Timesizing® Associates - Homepage

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Timesizing News, Sept.27-30, 2003
[Commentary] ©2003 Phil Hyde, Timesizing.com, Box 622, Porter Sq, Cambridge MA 02140 USA 617-623-8080

9/30/2003  primitive timesizing & worktime consciousness in the news = glimmers of strategic hope -

1. Plan could cut hours for state employees to 37.5 a week - Latest option would trim workdays to save $230m, by Chris Andrews, Lansing State Journal 9/29/2003 via GoogleNews.
   Budget-cutting options [blowout]
   Here are some of the options the state [of Michigan] has for cutting costs:
   • Shortening the workweek
   • Banking employees' leave time
   • Furloughing days
   • Laying off workers
   • Cutting contracts
   [This is the kind of list we like to see - a tange of timesizing options first and layoffs and contract-breaking last.]
   MICHIGAN, U.S.A. - Thousands of state workers could face shortened workdays if Gov. Jennifer Granholm doesn't get concessions from state unions.
   States agencies are developing plans for operating with employees working fewer hours. The most likely cut a half-hour a day in the 40-hour workweek.
   "We're talking about 37.5 hours because that's pretty close to the savings we need," said Daivd Fink, director of the Office of the State Employer.
   Fink said he still is hoping to negotiate an alternative in which workers continue to work eight-hour days but defer some pay or take extra unpaid time off.
   Granholm's 2003-04 budget assumes $230m in yet-to-be-approved employee concessions or other savings.
   With the start of the fiscal year looming, pressure is building on the state to resolve the issue.
   "I'd like to see meaningful progress in the month of October," Fink said. "At a certain point, we will have to take action to achieve savings."
   The Civil Service Commission is expected to take up the banked leave time proposal for non-unionized workers on Oct. 9.
   According to the notice sent to unions, the reduction in the workweek could begin as early as Oct. 26.
   55,000 face changes
   State workers will get 3% raises when the state's new fiscal year begins Wednesday [10/01].
   For a typical state worker earning $44,000, it's an increase of about $1,300.
   But cutting the workday by a half-hour would result in a 6.25% cut in pay.
   [Let's see, is that an exact prorating? (40-37.5)/40= 2.5/40= 6.25%. Yep. So no change in hourly wages.]
   Fink said it also would affect vacation time, delay step-increase raises and reduce retirement benefits.
   Fink said it would reduce state services, but not as much as extensive layoffs.
   Until recently, the state appeared to be giving unions a choice between a banked leave time proposal that affected all members and layoffs that might include 2,000 or 3,000 or the state's 55,000 workers.
   Union leaders say their members have overwhelmingly told them they prefer layoffs to that concession package.
   [So here again, we get labor union members slitting their own throats. As we've said many times, only about 50% of labor "gets" the shorter hours imperative. Half would rather lose union membership and foster more joblessness pressuring down their wages. Rather than share the vanishing work like their forefathers did as they cut the American workweek from 80-84 hours in the early 1800s to 40 in 1940, today's short-sighted half of the labor movement would rather see work concentrate on fewer people with ever higher taxes to support the excluded. A group (the CIO - no worksharing) split off from the AFL (worksharing) in the 1930s over this issue. This is why we say, this is not a left-right issue. Both management and labor is split on worksharing, half realizing it's long-term necessity and half sacrificing some of their own members to short-term selfishness.]
   If the choice is between a shorter workweek or banked leave time, all members will be affected either way.
   Phil Thompson, executive vice president of Service Employees International Union [SEIU] Local 517-M, said the proposal came out of left field.
   [Whatever that means.]
   "It has an element of surprise and gamesmanship to it," Thompson said.
   [Surprise? Gamesmanship? This guy's ignorance of labor history is colossal. Labor's first demand for 150 years was Shorter Hours.]
   "By imposing across-the-board, unilateral [huh?] work-hour reductions, you're irritating the entire work force."
   [What can you do with selfish cretins like this? Divide and conquer! They're asking for it. You can't save people who don't want to be saved. "Unilateral"? The "concenssions" are subject to union approval! And this moron clearly doesn't realize that "across the board" is another term for "labor solidarity," "irritating the entire work force" is another term for "all sacrifice together for longer term gains" - and if even more join the worksharing strategy, the full employment/supertight labor market you've created harnesses market forces so effectively that you get shorter hours with no paycuts.]
   Thompson said the union's attorneys are studying whether the changes would violate their contract or the Federal Wage and Hour Act.
   The Granholm administration is hoping that given the choice, unions will opt for the banked leave time plan. Employees would continue to work 40 hours but would only see 38 hours in their paychecks. They could use the other two hours as extra vacation, or it would be put into their retirement plans when they retire based on their final hourly wage. Workers also would be required to take five unpaid furlough days and get one extra paid day off under the plan. And the cost of their prescription drugs would go up.
   [But that means an immediate de-facto hourly wage cut with maintained wages relegated to a mere promise. Better to take the free time now and maintain hourly wages now by opting for the 37.5-hour workweek.]
   Unions weigh options
   UAW Local 6000, which rejected the concession proposal when it was presented earlier this month, has asked for another meeting with Fink.
   [Unfortunate management name under the circumstances.]
   Local 6000 President Mary Ettinger said she doesn't believe the state has done all it can to find other ways to cut the budget. "We continue to give them ways we think they could save money with their state subcontracts," Ettinger said.
   [Well, maybe they could, or maybe it's just nickles and dimes. Good faith bargaining requires that the state do everything it can along these lines, but in the larger view, fiddling state contracts might amount to layoffs too - which would hurt labor leverage downstream. The goal of every union should be a balance of power with management, meaning full employment and a supertight labor market, whatever that takes. And for most of American history, that "took" shorter hours.]
   Contact: Chris Andrews at 377-1054 or candrews(at)lsj.com.

