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May 2001

Island Living 48: Temp Nation
by A. D. Coleman

I’m not a joiner. But I am a founding member (and member in good standing) of the National Writers Union, which has for some years operated as a United Auto Workers affiliate. As one benefit of that affiliation, I get the UAW’s house organ, Solidarity, which provides me with a regular dose of the labor perspective on current events. I’ve also subscribed for years to the oldest left-wing periodical in the country, The Nation -- partly for its fine muck-raking investigative journalism and partly for its rabid columnists (I enjoy checking in at feeding time to watch the left eat its young, whenever it’s not busy chewing on itself). But in recent years I’ve ended up writing cantankerous letters to the editors of both publications, provoked by editorial policies that include periodic attacks on people like me -- a working freelance writer with 34 years’ experience in my chosen field. (Needless to say, the editors of both magazines made no response to these letters, and refused to publish them in their print editions or to post them at their respective websites. So much for a commitment to open debate.)

The issue at stake? Temp work, free-lancing, self-employment, or what some define as "non-standard jobs." From reading these publications and others from that side of the spectrum, it seems clear that the left has begun to mount a calculated propaganda campaign demonizing anyone and everyone who works free-lance and/orpart-time -- including (though not specifying) the thousands of writers such as myself who are now UAW-connected through their own union. Both Solidarity and The Nation exhibit a pattern of ill-considered, hostile and derogatory commentary on temp work, and a willingness to skew statistics deliberately to make their case against anything classified as “non-standard jobs.” These disturbing tendencies need to be pointed out, and corrected if possible.

Let’s look at two cases. In a September 1997 “Frontlines” article on "Non-Standard Jobs," Solidarity reported that "[n]early a fourth of all ‘non-standard’ job-holders would prefer ‘standard’ jobs."1 But, of course, there’s another way to view that same statistic: “More than three-quarters of all ‘non-standard’ job-holders prefer their working situation to ‘standard’ jobs.” In other words, by something approximating a democratic vote (the answers to a poll conducted by the Economic Policy Institute), among "non-standard" job holders the vote in favor of "non-standard jobs" is somewhere between 3 to 1 and 4 to 1.

One can understand why a union’s house organ would hide that provocative and perplexing fact from its membership. However, slanting the numbers in order to grind one’s axe constitutes editorial dishonesty, whether it’s done by management or by labor. The Solidarity story also stated that "all types of these non-standard jobs are typically inferior to regular full-time work," according to the EPI, because they’re of shorter duration, rarely provide health care or pension, and "pay less than regular full-time jobs with similar characteristics." The implication, clearly, is that those of us who voluntarily choose such work are idiots; who else would take on such labor willingly? The notion that there are other gauges by which work might be judged apparently never crossed the EPI’s minds, or the minds of Solidarity’s editors – or, if it did, the latter decided to keep that from their readers as well. Either way, both the bias and the obvious distortion of the facts reflected here are self-evident.

A similar line of reasoning manifests itself in a more recent cover story for The Nation by Christopher Cook, titled "Temps Demand a New Deal."2 Cook points out that "[n]early one-third of America's workers -- about 30 million -- toil in temporary, contracted, self-employed, leased, part-time and other 'non-standard' arrangements, according to a 1998-99 study by the Economic Policy Institute."3 He adds, further on, that "[g]overnment and industry studies show 60-70 percent of contingents wish for something more stable."4 This demonstrates yet again that statistics can be made to do pretty much whatever one wants them to, because it begs an important question: What of the remaining 30-40 percent of “contingents”?

Surely there's some news value, and some data fit for left analysis, in the fact that about 10 million people in the U.S. work in "non-standard" arrangements by choice, prefer to "toil" that way, and don't "wish for something more stable." Imagine reversing Cook's emphasis: "Government and industry studies show 30-40 percent of contingents don't wish for something more stable." Does that story not merit some attention from the intrepid (and presumably salaried) reporters from Solidarity and The Nation?

Significantly, nowhere in either report did these writers and editors allow the voice of anyone who’s opted voluntarily to work a "non-standard job" to be heard. So here are a few facts:

  • Many of the self-employed have occupations for which there are no "regular full-time jobs with similar characteristics." Not all jobs are, could be, or should be “standard.” For example, I’m a self-syndicated working photography critic, with no full-time staff slot anywhere but a chain of regular clients in this country and across Europe. It’s an occupation I invented back in 1968. Nowadays I have many colleagues, but none of them has a staff position; our specialization is too narrow for that.

  • True, I have no pension or job security. On the other hand, were I on staff at, say, the New York Times – where I freelanced for 4-1/2 years, after turning down their offer of a full-time staff position – all my writing for them would be considered work made for hire, and copyright for it, and all decisions regarding its republication and all subsequent revenues derived from it, would belong to the Times by law. Instead, I’ve now got 34 years’ worth of writing that I own outright and can treat as inventory, relicensing use of it to anyone I please; I’m entitled to keep all revenues therefrom for myself. Between 1988 and 1996, that alone brought in close to $66,000 – money I wouldn’t have any right to as a salaried employee of a publication -- for republications on which I have the final say, in books and periodicals and posted at Internet sites. Those are among my fringe benefits, and that money from resales out of inventory represents a good part of my retirement plan.

  • Some of the additional benefits I and others enjoy as “non-standard” workers: flexi-time; working from home; being our own bosses; doing work of our own choosing; redefining our occupation, and our work, whenever and however we feel the need; picking our own health plan; selecting (and firing) our own clients; setting our own rates and fee schedules; evaluation and advancement based primarily on merit; freedom from forced or mandatory retirement; not having all our economic eggs in one basket.

Obviously, neither the writers nor the editors at Solidarity and The Nation felt any obligation at all to speak of such matters when painting their patronizing and denigrating picture of "non-standard jobs." This disturbs me deeply, because I consider myself as of the left and also because I believe in unions, in the overall value of professional organizations, and in the power (and the imperative) of collective bargaining. My parents were union organizers once. I voted for the formation of the NWU, and have been a member ever since. I also voted for our merger with the UAW, though I was concerned then -- as I am now -- about what I saw as the UAW’s inevitable prejudice against free-lance workers and in favor of homogenized "standard" employment. That prejudice is manifest in this ongoing, ill-considered, and insulting misrepresentation of "non-standard" employment.

The free-lance life is not for everyone, and shouldn't be forced on anyone. Certainly there’s cause for concern in the nationwide trend toward staff reduction and the increased outsourcing of all kinds of work -- the emergence of what some refer to as “Temp Nation.” All the same, the left media's persistent slighting and/or ignoring of the millions of us "second-class workers" (Cook’s term) who work “non-standard” jobs by choice is both journalistically irresponsible and offensive. We’ll know that the left’s response to this development constitutes something more than mere mindless, doctrinaire, knee-jerk reflexive response when we see follow-up articles in which NWU members and others who favor "non-standard jobs" -- according to the numbers they themselves cite, somewhere between 75 percent and 80 percent of those who do such work -- get to speak their minds.

1 No author indicated, vol/issue?, September 1997, p. ??

2 March 27, 2000, Vol. 270, no. 12, pp. 13-19.

3 Ibid., p. 15.

4 Ibid., p. 15.

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© Copyright 2001 by A. D. Coleman. All rights reserved.
By permission of the author and Image/World Syndication Services,
P.O.B. 040078, Staten Island, New York 10304-0002 USA.