Austin On Labor, A story
From time to time, I like to make the joke, that I am Mike Roe without the Tv show. Not really that I am anything like Mike, but rather that I have had what feels like an endless stream of jobs over the years. Being a temporary employee for 12-years, I got around seeing the good the Bad and the Ugly as well What worked and what did not in more District 06 Factory’s and construction sights. The vast majority of company’s I worked for where wonderful, but on occasion I would come across one that was entirely on the “up and up.” Treating Employees as Replaceable Robots, Focusing solely on the Numbers, extraordinarily little employee safety. In other words, a place you do not want to work.
It was not until my venture to Wisconsin that I met some truly miserable places, one such place I worked had 0 days without injury more than not. One day after bitching to my supervisor, and actually doing “unsafe” things to see what he would do. We had a robot that would bring us Glued wood and we would attach tops to it, fine but the robot would randomly bring a piece of wood over with out being asked. Forcing you to step on the E-stop, if you were not paying attention, it would hit you in the head. As well there was on kid in his early twenties who was injured so bad his shoulder needed to have surgery, good kid his arm sill never be the same. Sad. Needless to say, once we got this new guy who had informed me, he was on blood-thinners and training to work the button to call the robot, I became concerned it would get him in the head and I would end up trying to stop the bleeding. It was not something I ever wanted to see, so I quietly grabbed my radio and went home.
The next day I walked into the office and insisted on talking about safety and my job. Witch I knew I had lost, no big deal I was working on my business at the time as well, this was just a W2 job for me. When they told me nicely to F… off, I simply replied with enjoy OSHA. So, the next day I went onto OSHA’s website Downloaded the form wrote up a detailed list of violations based of the law and my preserved violations of very standard safety practices. Fun fact, if you turn in an OSHA form in person, they are more likely to go to the site of the complaint. As luck would have it, there was one in Eau Clare 15 min away. I then put my self threw OSHA 30 training, it was so boring, but it needed to be learned. I learned some months latter the resulting inspection resulted in approximately $150,000 worth of potential Fines. So, while I have not ever had the benefit of a Union, with collective bargaining you can gain everything from increased wage potential, benefits and in most cases job security and increased safety. I am for anything that will help make the accountability of management to its employees more expansive and responsive. Because without your employee, what do you really have? A bunch of machinery, and an over worked owner. At the end of the day anything that can increase Labors rights, will be a net benefit for society as a hole as well as the economy. regardless of if its an employee owned Cooperative, Union, or regulations designed to help labor and increase their rights. It is simply something we as Owners and Entrepreneur have to keep top of mind.
Let us face it the best way to reduce labor cost is to keep your employees happy and healthy.
