Sociologist: Job Insecurity Is the New Normal

Mr.Intel writes: Allison Pugh, professor of Sociology at University of Virginia, and author of The Tumbleweed Society: Working and Caring in an Age of Insecurity, says workers in the U.S. are caught up in a "one-way honor system," in which workers are beholden to employers. She says that the golden era when Americans could get a job, keep it, and expect to retire with an adequate pension are over. JP Morgan Chase has cut 20,000 from its workforce in the past 5 years, last year HP cut 34,000 jobs, and many others have announced layoffs. In this interview Pugh talks about the social effects of this "insecurity culture."

Comments

And it all comes down to greed

[gweilo8888]

Consumers want more product for less money: Greedy.

Companies want higher profit margins off their products: Greedy.

Investors want higher returns on investment: Greedy.

Upper management sees that there is no way to fulfil all of the above and still give themselves huge pay rises without laying off half the riff-raff and making the other half work twice as hard for half as much: Greedy

Cue ever-decreasing circle as consumers earn less and want even more for it, in the hope of compensating for their shrinking earnings, thus repeating the circle. No single tier here is to blame; we ALL are in a more abstract manner. The blame lies squarely with basic human nature and the words "I want".

Re:And it all comes down to greed

[Anonymous Coward]

When you bought that TV from China, you voted with your money that their workers are better than domestic ones.

When you bought that foreign car, you voted with your money that auto workers in that country are better than domestic ones.

When you bought imported food because it is cheap, you voted that local farms are worthless compared to whatever fillers get tossed in the food.

When you bought at Amazon or Wal-Mart instead of paying a little more at a nearby grocery store, you voted for the race to the bottom in wages.

When you voted for a pro-immigration President and Congress because they would "stimulate the economy" with "free trade" treaties, you opened the floodgates for people to come in and take your job solely because they will work for less.

Only got yourself to blame, bub.

Re:And it all comes down to greed

[diamondmagic]

No rule of law is Somalia.

Total authoritarian rule is North Korea.

The middle is Capitalism: It proscribes rule of law, things like ownership of resources, voluntary exchange, don't take other people's stuff, enforcement of contracts, and presumes the existence of a justice system.

There's no reason to believe that "rah, rah, [middle of the road] free market capitalism" will lead you to Somalia: Right now it seems to be doing a pretty good job of leading us to corporatism, and at the extreme this becomes fascism.

Re:And it all comes down to greed

[Anonymous Coward]

>

For instance, UBER is a great capitalist solution to the problem of transportation, requiring no new infrastructure. Eventually some regulation will be required to make it safer, but it's a great working solution.

What about maintaining the broken infrastructure that already exists? UBER doesn't pay for the roads, yet it makes a profit off the public commons. And don't tell me that UBER drivers are paying their fair share to maintain the roads either. It's just another case of socializing the cost of a business and privatizing the profits.

Re:And it all comes down to greed

[ultranova]

Only got yourself to blame, bub.

Only if you aren't familiar with the concept of false consciousness. Your job got shipped overseas, so now you can only afford imported goods. You voted for a candidate because there's only two choices and the other is outright insane. You didn't have a choice and thus are not to blame.

Simply admit you fell for the lies of a conman, join your local labour union or comparable organization, and push it ever leftward. The only thing the system wants or needs from you is your support, overt or silent, so refuse to give it unless you get something in return, besides dreams of making it rich and getting to be the oppressor yourself.

Was just talking about this today

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been working for 25 years to try and beat this system. I hate it. I hate that I can take a corporate job where I'm told what kind of pants to wear, what angle to sit at in my seat, and be given more work than a person can complete in a reasonable timeframe, complete it anyway, and be given even more as a "reward". Alternatively, I can go work for a startup where I have more flexibility, but less security. My "solution" has been to live cheaply. I live in a small paid-off house. I drive paid-off cars. I owe no one any money. I have a few hundred thousand dollars in the bank. I am occasionally tempted to tell the nasty little bastard I work for to go fuck himself, but I haven't given into the temptation. Knowing that I could helps a bit. The thing I hate about it is that it all seems so unnecessary.

Two way street

[paiute]

Some decades ago, the multinational I worked for was all excited to get us to work like the Japanese, who were so gungho that they gathered before work to sing the company song. We responded that we would gladly do that in return for guaranteed lifetime job security. (Crickets.)

That's lovely

[rsilvergun]

Now where do I start? 1. The "Luxuries" you speak of are pretty much Cell Phones, cable tv / Internet and eating out once a week. These are a drop in the bucket next to the cost of a car/house/college education. Get rid of all the luxuries you want, it won't make up for the 40 years of declining wages while productivity has more or less doubled.

2. I like this one: "learn a practical skill". Reminds me of a neighbor of mine who'd been to night school 3 times and each time seen her new career outsourced. What you really means is "Somehow develop a significantly higher IQ as if by magic so you can get the STEM degree that you couldn't get when you were 18".

3. The working class doesn't get to pick where they live. It's expensive as hell to up and move. You live where you're born and hope for the best. If people could just move somewhere that's better there'd be no 3rd world countries.