2. Sports facilities to close - The Department of Parks and Recreation will close four sports facilities as a result of an almost $2m budget cut, by Akash Shringi, Pacific Daily News via GuamPDN.com 9/29/2003 via GoogleNews.
   GUAM, U.S. Territories - Four of the island's top public sports facilities will close down on Oct. 1. At the same time, 50 of the Dept. of Parks and Recreation's [DPR's] 83 employees may lose their jobs. DPR director Joe Duenas requested $4,802,517 - the same amount the Department got last year - from the Legislature for operations. The Legislature, however, appropriated [only] $2,846,614 for the Department....
   Duenas said he originally considered going with a 32-hour workweek to see if the Department could be saved with the Legislature's new appropriation for the Department. It wasn't enough. "Unfortunately, a 32-hour workweek will not help us meet the necessary cost reductions as we could only save about $700,000," Duenas said. "This would leave us with an additional $1.3m in costs to cut somewhere else." Duenas aid he has no other choice but to start laying off or furloughing his employees, which will "ultimately result in elimination of the entire recreation division."...
   [Well, aside from larger questions about whether government should really have a direct role in the recreation of its constituents, with all taxpayers forced to subsidize the hobbies of a subset of themselves - let's see what kind of timesizing Duenas could do to maintain all jobs. If a (40-32)/40= 8/40= 20% hourscut gives you a $700k saving and you still need $1.3m= 1.3m/0.7m= 1.857 times more, then a 20%x1.857= 37% hourscut would do the trick. That would involve a (100-37)x40= 63% of 40= 25.2-hour workweek, meaning five 5-hour, 2½-minute workdays. But he'd rather take the deadend street to the elimination of the entire recreation division -]
   "We eill have to let go of approximately 50 employees," he said. "This will severely cripple our operations as we currently do not have eoungh staff currently to operate," Duenas said. "Over the past few years, we were cut from 160 employees to the 83 we have now."...

3. [prevous timesizer doing well -]
   Watch the plain-Jane airline, pointer summary (to C3), WSJ, front page.
   Relatively little known outside the Southeast, AirTran has a rather attractive price/earnings ratio and new jets on the way that could help it expand.
   [Two years ago, we had a number of timesizing stories on AirTran:
   • 11/23/2001 #3,
   • 11/02/2001 #1,
   • 9/19/2001. ]

1. 9/27   Arnold: Debate about Davis - Schwarzenegger says focus should remain on recall effort, by Harrison Sheppard, Los Angeles Daily News via Oakland Tribune 9/26/2003 5:45:49 am PST via GoogleNews.
   USA -...He also said he supports a 40-hour workweek, rather than having employees get paid for overtime after working eight hours in one day.
   [Hey, at least he's against overtime.]
   The 40-hour week, he said, allows more flexibility for both employers and employees....

2. [a little history -]
   9/29   Birth of a dam, by Robert Wilson, Knoxville News Sentinel 9/28/2003 via GoogleNews.
   KNOXVILLE, Tenn. - The Tennessee Valley Authority [TVA] was conceived as a New Deal showpiece, and start of Norris Dam's construction - on Oct. 1, 1933 - was the first step in converting the concept into reality....
   [Well unfortunately, the concept was gov't makework, which was always too little too late, and if Congress had passed the 30-hour workweek bill after the Senate passed it in April, 1933, all the subsequent straining for makework would have been unnecessary. At least it was just a 35-hour workweek at the dam site.]
   Most laborers came from 45 counties in East and Middle Tennessee, 8 counties in Virginia, 15 in North Carolina, 9 in northern Georgia and 6 in southeastern Kentucky. Salaries were in line with industry, and a 35-hour workweek prevailed, allowing extra time for training and recreation....

