Workplace safety versus worker privacy

Employers often struggle to balance their interest in improving workplace safety with workers’ right to privacy. For example, the history of workplace drug and alcohol testing often turns on the circumstances under which is it appropriate for an employer to require a worker to submit to testing (e.g., post incident, suspicion of impairment, randomly).

Employers often assert (and behave as if) workplace safety considerations trump workers’ privacy rights. This is good rhetorical terrain for employers to argue from because it frames opponents of testing regimes as being opposed to (or at least not prioritizing) safety.

When there is an absence of evidence to support the efficacy of initiatives like testing (which is often the case), employers can revert to some version of ”better safe than sorry” as a rationale to justify their position. This rationale runs contrary to the generally acceptable proposition that they who make a claim must substantiate it.

I recently read a 2018 arbitration decision about cognitive testing for Edmonton transit drivers that was quite interesting. You can find the full decision on canlii.org under this reference:

Amalgamated Transit Union, Local No. 569 v Edmonton (City), 2018 CanLII 82319 (AB GAA)

The nub of the case (and I’m paraphrasing pretty liberally) is there had been two bus-related pedestrian fatalities and the government regulator required the city to implement a transit driver evaluation policy. The city’s response was to implement mandatory (1) road testing and (2) cognitive testing.

The cognitive testing included a computerized screening tool. If workers scored above a threshold on the tool, they were then suspended with pay and required to undergo medical evaluation. (There was no evidence that the two fatalities were related to cognitive impairment of the drivers.) The medical testing and release of information violated these workers’ privacy.

The grievance basically asserts that the city had no legal or factual basis for implementing (1) the mandatory screening and, for those who fail the screening, (2) the follow-on medical assessment. The union also argued the cognitive screening test, having been developed primarily to screen for cognition decay in older drivers, was not a valid test for an otherwise healthy population.

In the end, the arbitration panel ruled based upon the union’s argument around the testing being unreasonable and declined to address the (rather troubling) issue of the test’s validity and reliability. What makes this case interesting is that, while the matter awaited adjudication, the employer proceeded with the testing under the “work now, grieve later” principle and we actually have results about the efficacy of the testing.

The firm providing the testing predicted that, of the 1535 drivers tested, 1-2% would be suffering from cognitive impairment (so 15 to 31 drivers, roughly). At the time of the hearing, only one driver was confirmed as having cognitive impairment and a second driver’s status was undetermined (so the true rate of cognitive impairment was 0.12%, or one-tenth the rate the testing firm asserted). The screening tool sent 88 drivers for medical assessment, of whom the vast majority were false positives. (A small number of other drivers returned to work with modest work restrictions related to other medical conditions.)

This sort of outcome (where the proponents vastly over-state the true level of risk in order to push forward with testing) is not uncommon. Random drug testing is another example where, despite decades of effort, there is no good evidence that random testing reduces injuries. Certainly, we would expect a company that is selling testing to make claims that create the appearance that their product is valuable to potential clients. And, these kinds of circumstances are why, generally speaking, we expect those who make a claim to substantiate it.

It is also interesting to note the uneven application of the better safe than sorry principle by employers.

• When it is employees who bear the cost of an OHS intervention (i.e., have their privacy invaded), employers are happy to play by better safe than sorry and not demand high levels of proof. 
• When employers must bear the cost (e.g., face disrupted production or higher material costs) because workers have concerns about unsafe working conditions or materials, employers generally demand very high levels of proof before they will alter their processes. 

This existence of this double standard speaks to which (and whose) interests are prioritized in workplace regulation.

-- Bob Barnetson

New course: LBST 415: Sex work and sex workers

After more than a year of work, LBST 415: Sex Work and Sex Workers is now open for registration, with new intakes on the first of every month. This course examines the operation and regulation of sex work in Canada.

The course focuses on the experiences of sex workers—often told through their own writings—to identify how the structure and regulation of the sex industry affects them. This includes examining how sex workers experience exploitation and exert agency over their lives at the same time.

Of particular interest is how different jurisdictions approach regulating sex work. These very different approaches result in better and worse working conditions as well as shape the relationships between sex workers and law enforcement, managers, and clients.

This course is not for the faint of heart. But if offers students in labour studies, women’s and gender studies, or sociology with an opportunity to explore this very interesting intersection of work and sex.

