With lots of legal protections for workers gone, and an openly hostile government, new strategies and organising methods are needed. Cleaners face particular difficulties working in isolated conditions and prone to all kinds of exploitation, especially as so many organisations have sacked their cleaning staff and replaced them with contractors. The Liquor Hospitality and Miscellaneous Union international campaign to improve working conditions for cleaners. You can read more about the Clean Start campaign here.
.
John Quiggin 
A month of unpaid training, as the link indicates one cleaner experienced, seem terribly excessive. Do Australians taking these jobs experience the same month of unpaid training or is it because the cleaner was coming from outside the country?
This may not be uncommon in Australia. I found this link
http://mycareer.com.au/jobs/sydney/hospitality-travel-tourism/other-hospitality-travel-tourism/3942432+trainee+dealer.aspx
to a job (no longer open) for casino dealers, demanding 3 weeks of unpaid training
Trainee Dealer*-
Star City is currently on seeking motivated customer service orientated individuals to join our gaming department. The process will involve you completing a three week unpaid training school”
It mentions that there is “no charge” for the training (I should hope not!) and you do get free meals, still, this 3 weeks seems excessive too.
It’s a shame they can’t find a more evocative name. I thought the American “Justice for Janitors” campaign had a nice ring about it. But I don’t think “janitor” is a word we really use.
This is the future. They have taken away every institution and safeguard standing betwen people and the free market in labour. Now those wide eyed ideologues can contemplate at their leisure the difference between men and women and widgets. This and other campaigns will transform not just the labour movement, but will rock the whole edifice to its foundations.
It is good to see a union actually starting to concentrate on their members rather than training ALP politicians, holding rock concerts and centralised wage fixing. This is (IMHO) the way unions should be going – rather than paying expensive lawyers to front up to the arbitration commission and then sitting back and enjoying the union dues.
This sort of action, making them relevant again, may actually save the unions from the extinction through irrelevance to which they were heading.
Can they turn themselves around? We will see. Either way, it is another good point from these reforms.
Andrew Reynolds, you are being dishonest. Union organsiers are usually flat out dealing with member issues, working on collective agreements and so on. Can you identity these individuals who actually sit back and literally do nothing?
I understand that in America janitors have resorted to sabotage to try to get fair treatment, eg glueing down toilet seats. Good on ’em.
Steve,
So that is why union membership is dropping – unions are currently relevant to people’s lives and the organisers are hardworking. Silly me.
AR. Au contraire, this article suggests that union membership is now on the rise. Maybe, people are finally realising that the “free ride” that non-union members have enjoyed for so long has come to an end.
http://www3.griffith.edu.au/03/ertiki/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=2381
I had an experience where I noticed that rooms in a business I know about were getting filthy dirty. This was after the cleaning service had been outsourced. So I checked on the contract for the cleaning straff. They were basically given about 1.5 minutes to clean quite large, individual offices which just wasn’t enough.
Observations: The business recorded cost savings from the outsourcing as measured money costs did fall. Room cleanliness declined, cleaner dissatisfaction rose and staff cleaned their own rooms. This has lessons on the case for outsourcing and for effectively concealing a reduction in service quality within a foolish contract.
This “international campaign’, is this another example of the dreaded globalisation?
I agree with AR on the issue of sitting back and enjoying the dues, however from past experience it seems that only well paid advice will get you out trouble when forced to deal with numerous unfair dismissals and frivolous EA disputes taken (by the employer) in front of the commissioner. In the 7 years i worked down the wharf, I cant recall the workers ever issueing proceedings against the employer (except in the case of unfair dismissals).
As for naming lazy and incompetent union officials the list would indeed be long, but I think i will hide behind the defence of being uncertain about the new dafamation legislation in failing to do so
Avaroo, all “unpaid training” or other such schemes are quite illegal no matter where the worker was born. If you do work you should get paid for it.
If you encounter anyone who’s been forced to work for nothing, tell them to contact their union, who can attempt to get back their unpaid wages.
Neophyte,
That is my point. At no point during the long period where centralised wage bargaining was strong was the union movement growing in any substantial way. Start removing that and unions actually have to do something and then they start growing again. It is not rocket science. I am not an opponent of unions per se, but the unions that go around screaming for government assistance to do the job they should be doing end up where they should be; irrelevant husks, incapable of helping anyone.
