During my freshman year of college, 2015-2016, I worked at my first job, Kroger. I was never a cashier, nor a stocker, I had the privilege of working in the bakery, and the Deli. I only worked in the bakery for about a month and had I stayed any longer I would have quit. I learned three things about work during those nine months; do not sign up for a union if you only view the job as temporary work, good coworkers are gold and can make any job bearable, at least for nine months, and managers are useless nuisances that exist to impede work. The last point is not just an emotionally charged claim fueled by one poor experience with a manager at one company, The novel Nickel and Dimed by Ehrenreich and the movie Office Space support the idea that …show more content…
I went to several nearby stores and asked for applications, as per my parent’s instructions. The employees at all the businesses I visited didn’t give me a paper form to fill out and turn in, I instead got strange looks and vague instructions to “apply online”. So, home I went to traverse the dangerous web. There is nothing more nerve wracking than to apply for a job online. The stressfulness of filling out online application was not only from the time consumption and the invasive questionnaire, the same type mentioned in Nickel and Dimed, it was from the technical part of the form. (Ehrenreich 58-59) To type out your social security number, your full name, birthday, and address into a website you had never heard of before and had no real guarantee of its authenticity sounds ludicrous, but this risk is required to enter the work force. One of the companies I applied for was The Kroger Bakery, I would have had to fill out another application to apply for other departments in the same store. I would later learn how silly this was when I was abruptly transferred from the Bakery to the Deli. The ten-minute drive from my house and lack of fast food aspects appealed to
The paper will discuss minicases on ‘The White-Collar Union Organizer’ and ‘The Frustrated Labor Historians’ by Arthur A. Sloane and Fred Witney (2010), to understand the issues unions undergo in the marketplace. There is no predetermined statistical number reported of union memberships in this country. However, “the United Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) excludes almost 2 million U.S wages and salary employees, over half of whom are employed in the public sector, who are represented at their workplaces by a union but are not union members. Not being required to join a union as a condition of continued employment, these employees have for a variety of reasons chosen not to do so. Nor do the BLS estimates include union members who are currently unemployed” (Sloane & Witney, 2010, p.5). Given this important information, the examination of these minicases will provide answers to the problems unions face in organizational settings.
Throughout the history of the United States of America the continuation of misfortunes for the workforce has aggravated people to their apex, eventually leading to the development of labor unions.
Unions have always been a pain in employers’ sides. From today to the 1910s, workers have tried to unionize for better conditions in their jobs. Today, people try to opt out of being in unions, avoiding the union’s dues but still reaping the rewards. That’s a long way away from what people experienced in the 1910s. During that time period, people were struggling to even be apart of a union.
“Unions are about collective leverage, the power of numbers versus the power of capital” - Canadian entrepreneur, Kevin O’Leary. The American workplace has not always provided protections for employees. Until the early 20th century business owners held all of the power in the employee/employer relationship. Workers were subjected to extremely long hours, low wages and dangerous working conditions, with no recourse or protections. Organized labor over the last century challenged the position and power of employers and lobbied the government to create laws and policies that would protect workers and create safer working environments for employees. The majority of policies that today’s average employee takes for granted, such as the eight
Have you ever wondered what life would have been like if labor unions never existed? Labor unions were originally formed to help improve the worker’s low wages, their horrible working conditions, and lower the hours they work a day. “ Unions are powerful by the power of members acting together, linking arms, figuratively and literally, taking a stand , and forcing their agenda on either their employers or political representatives” ( Asher 650).Unions are only powerful if everybody is working together, if one person does something wrong, the whole organization fails. Labor unions formed after the Civil War as a response to the modern Industrial Economy. Labor Unions impacted workers everywhere by helping increase wages, better working conditions, and better benefits.
Labor unions were established as a way for workers’ needs and grievances to be heard by management. According to Fossum (2012), “forming a union creates a collective voice to influence change at work” (p. 7). The collective voice of workers in a union holds much more power than any single employee’s voice. It can loudly draw attention to mistreatment or abuse of workers. The organized collective voice of workers demands to be treated in a fair way by its management in terms of wages, hours, benefits, and working conditions.
Although having strong labor unions within a job isn’t beneficial to the careless employers, the employees are able to have better working conditions. The fear of reporting an injury or a simple complaint isn’t going to end with someone losing his or her job, his or her life, or his or her family. Despite the fact that it’s nearly impossible to make someone care about something, job unions have the ability to control the wages they receive, working conditions, protection, and their treatment. The employees that work in fast food nation have the ability to come together and fight for what they believe is right, without fearing the loss of a job.
The balance of power between management and labor has long been an issue. Historically, employers had the upper hand, and workers were afforded few rights in terms of pay, working conditions, or fair treatment (Fossum, 2012). Individual workers found that they had little influence over their own work situations and were frequently at the mercy of employers. Over time though, some progress was made in drawing attention to the plight of workers. The power of organizing began to give groups of workers some voice in workplace matters. Unfortunately, however, initial attempts at unionization of workers during the nineteenth century were short-lived and often marked by violence (Fossum, 2012). It was not until the twentieth century that major legislation gave unions a sense of legitimacy and workers slowly gained some leverage in the employer-employee relationship.
In today’s world of employment, one can choose to work in a unionized or a non unionized workplace; both situations have positive and negative attributes. In a unionized situation, members experience benefits such as union representation, and aversions such as layoffs and strikes. In a non-union situation, workers experience benefits such as better treatment by management, and aversions such as decreased benefits and overall decreased wages. Although over the last few decades union membership and growth have decreased, organized labor is becoming popular.
Throughout American history, labor unions have served to facilitate mediation between workers and employers. Workers seek to negotiate with employers for more control over their labor and its fruits. “A labor union can best be defined as an organization that exists for the purpose of representing its members to their employers regarding wages and terms and conditions of employment” (Hunter). Labor unions’ principal objectives are to increase wages, shorten work days, achieve greater benefits, and improve working conditions. Despite these goals, the early years of union formation were characterized by difficulties (Hunter).
Unions have an extensive history of standing up for workers. They have advocated rights of steelworkers, coal miners, clothing factory employees, teachers, health care workers, and many others. The labor movement is based on the idea that organized workers as a group have more power than individuals would have on their own. The key purpose of any union is to negotiate contracts, making sure workers are respected and fairly compensated for their work. “In theory” unions are democratic organizations, resulting in varying inner authority. Workers look for security within a job a...
Jobs and Colleges should not be able to judge hiring or accepting someone due to something they did online. Once the information is online its public information and people can freely judge you based
Flanagan, R. J. (2005). Has Management Strangled U.S. Unions? Journal of Labor Research, 26(1), 33-63.
No way would he ever let them down again! Now, two years later, sitting in front of his computer screen, filling out yet another job application, he was filled with self-doubt, hopelessness and desperation. He knew it was probably just a waste of time. Most employers would never read past the application section that he was staring at with dread. The words leapt off the screen and taunted him, “Have you ever been convicted of a crime?”
Many job seekers will face employment discrimination or perhaps to be treated differently because of their skin color, age, or religion. Although it is illegal to discriminate in hiring and firing, however, one of the mo...