- McJobs and Workers -

Re: Canada Working Conditions

In Reply to: Canada Working Conditions posted by Pat McIver on June 30, 1998 at 18:50:08:

I'm confused: what kind of "head start" does if give you? I'll be frank, it sounds as if you're merely regurgitating some recruitment drek. But on the more important topic of unions, you don't seem to realize that using casual or part-time school-age workers -- who at the end of the day don't care enough about the place to want to form a union or work for improved working conditions -- is precisely what has allowed McGoebbels to achieve their remarkable prosperity. If you hadn't noticed, other companies have, especially in the last 15 years, begun to adapt McDonald's-like strategies to their relations with their own labour force -- I'm thinking particularly of the increased use of casual and part-time labour, jobs with neither benefits nor security, but the list is long. The goal? A disposable workforce. "I'm finished with this Big Mac wrapper/human being, so I'll put it in the garbage." What would unionization achieve? In the present political climate, not a whole lot. A tiny bit more security, marginally better pay, an independent organization to hear and act on workers' grievances against the company. But in the future, when you've moved on? Who knows? Secure, decent-paying full-time jobs for adults, maybe? Remember those? Because, to be honest, I don't much care whether teenagers earn enough pocket money to facilitate Friday night's furtive post-movie grope in the back of Dad's Pontiac. Unionization of the service sector might be the first step in finding a way to force companies to maintain an acceptable level of decency in their relations with their labour force -- God knows their leaving it to their consciences won't work.

Follow Ups:

None.