Get back to the knitting: help the members. Work with the companies – don’t fight them. Help grow the companies and industries that your members are in. If the industry is in decline due to factors beyond your control, don’t run to government pleading for help – help the members to retrain and move jobs or locations to where the jobs are.
It is hard work – but that is what the union members are (normally) doing.
If people are paid to clean toilets and instead they spend their time glueing them down, then how is this worthy behaviour? Should we all start glueing down public toilet seats as a show of solidarity? Maybe we could also p!ss in the sink and sh!t on the floor to show them that we really care.
I don’t quite see the problem with the trainee dealers.
If the local TAFE offered a three-week, industry-accredited Certificate IV in Gaming Studies, would you expect the TAFE to pay the students, or the students to pay the TAFE?
If the trainees are sitting in a mock-up casino, dealing cards &c, to other trainees, they are not earning any money for the casino.
It’s not the same as “trainee housemaids” whose cleaning and making up rooms repaces paid workers.
I was a cleaner covered by the LHMWU in the mid 1990s (I used to clean UQ, actually). We used to net about $150 per fortnight, of which the union took $12. We were all postgraduate students, and thought that if the union wanted our membership that they could at least provide us with the name of our shop steward, or give us a contact point in case of a dispute. Despite numerous approaches, the union refused to even tell us who represented us. When we all tried to resign from the union the company told us that it was not possible to resign, or they would lose their contracts. So some of us quit in disgust (yes, I was an economics student after all). I should note that many of my cleaner colleagues were poor asian and african students barely feeding their families – I was only working for beer money really. And this was real cleaner work – toilets, kitchens, filthy lecture theatres, labs etc. Maybe even the office that JQ occupies now.
LHMWU cares about cleaners ? Only becuase they are staring down the barrel at their own oblivion down an S-bend of their making. The LHMWU turned me off labor for ever.
Unions can be relevant, but that have to start looking after their members, big and small. The sort of bureaucratic edifice that can take $12 out of a $150 pay packet while puporting to look after workers rights is finished – a lean flexible operation might however suceed.
AR, Rog & Nob, etc…
Let’s globalise minimum wages, human rights and actual “real” democracy (not the BS Dubya version), and then we can talk about globalisation. Ok?
Yes, that is a bad story Jimmythespiv. There are shonky politicians, shonky businesses and shonky unionists. Such is life.
What I despise is non-union members who get to enjoy the fruits of a union’s collective bargaining without paying their dues. These people are scabs and their should be appropriate regulations to deal with it. For example the union should be able to collect a bargaining agent’s fee.
p.s. if I worked for you Terge I would gladly glue your Finnish ass to your seat!! 🙂
jimmythehack 😉
Pleeeeease, the name is LHMU, so at least get that right. For your information I have also worked in similar shitty jobs, cleaning toilets, offices etc. Normally if your wages are as small as you say… you can pay p/t, junior, or discounted fees instead. Some unions even waive it or make it a “nominal” sum or a “solidarity” fee, eg: $30 per yr, etc.
Next, unlike the organisation that’s currently feeding you crap or even paying you (Young or Old Libs? AiG?, Chamber of Comm? etc.) the actual workers get to vote for their own representative: and it’s called a delegate. If for example, an ALP hack is trying to push a candidate or avoid the ellection it’s actually up to the workers affected to get involved and refuse it. If you are so inclined, you can put your hand up and become a delegate yourself… by running in the election.
If you can’t be bothered, then don’t whinge!
Next, the role of an effective union is to get out of the way and empower their actual members. Sure, some also lobby gov’s, try to influence their industry, OH&S standards, etc.
Since then I’ve further learned that a real effective union is not some hack in an office with some lawyers and Alp backing, but a united group of workers working hard for themselves in their joint interests. YOU are the union, and the workers make the decisions themselves.
But like S Munn says, there’s all kind of dodgy things in life. But just because your footy team’s shitty doesn’t mean that all football is shitty. Just join a better team, or even better: help your own team improve! and you will see how you learn to appreciate the beautiful game.