-- Bob Barnetson

Film: American Factory

Netflix has recently released a new documentary entitled American Factory. This film chronicles the opening of a branch plant of Fuyao Glass America in economically depressed Dayton, Ohio by a Chinese billionaire. The location has previously been the site of a General Motors plant that was closed, putting thousands of workers out of a job.

The documentary (which notably includes no narration) tracks the first two years of the factory's operations and the clash of cultures that it entails. A trip to China for American workers--and the failure of the management strategies that they tried to bring back--was particularly striking. The vulnerability of the local workforce to exploitation and their awareness of their vulnerability is nicely captured.

The film explores the relentless work of employers to shed jobs and increase productivity (regardless of the cost to workers). It also does a nice job of exploring the tactics of both the union and the employer during a union drive.

-- Bob Barnetson

Indigenous labour history in Alberta

Over the past few years, the Alberta Labour History Institute has been collecting the stories of Indigenous workers in Alberta. A number of video interviews are now available online.

The most recent edited set of interviews looks at the role of Metis iron workers in building the CN Tower in Edmonton.



There is also a full transcript of the various interviews available that contains a fair bit more detail.

There are also numerous other interviews available.



At random, I listened to Linda Robinson’s very interesting interview about her experiences on the job as a person with a disability and her experiences with the labour movement.

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Rain on the Scarecrow

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “Rain on the Scarecrow” by John Cougar. I recently watched a really off-putting documentary on John Mellencamp on Netflix (Plain Spoken) and this was one of the songs that played in the background.

It is written from the perspective of a farmer about to lose the family farm due to mounting debt and the cost-price squeeze. Overall, a pretty haunting song about farming as we head into the harvest season.

Scarecrow on a wooden cross blackbird in the barn
Four hundred empty acres that used to be my farm
I grew up like my daddy did my grandpa cleared this land
When I was five I walked the fence while grandpa held my hand

Rain on the scarecrow blood on the plow
This land fed a nation this land made me proud
And son I'm just sorry there’s no legacy for you now
Rain on the scarecrow blood on the plow
Rain on the scarecrow blood on the plow

The crops we grew last summer weren't enough to pay the loans
Couldn't buy the seed to plant this spring and the farmers bank foreclosed
Called my old friend schepman up to auction off the land
He said john its just my job and I hope you understand
Hey calling it your job ol hoss sure dont make it right
But if you want me to Ill say a prayer for your soul tonight

And grandmas on the front porch swing with a
Bible in her hand Sometimes I hear her singing take me to the promised land
When you take away a mans dignity he cant work his fields and cows
There'll be blood on the scarecrow blood on the plow
Blood on the scarecrow blood on the plow

Well there's ninety-seven crosses planted in the courthouse yard
Ninety-seven families who lost ninety-seven farms
I think about my grandpa and my neighbors and my name and some nights
I feel like dying like that scarecrow in the rain

Rain on the scarecrow blood on the plow
This land fed a nation this land made me so proud
And son I'm just sorry they're just memories for you now
Rain on the scarecrow blood on the plow
Rain on the scarecrow blood on the plow

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Death to my Hometown

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture looks at “Death to my Hometown” by Bruce Springsteen. This Celtic-infused (and very angry) song was part of Springsteen’s 2012 album Wrecking Ball, which examined the impact of the 2008 recession on Americans.

The song's premise is that economic mis-management is a form of violence, with effects analogous to war. He particularly notes that the impersonal nature of the economic system means that it is hard to identify and punish those responsible for economic crimes:

Send the robber barons straight to hell
The greedy thieves who came around
And ate the flesh of everything they found
Whose crimes have gone unpunished now
Who walk the streets as free men now

Protest songs like this one do a nice job of capturing frustration and giving it voice. What this song lacks any sort of call to action (excepting the vague “be ready when they come” and "send them straight to hell") that would change the underlying political economy that allowed this economic violence to be perpetrated on the working class.

Well, no cannon ball did fly, no rifles cut us down
No bombs fell from the sky, no blood soaked the ground
No powder flash blinded the eye
No deathly thunder sounded
But just as sure as the hand of God
They brought death to my hometown
They brought death to my hometown

Now, no shells ripped the evening sky
No cities burning down
No army stormed the shores for which we’d die
No dictators were crowned
I awoke on a quiet night, I never heard a sound
The marauders raided in the dark
And brought death to my hometown
They brought death to my hometown

They destroyed our families, factories
And they took our homes
They left our bodies on the plains
The vultures picked our bones

So, listen up my sonny boy, be ready when they come
For they’ll be returning sure as the rising sun
Now get yourself a song to sing
And sing it ’til you’re done
Sing it hard and sing it well
Send the robber barons straight to hell
The greedy thieves who came around
And ate the flesh of everything they found
Whose crimes have gone unpunished now
Who walk the streets as free men now

They brought death to our hometown, boys
Death to our hometown
Death to our hometown, boys
Death to our hometown

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Paid in Full

This week’s instalment of Labour & Pop Culture returns us to heady days of 1987, when hip-hop was beginning to penetrate mainstream American culture. “Paid in Full” by Eric B and Rakim explains the economics of crime. The song gave its name to a 2002 film about the drug trade in Harlem.

