FEAR OF LOSING THE JOB
Ross, Prof. E. A.
Fear Of Losing The Job Blue Slip In The Pay Envelope Really Poisons The Life Of Multitudes; Should Be Given Certain Advance Pay When Discharged By PROF. E. A. ROSS, (Professor of Sociology,...
...After a few years, he would be quite free of the dread of the blue slip...
...Fifty-seven Detroit plants last year took on and let out two and a half times as many men as they carried on the payroll...
...If he lost his job at the end of a year he would have a fortnight to look around in before his income stopped...
...Up to a certain point, the longer he made good in his place the more secure he would feel, for the more it would cost his employer to turn him off without fault on his part...
...I have heard of a firm, long aware of the necessity of curtailment, waiting till half an hour before the evening whistle blew to post a notice throwing hundreds of men out of a job for an indefinite time...
...School boards, hospitals, churches and non-gainful organizations generally feel that it is indecent to cut off a faithful servant without giving reasonable time for him to look around for another place...
...of rushing hither and thither on a rumor that this firm or that is taking on men...
...Even by private employes, professional men are usually not dismissed without more or less notice...
...Of course, the man who "fires himself" by persistent negligence or misconduct should get no dismissal wage...
...How can we lessen this fear...
...The obligation to pay a dismissal wage would give such employers a motive to make their practices conform to that of those thoughtful and humane employers who have brought their annual turnover, in some cases, down to 30 per cent, with profit to themselves and contentment to their employes...
...How wholeheartedly a man will toil if he realizes that he is building about his job a wall of protection which will survive change of foreman or managers or owner...
...An employe who quit of his free will would, of course, get no dismissal wage...
...After two years' service, he would have a month, after six years' service, three months, which would perhaps stand for the maximum...
...Imagine a law which should entitle the dismissed employe, after a certain brief term, of say a month, to a day's dismissal wage for every twenty days in service...
...In universities, the professor is usually given a year's notice, or else his salary is continued for at least half a year...
...Inquiries show that the hiring of 22,031 unneeded employes in twelve factories involved an economic waste of a million dollars...
...So long as this condition continues, there will be resentment and unrest in the ranks of labor, no matter how reasonable the hours and pay...
...It is universally agreed that the labor "turnover" in American industries is scandalous...
...The public employe is protected in various ways against abrupt and undeserved dismissal...
...From conversations with wage earners, one gathers that fear of finding the dreaded "blue slip" in the pay envelope really poisons life for multitudes...
...These and other vital questions could be worked out, however...
...I know an industry employing 28,000 men which hired and fired at least that many men a year...
...To prevent "soldiering" to get himself dismissed, would require supervision by the local board, too...
...of returning night after night, worn out and discouraged, to an anxious family...
...The average employer seems to give himself not the slightest concern as to what is to become of the worker let out through no fault of his own...
...How would the legal dismissal wage affect employers...
...of the sharp cutting down of household expenses, the begging of credit from butcher and grocer, the borrowing of small sums from one's cronies, the shattering of the hopeful plans for the children...
...Talk to any workingman today as to what loss of job has meant to them...
...What tales of tramping the streets, looking for work, you would hear...
...And what of the far greater number who are employed continuously, but who are always worrying lest they lose their jobs without warning...
...E. A. ROSS, (Professor of Sociology, University of Wisconsin) THE fear of "losing the job" is perhaps the most prolific source of misery in the world today...
...Few employers have any conception of what they lose by such a turnover...
...Here are real tragedies, hundreds and thousands of them a year in our larger centers...
...But in industry, the lack of consideration for the worker found superfluous is amazing...
...And, since an unscrupulous employer might charge fault where there is none there will have to be local boards to hear complaints on this score...
...No wonder, among wage earners, the bitter saying is rife: "A working man is a fool to have a wife and kids...
Vol. 11 • February 1919 • No. 2