“Avaroo, all “unpaid trainingâ€? or other such schemes are quite illegal no matter where the worker was born. ”
Then this really isn’t a union issue. If it’s illegal, it’s illegal. All anyone should do, if asked to do something illegal is report it to the authorities.
Unions unfortunately, wind up exploiting many of their members, no less than employers have in the past and may still do. Anyone glueing down a toilet seat that does not belong to them should be arrested and charged with damaging someone else’s property, no different than if they ran their car into your building on purpose.
Carlos
Settle down and remember the coarse language rule. Also I acknowledge that this was 10 years ago, and things may well have changed (i hope so). But the fact remains that we rang LHMU because there was no union rep on site – and head office could not and would not provide contact details. I guess they were all working on more important things, like how to lower real wages over the life of the various Accords while still guaranteeing poor employment outcomes. There was certainly no evidence of a delegate.
Agree with you on what you put in is what you get out – which was my point all along. But then there was no way to contribute, other than financially. And you couldn’t go start your own union either.
As for allegations of who is paying me, nobody is, which is why the ALP has a political problem. It’s largely unionist membership (can’t be a member unless your a union member, remember) can’t conceive of why you would be critical of unions unless you are a liberal stooge. Could it be that they weren’t doing their job for the majority of their members. I ‘m at pains here to exempt those OH&S functions that CFMEU etc do so well.
Te mando un abrazo
Steve Munn,
QUOTE: p.s. if I worked for you Terge I would gladly glue your Finnish ass to your seat!!
RESPONSE: What a lovely offer. Firstly I am not Finnish. Secondly you can’t spell my name (there is no “G” in Terje). Thirdly you would not get the job if personal abuse, property destruction and physical attack were your primary responses to differences of opinion.
What I find odd about your carry on is that if an employer was to kick an employees ass, or glue down the employees personal property then you would scream blue murder. You appear to be purely tribal with little interest in what is fair or reasonable in human relationships (ie what is good for the goose should be good for the gander).
Luckily your views and apparent norms of behaviour are not representative of most people in society.
Regards,
Terje.
ok, guys, time for a chill pill!
Jimmy, I meant no offence. just got a bit jovial and too excited… looking forward to my long weekend… while we still can hav ’em!
Terje, at least I read Steve’s rant as a joke. I don’t think it was meant as abuse (preeetty lame).
But the real point here is that lack of productivity and “toilet” sabotage will become the norm, under Howard’s extreme and radical ideologically based anti-worker laws. Massive strikes will happen, and our country is becoming more and more divided and polarised.
I’m no Keating fan but if there’s something he did well was to manage expectations and conflict while getting out of the way of the economy and most businesses. Until he stuffed up with the recession we had to have…
That Social Accord is what is being shred to pieces, and it wasn’t even openly taken to an election. Previous generations of inmigrants used to call Oz a: “Workers’ Paradise”. Current generations of inmigrants call Oz a gulag, and Howard racist.
It’s ironic that neo-liberals and left-wing socialists disagree on many things, but happen to share a common dislike for industrial tribunals. The only two groups who opposed arbitration were–and are–the communist and left-wing unions, who prefer to rely on direct action (“workers of the world unite..!”) and the neo-liberal, extreme right, who think anything that protects unions and workers (the tribunals dont just deal with wage claims) is a clamp on private enterprise.
sorry for the error
Avaroo,
Could you supply us with the details of how ‘ unions exploit many of their members’. This statement is simply nonesense. Union membership is voluntary. If you don’t like your union you can resign. As for ALP hacks and the like, there are some in some unions, but rather less than wannabee liberals working for employer organisations-and let me say, if anyone thinks union organisers sit back all day doing nothing while the dues roll in, they need to get out a bit more-as for the destruction of property occasioned by the glueing of a toiletseat to the toilet, understand that in the absence of any rights at work, people will do what they have to do to register their feeelings at being exploited and mistreated at work. I realise that in the neo liberal paradise inhabitated by the likes of terje and his mates form the CIS that the remedy for workers is to go out and look for another job, but I guess those welfare to work single parents who try that one in a country town will have to learn to like it and lump it, since to leave a job with out a reasonable excuse will result in a breaching of their welfare entitlements to the tune of thousands of dollars.
