Valuing Hard Work
Submitted by Ed Ridpath on Sun, 03/30/2008 - 9:58am
In my “day job”, I am a professional working at the business and technical interface of a large company. I see the business needs to balance investments in equipment with investments in people. However, our current laws too often value capital over labor. To maintain our shared prosperity and the basics of the American dream, we must restore the balance of valuing hard work over wealth.
Treating workers fairly is not only fundamentally right; it is also good for business and our community. Good salary, benefits, and safe working conditions expand the middle class, reduce turnover, and improve productivity. Rather than living hand to mouth, workers and their families can improve their lives and our community.
A basic constitutional right to free association also means workers need to be free to join unions, to collectively bargain in good faith, and be free from intimidation by employers or the government.
A special word about North Carolina State Employees: First and foremost, the way we treat our state employees should be a model for how we expect North Carolina businesses to treat all their workers. Unfortunately, the opposite is true.
State employees are effectively denied access to unions and collective bargaining. Salary and benefits are sorely lacking and are first on the chopping block come budget time, instead of fully funding the statutory Pay Plan. Classes of state employees are being carved out and denied standard legal protections. The burden of funding the retirement system and dependant health care is put on the shoulders of state employees.
This poor treatment of state employees has resulted in high turnover to private and even local public sector jobs. State workers strain under increased work and case loads. It becomes difficult to provide the effective and efficient services the people and businesses of North Carolina deserve. It is not just bad for state employees; it is bad for North Carolina.
In business or government, we need to put hard working employees at the head of line.
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Your take on workers rights, unions, state employees?
I would love to see some BlueNC dialog on this progressive issue.
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Ed Ridpath
www.EdRidpath.com
Ed, I started to post this earlier, and then I stopped.
I agree, employees of the state of NC should have the right to form a union, collective bargaining, or whatever you wish to call it.
I have a hard time getting worked up over it, however, because there are so many people in NC, with full-time employment, with so fewer benefits and lower wages. According to the US Dept. of Labor, the mean hourly wage for child care workers was $9.05, the median was $8.48 (May 2006). Most child care providers in North Carolina do not offer benefits such as sick pay or holiday pay. Those that offer retirement plans or health insurance are rare. I work with this population every day, so you can understand why it's difficult for me to get worked up over state employees not getting collective bargaining when they have so much more than the folks I work with have.
Ideally, I'd like to see everyone have the right to organize to protect their jobs and gain better benefits. I'd especially like to see that in the more disenfranchised groups of workers.
Be the change you wish to see in the world. --Gandhi
Pointing at Naked Emperors
Came up on candidate question threads
Can't find it right now, but there was a good discussion.
Maybe you can raise it with Perdue and Moore as a question that's part of "transforming government." It's not a technology issue, but it is a transformational one - and it deserves to be asked.