The New American Job: A Part-Time Life, as Hours Shrink and Shift

[marmar]

from the New York Times:



By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
Published: October 27, 2012


SPRING VALLEY, Calif. — Since the Fresh & Easy grocery chain was founded five years ago, it has opened 150 stores in California and positioned itself as a hip, socially responsible company.

A cross between Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, the company brags that its house brands have no artificial colors or trans fats, that two-thirds of its produce is grown locally and that its main distribution center is powered by a $13 million solar installation.

But in one crucial respect, Fresh & Easy is just like the vast majority of large American retailers: most employees work part-time, with its stores changing many of their workers’ schedules week to week.

At its store here, just east of San Diego, Shannon Hardin oversees seven self-checkout stations, usually by herself. Typically working shifts of five or six hours, she hops between stations — bagging groceries, approving alcohol purchases, explaining the checkout system to shoppers and urging customers to join the retailer’s loyalty program, all while watching for shoplifters. ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/28/business/a-part-time-life-as-hours-shrink-and-shift-for-american-workers.html?hp&_r=0

[Peepsite]

1. Welcome to 10 yrs ago NYT. And here I thought NY got all the big trends first.

[snot]

2. The trend is part of an economy of exploitation and looting, a vicious cycle.

Currently, we allow our economy to be run by those who treat it as a zero-sum game in which the goal is to exploit workers in order to enrich the 1%; the goal is to loot the situation faster than the other guys, even though it means increasing unemploymnet and consumers too impoverished to buy anything. The looters just look forward to the time when everyone has to sell everything they've got dirt-cheap, so they looters can buy the assets up.

But we could instead recognize that the economy does not have to be a zero-sum game, and have an economy in which the goal is to increase the productivity of all and to share the resulting wealth equitably enough so that all workers can afford to buy things, creating more jobs – a virtuous cycle in which the pie itself gets bigger and bigger.

[aletier_v]

6. 32-hour workweek

Even 36-hour would be significantly better.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_economics

[MountainLaurel]

3. Not just retailers

Folks including adjunct professors, librarians, bank tellers, and nurses are having to cobble together multiple part-time jobs to try to pay the bills.

[starroute]

4. The big-box stores basically own your life

I know someone who worked at one of them for a year or two. They had a prior claim on every moment of his time from something like 7 am to 10 pm, every day of every week (a couple of hours less on Sunday) and would only inform him two weeks in advance which 39 of those hours he would actually be working.

This meant he had no life. Weekends off were unthinkable, of course -- but even getting two other days in a row was chancy. He couldn't plan on something like a regular Wednesday evening get-together with his friends. He couldn't buy concert tickets for two months in advance. And taking vacation time when he wanted it was dependent on the higher-ups.

Shifts also moved around, so he might be working a late evening shift and have to go home, snatch a few hours of sleep, and be back for the early morning shift the next day.

This is not a way to treat human beings.

[aletier_v]

5. It's not sustainable

A man who works sixty hours per week has no time to consume what he produces.

This is why you have part of the population angry about working too hard, but the other part on government subsidies. A 32-hour workweek would spread income, work and consumption in a fairer pattern.

This is why FDR legislated the 40-hour workweek during the Great Depression.

[SoCalDem]

7. Fulltime life on part time pay..with extra crunchy soul-crushing schedules

How uniquely American

[hfojvt]

8. I hate that title

Is work the only thing to life? Should we all work 24/7?

Part-time work often means a steep drop in income and benefits, but in other ways it gives you MORE of a life, not less. Personally, I have always felt that a 40 hour week was too damned long.

[nobunnyclue]

9. The "Productivity" Benefit from technology

30+ years ago when I was in high-school, I marveled at the McDonald's manager who, every couple of hours, would run a tally of how much business they had done vs. how many people were working during that time. And if it wasn't up-to-snuff, they'd ask one or another employee to leave early for the night.

McDonald's used this tactic to manage labor "productivity" to become the most successful American franchise outfit in the world.

Today it's all done by computer, and everybody has caught on. The computer tracks register sales vs. electronic time cards. It doesn't care whether someone is in the electronics department helping grandma choose the right digital camera unless she buys it right then and there. If the revenue isn't in this hour, send someone home. Economists call it "the productivity coefficient" - fewer workers, same output, or, in the case of retail, number of workers hawkishly managed to the rate of sales.

It's a good model for selling commoditized burgers made by commoditized high-school kids working for cash to buy baseball cards, a dress for the prom, or maybe even a car. But it's a completely unacceptable model for delivering a sustainable society of professionals who raise their families, engage actively in their communities, and invest in developing their own skills and human capital.

[librechik]

10. if only we had a decent social safety net, there would be nothing wrong with this

workers should be gradually reducing their hours over time in a response to automation and population. But the way we are doing it is just cruel and unusual.

[Rex]

11. How is that new!?! Did they invent a time machine

and go back in time 20 years!?! Yes NYT that is how long we have been a 35 hour (no health care) work force and the GOP thinks we get more than we should! They want to do away with minimum wage (they want total slave wages).

This is why the GOP will destroy American if given the chance...they still want their free market and no oversight.

Like driving a car off a cliff and flooring the accelerator..

Another reason NEVER to vote for a Repuke.