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A Healthy Economy Requires Healthy Workers
With the Omicron variant rampaging through Canadian communities, many industries are experiencing supply disruptions because many workers cannot go to their jobs: because they have COVID, were exposed to it, or are caring for others (like kids who can’t go to school). Perversely, this has spurred governments to weaken policies that limited the spread of COVID in workplaces. This may seem like a quick ‘fix’, but will only accelerate further contagion (and exacerbate supply chain problems) within days. In this commentary, originally published in the Toronto Star, Centre for Future Work Director Jim Stanford highlights the contradictory messages from political and business leaders toward workers throughout the entire pandemic. At…
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Is There Really a Shortage of Labour?
With restaurants and stores opening up again after the pandemic, loud complaints are emerging from employers in the hospitality and retail sectors that they can’t find enough workers. Many point the finger at government income supports which supported people through the pandemic (including the former CERB, cancelled last September, and subsequent improvements in EI benefits). Many also want the federal government to open the taps on Temporary Foreign Workers, to bring in more low-cost labour from other countries. However, the hard economic evidence does not support this complaint about a supposed ‘labour shortage.’ Yes, it is certainly an operational challenge for restaurants and stores to reconnect with former employees after…
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Global Manifesto to Democratize Work
The COVID pandemic has painfully reminded us of the lack of genuine power that most workers have in their working lives. As soon as COVID began to spread, it was immediately obvious that workplaces were very vulnerable to contagion – yet employers and government regulators were very slow to address the threat with adequate and meaningful protective measures. Compelled by economic necessity, and lacking organized voice and bargaining power, workers literally risk their lives to continue performing their duties – often for poverty-level wages, in dangerous conditions. If workers had real say over how their workplaces operate, they could demand and win obvious and important changes to make their jobs…
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Amidst COVID, Unions More Relevant Than Ever
One surprising consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic and recession has been a notable increase in the proportion of employed Canadians who belong to a union. This partly reflects an increase in union organizing among workers who feel unsafe or exploited during the pandemic (in long term care homes, other health facilities, hospitality and retail workplaces, and others). It is also due to the fact that workers without a union have fewer job protections – and hence more of them lost their jobs, more immediately, as the pandemic hit. Centre for Future Work Director Jim Stanford recently joined the Out of Left Field podcast to discuss the opportunities for strengthening trade…
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In a Crisis, You Want Someone at Your Back
As Canadians celebrated Labour Day, new data indicates that union membership has been growing in Canada (and several other industrial countries) even as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to rage around the world. In this column, originally published in the Toronto Star, Centre for Future Work Director Jim Stanford argues there is a connection between the current crisis and renewed interest in unions and collective bargaining. Unions are particularly important during tough times, to limit employers’ normal tendencies to try to shift the costs of a downturn onto the backs of their workers. This pandemic has caused a surprising rebound for the unions There won’t be any Labour Day parades this…
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The Surprising Resilience of Trade Unionism in Canada
Trade unions in Canada and globally have been on the defensive for years. Economic and political cultural changes have tended to undermine the power, visibility, and viability of trade unions and traditional forms of collective bargaining. As a result, union density (the proportion of workers with the protection of a union and a collective agreement) has declined in most countries through the neoliberal era. Canadian unions are not immune to these challenges. However, comparative data compiled by Centre for Future Work Director Jim Stanford provides surprising evidence that despite these challenges, Canadian unions have exerted a relatively stable influence on wages, income distribution, and labour policies. This helps to explain…
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Rebuilding Canada’s Economy Must Start with Rebuilding Work
The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting economic crisis have shone an unforgiving spotlight on several long-standing fractures in Canada’s labour market. Repairing those structural weaknesses is an essential precondition for re-opening the economy — and keeping it open — once the immediate health emergency passes and we start heading back to work. Failing to address those challenges will amplify the consequences of this crisis for millions of Canadians, as well as our overall social and economic stability. And it will leave us more vulnerable to the next pandemic, or comparable shock of some other sort. Centre for Future Work Director Jim Stanford was invited to participate in a new project, Rebuild…
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rabble.ca Podcast with Jim Stanford on Making Work Better After COVID
The Canadian on-line news site rabble.ca has produced a new podcast from a presentation which Centre for Future Work Director Jim Stanford recently gave to rabble’s Members’ Council. The presentation draws on the Centre’s recent report, Ten Ways the COVID-19 Pandemic Must Change Work for Good. To hear or download the full podcast, please visit rabble’s podcast page here: Economist Jim Stanford talks about the future of work — during COVID-19 times and beyond.
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There are Opportunities as Well as Threats for Workers in the COVID-19 Recession
The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting economic crisis poses many obvious threats to workers in all industries: job loss, reduced hours, employer demands for concessions in wages and benefits… and of course the risk of contracting the virus at work. However, the pandemic is also highlighting long-standing weaknesses in Canada’s labour market structures and policies – and opening promising opportunities to win improvements in those structures and policies. Journalist Chelsea Nash, labour beat reporter with the Canadian digital news site rabble.ca, has published an inspiring article discussing those opportunities, and analyzing what unions and equality advocates will need to do to make the most of them. Her article features extensive quotes…
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There’s no Shortage of Labour: Employers Have to Improve their Offer
As the COVID-19 recession continues to destroy jobs and incomes across Canada, some employer lobbyists are complaining that federal government income security programs (like the Canada Emergency Response Benefit, or CERB) are undermining the “incentive to work” and making it difficult to attract workers to their businesses. In this column, originally published in the Toronto Star, Jim Stanford refutes these complaints – and suggests that the CERB is placing desired pressure on employers to improve the wages and hours they are offering to prospective workers. Employer Complaints About CERB Expose Their Exploitive Staffing Model As health restrictions ease and stores, restaurants, and other services start to reopen, some employers…