New (unpaid) job title at CVS: Customer/cashier

One of my occasional stops on the walk from work to the subway is a CVS drugstore in downtown Boston.  Over the past few months, CVS has been installing more self-service checkout counters at this outlet, whereby the customers electronically ring up their purchases and provide payment, without the help of a cashier.  A CVS employee hovers around the self-service counters to help out the befuddled, such as me.

Recently I walked in the store and was stunned to see that most of the “regular” checkout counters had been replaced with the self-service variety.  At this CVS store, you’d better be prepared to check your own purchases, or possibly wait in a longer line for a human cashier.

From low-paying jobs to no jobs

For customers, this may be a hassle or inconvenience, but the most serious impact is the loss of jobs.  I’m guessing that those cashier jobs did not morph into other positions within the company — and even if they did, they’ll disappear via attrition. CVS isn’t doing this out of a love of gadgetry: Automating the cashier position means you can cut payroll.

During the past four decades, America has lost countless of its higher-paying jobs in the manufacturing and construction sectors.  However, one of the primary growth areas of the labor market has been low-paying retail sector work.  Now we’re seeing how even those jobs can be rendered obsolete, or at least less necessary.

Indeed, when we customers serve as our own cashiers, we become involuntary accomplices to eliminating yet another route to employment.  And while these may not be the greatest jobs in the world, they are sources of income, especially for younger workers entering the workforce and workers of all ages who may lack advanced training and skills.

The good vacation and why it matters

What makes for a terrific vacation?  How can we maximize our use of precious vacation time?  Are long sojourns better than short trips?

Many of us have personal responses to those questions, likely based on our own experiences.  One especially memorable vacation (good or bad) can fix our opinion about the ideal break. And if money and/or time happen to be in short supply, any vacation may look like paradise.

Researchers weigh in

Drake Bennett, writing for the Boston Globe, assembled advice from psychologists and economists about what makes for a good vacation:

For example, how long we take off probably counts for less than we think, and in the aggregate, taking more short trips leaves us happier than taking a few long ones. We’re often happier planning a trip than actually taking it. And interrupting a vacation — far from being a nuisance — can make us enjoy it more. How a trip ends matters more than how it begins, who you’re with matters as much as where you go, and if you want to remember a vacation vividly, do something during it that you’ve never done before.

Anticipation and memory

For many, the best parts of a vacation may be in anticipating and remembering it, while the vacation itself poses frustrations and glitches.  Bennett reported on a study of vacationers who were asked to record “emotional inventories” of their trips:

…(T)he respondents were least happy about the vacation while they were taking it. Beforehand, they looked forward to it with eager anticipation, and within a few days of returning, they remembered it fondly. But while on it, they found themselves bogged down by the disappointments and logistical headaches of actually going somewhere and doing something, and the pressure they felt to be enjoying themselves.

Americans and vacations

Should we be taking the topic of vacations this, well, seriously?  At least for Americans, the answer is yes.  We take much less vacation time than our counterparts in Europe and other parts of the world.  In some nations, paid vacation time is a legal right.  Our workaholic culture is regarded by many as unhealthy and misguided.  It’s the less attractive flipside of our willingness to dig into work and get the job done.  Google the phrase Americans vacation time and you’ll get countless hits to surveys, studies, and analyses on this phenomenon.

Recession effects

The Great Recession has only made things worse.  Obviously for those who have lost their jobs, “free” time may be in greater supply, but accompanied by the stress of unemployment and much less disposable cash.  For those fortunate to have jobs, the pressures to do more with less and to demonstrate one’s value to the organization are making it harder to get away.  (For a related observation, see my post, “The Masochism Tango” at Work.)

Bigger picture

Overall, Americans are not too good at the work-life balance thing.  Economist Juliet Schor’s seminal work, The Overworked American: The Unexpected Decline of Leisure (1991) documented and analyzed how Americans are spending a lot of time at work. It triggered a wave of research and commentary that continues to this day.

Law schools and the legal job market

Law professor Brian Tamanaha (recently of St. John’s University in New York; now at Washington University in St. Louis) challenged law professors at regional law schools in a blog post to consider the ethical implications of attracting thousands of students to pursue an expensive legal education at a time when the job market cannot provide them with meaningful employment.  Citing to angry, despairing posts on blogs by law students and recently graduated lawyers, he writes:

Their complaint is that non-elite law schools are selling a fraudulent bill of goods. Law schools advertise deceptively high rates of employment and misleading income figures. Many graduates can’t get jobs. Many graduates end up as temp attorneys working for $15 to $20 dollars an hour on two week gigs, with no benefits. The luckier graduates land jobs in government or small firms for maybe $45,000, with limited prospects for improvement. A handful of lottery winners score big firm jobs.