Oh well, it’s their fault I suppose- should have invested more in their personal capital-like having rich parents to send them to university and the like. Grow up. You neo liberals and libertarians are just a bunch of socially challenged adolescents.
Unions unfortunately, wind up exploiting many of their members,
I’m a union member, and I feel protected ratehr than exploited. While I don’t in principle think that my dues should in part go to the ALP, I think that this is no greater an injsutice than the companies that donate heavily to the conservatives, without any shareholder approval or notification. The unions are in bed with teh ALP, big business is in bed with the Liberals. It kinda balances out, except that the arrogant and hubristic Howard government is crackign down on the unions and opening teh floodgates for the rich to donate.
Why are political donations tax deductible?
stoptherubbish,
If I was a union member, working on a Perth construction site, do you really think I could resign from the union without losing my job? Closed shops are still a reality (even if illegal), so perhaps you should just take a breath during your incredibly long sentences and think about it. As for exploitation – if I am happy with my pay and conditions, but the union, pursuing a political point, calls a stop work to which I am essentially forced to go, am I being exploited?
As for finding another job – I worked as a labourer for over two years, on building sites and mine sites. I was still able to find another job when the current employer was not paying me enough or was, in my opinion, just not worth working for. I have had to move to find work. It is not that difficult.
Our ancestors (or, at least those not forced out of the UK) moved here of their own volition to get work. Surely we can write up a CV or pick up the phone for the same purpose.
Neophyte, union membership as a share of the workforce is still dropping. I did a little post on this today (http://andrewleigh.com/?p=42). Somehow the reporting has been particularly bad this year, as a bunch of people seem to think the share is going up.
“If people are paid to clean toilets and instead they spend their time glueing them down, then how is this worthy behaviour?”
Suppose there is an entrepreneur among the toilet cleaners. Being profit minded, the entrepreneur figures that investing a bit of time and acquiring the input ‘glue’ to produce the output ‘toilet with its seat glued down’ leads to a positive return in the form of a reduction in the total surface area to be cleaned for many periods to come. The entrepreneur explains this idea to his or her potential business partners (shareholders) by saying that the reduction in work required from this investment project corresponds to a cost-cutting measure in the form of narrowing the difference between their marginal product and their wage. Yes, says the entrepreneur in response to a question from the floor of the first shareholders meeting, we are underpaid not because our ‘boss’ is mean or has the wrong attitude, its just because the guy has no experience in the job we are doing and hence doesn’t know what our marginal product is. So, we just have to take over the operation to improve allocative efficiency. Yes, the entrepreneur says in response to another question, you are quite right, if the toilets are used only by females then we can say that we have brought about a Pareto improvement. And, if this is not the case, then we do what is commercial practice, we introduce the user-pays principle. Those who want to have cleaning of a technology with an enlarged cleaning area have to pay a service fee. That’s progress – why else would you have to pay not to have your name in the telephone book.
I hope this answers the question.
Ernestine,
The business then promptly goes bankrupt because no-one wants to buy rubbish toilet seats.
Thus endeth the lesson.
Andrew,
Are you sure you are not substituting a different business plan?
Please note, Terje advocates freedom to collude.
Ernestine,
Very creative. Although not a lot of help. I still don’t see the activity as worthy behaviour. Deliberately destroying property that belongs to others in the cause of extracting a better deal is extortion. It may also involve collusion but that is not what makes it objectionable.
Regards,
Terje.
The cleaning company that cleans my premises was doing a sh!tty job (both literally and metaphorically). When they didn’t improve after having this brought to their attention, we terminated the contract and got a new cleaning company.
The new guys are great – spend less time in the office of an evening yet get more done.
That’s why we outsource: what can be easier and more honest than a contract? Cleaning is not core to our business, just as neither is legal work, accounting, office supply manufacturing (we buy our supplies down at OfficeWorks like everyone else), etc, etc.
This lefty aversion to outsourcing of certain jobs makes no sense to me.
“Could you supply us with the details of how ‘ unions exploit many of their members’. ”
Closed shops as Andrew mentioned for starters. I’m not a fan or forced union membership, or forced membership in anything. It’s basically extortion. Secondly, some unions, and I’m speaking of the US here, as that’s where my experience is, have spent lavishly on their leadership while basically doing not a thing for their members, or even getting companies shut down, all at union members’ expense. Easter Airlines, anyone?