4. See Point # 1.

5. See this. Specifically the chorus ("Turning 30, 40, 50 gotta move in with my Parents...").

Fuck the American Dream. It's a bill of goods we've all been sold.

New norm??

[Taco Cowboy]

I arrived at America in the 1970's, and immediately plunged into the job market (Chinatown) because I practically had no money with me

After schooling and so on (paid for with the slave wages I got from working in Chinatown and other places) I 'upgraded' my career into research institutions

After that I was (repeatedly) head-hunted and ended up working in a string of tech companies

None of the places I worked had any of the 'job security' clause in the agreement - and in fact, more than one time I've seen long-time employees being escorted by security guards out of the building, with only an envelop with the pink-slip inside and a cardboard carton of personal belongings cleansed out of the cubicle of that employee

I do not know where the that 'sociologist' got his 'new norm" from, but in the good ol' U. S. of A., I never had any sense of 'job security' since 1970's, at least not until I started my own businesses

Unlike research papers dealing with real science, many of the 'research reports' from those 'sociologists' make no freaking sense whatsoever

Re:Troll

[PopeRatzo]

I've been to Soviet Russia (Stalingrad (now St. Petersberg)) and lived in it personally, first hand.` Have you?

I've been to, and lived in, and have worked in Britain, Finland and France. Have you? Hell, I was even there long enough to have experienced their health care system after I got a wisdom tooth removed in Helsinki. Cost me $25 (which the dentist wouldn't take because he said it had been a pleasure to practice English with me).

So, if you want to talk about "socialism" with me, you can bring your "Soviet Russia" to the parks and see if the squirrels want it, because nobody's buying here. My experience with socialism is a whole hell of a lot more germane than your "Soviet Russia".

And yes, I have been to St Petersberg. In fact, I've got a picture of my wife and I in front of The Hermitage right over my left (your right) shoulder. It was taken on an August day six years ago. My wife was there for a Mathematics conference and I was her plus one.

Re:Insecurity culture....

[im_thatoneguy]

One thing I've noticed too is that when they try to transition from a well cared for workforce to one in which the company essentially says "Work hard, but be ready to get fired at any moment" suddenly a lot of costs start adding up for the company. Suddenly people who might have clocked out for lunch before now start 'working' at their desk. People who would even buy supplies from time to time in order to keep working would just sit idly doing nothing if they didn't have everything they needed waiting on the company to provide everything. Someone who might not have religiously used all of their sick days now uses up every paid sick day available because their throat tickles. Oh and all of those employees you used to classify as independent contractors, a few of them just filed paperwork asking the IRS for guidance on their status. The company now owes 5 years of back taxes on 15% of their payroll. Goodbye last 5 years of profits.

When you become a stickler for rules as an employer you'll suddenly discover that your employees are also really good at finding rules that benefit them.

Re:Then make the "aberration" return.

[TheRaven64]

It varies a bit depending on the relative scarcity of your skills and jobs. For someone with skills in shortage, job security isn't that great a thing, as moving jobs will typically involve a pay rise. For someone with fewer options, it's much more important because there's going to be a gap between jobs and they're not in a position to negotiate a better package. Unions were supposed to redress some of this imbalance: an individual employee may be easily replaceable for a lot of companies, but the entire workforce (or even a third of the workforce) probably isn't.

Unfortunately, unions in the USA managed to becomes completely self-interested and corrupt institutions. This is partly due to lack of competition: in most of the rest of the world you have a choice of at least a couple of unions to join, so if your union isn't representing your interests you can switch to another one. Partly due to the ties between unions and organised crime in the USA coming out of the prohibition era. Partly due to the demonisation of anything vaguely socialist during the Cold War, which reduced employee involvement in unions (and if most people aren't involved in the union, then the few that are have disproportionate influence).

Even this has been somewhat eroded by automation. If you're replacing 1,000 employees with robots and 100 workers, then a union's threat to have 600 people go on strike doesn't mean much and even when it does it's very hard to persuade those 600 that striking won't mean that they're moved to the top of the to-be-redundant list.

But, back to my original point: lack of jobs for life isn't the real problem. A large imbalance in negotiating power between companies and employees is. When employees are in a stronger negotiating position, companies will favour keeping existing employees because it's cheaper than hiring new ones.

Re:Insecurity culture....

[tburkhol]

Stick to the Bible, son. It's for the best.

This is what the Lord has commanded: Gather of it, every man of you, as much as he can eat; you shall take an omer apiece, according to the number of persons who each of you has in his tent. And the people of Israel did so; they gathered some more, some less. But when they measured it with an omer, he that gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack; each gathered according to what he could eat (Exodus 16:16-18

All that believed were together, and had all things in common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need. (Acts 2:44-45)

You shall not oppress a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brothers or one of the sojourners who are in your land within your towns. You shall give him his wages on the same day, before the sun sets (for he is poor and counts on it), lest he cry against you to the Lord, and you be guilty of sin.Deuteronomy 24:14