When one is looking at a statistic it is always worthwhile asking if the statistic is really measuring what you want to know. Take for example, a rating of dangerous jobs. In most of these lists you will find the number of deaths per 100,000 workers per year. This is an important statistic, since dying for your job is something we can all agree is something that is to be avoided. Still does it tell the whole story?
Mine workers have a 34.8 per 100,000 fatality rate in the United States (in 2008 the last year that statistics are available) with a serious injury rate of 6.5 per 100 workers per year. Those are really high numbers (though mining is only the fourth most dangerous job behind logging, commercial fishing and strangely enough farming), but they do not tell the real story.
"Originally posted at Squarestate.net"
When we look at labor statistics we are not looking at the cost to the worker over the long haul. It is of immediate importance for making the work place safer that we focus on deaths and injuries that result in time off, obviously we want to do all we can to reduce the instance of these kinds of events. Yet we are not really counting the long-term cost of working in America.
Black lung kills about 10,000 former miners a decade. That is 2500 times as many who will die from mine accidents in the same amount of time. What this means is that you could work you career in a mine, never be involved in a serious accident and still be killed by the work. Around 9% of miners who have worked 25 years in the coals mines are currently diagnosed with the fatal condition.
Work is important. I am the son of an immigrant on one-side and the grandson of a coal miner on the other. The idea of hard work, of striving to do what it takes to be employed and being able to provide for my family is deeply ingrained in my psyche, just like most of the people of this nation. Yet there has to be some kind of balance. Just I and others believe that we should work hard for our pay does not mean that we should do just anything for the money.
The fact is that more safety measures can often mean more cost, in the short term. Business is generally not very good about taking the long view in terms of profit. Seeing that it will boost the current quarter’s earnings if corners are cut is often irresistible, even if it costs more in the long term from fines and settlements. There is often a failure to recognize the value of the workers who are actually doing the jobs that bring in the coal, or keep the rooms ready or move the documentation through the process, all of which ultimately generate the profits.
This is where the collapse of Organized Labor is so troubling. As long as workers are on their own in dealing with the management of companies, they are powerless to insure fair working conditions. They can be forced, as the miners in the Upper Big Branch Mine were, to work hours that guarantee they will be tired and more prone to mistakes. In industries like coal mining quitting is not even a real option, as Massey has made it clear they are not above black balling a miner. This assures that no one will talk about the conditions in the mine, even if they leave.
Without strong Labor representation, the only backstop for worker safety is the Federal government. Our recent history has shown that this is far from a reliable safety net. Proposed mine safety regulations from the Clinton administration were shelved and ignored by the Bush administration. Even when safety is legislated there is no assurance that the workers will really be protected. Big money buys big influence. The ability of business to spend money to lobby for less regulation is well known. It has only grown by the recent and tragic Supreme Court decision in Citizens United.
So, who will look out for the workers? The answer is the same as it always has been, it has to be the workers. 90% or more of us are cogs in the machine. We might even be low level or mid-level managers, but the reality is we are not owners, we are not fat cats. As long as we continue to think that we can get more on our own than speaking with one voice as the people who actually do the work, we are doomed to be trampled by the interests of the bottom line.
There is a pernicious meme that has been fostered in the minds of the American workers. It is the completely false idea that we should be completely self-reliant. This flies in the face of human history, but it is widely believed in the U.S. today. There is no time in our history when any human could be completely self-reliant. Our species dominates this planet because we have cooperated. On the hot African savanna 100,000 years ago a single human was a good meal for a lion or some hyenas. A group of humans was a flat disaster for these same apex predators.
Our iconic vision of Cowboys as self-reliant heroes is false too. They never made their guns, they never made their saddles. The clothes they wore were not woven and sown by them. Hell, they often did not even own the cattle they drove. Yes, they did a hard job in hard conditions away from much of society, but they were never anything but completely dependent on that society.
The same is true today. We are all interdependent on our fellow citizens. We can not have our standard of living without the hard work of thousands and thousands of others. To act and think otherwise is to give away the one strength the workers have, the overwhelming strength of our numbers.
Today in America people will be working. They will be lifting heavy weights, they will be dealing with dangerous materials, they will be taking risks on bikes to deliver messages, they will be working with incredibly sharp knives on speeding conveyor belts. Some of them will die today. Some will be injured, permanently or temporarily. Many will be trading their future health and well-being for the paycheck at the end of the week.
If we are to re-balance power in this nation, this is where we must start. We must band together as workers and speak in a single voice. Not just for better wages but for working conditions that will not leave us bent and broken in our old age. This is the promise that Labor can deliver, but it will not come from the unions alone. If we do not recognize that its our work that generates the wealth in this nation and stand up for our share, then we deserve to be dying for a job.
The floor is yours.