Employment at will

A friend of mine has an essay to write about at will employment and wondered what I thought. Actually, he was looking to quote me as, to use his words, "a scion of cyberspace." At will employment basically means I can leave when I want and you can fire me when you want. It sounds easy, logical, good open market for people to whore themselves - excuse me - apply their skills at various companies to receive the best salary, benefits, commute, vacation time, whatever you may be looking for. In general, I agree that an open human capital market is a good thing because it gives flexibility to the work force in general and, more importantly, me in particular. This blog is all about me after all. Love me love me! You don't become a "scion of cyberspace" without a little ego!

Anyway, is this type of arrangement between workers and employers a good thing? At first glance, as I said above, I say yes. However, I think we need to look into this with our depth perception glasses, as uncomfortable as those may be. A flexible employee market, where employees can trade off skills to the highest bidder and management can eliminate low performing employees, is a great market mechanism to keep America productive. It rewards excellence, and skills, and creativity. It, in other words, rewards people who are already winning. It helps people with strong skills develop better skills, which enables us to get even higher paying jobs where they continue to develop us! In general, this system helps people who are educated and/or went to college, people from better high schools (feeds into college I agree but it has some other effects), people who are naturally leaders and those who develop these skills, drive, determination, etc. Basically, the free labor market is a great tool to separate the "winners", or people who can function in corporate America, from "losers", people who cannot. When I say cannot, I am speaking in very general terms of people with less eduction or desire or motivation or, as a friend would say, someone who has many barriers (lack of education, children at home, no family, low confidence from one of the previous items, etc).

The free labor market, over time, in my opinion, separates us into winners and losers. Actually, I believe everything about capitalism as a major system of our economy and our lives creates this division. A few years back, actually many years back, there was an article in The New Yorker about Karl Marx. You may have heard of him, he was a bit of a trouble maker and tried to stir up all the working class (proletariat) against the big, powerful, bourgeoisie. He even helped express the idea of communism (or socialism, not sure which), the adoption of which caused a bit of world strife for a few years in the in 1900s. Anyway, one of Marx's arguments against capitalism is that the worker loses out and the manager wins. He argued that it would drive man against man and chain us all into a sort of slavery to objects. He also argued that with time, capitalism would create great divides between winners and losers. The article argued that regardless of what one thought of communism as a political idea, his criticism of capitalism was extremely strong and profound, and in many was becoming true. That argument has only strengthened in the 10 years or so since I read that. In other words, you might not like his solution but you can't fault his argument. The article argued he should be recognized at least as much for his criticism of capitalism as for his support for communism. As an aside, he never truly created a document for implementing and running a communist state, which is a big gap in his legacy. Instead, he focused on pro-commy propaganda and capitalist criticisms. Just something to keep in mind as you judge his role in the failed communist states of history, past present and future.

Anyway, it appears he was correct. The divide between the winners and losers may actually be increasing, or as people often phrase it, the middle class is disappearing. The winners are winning and the losers are losing. The losers are not only losing here in America, where they were barely able to make a living wage (remember it has been 10 years since we increased minimum wage, which means every year a minimum wage earners actually loses money from the previous year. How the minimum wage isn't just tied to annual inflation, just like legislative salaries should be, is beyond me.), they are now losing more because jobs are moving overseas. It is actually cheaper to sew clothing in China and ship it to America than it is to do that here. Fine, I like cheap clothing. However, the only way for such a free labor market to work is through retraining people who lose jobs to do other jobs. This is the only way the entire globalized economy won't collapse through tariffs and other protectionism. As jobs leave a country (ie the US), the government and the companies must re-train portions of the population to work in other industries. Why is it in the companies interest? If people hate the company or don't have jobs, they can't buy anything. People hate Walmart, but a lot of people shop there. Why? Prices. Actually, I read an article a few years back called the 2nd place advantage. The article was probably in the Economist because it sounds like something they would say but who knows. Anyway, the article argued that being 2nd in an industry can actually be a good thing because you don't get the negative publicity. There is a lot of anger against Coke in developing countries and WalMart here, but the statistics say both Pepsi and Target have very similar practices. You just don't know it because they aren't the leader. Think about that when you shop or complain - it's probably best to research the issue a bit but I wouldn't be surprised if it were true.

All right so I went way off topic there. The topic is open markets. I think the concept is good, but I'm probably in the winning bracket if I choose to be. I am educated, I have experience, and I have some savings. I already dropped out of my life once for 2 years, returned, and am considering doing it again. I'm spoiled. Most of my friends are in the same situation to varying degrees. So what? I don't feel guilty for it, but I do realize the freedom I have means that other people do not have these freedoms. What is our other option? Return to the days when you worked at a company for 40 years, received a pension, went home to you picket fence, and lived happily ever after? I don't like that either.

This little rant was all over the place. In the next few days, I'll try to take out pieces and expand on them. Basically, the issue of at will employment is necessary to create a global economy, it is necessary to have a flexible economy, and it is necessary to keep me sane. However, it is a sidecar from our capitalistic motorcycle, and like all motorcycles, it is dangerous. That's a dumb analogy but I don't care. I'm a scion, remember?