“Union membership is voluntary. If you don’t like your union you can resign. ”
That’s not actually true everywhere. Even if it is, I’m not a fan of the leadership getting the royal treatment while the “little people” get the shaft and that’s often the case with unions. If you’re John Sweeney, you’re probably doing OK, if you’re not, well, too bad.
“if anyone thinks union organisers sit back all day doing nothing while the dues roll in, they need to get out a bit more”
some don’t. some do.
“as for the destruction of property occasioned by the glueing of a toiletseat to the toilet, understand that in the absence of any rights at work, people will do what they have to do to register their feeelings at being exploited and mistreated at work.”
IS the point to register one’s feelings or to improve conditions. Vandalism never improves conditions.
“I realise that in the neo liberal paradise inhabitated by the likes of terje and his mates form the CIS that the remedy for workers is to go out and look for another job, but I guess those welfare to work single parents who try that one in a country town will have to learn to like it and lump it, since to leave a job with out a reasonable excuse will result in a breaching of their welfare entitlements to the tune of thousands of dollars.”
What we all need to realize, for ourselves as well as future generations, is that we are all our own brands these days. There’s no safety anymore in huddling together trying to keep from being shown the door simply by being too big to fit through the door. If a company can’t work with a union, the company will go out of business, benefitting no one, the union members least of all. We need to, for ourselves and our children, make sure that we each have marketable, adaptable skills. That way we can move from field to field and company to company, as work does. There’s little point in trying to remain dinosaurs these days. Protect yourself by being marketable and employable, not by vandalism.
“I’m a union member, and I feel protected ratehr than exploited. ”
You’re probably not alone either. But the way of the world is moving away from unionization. You can swim with the tide or against it. I’ve always found it easier, as well as to my benefit, to swim with it.
Sorry, that should have been Eastern Airlines, of course.
Avaroo,
You mistake casue and effect. You are also full of post modern marketing s***.
Sorry rubbish, that comment means nothing to me. Want to elaborate?
Terje,
Thanks for your reply: “Very creative. Although not a lot of help. I still don’t see the activity as worthy behaviour. Deliberately destroying property that belongs to others in the cause of extracting a better deal is extortion. It may also involve collusion but that is not what makes it objectionable. ”
I am surprised by your reply.
Isn’t one of the aims of ‘micro-economic reform’ to ‘improve allocative efficiency’? On the basis of my reading on this subject, I maintain it is. If you don’t think so then the ‘free market capitalism story’, which you and others seem to promote all over cyber space, differs from the conceptual framework of ‘competitive private ownership economies’ in a way that cannot be dismissed as ‘mere semantics’.
My entrepreneurial ‘glue-job’ story contains the hypothesis that the marginal product of a cleaner is greater than the price (wage) received by the cleaner for the service. I am not trying to persuade you to believe my story. I am saying, please feel free to disprove the hypothesis by means of empirical data. My entrepreneurial ‘glue-job’ story contains an example of an application of the notion of ‘Pareto improvement’ with a ‘mixed result’ (males vs females but not due to any sociological gender bias hypothesis).
Your description, quote “deliberately destroying property that belongs to others in the cause of extracting a better deal is extortion� does not belong to the story I wrote.
Where in my entrepreneurial ‘glue-job story’ is there a ‘destruction of property’? Nowhere. The glue-job constitutes an alteration of a physical object, called toilet. There is a distinction between ‘destruction’ and ‘alteration’. Nowhere in my entrepreneurial ‘glue-job story’ is there any information which allows you to conclude (logically) that the physical objects, called toilets, ‘belong to others’. Given compulsory superannuation, which is managed by people who tend to know about portfolio theory, the chances are that each cleaner is a partial owner. (Just recently, Avaroo informed that the old distinction between ‘capital’ and ‘labour’ is no longer relevant in the USA because of wide-spread share ownership). True, I didn’t make this hypothesis explicit in my entrepreneurial glue-job story but I make it explicit now. You are free to test the hypothesis empirically.
‘Extracting a better deal’: Who is extracting a better deal from whom in the ‘glue-job parable’ and in which sense?