[Eric B]: Yo Rakim, what's up?
[Rakim]: Yo, I'm doing the knowledge, E., I'm trying to get paid in full
[E]: Well, check this out, since Nobry Walters is our agency, right?
[R]: True
[E]: Kara Lewis is our agent
[R]: Word up
[E]: Zakia/4th & Broadway is our record company
[R]: Indeed
[E]: Okay, so who we rollin with?
[R]: We rollin with Rush
[E]: Of Rushtown Management. Check this out, since we talking over
This def beat that I put together, I wanna hear some of them
Def rhymes, know what I'm sayin? And together, we can get
Paid in full...

[Rakim]
Thinkin of a master plan
'cause ain't nuthin but sweat inside my hand
So I dig into my pocket, all my money is spent
So I dig deeper but still comin up with lint
So I start my mission- leave my residence
Thinkin how could I get some dead presidents
I need money, I used to be a stick-up kid
So I think of all the devious things I did
I used to roll up, this is a hold up, ain't nuthin funny
Stop smiling, be still, don't nuthin move but the money
But now I learned to earn cos I'm righteous
I feel great! So maybe I might just
Search for a 9 to 5, if I strive
Then maybe I'll stay alive
So I walk up the street whistlin this
Feelin out of place cos, man, do I miss
A pen and a paper, a stereo, a tape of
Me and Eric B, and a nice big plate of
Fish, which is my favorite dish
But without no money it's still a wish
Cos I don't like to dream about gettin paid
So I dig into the books of the rhymes that I made
To now test to see if I got pull
Hit the studio, cos I'm paid in full

-- Bob Barnetson

Research: Union safety effect

By Erik Henningsen 

A few weeks ago, a friend in the labour movement pointed me to this new article about the impact of unions on workplace injuries. “Does ‘right to work’ imperil the right to health? The effect of labour unions on workplace fatalities” examines how legislative changes that impede unionization affects levels of injury and fatality in those workplaces.

The research on the union safety effect is mixed. Some of it supports the notion that unions results in lower levels of injury and fatalities. Some of it comes to the opposite conclusion.

There are lots of methodological challenges in doing these kinds of studies that help explain the mixed results. Comparing unionized and non-unionized workplaces, for example, sometimes suggests that unionized workplaces have higher levels of injury and fatalities. Critics of unions often use such data to conclude that there is no union safety effect. There are, of course, good potential explanations for these results.

For example, workers may be more likely to unionize in dangerous workplaces (spurred on by the danger) so there may be an apples-to-oranges issue with the comparison. The presence of a union may also embolden workers to report injuries, thereby creating the appearance of more injuries when, in fact, it is just a matter of more reported injuries.

This new study examines fatality levels in US states that have implemented so-called right to work laws. These laws weaken unions by allowing workers to opt out of paying union dues (thereby creating a free rider problem). The question is essentially, what effect do right-to-work laws have on workplace health.

The upshot is that a 1% decline in unionization (attributable to right-to-work laws) means about a 5% increase in occupational fatalities. Overall, RTW laws have resulted in a 14.2% increase in workplace mortality (this is bad). It also suggests that unionization reduces occupational fatalities (these being the most serious forms of injury and also the most likely injuries to be reported). The author discusses his study a bit more on his blog, which is an interesting read.

-- Bob Barnetson

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Private Dancer

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “Private Dancer” by Tina Turner. The song is sung from the perspective of a worker in the sex industry. We don’t normally think about sex workers as workers—although they are.

A new course under development at Athabasca is hoping to change that. LBST 4XX (Sex work and sex workers) will examine the sex industry and the experiences of those work in it. While sex work represents one of the most extreme forms of employment, it shares many features with other forms of employment. Specifically, it is a relationship of power wherein one party appropriate the surplus value generated by the other, often employing coercion and externalizing costs in gendered and racialized ways.

