What’s Happened to the ‘Quality of Life’
Of American Workers and Their Families?

The introduction of the computer and other amazing technologies produced an unprecedented explosion in productivity that, many economists predicted, would be an enormous blessing for both workers and employers. The “Age of Automation” would make a six-hour workday and full employment a realistic possibility, because the goods and services the American people needed could be produced with more people working fewer hours.

The dream never came true. Today, workers are toiling longer and harder, largely because if they don’t, they can lose their jobs. In some industries, 10- and 12-hour workdays have become almost standard, even in union plants. Some employers insist on mandatory weekend shifts, which have a disruptive effect on family life.

It used to be that one breadwinner working on one job was enough to supply a family with at least the basic necessities of food, clothing and shelter. Today, both a husband and wife in a traditional family have to work in order to maintain a modest livelihood, that often requires working at a third job. It is especially difficult for single mothers, who often have makeshift, inadequate care for their children when they go out to a badly-needed job.

Family life is disrupted when a husband and wife work different time shifts, leaving their “latch-key” children to fend for themselves, because they cannot afford professional child care. The stressful situation often leads to anger and bitterness, followed by separation and divorce. It causes serious psychological damage in children, who are deprived of the security and love of family life.

Life is especially tough and unfair for millions of people who work full-time jobs and receive wages so low that they and their families cannot climb out of their poverty status. They are the perpetual victims of an economic system that prides itself as the wealthiest and most productive in the world.

A Frank Look at Labor’s ‘Voice’ in the Workplace

AFL-CIO leaders and their publications constantly brag that when workers join a union, they have a “voice” in the workplace. There’s just a smidgen of truth in that claim, but not much more, and it certainly is not true about the issues that concern workers the most. Workers, even in unionized enterprises, know that the minute they walk into the workplace, they are at the mercy of their employer, because he has the ultimate power to deprive them of their livelihood.

They have no voice over their conditions of employment or the employer’s financial operations, structural changes, profit distribution and future plans.

They can hold their jobs as long as they can be sufficiently productive and profitable to the employer. They can be fired for reasons that have nothing to do with their skills, no matter how many years they have loyally served the employer.

It used to be that when men and women went to work for a major company, they expected it to become a lifetime job if they performed their work well. Today, because of an intensely competitive, globalized job market, workers may have to change jobs as many as nine times during their career, they are told. That’s not a cheerful outlook for a worker who, at age 50, has just been fired and is unequipped to start a new career.

Labor Has Surrendered Too Much Power to Employers

We should be grateful to the nation’s working people, who supply us with the goods and services on which our economy and society depend. Without their daily efforts, the United States could not possibly attain the status of wealthiest country in the world.

Yet these workers have no “voice” at all in the policy decisions of the companies they work for, especially over such financial matters, as profit distribution. Employers have managed to monopolize complete control and treat workers as servants rather than partners. They won’t even let their workers join a union. Moreover, with their extraordinary wealth (created by working people), they can influence both Congress and the White House, leaving labor as a virtual outcast in the political process.

A labor leader’s task can no longer be limited to negotiating a contract for wages and benefits, while not challenging the overwhelming power of Corporate America. Our leaders must find ways to give the nation’s working people (the true creators of national wealth) a real voice in the economy and society.

Our weekly column, “The World of Labor,” reports the struggles and victories of unions in countries around the globe. Check our web site: www.LaborEducator.org.