Wednesday, June 1, 1:30-3, Math Sciences 217: (with Jason Foster) Impact of Temporary Foreign Workers on Alberta construction employment patterns.
Thursday, June 1, 9-10:30, Math Sciences 319: (with Jason Foster) Move it along, nothing to see here: The construction of workplace injury in Canadian newspapers.
Thursday, June 1, 1:30-3, Math Sciences 211: Challenges of organizing Farm workers in Alberta (panel)
Thursday, June 1, 3:15-4:45, Math Sciences 211: Urban and industrial: The structural challenge of rural engagement by Alberta unions
I will be posting my presentations up over the next few days.
This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is the “Magdalene Laundries” by Joni Mitchell. This song chronicles the plight of up to 30,000 unmarried Irish women banished by the church to various convents and other institutions. Many of these women were pregnant and unmarried or fled abusive husbands or fathers. Others were imprisoned because they were flirtatious or beautiful or poor.
They would often spend their lives in “the laundries”, performing thankless domestic tasks. Many died there, often buried in unmarked graves. These so-called asylums operated into the late 20th century and both the government and private companies contracted with these institutions to supply cut-rate laundry services provided by an unfree labour force.
I was an unmarried girl I'd just turned twenty-seven When they sent me to the sisters For the way men looked at me Branded as a jezebel I knew I was not bound for Heaven I'd be cast in shame Into the Magdalene laundries *
Most girls come here pregnant Some by their own fathers Bridget got that belly By her parish priest We're trying to get things white as snow All of us woe-begotten-daughters In the steaming stains Of the Magdalene laundries
Prostitutes and destitutes And temptresses like me Fallen women Sentenced into dreamless drudgery Why do they call this heartless place Our Lady of Charity? Oh charity!
These bloodless brides of Jesus If they had just once glimpsed their groom Then they'd know and they'd drop the stones Concealed behind their rosaries They wilt the grass they walk upon They leech the light out of a room They'd like to drive us down the drain At the Magdalene laundries
Peg O'Connell died today She was a cheeky girl A flirt They just stuffed her in a hole! Surely to God you'd think at least some bells should ring! One day I'm going to die here too And they'll plant me in the dirt Like some lame bulb That never blooms come any spring Not any spring No, not any spring Not any spring
Last week, the Huffington Post reported that President Obama is changing the rules around over time in America in a way that will affect millions of workers. In the US, employment is (mostly) federally regulated. Workers who work more than 40 hours a week must be paid time-and-half if their annual salary is below $23,661. The Obama changes raise this threshold to $47,476 and index it to inflation.
The story contains the usual employer concerns about the effect of the change on workers (“oh, think of the workers!”). The movement towards a $15 minimum wage suggests that most of this employer catastrophizing is just economically self-serving propaganda.
The rules around over time in Canada (where employment is mostly provincially regulated) are different. Jurisdictions typically require over time if any worker works more than 40 hour in a week or 8 hours in a day. Some jurisdictions also largely prohibit over time except in emergencies.
The effectiveness of these employment standards is mixed, with many researchers finding widespread noncompliance. This reflects that enforcement is mostly complaint-based and workers are reluctant to complaint.
This is particularly true for vulnerable workers—those with fewer options and less ability to recover from being terminated (however illegally) for complaining. As one person I spoke to last month put it, “employment standards work less well the more reliant you are on it for protection.”
While the conversation we were having identified many ways to improve the operation of Alberta’s employment standards system, it all basically comes back to the ineffectiveness of complaint-based enforcement which renders most employer violations invisible. Under this system, we’re essentially expecting employers to act against their own economic interests and comply with the law.
This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “Working for the Weekend” by Loverboy. This song almost always makes the top-10 list of songs about labour on Labour Day. I’ve been reluctant to feature it because there just isn’t much meat here to discuss.
The song is about people working hard during the week in order to enjoy the weekend. The inspiration for the song hit Loverboy’s guitarist while walking on a beach during a weekday and thinking “where is everybody?” And then thinking, “oh, they are at work waiting for the weekend” (which was the original title).
But, you know, I’m baked after a long academic year so this is going to have to do. The original video is terrible (1981 was a tough year for music videos) so here is the song featured in a Saturday Night Live skit. Like many SNL skits, it is too long (too much Harvard, not enough improve on the writing team that year). But, damn, Chris Farley could dance!