3. [Now, however, 'experts' think productivity, regardless of marketability, is all they have to worry about]
   9/29   Job hunters find anxiety, by Christopher Boyd & Barry Flynn, Orlando Sentinel 9/28/2003 via GoogleNews.
   ORLANDO, Fla. -...Tightfisted budgeting reigns in the nation's boardrooms.
   [The boards don't meddle with budgeting - that's handled in the nation's executive suites.]
   Companies have cut payrolls [ie: jobs] while leaning on remaining workers to produce more. Longer workweeks and the introduction of labor-saving technology have helped push U.S. productivity to historic heights....
   [So who cares, if nobody has a job to provide money to buy all the stuff?! - and those who still have jobs are working too many megahours to go shopping.]

4. 9/30   Kittridge connection to State Patrol may be ending, by David Chanen, Minneapolis Star Tribune 9/29/2003 via GoogleNews.
   MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. - ...Kevin Kittridge joined the State Patrol in 1974.... He was third-generation Kittridge in the agency.... With Kevin's retirement last month, the Kittridge clan has written its last ticket. At least for now.
   One might think family gatherings would be nothing but law enforcement talk, but Kevin said it was kept to a minimum "because dealing with it 8 hours a day was enough."
   [A sensible American at last. Although -]
   Throughout the years, he would hear other Kittridge troopers complain about 6-day workweeks....

5. 9/27   40 hours for GTA, by Gaynor Dumat-ol Daleno, Pacific Daily News via GuamPDN.com 9/26/2003 via GoogleNews.
   GUAM, U.S. Territories - Guam Telephone Authority [GTA] employees will see their paychecks restored to reflect 40 hours of work a week - at least for three months beginning Oct. 1. The GTA board, at a meeting last night, gave Gen. Mgr. Lawrence Perez first-quarter spending authority that includes restoring GTA employees from a 32- to a 40-hour workweek, or a restoration of their 20% pay reduction....
   [So can we assume that Guam has plenty of on-the-job training and full employment? Otherwise, this relengthening of the workweek is a step in the wrong direction.
   Perez said the planned restoration of the 40-hour workweek at the telephone agency will be made possible with GTA's anticipated rise in revenues in the coming fiscal year.
   The telephone agency expects the number of telephone subscribers to increase....
   [Subscribers won't increase if fewer and fewer people on the island are doing longer and longer working hours while more and more people are unemployed. Islands are the easiest economies for people to kinda connect the dots, but no guarantee.]

6. 9/27   'Luxury' no longer a dirty word? - Trend watchers say U.S. consumers are willing to give high fashion another try, by Parija Bhatnagar, CNN/Money 9/26/2003 4:13 pm EDT via GoogleNews.
   NEW YORK, N.Y. - When the U.S. economy spirals into a recession, it usually takes the luxury goods market along for the ride.
   [Note the casual attitude toward downturn - 'recession', temporary - 'along for the ride', joyride. No concept of the cumulative devastation of long frozen workweek, plus waves of worksaving technology introduced for the sake of downsizing instead of timesizing, plus uncontrolled imports-immigrants-births.]
   This time around was no exception. "If we look at the current consumer climate, we notice quite a bit of angst," said Nicki Gondell, president and creative director of Trend House, a NYC-based trend-forecasting firm. "Rampant unemployment, a collapsing middle class, extended workweeks, a shrinking dollar, mounting debt and bankruptcies. Is it any wonder we're not spending like we used to?"
   [Nicki hints at something darker than cheerleading Parija.]
   ...A slow economy enticed designers such as Todd Oldham and Max Azaria to take their one "exclusive" brands to discount retailers such as Target and J.C. Penney in an effort to boost sales....
   [The article does go on to claim that high-end retailers are making a comeback, but...this is just another case of shouting a little good news after whispering a lot of bad news. It's already slurred over the key problem - "extended workweeks" for those still working full-time with no downward adjustment, on the horizon, of the definition of "full time" to suit technology levels.]

7. 9/28   Supporters fail to sway judge to free murder suspect, 17, by Mary McLachlin, PalmBeachPost.com 9/27/2003 via GoogleNews.
   WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Fifty friends, neighbors and family members came to court Friday to convince a judge that 17-year-old Jonathan Rodriguez is a "sweet kid" and a "good guy" who had no connection to a gang and should be released to his parents while awaiting trial for murder.... Marilyn Rodriguez said her son had left John Leonard High School last year in the ninth grade, worked 25-35 hours a week at a McDonald's restaurant and had completed the coursework for his general equivalency diploma....
   [Teenager driven to kill by overwork?]

