Can we care about work?
Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act in 1935. What is the difference between then and now? He identified industrialization’s ill effects as the unwanted determinations that the Social Security Act was intended to remove. FDR (filmed and archived) could not have been more clear! Today, we don’t hear politicians talk about industrialization; instead, we hear about globalization. For caring practices, is there a difference? Are the ill effects the same?
https://www.thebalance.com/trump-s-tax-plan-how-it-affects-you-4113968
If the same, what is to be done to rid ourselves of these unwanted determinations? Would tax cuts be appropriate? More welfare programs? Stringent trade tariffs? FDR increased taxes to fund the welfare projects of the 1930s; the payroll tax was introduced in 1941. The Trump administration engineered tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/pikettys-inequality-story-in-six-charts
Thomas Piketty has shown that between the two major wars of the 20th Century and up to 1980 there was a significant redistribution of wealth in the world and the U.S. After 1980, wealth inequality the U.S. (measured by income and assets) made a dramatic upward turn. This era was defined by globalization,
“…the spread of products, technology, information, and jobs across national borders and cultures. In economic terms, it describes an interdependence of nations around the globe fostered through free trade. On one hand, globalization has created new jobs and economic growth through the cross-border flow of goods, capital, and labor. On the other hand, this growth and job creation is not distributed evenly across industries or countries. Specific industries in certain countries, such as textile manufacturing in the U.S. or corn farming in Mexico, have suffered severe disruption or outright collapse as a result of increased international competition. Globalization motives are idealistic, as well as opportunistic, but the development of a global free market has benefited large corporations based in the Western world. Its impact remains mixed for workers, cultures, and small businesses around the globe, in both developed and emerging nations”
READ MORE From 1875 to 1920, during the gilded age, we saw a massive accumulation of wealth. Yet using wealth inequality as the measure, we are worse off today than 1935. So both processes, industrialization and globalization, produce similar effects: poverty, wealth disparities, unemployment, and economic insecurity for the working class. We are repeating history. Once again we must remove unwanted determinations. However, we are far from the liberal tax laws and welfare programs of the 1930s. Look at the effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act, for example. Why?
The ill effects of industrialization that gave rise to the New Deal are similar to the ill effects of globalization but with one significant difference: globalization has created an infinite supply of labor leaving laborers in different geographic regions of the world without demand for their labor. FDR had labor unions. Big Labor knew factories could not run without them. And Big Business knew its profits depended on labor. Fordism—Big Business, Big Government, and Big Labor—became a tripartite political-economy. Big Business needed labor, Big Labor needed Big Business, and both needed the safety net and assurances of Big Government. The difference between now?: the collapse of Fordism, the rapid development of technology (artificial intelligence), globalization, and neoliberal politics and economics. The end result: industry needed fewer and fewer laborers. Aned Ronald Reagan led an unstoppable campaign against unions. Today we have millions of workers without job protections. We call them temporary workers, the precariat class, or more glamorously, the gig worker. Are they are here to stay!
California, for example, will vote on November 3rd, Prop 22, to make gig workers (Uber and Lift drivers) non-employees. The New York Times summed it up:
“Gig industry giants long ago settled on treating their workers as independent contractors, which allows flexible hours for workers but spares the companies the expense of extending benefits like employer-paid health insurance and reimbursement for fuel and vehicle expenses. That structure — along with not having to pay severance, payroll taxes and for unemployment insurance — helps to keep their costs low. It’s a decision that is essential (our emphasis) for these companies’ bottom lines, especially given that the industry continues to lose billions annually anyway.” (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/12/opinion/california-prop-22-uber-lyft.html)
By every measure there are massive world labor surpluses, notwithstanding some places where there are shortages. Computers, robotics and the internet—across all industries and dependent upon Artificial Intelligence systems—have made millions of laborers nonessential. Alain de Badiou calls these workers the disposable class and he argues they lack any sustainable subject position (not owners, workers, or consumers):
“Let’s remember where we’re at, from a strictly objective point of view—the concentration of capital. 10% of the world population owns 86% of disposable capital; 1% has 46% and 50% of the world population has exactly nothing, 0%. We can easily understand that the 10% that owns almost everything don’t want to get into the same situation as those who have nothing. In turn, a large number of those who share out the remaining 14% are burning with a fierce desire to hold on to what they’ve got. That’s why they often give their support—and racism and nationalism play a role here, too—to the countless repressive measures to build up a defensive wall against the terrible “threat” they see from the 50% who have nothing (Badiou 2015,)
Who speaks for these disposable and unwanted workers? It would seem that Silicon Valley try and are even conscious of their participation in creating a redundant class of workers (even while Silicon Valley CEO’s support Prop 22!):
“Silicon Valley has, paradoxically, become one of the most vocal proponents of universal basic income (UBI). Venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, web guru Tim O’Reilly and a cadre of other Silicon Valley denizens have expressed support for the “social vaccine of the 21st century. UBI is one of those rare social programs that has a radical flair, while also finding support across the political spectrum from libertarians to socialists. Silicon Valley’s flavor is, of course, thoroughly technological, embracing tech advances to achieve abundance in a manner that bears some resemblance to “fully automated luxury communism”. This modern take on Marx argues we should not fear robots taking away our jobs and making us obsolete. We should embrace them! They will deliver us into the post-work future where robots produce while we consume, create and relax – but only if we seize control of the technology” (Sadowski, J. (2016). Why silicon valley is embracing universal basic income. Guardian, Wed, 22nd, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/22/silicon-valley-universal-basic-income-y-combinator).