The course offers an overview of the sex industry in a variety of theoretical and material contexts, as well as an in-depth focus on prostitution in the Canadian context. Taking “the prostitute” as the stereotype that drives public sex work policy, this course examines the myriad images of and circumstances in which sex work occurs. In addition to reading key texts by scholarly experts on the sex industry, we will hear from sex workers themselves about their jobs, working conditions, and the power dynamics of sex work.

Students will learn to analyze sex work as work through a variety of theoretical lenses, and to identify similarities and differences in legal and policy positions that respond to feminism, queer theory, critiques of neoliberalism and globalization, postcolonial praxis, and progressive legalism. This includes examining how labour policies, such as occupational health and safety policies, affect sex workers, the roles of clients and third parties in the sex industry, and sex workers’ labour organizing.

I’m hopeful this course will open in late 2019.

Well, the men come in these places
And the men are all the same
You don't look at their faces
And you don't ask their names
You don't think of them as human
You don't think of them at all
You keep your mind on the money
Keeping your eyes on the wall

I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
I'll do what you want me to do
I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
And any old music will do

I want to make a million dollars
I want to live out by the sea
Have a husband and some children
Yeah, I guess I want a family
All the men come in these places
And the men are all the same
You don't look at their faces
And you don't ask their names

I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
I'll do what you want me to do
I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
And any old music will do
I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
I'll do what you want me to do
Just a private dancer
A dancer for money
And any old music will do

Deutschmarks or dollars
American Express will do nicely, thank you
Let me loosen up your collar
Tell me, do you want to see me do the shimmy again?

I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
Do what you want me to do
Just a private dancer
A dancer for money
And any old music will do

All the men come in these places
And the men are all the same
You don't look at their faces
And you don't ask their names
You don't think of them as human
You don't think of them at all
You keep your mind on the money
Keeping your eyes on the wall

I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
I'll do what you want me to do
I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
And any old music will do
I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
I'll do what you want me to do
I'm your private dancer
A dancer for money
And any old music will do

I'm your private dancer, a dancer for money
I'm your private dancer, a dancer for money
I'm your private dancer, a dancer for money
Just a private dancer, a dancer for money

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: One More Dollar

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “One More Dollar” by Gillian Welch. This is a folksie song about a travelling agricultural worker who picks fruit for a living and sends remittances home to his family.

In Canada, much of the temporary agricultural workforce comprises non-citizens who enter Canada under the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP) from Mexico and Caribbean countries. Others enter in the agricultural worker stream of the temporary foreign worker program.

These workers are subjected to difficult working and living conditions and have few meaningful labour rights, both because of statutory exclusions and because their residency and right of return is tied to their employer’s good will. This 2016 article contains some useful background:

Farm labourers in Ontario, including SAWP migrants, are exempt from labour laws that govern minimum wage, overtime and rest periods. 

"For 50 years, the SAWP has been framed as being used to meet acute labour shortage in periods we need more workers, but it's actually meeting a long-term labour demand," Jenna Hennebry, director of the International Migrant Research Centre at Wilfrid Laurier University, told me. 

Although SAWP workers are entitled to provincial health insurance when they arrive, those who are injured are often "medically repatriated" to their home country. In 2014, the Canadian Medical Association Journal reported that 787 migrant farm workers were medically repatriated between 2001 and 2011.

While the government has made some recent efforts to improve these workers’ living conditions (such as mandatory inspections), that living conditions are so bad as to (finally) trigger mandatory inspections speaks to the exploitation faced by the workers.

A long time ago left my home
For job in the fruit trees
But I miss those hills with the windy pines
Their song seemed to suit me

So I sent my wages to my home
Said, we'd soon be 'gether
For the next good crop, pay my way
And I'd come home forever

One more dime to show for my day
One more dollar and I'm on my way
When I reach those hills, boys, I'll never roam
'Cause one more dollar and I'm going home

No work, said the boss at bunkhouse door
There's freeze on the branches
So when the dice came out at bar downtown
I rolled and took my chances

One more dime to show for my day
One more dollar and I'm on my way
When I reach those hills, boys, I'll never roam
'Cause one more dollar and I'm going home

A long time ago left my home
Just a boy passing twenty
Could you spare a coin and a Christian prayer
My luck has turned against me

One more dime to show for my day
One more dollar and I'm on my way
When I reach those hills, boys, I'll never roam
Just one more dollar and I'm going home

One more dollar, boys, I'm going home

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Solo: A Star Wars Story

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture examines the new movie Solo: A Star Wars Story. The film reveals the origins of the Han Solo character. This post contains some spoilers so you may want to stop reading if that bothers you.