As mentioned in an earlier post, theoretical models of ‘competitive private ownership economies’ do not contain a bias in favour of property rights of ‘capital’ over property rights of human skills. How does your ‘free market capitalism story’ deal with this item?
I did find a book in my library with the title “Capitalism In Spite of It All�, Edwin C. Sims, Gordon and Breach, 1989. It contains a story but it does not contain questions and it does not contain answers and it does not contain anything from which potentially testable hypotheses can be derived. I learned nothing. Perhaps the book is aimed at satisfying a demand for a type of gospel; there is a chapter on ‘The Spirit of Capitalism’.
Your advocacy of collusion makes the glue-job project a credible one (ie no ‘blue sky’ project). Are you still in favour of collusion?
I never said I was in favour of collusion. I said that I did not think collusion should be illegal. Or at least that was the intent of what I said.
Likewise I don’t think abortion should be illegal. However I am not “in favour” of abortion. I think abortion is rather tragic and I would be unlikely to encourage it. Let me know if you can’t figure out the distinction I am making.
In general I do think extortion (ie threatening to damage peoples faces or their property if they don’t do what you want) should be illegal, even when it is done in collusion with others.
Yes that seems like a reasonable assertion. Although for a lot of micro-economic reform their are other supporting arguments also.
It is relevant in so far as it says that (in my humble opinion) allocative efficiency is not acceptable on any terms. Throwing Jamie Packer in jail and distributing his wealth across the Australian population might be good for allocative efficiency but I would neither advocate it nor regard it as “micro-economic reform”.
There are many instances of efficiency that I am inclined to object to. A universal identification card issued by the government and cross correlating all our personal details, movements and history might be efficient but I am unlikely to support or advocate such a device.
Terje,
1. True, you advocated making collusion legal.
2. I agree, extortion should be illegal and I understand it is illegal. But can people, who are both toilet cleaners and shareholders be accused of extortion against themselves?
3. Extracting a better deal’: Who is extracting a better deal from whom in the ‘glue-job parable’ and in which sense?
4. “[Isn’t one of the aims of ‘micro-economic reform’ to ‘improve allocative efficiency’? On the basis of my reading on this subject, I maintain it is.]
Yes that seems like a reasonable assertion. Although for a lot of micro-economic reform their are other supporting arguments also. ”
What are “other supporting arguments” for micro-economic reform?
5. “[Your description, quote “deliberately destroying property that belongs to others in the cause of extracting a better deal is extortionâ€? does not belong to the story I wrote. ]
It is relevant in so far as it says that (in my humble opinion) allocative efficiency is not acceptable on any terms. Throwing Jamie Packer in jail and distributing his wealth across the Australian population might be good for allocative efficiency but I would neither advocate it nor regard it as “micro-economic reformâ€?.”
No it is not because you are tryig to change the order of arguments and hence construct a different story.
6. It seems to me you don’t understand the concept of ‘allocative efficiency’.
Regards and Happy Easter
“But can people, who are both toilet cleaners and shareholders be accused of extortion against themselves?”
I thought the liberal argument was that people are EITHER toilet cleaners or shareholders but never both at the same time. If a shareholder is damaging company property, then he’s just a very stupid person, unless you think people who damage their own property are successfully telling off anyone other than themselves.
Ok – hope those enthusiastic people out there will join in the launch of the Clean Start campaign come next Thursday.
Where’s it happening? At a place near you!
Here’s a list showing where you can join a rally in the ten-city launch of the Clean Start campaign
1. No argument.
2. No argument.
3. The ‘glue-job parable’ is all nice. The parable is not where the seat glueing idea first came into this discussion. When it was first introduced it was presented as a form of extortion against the employer. You have re-written the story for your own reasons. Your version seems to neglect the fact that there may be other shareholders besides the cleaners or the perception that the consumers of toilet services will have towards glued seats. Perhaps you can rework it to accomodate these issues. I won’t hold my breath.
4. Some micro-economic reforms (eg user pays) can be argued on the grounds of fairness. ie ethical arguments not economic ones.
