Globalization has produced higher productivity in the USA by  “outsourcing” most of the labor intensive work to the third world. It is no wonder then that year after year, as the dollar chases the cheapest labor costs, productivity goes up in terms of the USA’s GDP. Goods made overseas are sold at here at American prices, providing a huge profit margin, which is then passed on to the elites, while artificially pumping up the GDP. The USA’s main export is money, which flows abundantly from the nation’s monetary growth driven by “easy credit“.

What labor outsourcing has not done to America’s workers, the wide spread use of process technology has completed. Process technology speeds up the manufacture of goods, or the processing of information, to such an extent that it is no longer humanly possible to perform the same tasks manually. Computers are embedded into manufacturing machinery in such a way as to make workers redundant.

In the white collar or data processing sector, the use of computers has decimated the operational sector, as the Internet and XML transactions make human interaction unnecessary.  The IT sector has been perhaps the hardest hit by this “new economy”, since the computer never forgets what it has been “taught” by it’s software developers, making them redundant as soon as the computrer “knows” all that they could program into it.

Job Sharing

The solution to these problems is a simple one, but one that politicians avoid because it steps upon too many vested interests. It is mandatory job sharing, where one job becomes two, by virtue of the fact that it is no longer a one full time 40 hour a week job, but two half time 24 hour positions.

All benefits and obligations will need to be split as well, so that any benefits at 40 hours of employment will also be available at 24 hours of work. This can be done by family centric bank accounts, where social benefits are accrued into a shared account, which is then used by an entire family or community to pay for it’s actual insurance and social costs.

As salaries are split, those who are going from full time to part time work will need to negotiate a severance package from their employer.  All new jobs should be created to comply with the job sharing initiative, without the need for a transitionary period.  A severance contract must be signed, either with the individual employee, or with a collective bargaining union, for those professionals whose jobs with be shared.  For those professional workers whose income would be reduced, the state must provide a direct salary subsidy to cover the difference between the old 40 hour salary and the new 24 hour salary, using automated means testing.  This would become a new social benefit until it is no longer needed.

No one would be barred from working more than one job per week if they want to and are able to. However, every professional and skilled technician must be guaranteed at least one 24 position in his/her chosen career, if he/she qualifies for it by reason of his/her education and experience. Hiring priority  must be given to professionals and technicians who are either unemployed or underemployed at the time.  The traditional job search and application process would remain a competitive and free process, as long as any applications from people qualified under the job/share initiative are considered before any other applicants.

An advantage to job sharing is that is would provide for one half of the job to be assigned to a junior person, who would then learn from his/her more experienced senior colleague. There would be better coverage in critical job areas, and better job training as a result of sharing the same workplace over a longer period of time.

The 24 hour work week

For this initiative to have any meaning and fairness, the total salary for an existing 40 job must be split into two parts, according to the skill level and experience of each party.  If both have equal experience and aptitude, the job's salary should be equal.  However, pay can not be based on seniority for one party, while the other party is relegated to a lower salary scale for no other reason. Not to provide for this "total split pay" clause would result in a half-sizing of the job market, where unscrupulous business's would reap considerable profits by paying less for two 24 hour jobs than they did for one 40 hour job.

Clearly, not all jobs can be split. The executive management or creative R&D  of an enterprise can not be shared, since to do so would cause a discontinuity in the mission.  A person who is self employed would not be required to share his employment. However, a self employed person could qualify for the job/share employment program if his self employment is not in his chosen  profession by reason of his education and experience.

The same forces that drove the neo liberal globalization will now allow for most jobs to be shared. Any job that involves a computer work station of some kind can be shared. Most office jobs are now shareable because all records are stored in a centralized database, that can be accessed by any employee, and need not be archived at a physical filing cabinet.

Summary

Eventually, most jobs will be shared, and the sacrosanct 40 hour work week will be a vestige of the industrial age; that tragic era where the chaos of totalitarian capitalist systems almost brought about the total and complete destruction of the planet.  It is only the transition to mandated job sharing that is difficult to implement, once it is complete, all subsidies and transitional considerations can be deprecated. With each new job posting, with each new legislative act, with each new labor contract, with each innovation, in time, new and better 24 hour jobs will be created.

Sharing is an altruistic instinct with all Human beings,  it is the capitalist system that has cajoled us into isolation and competition. We need only to look around to see what the results of their much hyped "supremacy of the individual" has wrought upon the earth.   

Time will again be available to spend with one’s family and friends, instead of being spent in their 40 hour a week treadmill, where life seems like is nothing but a daily routine instead of a joy. Human beings were not meant to work until they drop dead of exhaustion. Machines should help us work less, not more, we should share the joys of living, that is G-ds will for us.

Atlanta, GA
Aug 12, 2003