The film introduces Solo as an orphan on the ship-building word of Correllia. Orphans are made to steal for criminal gangs in order to survive. This premise a very 19th-century, Dickensian feel to it.

Solo’s only way out is, ultimately, to join the Imperial Navy. Taking the king’s shilling was historically a common pathway out of poverty for lower-class British males

Solo eventually hooks up with a criminal gang but a botched heist puts him in a debt bondage to a bad guy. Relationships within the criminal gang (and between gangs) turn out to be very all-against-all and serve as a nice metaphor for the competitive individualism of capitalism.

Action eventually shifts to the mining planet of Kessel where slavery and ecological destruction are evident. While a heist is underway, Lando Calrissian’s robotic co-pilot triggers a slave revolt, which causes the destruction of the enterprise. It was interesting how quickly control slipped away from the mine’s operators.

More hi-jinx ensue and we eventually get to the climax of the story. Solo only manages to get out of the resulting jam he’s in by working collaboratively with others who are seeking to overthrown the corporatist fascism advanced by the Empire. Overall, some interesting commentary on labour and work in a galaxy far, far away.

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Worker-generated memes

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture looks at worker-generated contributions to pop culture—specifically memes. Workers have always generated cultural artifacts (paintings, handbills, poetry, songs, graffiti) about their work.

Social media has given these forms of cultural expression wider circulation. Consider this example, from the Ontario Federation of Labour in response to Tim Horton’s miserly reduction in paid breaks to offset increases in the minimum wage.

The backlash caused (in part) by online campaigns like this one included protests against the franchise across the nation.

The more interest memes are those generated by individual workers. While they are less polished, they often do a good job of conveying a complex idea. For example, consider this criticism of employer efforts to restructure work:

This pretty clearly illustrates that, whatever their mission statements may say about valuing workers, employers' true interests lie in making profits.

More complex dynamics can also be teased out. For example, one way to view health and safety regulations is that they determine the acceptable level at which employers can trade workers’ health (and lives) for profit. When you say it like that, most people roll their eyes and think “communist”. But you can make the same point like this:

This meme clearly conveys the double standard in employment. The state allows employers to main and kill workers (up to point) by setting levels of exposure to hazardous substances. But if workers did the same the same thing to employers, the workers would go to jail. This kind of presentation often resonates with workers and causes them to re-evaluate their views.

Worker generated memes also have the potential to change the minds of employers. For example, employers often complain about and/or undermine (e.g., by stalling) the operation of the grievance process. Filing an unfair labour practice against the employer is one option. Another is to start posting memes such as this in the workplace.

This highlights to employers that there certainly are alternatives to complying with the grievance process. But they aren't necessarily the most desirable options for employer, all told. Overall, I'm very encouraged by the potential utility of memes in labour education.

-- Bob Barnetson

Labour & Pop Culture: Bread and Roses

This week’s installment of Labour & Pop Culture is “Bread and Roses”. This song has its origins in a speech by Rose Schneiderman, a US suffragette and labour activist from the early of the 20th century. She said:

What the woman who labors wants is the right to live, not simply exist — the right to life as the rich woman has the right to life, and the sun and music and art. You have nothing that the humblest worker has not a right to have also. The worker must have bread, but she must have roses, too. Help, you women of privilege, give her the ballot to fight with.

The line “bread and roses” gave rise to a poem and then several songs about workers’ need for not just sustenance, but also dignity. The most famous version is by Judy Collins (or maybe Joan Baez), the arrangement that appeared most recently in the movie Pride.



John Denver also recorded it to a different (more Celtic) melody.



As we go marching, marching in the beauty of the day
A million darkened kitchens, a thousand mill lofts gray
Are touched with all the radiance that a sudden sun discloses
For the people hear us singing: “Bread and roses! Bread and roses!”

As we come marching, marching, we battle too for men
For they are women's children, and we mother them again
Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes
Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread, but give us roses!

As we go marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
Go crying through our singing their ancient song of bread
Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew
Yes, it is bread we fight for - but we fight for roses, too!

As we come marching, marching, we bring the greater days
The rising of the women means the rising of the race
No more the drudge and idler — ten that toil where one reposes
But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses! Bread and roses!

Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes
Hearts starve as well as bodies;
Bread and roses! Bread and roses!

-- Bob Barnetson