5. Its not like your parable stuck to the story being discussed.
6. It seems to me that you don’t have any signficant point to make.
Terje,
The purpose of the parable was not to generate an opportunity for point scoring. One of the aims of this little exercise was to bring out a few issues associated with the corporate form of business. These issues are totally wiped under the carpet with simplistic mental models involving ‘the employer’ and ‘the employee’. Another point was that it is one thing to have theoretical models which characterise an ‘efficient allocation’ (eg marginal product = price). It is another to find out what happens in reality. IMHO, doctrinaire market people confuse the two. This is unreasonable because it is a confusion of what one would like to have with what exists in reality. The most annoying aspect (at least for me) of these doctrinaire people is that they start moralising – all over the place and incoherent.
To give you a real life example (ie I have direct knowledge), a hospitality worker has been working for 7 years without a pay increase. The amount of work increased during the period, prices of goods and services increased during the same period. The pay at the beginning of the period was ‘minimum pay’. The person became ill. Can’t work anymore at all. During the same period, ‘the employer’ has hired a public relations person who ‘needs to’ go on overseas trips – business class. Take the ‘needs to go’ as given. What about the business class air fares?? How does such a situation come about? Simple, people get talked into contracts which make increases in pay dependent of the profitability of the enterprise. Obviously, the hospitality worker was not asked whether the enterprise should pay for the difference between economy and business class air fares. So, in what sense is the ‘wage’ market determined – if it is the fashion to for enterprises to have PR managers who like to travel ‘business class’? And, how would one measure the productivity of a PR manager? Could be negative. The advice to go somewhere else is simplistic in the sense that it works only in some special circustances.
As to your specific question, what happens is there are more shareholders (in the parable). This is a version of my question: Extracting a better deal’: Who is extracting a better deal from whom in the ‘glue-job parable’ and in which sense?
Setting all other possible issues aside, if the marginal product of the cleaners is higher than their wage then the cleaner-shareholders are subsidising the non-cleaner shareholders.
Ernestine,
Do you believe that employees should be paid an amount equivalent to their marginal product? If so why? If not then why not?
Regards,
Terje.
Terje,
I don’t understand your question.
I refer to a paper by Mr J. Humphreys, ‘Reform 30/30: rebuilding Australia’s tax and welfare systems, ‘Perspectives on Tax Reform (10)’, Centre for Independent Studies Policy Monograph 70, Sydney, December 2005, which was submitted to the Government. This paper contains a statement which corresponds to a theoretical result (marginal product = price) from a body of theory known as the ‘marginal productivity theory’ but it is written as if it would be an empirical fact or self-evident truth.. I have quoted the relevant excerpt from Mr Humpheys’ paper in an earlier post.
Please ask Mr Humphreys for the empirical evidence in support of all of the assumptions underlying the theoretical model for which the marginal conditions can be shown to hold and for empirical evidence that people’s wages do correspond to their marginal product.
If Mr Humphreys hasn’t got the data, then I am saying his submission is ‘doctrinaire’ as defined in my earlier post.
My believes are irrelevant.
Increasingly I am inclined to agree.
Terje,
Happy to hear you are inclined to agree with me.
So where is the data to support the statement in Mr J. Humphreys, ‘Reform 30/30: rebuilding Australia’s tax and welfare systems, ‘Perspectives on Tax Reform (10)’, Centre for Independent Studies Policy Monograph 70, Sydney, December 2005, regarding the relationship between ‘marginal products and prices (including wages).
On the subject of whether union membership is increasing, the ABS figures that Andrew Leigh refers to were collected eight months ago, before people started to understand the impact of WorkChoices.
More recent Roy Morgan polling, in October 2005, reported a small increase in union membership, to about 24 percent. I haven’t seen the survey, and don’t know the confidence levels, but this seems to suggest a 1 percentage point increase compared with the August 2005 ABS figures, which placed union membership at 22.4 percent.
The ABS figures also reported a 4 percent increase in actual membership numbers since August 2004, and that’s the basis of the claim by David Peetz, which neophyte points to. Andrew dismisses that claim on the basis that the increase is absolute, not proportional, but business and organisations frequently cite absolute sales and membership figures, and they do so legitimately.
Given that the full impact of WorkChoices have become apparent to most people only over the past few weeks, it’s likely that the upward membership trend identified by the Morgan polling last year will be confirmed.
Why don’t you ask John Humphreys? It seems that he wrote the paper in question. If you need help in locating his email address I am sure I can help track it down.