that different.

Why do employees have such opposition to unions in general? I don’t think it is merely fear of losing their jobs. It seems as if people feel employers have the right to prevent unionization at the workplace if they see fit. Also, unions don’t have a good reputation – internal corruption, goals opposed to workers goals, secret negotiations with management, etc.

Young employees have minimal loyalty to their employers these days, understandably so. Is this a positive or negative development? Should employees have some loyalty to the employer which is extra-contractual? I guess I’m asking, should there be an assumption of good will between employer and employee w.r.t their relationship at the workplace?

It seems to me when companies fail or close or relocate that employee pensions are especially vulnerable. Any comments on responsibilities of corporations in this type of situation?

easy: globalizaion.
Companies don’ need o sell produs loally anymore, so wy pay employees more an you absoluly mus.
Hmm- 2 of my keys seem o be non-working! Sorry, sorry

Responding to Tula (comment 35)

In my book, I write in detail about many unfortunate things that prominent corporations do. I write about how Hewlett Packard has some employees working as temps for a full 10 years. I write about how some Wal-Mart stores locked in workers. I write about the miserable conditions that some Latino workers faced at the giant Smithfield pork-processing plant in North Carolina.

But I also thought it’s important to write about — and praise — companies that are doing the right thing for their workers. Some companies are nasty to their workers, but some are so good that it makes me smile. I think of Patagonia, which each year pays for 40 of its employees to take paid two-month internships with the environmental organization of their choice. Patagonia even encourages its workers to take a two-hour break at lunchtime to go surfing in the Pacific, just 150 yards from headquarters. Patagonia trust its employees to get all the work done even if htey go surfing.

In writing about Costco, I was delighted to find out that when Costco surveyed its workers and asked them what was the thing they disliked most about their job, their No. 1 complaint was that Costco did not allow them to wear shorts to work year-round. (Costco has since changed that rule.) Imagine if that were the No. 1 complaint at every company across the nation. The U.S. would be workplace heaven.

In my chapter on companies that do the right thing, I explain that there are many advantages for those companies, their shareholders, their managers and, of course, their workers. The companies say that when they treat their workers well (and pay them well), the workers work harder and stay longer. Jim Sinegal, Costco’s CEO, told me that Costco’s workers provide better service to customers because they feel better about their jobs and the company they work for. The head of the MGM Grand in Las Vegas told me the exact same thing — a casino hotel relies on making its guests happy, and the MGM Grand and many other casino hotels in Vegas realize that unless they treat their workers well, their workers are likely to be grumpy and their hotel guests will see that — and if the guests see that, then they might decide to stay at another hotel the next time.

Executives at numerous companies told me that treating their workers well reduces turnover. That means companies don’t need to hire as many new workers and don’t need to train as many new workers. That saves money. As I explain in writing about a wonderful homecare agency in the Bronx that has far less turnover than most agencies, an experienced homecare worker is more likely than an inexperienced worker to know how to treat a patient suffering an epileptic attack.

At Wal-Mart, not known for good wages or benefits, workers typically leave less than two years. At Costco, known for excellent wages and benefits, those workers who remain more than a year, typically stay for 17 years. Experienced employees should know their way around the store better than new employees — and in theory can stock shelves faster.

One surprise for me was what happened with Costco. Many Wall Street analysts complained that Costco’s wages were too high and its health care benefits generous. Despite those complaints, Costco’s share price to earnings ratio was better than of many other retailers. One Wall Street analyst told me he thought this was the case because many investors and consumers believe in Costco, see it as a good company and are eager to invest in it.

Lastly, of course, if you were managaing a company with 1,000 or 100,000 workers, would you sleep better if you knew you were treating your workers well or not well?

re: the rise of neoentrepreneurialism…..

Very interesting Steven (thanks for your response @ 38).

So, if I understand correctly, it seems that you are suggesting that it was initially an organic process fueled by the successes of products of the great social contract/experiment (eg. Jobs, Gates, Woz and the corporate-financed innovators at PARC/Xerox) that was later exploited by corporate promoters of deregulation and lower taxes?

If that’s the case it looks like the forerunner of Thomas Franks’ Kansas – only in this case it started happening 20 years earlier in Berkeley and Palo Alto.

Regardless, if we take this as a given, when did the political exploitation of the rise of the NeoEnts begin (ie. was it before or after the corporate promoters began the big push)?

.

When “America” realizes that they are the worker bees (i.e., glorified slaves for the corporations who are leaving them behind for foreign soil and/or staying here and paying the very least they can for enormous profit)….and when they really recognize that they are being ripped off by so-called “society” or the 1 or 2% of what is actual wealth…there will be a very rude awakening..shizzola will hit the fan. The only way this country can actually survive is for it to become a social democracy of some kind….otherwise, we’re on the way back to the stone age.

Too bad the kids are getting so dumbed down that they can’t point to where Iraq is on the map…nevermind even Illinois…

capitalism is the new feudalism… or even slavery in any cases. Corporation = plantation.

Costco and Patagonia are a drop in the bucket.

I have a friend in Norway. She makes about $80,000 a year. She is a train conductor. All of her healthcare is paid for. She lives in a great apartment. Drives a great car. Yeah, she’s pays a bunch of taxes, but dayem….she has a great life and still has plenty after taxes.