Everyone's watching to see what you will do Everyone's looking at you, oh Everyone's wondering will you come out tonight Everyone's trying to get it right, get it right
Everybody's working for the weekend Everybody wants a new romance Everybody's going off the deep end Everybody needs a second chance, oh
You want a piece of my heart? You better start from the start You want to be in the show? C'mon baby, let's go
Everyone's looking to see if it was you Everyone wants you to come through Everyone's hoping it'll all work out Everyone's waiting to hold you out
Everybody's working for the weekend Everybody wants a new romance, hey yeah Everybody's going off the deep end Everybody needs a second chance, oh
You want a piece of my heart? You better start from the start You want to be in the show? C'mon baby, let's go
Hey!
You want a piece of my heart? You better start from the start You want to be in the show? C'mon baby, let's go
You want a piece of my heart? You better start from the start You want to be in the show? C'mon baby, let's go
Despite the beating Statistics Canada took during the Harper years, StatCan still offers all sorts of fascinating information about the labour market that you can customize to a significant degree. What this means is that the average Canadian isn't reliant upon the media for information about the labour market.
For example, CANSIM Table 285-0003 allows you to look at job vacancies by region and occupation. A few minutes of fiddling allows you to see that there were 63,000 job openings in Alberta during Q3 of 2015.
About half of the job openings (31,070) were in the sales and service occupations. While it is unfair to suggest that anyone could do these jobs, the requirements for employment tend to be low. Not surprisingly, so too is the pay (averaging $12.95 per hour).
You can also look at employment and unemployment rates using CANSIM Table 282-0087. Again, you can fiddle the data to find that there were 162,700 unemployed people in Alberta in September of 2015.
One question that immediately pops into my mind is why are there unskilled positions (in sales and service occupations) available when there are so many unemployed people who could fill them? There are likely many factors at play. For example, there will also be some unfilled positions due to labour market friction.
Yet let's just use our common sense. For example, we can all see that jobs that pay (on average) $12.95 per hour are not very attractive jobs. We might still take them (if we were in a real jam) but what other options are there?
Many unemployed Albertans will have access to Employment Insurance benefits. I couldn’t find the September 2015 amount but the January 2016 maximum was $537 per week (assuming your annual salary while employed had been $50,800—otherwise it would be 55% of your salary).
So, if you could get maximum EI benefits, you would need to work 42 hours per week in an average sales and services job just to generate the same income you could get on pogey. Who would in their right mind would do that?
Commentators on the right would likely suggest that reducing the level and duration of EI benefits would solve that problem (by forcing unemployed to take bad jobs to avoid starving). I wonder, though, if you can’t make an equally good argument that an increase in the minimum wage (or other changes in the terms and conditions of work, given that sales and service jobs are hard work) might be an equally effective way to fill these positions?
The other observation (made by economist Jim Stanford on twitter using the table on the left) is that job vacancy numbers undercut the narrative that Canada suffers from a skills shortage. Nine of the 10 occupations most in demand nationally are low-skill occupations. The real issue appears to be that Canada has a shortage of jobs period.
This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture features “Industrial Disease” by Dire Straits. The song is ostensibly about sickness created by work but is, in fact, an allegory about the decline of British industry during the late 1970s and early 1980s under Margaret Thatcher.
This period of time was characterized by workers struggling against the state and their employers and lots of the lyrics reflect this, such as “The watchdog's got rabies the foreman's got fleas”. Workers reactions, such as sympathy strikes and spot strikes, are also present: “Some come out in sympathy some come out in spots”. Even the doctor’s diagnosis of depression has a double meaning (“He wrote me a prescription he said 'you are depressed”).
Overall, the lyrics here are evocative and deep—something you don’t see in every song about work.
Warning lights are flashing down at Quality Control Somebody threw a spanner and they threw him in the hole There's rumors in the loading bay and anger in the town Somebody blew the whistle and the walls came down There's a meeting in the boardroom they're trying to trace the smell There's leaking in the washroom there's a sneak in personnel Somewhere in the corridors someone was heard to sneeze 'goodness me could this be Industrial Disease?