Raw testimony

I’ve looked at some of these blogs, and agree with Tamanaha:

It’s grim reading. The observations are raw, bitter, and filled with despair. It is easier to avert our eyes and carry on with our pursuits. But please, take a few moments and force yourself to look at Third Tier Reality, Esq. Never, Exposing the Law School Scam, Jobless Juris Doctor, Temporary Attorney: The Sweatshop Edition, and linked sites. Read the posts and the comments. These sites are proliferating, with thousands of hits.

Look past the occasional vulgarity and disgusting pictures. Don’t dismiss the posters as whiners. To a person they accept responsibility for their poor decisions. But they make a strong case that something is deeply wrong with law schools.

Responses

Tamanaha’s post hits home for me.  My employer, Suffolk University Law School, is a known quantity in Boston and New England generally, but it places modestly in national rankings.  Historically, the school’s graduates have found places in smaller law firms and government service (such as district attorney’s offices and legislative positions), with some managing to obtain jobs in large law firms.  However, severe restructuring within the legal profession and the effects of the recession have had a devastating impact on job prospects for our graduates.

As I see it, there are several important questions to consider:

Cutting the net costs of legal education

Law schools have been raising tuition at rates far outpacing inflation, not to mention the ability of their graduates to comfortably repay student loans. Today, the real cost of a legal education must be measured in student loan debt and anticipated earnings.  Even before the recession, law schools falling outside the top rank could not reasonably assure the bulk of their graduates that lucrative jobs awaited them.  Controlling tuition and increasing grant and scholarship assistance are crucial toward capping student indebtedness.

Reconnecting supply and demand

If you’re not a lawyer (and perhaps even if you are one), think fast: A personal or business crisis suddenly emerges, and you need legal advice.  How do you get it?

For many folks, it would involve a mad rush of phone calls, e-mails, and Internet searches, with very uneven results.

Fact is, even though there are lots of underemployed, able lawyers out there, most of us do not have ready access to quality, affordable legal advice to guide us through our personal and business affairs.  From the standpoint of access and price, even the oft-criticized HMO model for healthcare looks a heckuva lot better than any delivery system for legal services.

In sum, we need to develop a business model for providing legal assistance that bridges this perverse gap between supply and demand.  In doing so, the public will be served better by the legal profession, and more talented lawyers will be employed.

Too many lawyers

Even if we do develop this business model, it’s likely that our law schools will still be producing an oversupply of lawyers.  When law school tuition was a fraction of its current level and students graduated with minimal debt, perhaps that wasn’t a big disaster.  But what do you do when you graduate with $100,000 in student loans and limited job prospects?

Law schools are regarded as money makers.  They take in lots of students, provide instruction in mostly large, impersonal classes, and charge a heap of money for the privilege.  They are loathe to cut entering classes because each student represents, generally speaking, well over $100,000 in tuition payments.  Reduce the new class by 10 students, and that’s $1 million in “lost” income.  For law schools unwilling or unable to engage in effective fundraising from alums and other supporters, it’s a lot easier simply to load up on new students.

The need for legally literate professionals

Even if we don’t need a lot more lawyers, we do need people in business, government, and the non-profit sector who understand legal issues.  The law permeates so many aspects of everyday life, commerce, and activity.  Law schools should play a greater role in educating people about the law and legal systems, without requiring them to earn a law degree.  Law schools that successfully develop such offerings will not only create new revenue streams, but also play an important role in bringing legal literacy to the broader public.

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These are among the ethical questions that law schools should face, and very few are doing so right now.  Tamanaha suggests that addressing these concerns effectively may involve faculty doing more with less, and that’s a real possibility.  I do know that schools choosing to grapple with the situation now rather than later will be in better shape in the long run, in terms of both opportunities for their students and graduates and overall institutional health.  The ones that ignore it may find themselves out of business, and perhaps deservedly so.

