Can anybody explain why so much hullabaloo is surrounding the introduction of a two-tier wage system at Chrysler? This is what the system is about:
The newest workers earn about $14 an hour; longtime employees earn double that. . .
The gap in wages between regular and entry-level workers has created dissent in U.A.W. ranks. Some long-term employees have demonstrated against the two-tier system and called for it to be abolished. Mr. King, however, has focused on getting meaningful pay raises for the lower tier rather than eliminating it.
At the big Labor Day parade in Detroit, union activists chanted “equal pay for equal work,” and some full-paid workers said they were willing to forgo a wage increase in the new contract to help the lower-tier employees.
That’s exactly how it is at my job, too. A Full Professor at my department makes exactly twice as much as I do. Our teaching load and research requirements are identical, there is no difference in the level of the courses we teach (everybody gets to teach at every level on an equal basis). I think it’s fair that people start with lower salaries and then get paid more the longer they work at a place. Right now, I’m honestly not worth the same salary to my place of employment as my senior colleagues. They invested more of themselves into our university, they understand it better, so they should be getting more.
I love feeling aggrieved and short-changed but here I simply don’t see why I should be.
Clarissa's Blog 
It’s a point of view thing, Clarissa. You think payscale should depend upon demonstrated loyalty to an institution, whereas others (I haven’t read the Chrysler pov) may be that wage should be contingent on the value (determined on an industry or company level) of the labour provided.
One of the most glaring problems with the former system, the one you are under, is this: seniority/sufficient years of loyalty is determined by the same body — or a closely associated one — that pays you. There is considerable scope, therefore, for rigging the approval system such that certain people achieve seniority (tenure, in this case) relatively easily and fast, while others don’t. It all becomes contingent on something other than the quality and amount of labour one is putting in, and I think you can see what the problems might be here.
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“You think payscale should depend upon demonstrated loyalty to an institution”
-No, I don’t. Where did I say I do? 🙂
“One of the most glaring problems with the former system, the one you are under, is this: seniority/sufficient years of loyalty is determined by the same body ”
-Where is this whole “loyalty” thing comes from in relation to my job?? Tenure travels with a person no matter what school they decide to join at any point.
“There is considerable scope, therefore, for rigging the approval system such that certain people achieve seniority (tenure, in this case) relatively easily and fast, while others don’t.”
-Everybody is given the same number of years to get tenure. If they don’t, they will have to leave. But it isn’t like it can take one person 6 years and another person 16.
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“No, I don’t. Where did I say I do?”
Oh, wasn’t that clear? I assumed you realised that what you see as ‘investing in a company’ can be seen by other people as loyalty to the company — by not leaving for a better-paid or better-benefit job elsewhere. This is why in some circles our generation is called ‘professionally disloyal’ — we voluntarily change jobs for relatively small perks quite often.
Tenure, can, in fact, be denied on several non-academic accounts by administration if they so desire. But you know this. Anyway, an academic job shouldn’t be the scale of comparison for an industry job — my mistake in bringing that example in. Doing exactly the same work at an industry job is not the same as having the same teaching load. A senior professor with years of research, publications and teaching experience will command more money because he has more of the things you are being paid for. However, if a senior industry employee earns double of what a new one does for exactly the same work, it suggests the older employee has no capability to improve or work his way up, and consequently the only reason the company is paying him double must be for the one thing he can demonstrably do: stick loyally to one institution and keep at the same old job like a clockwork.
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Actually, the most recent trends in hiring practices are stacked heavily against company loyalty. Nowadays, an employee who has spent more than 5 years at one place is viewed with suspicion in many cases. So here, Chrysler is going against this new trend that expects people to flit around as much as possible.
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Mmm. You know, it is difficult, and I sort of see both sides. If there were other criterion NOT relating to time on-the-job (e.g. race or sex), it would be a totally different matter, but I see nothing wrong in principle with this sort of scheme. It’s all in the implementation, really.
If workers were being conned into believing everyone was paid the same, and therefore coerced into receiving a low wage, or it was a variable system where only some ‘designated’ new workers were put onto a low wage (perhaps due to inappropriate criteria), I would find cause for concern. That doesn’t seem to be the case.
Is the big issue here the fact that there is no suggestion that new workers will be able to ‘work their way up’? In my work, holiday leave will increase with seniority (something mentioned in the article), but I do know how and when it will increase. I can see how some people might, long-term, become uneasy with a system that offers no opportunities for benefit/wage increases, or that obscures the mechanism by which they can be obtained. Yet, that problem exists in a lot of careers that have obscure promotion mechanisms, doesn’t it?