The caretaker was crucified for sleeping at his post They're refusing to be pacified it's him they blame the most The watchdog's got rabies the foreman's got fleas And everyone's concerned about Industrial Disease There's panic on the switchboard tongues are ties in knots Some come out in sympathy some come out in spots Some blame the management some the employees And everybody knows it's the Industrial Disease
The work force is disgusted downs tools and walks Innocence is injured experience just talks Everyone seeks damages and everyone agrees That these are 'classic symptoms of a monetary squeeze' On ITV and BBC they talk about the curse Philosophy is useless theology is worse History boils over there's an economics freeze Sociologists invent words that mean 'Industrial Disease'
Doctor Parkinson declared 'I'm not surprised to see you here You've got smokers cough from smoking, brewer's droop from drinking beer I don't know how you came to get the Betty Davis knees But worst of all young man you've got Industrial Disease' He wrote me a prescription he said 'you are depressed But I'm glad you came to see me to get this off your chest Come back and see me later - next patient please Send in another victim of Industrial Disease'
I go down to Speaker's Corner I'm thunderstruck They got free speech, tourists, police in trucks Two men say they're Jesus one of them must be wrong There's a protest singer singing a protest song - he says 'they wanna have a war to keep us on our knees They wanna have a war to keep their factories They wanna have a war to stop us buying Japanese They wanna have a war to stop Industrial Disease They're pointing out the enemy to keep you deaf and blind They wanna sap your energy incarcerate your mind They give you Rule Brittania, gassy beer, page three Two weeks in Espana and Sunday striptease' Meanwhile the first Jesus says 'I'd cure it soon Abolish monday mornings and friday afternoons' The other one's on a hunger strike he's dying by degrees How come Jesus gets Industrial Disease
The most famous of these strikes was the Gainers Meatpacking strike in Edmonton. Here, workers resisted Peter Pocklington’s efforts to drive down their wages and crush their union. The video footage of Gainer’s is astounding to watch, with picketing confrontations and police violence (see image to the right).
This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “Feel Like a Number” by Bob Seger. Yes, back to the classic rock well (I’m open to suggestions for songs from different genres!).
This is a pretty straight forward song about alienation and the depersonalizing effects of industrial society. The singer feels like a number and flags various sources of his alienation (schools, government, employers, phone companies). The singer’s solution is interesting:
Gonna cruise out of this city Head down to the sea Gonna shout out at the ocean Hey it's me
That really doesn’t resolve the issue: in the typology of exit, voice, neglect and patience, the singer is mostly exercising patience (combined with temporary neglect). Basically, he’s accepting his place in society (however grudgingly) and expressing his dissatisfaction via harmless behaviour (a short vacation).
We should probably give Seger props for writing a song that likely taps into his fans’ work-a-day experience, including their constrained set of options to respond to a dehumanizing society. Yet it is interesting to contrast the remedy outlined in song with that in, say, “Take this Job and Shove It”. Seger knuckles under while Johnny Paycheque tells the boss where to step off.
Finding a video for this song was a chore. It was originally released on the late 1970s (so no video) and Seger’s live performances have terrible audio (plus he’s not exactly vocalist of the year). So I give you (a rather shouty) Cher…
I take my card and I stand in line To make a buck I work overtime Dear Sir letters keep coming in the mail I work my back till it's racked with pain The boss can't even recall my name
I show up late and I'm docked It never fails I feel like just another Spoke in a great big wheel Like a tiny blade of grass In a great big field
To workers I'm just another drone To Ma Bell I'm just another phone I'm just another statistic on a sheet To teachers I'm just another child To IRS I'm just another file
I'm just another consensus on the street Gonna cruise out of this city Head down to the sea Gonna shout out at the ocean Hey it's me
And I feel like a number Feel like a number Feel like a stranger A stranger in this land I feel like a number
I'm not a number I'm not a number Dammit I'm a man I said I'm a man
A few weeks back, Alberta announced it will be reviewing its workers’ compensation system over the coming year. One of the topics that ought to be considered is the effectiveness of its experiencing-rate system.
Experience-rating raises or lowers an employer’s workers’ compensation premiums based upon an employer’s claims costs. The rationale for experience rating is that it creates a firm-level incentive for employers to improve safety in their workplaces that otherwise does not exist.
Broadly speaking, Alberta employers are eligible for premium surcharges and rebates of up to 40% (this can vary by employer size). Employers can also receive up to another 20% in rebates under the partners in injury reduction program.
In 2014, these programs were budgeted to operate at a net loss of $173.3 million. There is no analysis of whether these programs improved safety: fewer lost-claim incidents and lower employer claims costs can result from reporting error and employer claims management behaviour.
The academic research suggests that there is some (but uncertain) evidence to support a relationship between experience-rating and safety. But, there is strong evidence that worksite inspections coupled with penalties reduces injuries. Overall, this evidence suggests improved workplace safety is better pursued through enforcement activity.
Given that there is little evidence that experience-rating and other premium rebate programs make workplace safer (but good evidence that these programs incentivize illegitimate claims management behaviour by employers that negatively affect injured workers), Alberta ought to consider terminating these programs. The ~$175 million in cost-savings should be used to fund a four-fold increase in OHS enforcement activity by the government.