8. 9/27   Some local firms trim work-life benefits, by Michael Kinsman, San Diego Union-Tribune 9/26/2003 via GoogleNews.
   [Note this article contradicts the happytalk of Working Mothers magazine on 9/24/2003 #1.]
   SAN DIEGO, Calif. - Some employers in San Diego County have scaled back so-called work-life benefits over the past two years, according to a survey released yesterday by the Work-Life Coalition of San Diego. Although there were only minor reductions in most benefits, the survey's results mirror a national trend by companies over the last few years to eliminate some employee benefits.
   The local survey included reports from 110 companies. The survey showed the deepest cuts in work-time options,
   [oh-oh, gotta focus on regaining leverage by regaining non-market-surplus by resuming the workweek reduction process of 1776-1940 or it's all over]
   where
   • 10% fewer companies offered permanent part-time jobs in 2003 than in 2001,
   • 9% fewer companies offered compressed workweeks,
   • 7% fewer offered telecommuting,
   • and 6% fewer allowed flexible schedules.
   [All part of the self-fueling downsizing death spiral, that starts with downsizing instead of timesizing in response to worksaving technology and then goes to market loss, takeovers (shortcut to market share without market growth), overlap, downsizing instead of timesizing and retraining in response to overlap, more market loss, benefit cuts, more market loss, paycuts, more market loss.... You get the picture.]
   Although there was an increase in the number of companies providing career assessment services [ie: post-downsizing outplacement?] and domestic partner benefits, companies reduced a varietyi of benefits, including dental plans, benefits for part-time workers, employee assistance programs [huh?], and discounts for healthclub memberships.
   "This is what happens when the economy takes a downturn," said David Allen, senior consultant for TRI-AD, an Escondido benefits and consulting firm that conducted the survey.
   [More actionably, this is what happens when we overlook the fact that we haven't adjusted our workweek for 63 years and the resulting labor surplus and high unemployment multiply and cheapen jobseekers - and pressure down wages and benefits for jobholders. Then our corporate masters get megamaniacal for globalization and "free" trade so they can ream the world, and that adds a little speed to the econo-death spiral.]
   "In order to manage internal costs [blahblahblah], employers are cutting back at anything they see as unnecessary.
   [Weird combo of "cutting back on" and "striking back at".]
   "These benefits, unfortunately, fall into that category." Allen said he was [particularly] concerned that workplace scheduling flexibility was being cut. "It's something employees really need today," he said.
   [Especially if they're losing free time to longer workhours.]
   "I think employers fail to realize that these are benefits that don't cost anything.
   [It costs them control, and during a deepening national and global labor surplus, employers don't have to realize anything - they're holding all the cards. (Except the power to stop their markets from dwindling because of their own 'clever' and "efficient" downsizing.)]
   "But many executives look at alternative work schedules as undermining productivity."...
   [You don't need to provide alternative work schedules for people who are passively cooperating in your turning them into slaves. But then, slaves have no spending power to prop markets.]

9. 9/27   Shipyard workers wait to hear firm's fate, Devon Western Morning News 10:14 - 26 Sept 2003 via GoogleNews.
   DEVON, England - Workers at struggling Appledore Shipbuilders will learn their fate next week. ...All 550 workers will be called to a mass meeting at the yard on Tuesday morning.... The news is not likely to spread confidence amongst the workforce who have been on reduced hours since May and whose last order was finished three weeks ago.
   [So they've wisely practiced timesizing to avoid downsizing - so far.]
   Since then the workers have busied themselves by carrying out repairs to the yard and tidying it up....
   [Exactly what Lincoln Electric of Cleveland OH has workers do during downturns.]

10. 9/28   Shipping industry hit by skills shortage, Ipswich Evening Star 9/27/2003 23:20 via GoogleNews.
    IPSWICH, England - Skills shortages are already in evidence in the shipping industry at Felixstowe, Ipswich and Harwich, and the situation is set to get worse as the ports expand. More shipping import and export clerks, and lorry drivers, will be among those needed in the next five years as more cargo is handled and new European restrictions on working hours begin to bite....
    [Have 'stowers and 'wichers never heard of T-R-A-I-N-I-N-G. They've got 5 years to figure it out. And they've got a load of jobless people to work with. They should be using overtime to target OJT (that's on-the-job training, limeys).]