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I don’t like the idea too much, especially when the gap is big, it’s very problematic. Here is may be somewhat related story. In many places, both low and high wage jobs, businesses use the excuse of apprenticeship, on-job training, to get unpaid labour. One of my on-line friends was used like this for several months (!) and then (iirc, most likely I do) was sent away. It’s exploitation, pure and simple. A two-tier wage system gives numerous opportunities to exploit too. You’re a university professor, which is very different from most jobs outside. Many jobs don’t demand so many specific skills and often there is no reason not to send costy employees packing first in a downsizing (f.e. due to economic crisis) or/and send them anyway and take new ones, which’ll be paid much less under excuse of not working there long enough. In a crisis and even without it most people’ll work well and won’t quickly leave the job, so the businesses win. I don’t say it’s always so, but in many cases, specially now with 5 job seekers for each place in US, it is true. Two-Tier Wage System is one more way to bring bigger profits, not from a true explanation of not very old workers being that much worse than older ones.
I don’t understand why you’re worth twice less than others either, but you know best. I am sure you don’t intend to say you teach worse (twice worse!) or do less valuable research (in fact, you complained a lot about very old employees hardly researching at all).
In short, I am against huge differences in wages. Some difference, OK. Somewhat longer vacations, I understand. But huge differences, no. Pure and simple exploitation, trying to make it look legitimate to the proles by using “you worked less” “explanation”.
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I’ve just understood why the words “loyalty to an institution” feel me with such hate. In most cases there is hardly any, if at all, job security. Yes, you may have worked for 10/15/25 years here, but (we’re downsizing)/ (crisis)/ (want somebody younger and for less pay)/ (whatever). Nothing personal, it’s business. Why should I give more loyalty than I get? It resembles some owner/ director (?) of a huge company lecturing other, simple people of the need to return loans and not give their houses to a bank. Needless to say, his company did just the opposite.
There is also this great play by Elmer Rice “The Adding Machine” on a somewhat similar topic, with main hero amptly names Mr. Zero.
The story focuses on Mr. Zero, an accountant at a large, faceless company. After 25 years at his job, he discovers that he will be replaced by an adding machine
I don’t mean that businesses should or can work as charities, but every man for himself shouldn’t be only applied to rich business owners and corporations.
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Having worked in Chrysler factories, I can assure you there is no difference in the quality or throughput of a new worker and someone who has 15 yrs seniority. The job comes to your station every 45 seconds, and you have to put in your bolts/welds/parts, etc. . . . You may feel that your not as good an educator as a 20 yr professor, and that may be true. But it doesn’t correlate to the factory floor.
The jobs on the factory floor are so standardized, I could have you trained and performing EXACTLY like a 20 yr pro inside of a week. There is no justification for a wage differential.
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One thing people tend to forget is that “doing” the same work isnt the same as “doing it” with the same skill level. Experienced people should be paid more.
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But we’re talking about unskilled labour here (and trust me, it’s unskilled). The engineering that has gone into the process of standardization makes it easily transferable from person to person. Literally anyone off the street could be producing the same product within an amazingly short time frame. I guarantee that you could not differentiate the work of a 20 yr veteran from an employee who’s been on the job a month.
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Precisely what I meant. To use umbrella prescriptions like “experienced people should be paid more” means exactly noting in our kind of labour economy.
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The problem is that the newer workers are locked forever into a lower wage scale. They will never reach the level of the older workers; once the older workers leave the workforce, everyone will be paid at the lower level. I agree that this is an outrage, but the alternative seems to be that Chrysler goes out of business and no one has a job at all. The deflationary pressures are intense.
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I got the impression from the original article that eventually, the newer workers get to the same salaries as the older workers. The article says that this was done before in harsh economic times and when things got better, everybody’s salary went to the level of the higher-paid workers.
Of course, if all this is just a ploy to lower the salaries for everybody in this roundabout way, that’s wrong. But is there any evidence of that?
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I have no problem with earning twice as much as an assistant professor. The problem is that those workers will never get to the high level of manufacturing wages as we saw in previous decades. So imagine if they said to you: “Lola, you are not only earning half of what the full professors earn, but you will never reach that level.”
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Don’t confuse skilled work (a professor) with unskilled work (manufacturing). They are not the same thing. The fact that we overpaid factory workers for the last 30 years (I could have stayed on the factory floor and earned 90K/yr) does not justify overpaying them for the next 30 years. The two-tier wage system is an attempt to scale back the wages to a reasonable level, consistent with the skill required.
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I think I’m actually agreeing with Patrick on this one. This comment really makes sense to me.
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Perhaps it’s time to check your temperature. 🙂
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Maybe I’m just a very multi-faceted person. 🙂 Just like my blog’s readers.
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I agree. There had to be an adjustment at some point. You can see how unions would resist that, because they had a good thing going for a long time.
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“I have no problem with earning twice as much as an assistant professor. ”
-And I think that’s good. I have your post on guilt-free research on my wall right now. 🙂
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In a particular organization (intra, not necessarily inter-organization: I don’t want a government to manage this), salaries should be proportional to work.
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But the question is, who do you measure “work”? Just by the hours one is actually present at the job? Does that always make all that much sense?
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“Just by the hours one is actually present at the job? ”
For these Chrysler workers, yes.
P.S.: I admit this is harder to figure out for University professors, except to teaching-only purposes.
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for
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