READ MORE Los Angeles Times
Here’s the crucial difference between FDR’s New Deal and now: there is no rush or demand to shore up traditional Social Security, unemployment compensation, and other federal welfare programs. Indeed, we won’t recognize workers as workers: they are instead seen and treated as independent contractors. We don’t need to protect FDR’s workers: their descendants are now independent contractors. And finding feasible solutions presents formidable challenges (see our blog post on feasibility). If we brand universal wage schemes as socialism it will not likely be feasible, at least not in this current political climate. The unwanted determinations of industrialization and globalization share a common ill effect: unregulated market economies put profits above labor. Industrialization (roughly 1850-1930) organized labor into units of mass production, which created an awareness and appreciation of labor; and for a brief time labor organizations flourished. Why? There were labor shortages. Globalization, in contrast, creates labor surpluses by hiring non-union (cheaper) workers around the globe. This results in idle workers in parts of the world where the costs of labor are much higher (U.S.); for example, white, non college educated males from the upper midwest, old industrial belt. Redundant laborers have no power to bargain without unions. And Prop 22 would strip some of all federal labor protections.
Thus, in the era of globalization and neoliberalism we can’t look to the past for some new NEW DEAL. The New Deal emerged out of very different political and economic circumstances. Adding more national welfare programs will not solve the surplus labor problem. And we can’t go backwards and propose a 21st Century Luddite movement that would destroy AI and the internet. To not address the lack of sustainable jobs, wages, and protections is dangerous and destructive; it has led to extreme populist movements in the U.S., extreme white nationalism, and to extremist populist movements around the world.
Unlike the 1930s and 40s, we need to fundamentally rethink the idea of social safety nets. Workers today need more than an occasional helping hand, or friendly visitor (the nineteenth century social worker) as promised by the New Deal; they now need a respectable and protected JOB! All laborers should be protected and nourished. We need to care and know about how jobs are created and distributed among workers. Think about the unequal exposure to the coronavirus that left many people of color sick and dead. They had to keep working while many others could escape the virus by staying home—all made possible by the internet. They are often called essential workers. We should have protected them. Where is unemployment insurance for all who need it now? We should protect them. Why is manual labor sometimes called menial? What makes certain labor more valuable than others? Knowing about labor will help us care about labor and we cannot separate these without serious consequences. Knowing about work is essential to caring about work. One school of social work, for example, is enthusiastic about AI for social work but they don’t ask the most fundamental question: What about work? Why? They have separated knowing AI and globalization from caring about their particular social work projects: homelessness, predicting substance abuse, etc. This is disturbing. Social Work AI is wishful thinking if it’s not understood in its entire context. We should know about the consequences of AI before we care so much about applying it to social work projects.
We can’t wait for another NEW DEAL. It is wishful thinking that a celebrity politician or social work researcher will save us. A more generous welfare state will not solve our surplus labor problem. We need a social movement—independent of all political parties—that respects, recognizes, cares and organizes a politics of labor and for labor. Workers produce all the value that matters most to people: food, shelter, health care, transportation, clothing, science, care of the dependent, energy, and art. And instead of seeing the unemployed as disposable or redundant, we need to embrace and protect their sense of well-being. If for no other reason, a selfish one: the next permanent layoffs will be in your industry or profession.
Business-minded social service administrators are replacing the MSW with lower paid workers. In New Jersey, for example, an outpatient drug counseling center was recently purchased by venture capitalists (seeking to expand to seven other sites in NJ) and their first task was to hire social work equivalents (LPC’s, Behavior Analysts, etc.) at $25,000. The second change was to introduce a computerized and standardized evaluation system to match symptoms with evidence-based drug interventions: substituting AI for professional judgement. What is the purpose of earning an MSW if AI replaces the professional and skilled worker?
http://www.socialworkblog.org/pressroom/2019/03/what-can-be-done-to-raise-social-work-salaries-listen-to-our-podcast-series-and-give-us-your-comments/
AI and related efficiencies are rapidly creating inequalities in every sector of global market economies. Yet we have no answer to the most basic question: what meaningful work will exist at what wage? Thus, the forces of production (e.g., the development of technology and how it is deployed) have outstripped our ability to develop corresponding relations of production to enable us to care about work and a workers. Will AI work for the common good? Even if we had a universal wage, what would we meaningfully do with our work time? How do we mobilize our reflective minds, our emotional caring, and our political actions to develop alternatives for knowing and caring about work and labor?