To the Point:

Part-time issue a growing concern

By William E. Scheuerman
UUP President

For years, UUP has tried to address the needs of SUNY’s part-time workers, both through collective bargaining and in the political arena. While we’ve achieved some success, our work is far from done. But the issue of part-time employment at SUNY in particular and higher education in general is only a piece of a larger puzzle.

The puzzle I’m talking about is the phenomenal growth of part-time and contingent workers throughout America’s changing new workplace. Today, some 39 million workers — one-third of the labor force — are characterized by the Bureau of Labor Statistics as either part-time or contingent. This trend presents new challenges to the labor movement in its ongoing quest to help workers get their share of the American Dream. So, the challenge facing the labor movement here is clear. Unions need to organize a large and growing group of exploited workers who need the protections organized labor offers. Sounds simple enough. Too bad it’s not. To understand why, let’s look at who these workers are and the problems they face.

The first problem is the nature of the work itself. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a part-time worker is someone who works less than 35 hours a week. Some part-timers choose to work part-time. Others are forced into part-time employment for a wide variety of reasons. Needless to say, most are poorly paid and lack both benefits and job security. Contingent workers may work full- or part-time. They’re characterized as contingent because they work only when they’re needed. Their employer is often a firm other than the one paying their salary, as in contract work through a “temp” agency. Kelly Services, which used to supply just temporary office workers, now offers public and private employers a wide range of contract services, including government workers. Some contingent workers receive higher wages and better benefits than do regular part-timers, but many are poorly paid and lack benefits and job security. Remember, a contingent employee only works as needed — by the employer!

The other big problem is how to get the union message to transient workers. A big change in the American workplace is that a growing segment of the labor force does not have an institutional affiliation amenable to traditional organizing methods. How, for example, do you organize people who lack job security and regularly move from job to job? Or how do you organize a worker at Company X when that worker is hired and paid by another employer? How do you organize a contracting company of temporary workers? You get the point.

In the old days, when people worked at, say, an auto plant, unions could go to the plant and organize. Since some 30 percent of all workers now lack a traditional employment relationship to a company, unions have to find a way to reach these workers. We need to create new structures that mediate between new economy workers and their jobs. We can do this in a number of ways. Organizing the employment agencies — a very tough task — is a possibility. Some unions have gone beyond that by establishing their own employment agencies. These agencies could serve as the basis of providing portable health insurance to the millions now lacking coverage.

Another model for unions is to assume a gate-keeping function. This is not a new idea. The Screen Actors Guild and the musicians’ union represent transient workers. And for years, maritime unions have had hiring halls to provide ships with crews. This model might guide us.

The stakes in labor’s newest challenge are high. Unions have always given the downtrodden and exploited a chance to improve their lot in life. In so doing, unions helped to give birth to America’s middle class, making it possible for countless millions to participate in the American Dream. But to the part-time and contingent workers who play an increasingly important role in our economy, the dream is floating away in a sea of exploitation. We can’t let that happen.

Organized labor needs to develop effective new structures to meet the needs of the growing number of part-time and contingent workers. If we succeed, part-time and contingency work — often driven by anti-unionism and the desire to make the Big Buck on the workers’ backs — may cease to be the latest form of wage slavery.

(Editor’s note: The AFT is taking a close look at these important issues. Scheuerman, who is an AFT vice president, co-chairs the AFT Task Force on Part-Time and Contingent Workers.)