11. 9/28   Workers anger as firm axes 100 jobs, by Dan Grimmer [an' he ain't kiddin'!], Norfolk Evening News 9/27/2003 13:34 via GoogleNews.
    NORWICH, England - Scores of workers face an unhappy Christmas [geez, we haven't even got through Halloween and Armistice Day yet!] after bosses confirmed nearly 100 jobs - a quarter of the workforce - will be axed at a Norwich factory. Weeks of consultation between union officials and management at Salhouse Road-based metal-packaging firm Impress have ended - and [30] jobs have already been lost as a result....
    The jobs blow will mark the second black Christmas for staff at the factory, which makes tins and cans. In December 1997 the Evening News reported how money-saving measures had wrecked their seasonal celebrations [back then]. About 70 workers were told their wages [meaning weekly pay, probably] would be slashed by an average of 20% and their working week reduced to improve productivity....
    [If their workweek was also reduced by 20%, then at least their hourly wages weren't being reduced, just the working hours they were based on.]

12. 9/27   Capital set for week of nursery strike, by Fiona MacGregor, Edinburgh Evening News Online 26 Sep 2003 via GoogleNews.
    EDINBURGH, Scotland - Nursery nurses in the Capital are to stage a week-long walk-out...to begin on Oct.6 \in\ a major escalation of their pay dispute. The action, which will leave thousands of parents facing childcare chaos, follows the collapse of negotiations between nursery workers and the local authority umbrella group Cosla [any relation to coleslaw?]....
    As well as a pay rise, workers are calling for a generic job description, the creation of a clear four-tier career structure, the implementation of a 35-hour working week and full employment status, including a pension....

13. 9/28   Headteachers 'frustrated by interference', Edinburgh Evening News Online 27 Sep 2003 via GoogleNews.
    EDINBURGH, Scotland - Scotland's head teachers are frustrated by what they see as interference from local education authorities, according to a new survey. Nearly half of secondary school heads in Scotland think their job is made more difficult by the unwarranted interventions of council education officials, research by Edinburgh University has shown.
    The research also paints a picture of professional frustration and complaints of physical exhaustion due to a working week that is usually longer than 50 hours.
    Researchers at Edinburgh University's Centre for Educational Leadership interviewed 153 headmasters and deputies in the study. [When] asked if their local authority added value to their work, 48% answered in the negative....

14. 9/28   Just one in four has a sporting chance, by Denis Campbell & Jo Revill & Mark Townsend, The Observer via the [Manchester] Guardian Unltd 9/28/2003 via GoogleNews.
    ENGLAND - Millions of children are putting their future health at risk by refusing to exercise, new research [by Sport England] reveals.... Long working hours and parental fear of letting children play outside are also driving [exercise] participation rates down, warns the report....

15. [and not only outside exercise in England but 'down under' exercise Down Under -]
    9/29   Lovers look to stars as passion dies, by Catherine Lambert, [Sydney?] Herald Sun 28sep03 via GoogleNews.
    AUSTRALIA - Stress, lack of time and mortgages are blamed for the death of passion in relationships. A new survey found 83% OF Australians wanted more passion in their relationships.... Psychologist and relationship expert Tracey Cox said...the laid-back attitude of Australians was killing passion in relationships, along with mortgage pressure, children and increased working hours.
    The study found lack of time was the greatest killer of passion (28%), closely followed by stress (23%), loss of interest in your partner (20%), tiredness from long hours (19%) and having children (7%)....

16. [So does the Mediterranean have the lifestyle answer? -]
    9/28   Mediterranean abandons fish, pasta...and grows obese, by Sarah-Kate Templeton, Glasgow Sunday Herald 28 Sept 2003 via GoogleNews.
    ROME, Italy - The Mediterranean diet of oily fish, abundant fruit and vegetables and red wine is widely accepted as the key to a long and healthy life. But [even] as Scots are encouraged to adopt the southern European style of eating, the Spanish, Greeks and Cypriots are abandoning [it], health experts will tell the Ninth European Nutrition Conference in Rome this week. The decline of the four-hour lunch break, which allowed families to enjoy a leisurely home-cooked meal together, has resulted in an explosion of fast food.
    [Arrrgggh, the whole world's going mad.]
    This, experts have found, has made Mediterranean teenagers the fattest in Europe....
    [Let's all get back to the four-hour lunch!]
    Working hours in Spain and Italy have traditionally been from around 8:30am to 12:30pm and then 4pm until 8pm,
    [not exactly a 30- or even 35-hour workweek, but nicely broken up anyway.]
    but now there is growing pressure on employees to take a shorter break in the middle of the day, particularly from multinational companies, giving [employees] less time for a sit-down meal....
    [Another reason to take a time-out from globalization.]