Oh, yeah, and has six weeks vacation per year…at least.

To bad it’s so cold over there in the winter…

Steve, Thank you for stopping by the Lake today and spending the afternoon discussion your book.

Tula, Thank you for Hosting this great Book Salon.

Everyone,if you haven’t bought this excellent book, there is a link above.

Thanks you all.

Responding to xebecs (Comment 13)

You ask an excellent question, why do many Americans feel disdain for workers. A fact of life is that many Americans have encountered workers who were impolite (perhaps a train conductor) or did not return the right change. And many Americans blame auto workers if there are problems with the Chevvies or Fords they drive.

Many workers must wish that there was some countervailing force in society that would help convince Americans the many, many times that American workers do a great job. Sometimes there is such a countervailing force — hailing fire fighters for doing a great job, or the heroic workers who responded to the 9/11 attacks or construction workers who work on high rise buildings or the lifeguard who saves a four-year-old from drowning.
But my sense is many corporations have been successful during labor negotiations in depicting workers as greedy, as wanting too much. And I think that labor unions often don’t do as good a job in explaining how hard many workers have it.

You make a legitimate point that there is a Puritan streak in us, that might make us think that that person over there, that worker over there, isn’t doing his or her best, isn’t measuring up, is trying to pull a fast one. That gets back to what I described as the decline of social solidarity in the U.S.

One reason I wrote The Big Squeeze is to show how hard it is for millions of American workers — and how in many way things are getting harder for millions of workers I write about hotel housekeepers, meat-packing workers, call-center workers, security guards, janitors, software engineers, bank employees. One of my main themes is that if more Americans saw how hard workers work and saw how arduous their lives (and worklives) are, they would feel more sympathy and maybe, just maybe, American corporations would stop squeezing their workers so hard.

Not many Norwegian millionaires or billionaires or huge corporations… eh?

There are plenty of both….but they have a much better structure.

not a snowball’s chance in hell.

I work for one of the worst of the pharmacy chains when it comes to bargaining with a union. I pretty much live your Big Squeeze, Mr Greenhouse. I make under 10$ an hour and i’m a nationally Certified Pharmacy Technician. The UFCW is the union, but they also know that bargaining with this particular chain is like pulling teeth. We won’t see our union contract renewed until October. For now we’re just coasting on what was given in the last year of the contract.

I wish more of the workers would actually speak up and support the union to get them higher wages. Unfortunately the turnover is insanely quick in most of the stores. Aside from the older pharm techs, they can’t keep cashiers much at all. I was hired in as a pharmacy cashier and the nasty trick they played on me was to keep me at cashier wages even though i haven’t been a cashier for well over 2 years and running now.

Still looking for a better employer, but that’s just one example that i’m sure you’ve got paralleled somewhere in your book, i’d bet.

here’s how this discussion needs to be framed;

“when industry or any company pays so little a family man has to use public assistance in providing healthy food for their wife and kids, that industry is stealing from me because I am the one paying that public assistance bill, I am and you are.

when an industry pays so little the laborers can’t afford health care, then when that persons kid goes to the emergency room to fix his arm, I pay that bill and that is stealing

when industry pays so little a man goes bankrupt if his wife gets sick, I am the one paying that bill, me and you and that’s stealing”

bing

a business has an obligation to pay it’s own bills, it cannot defer the expenses of their labor force to you and me, that’s stealing and that’s the way this discussion needs to be framed if we are to win the war if words

Tula, Jordan and other questioners.

Thanks for all the intelligent (and provocative) questions and comments.

I’m terribly sorry that I couldn’t answer every comment and question. I can’t remember when I ever typed so many words ove a two-hour stretch.

For those who want more information on my book, I invite you to look at my web site stevengreenhouse.com There’s a pdf of my first chapter

Keep up the great work.

Let’s all hope for an end to The Big Squeeze

JoFish is upstairs!
Losing their Majority

Just a passing thought – It seems to this old pothead, that too many would-be CEOs and other wanna-be’s, could not separate fiction from reality and gleefully embraced the famous Gordon Gekko “Greed is Good” speech from the motion picture “Wall Street”

Someone needs to send a memo: “It was just a fucking movie!”

Hear, Here!!

Just to raise an issue that will be unpopular, but must be considered if we are to find a real solution.

I employ people in construction & forestry.

If I hire an American citizen with a take home pay of $10 per hour I pay $30 per hour– after withholdings workman’s comp and a $5/hour allowance for lawsuits.

If I hire an illegal, for $10/hour I pay $12/ hour. They won’t sue or claim benefits.

I’m not willing to take that route so I did away with employees & contract everything out. But the end result isn’t much different.

Until employers are penalized for employing illegals, those of us who would like to employ citizens can’t.

If I hire an American citizen with a take home pay of $10 per hour I pay $30 per hour– after withholdings workman’s comp and a $5/hour allowance for lawsuits.

the solution to undocumented workers in this country is simple and doesn’t cost a penny;

jail employers who don’t document their workers

bing, problem solved

Until employers are penalized for employing illegals, those of us who would like to employ citizens can’t.

I guess I just repeated your point in my 62, sorry