An even bigger question

The problems facing law graduates are not occurring in a vacuum.  In the U.S., and around the world, we are seeing an emerging jobs crisis for young people.  Levels of unemployment for high school and college graduates are spiking upward.  Vocations once regarded as safe havens (such as law) are no longer so.  I understand if the specter of unemployed lawyers is not the stuff of public sympathy, but we all should be deeply concerned that our labor markets are not providing gainful employment to their latest entrants.

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Jan. 2011 update — David Segal of the New York Times penned this long feature, “Is Law School a Losing Game?,” examining the state of the legal job market, the cost of a legal education, and law student debt.

Americans: We’re rich but not saving a lot

Yahoo!’s home page this morning served up an interesting double dose about income, social responsibility, and personal savings rates.

We’re rich!

First up, a piece by Jeanine Skowronski about how our earnings compare with the rest of the world:

For example, if you make $52,000 a year (the median American household income for 2009), you are the 58,252,719 richest person in the world (or in the top 0.97 percentile of all moneymakers).

The article links to the Global Rich List, a little calculator that allows you to enter your annual income (anonymously) to see how it stacks up against individual earnings globally.  Most employed American middle-class (and above) workers will see that they’re doing remarkably well compared to the world generally.

Giving

The Global Rich List site is shamelessly manipulative.  Its purpose is not to solicit our investments, but rather to make us more aware of how even modest charitable donations can make a huge difference to those in need:

$8 could buy you 15 organic apples OR 25 fruit trees for farmers in Honduras to grow and sell fruit at their local market.

$30 could buy you an ER DVD Boxset OR a First Aid kit for a village in Haiti.

$73 could buy you a new mobile phone OR a new mobile health clinic to care for AIDS orphans in Uganda.

$2400 could buy you a second generation High Definition TV OR schooling for an entire generation of school children in an Angolan village.

Saving

The average American may be wealthy by global standards, but we’re not saving much of what we earn.  A second article posted on Yahoo! by Joe Mont details how Americans are saving less of their incomes in the midst of the recession:

When it comes to saving their pennies for a rainy day, millions of Americans are facing drought conditions, victimized by the bad decisions that come with a lack of financial literacy.

…The portion of adults who lack non-retirement savings has increased from 63% in 2007 to 67% in 2010. However, 30% — the statistical equivalent of more than 68 million people — have no savings. Only 24% are saving more now than they did a year ago because of the weak economy. Nearly 39% Generation Y adults, more than any other age group, reported having no savings. Of those with no savings, one in four say that if faced with an emergency, they would charge that expense to a credit card or take out a loan.

…One-third of adults, approximately 75 million people, don’t put any household income toward retirement. That’s a 5% increase from the 2008 survey, but unchanged from 2009.

Verdict?

Even as we climb out of this horrific recession, many Americans still live in the Land of Plenty compared to many of our neighbors around the world.  We probably could afford to share more of our good fortune, and we sure as heck should be saving more for rainy days and retirements.

These are bigger topics, and I plan on commenting more in the months to come, but there’s lots of food for thought here.

Workforce Management on bosses, attrition, and bullying

The April issue of Workforce Management magazine includes a very good package of related articles by Ed Frauenheim on management behavior, employee attrition, and workplace bullying in the midst of this recessionary environment: (Note that it may be necessary to obtain a free registration to access these articles.)

“Managers Don’t Matter”

That’s the contention of experts who argue that worker defections have little to do with how well or poorly management performs. Others say managing effectively is more important for employee retention than ever before.

“Bosses Don’t Drive Workers Away, Poll Concludes”

A survey by Workforce Management and Workplace Options finds that a bad connection with the immediate boss is not the main reason workers are thinking about leaving their firms.

“Recession Unleashes Boss Bullying”

A number of workplace experts say the economic slump has triggered a rise in belligerent behavior on the part of supervisors.

You’ll find a few quotes there from yours truly.  My basic point is that one reason why bad bosses are not driving away workers is that the bad economy is compelling underlings to deal with bullying behaviors until the job market improves.

Americans and Taxes: Pay Less, Expect More

New York Times economics columnist David Leonhardt (link below) nailed it this week in a piece on taxes and expectations.

Citizens of richer societies generally prefer more government services…. With their basic needs met, they want a military to protect them, good schools for their children, comfortable retirement for the elderly, medical care even when it isn’t profitable and a strong social safety net.

As people seek more from the government, they have been willing to pay higher taxes to secure these services and benefits.  Rising levels of taxation in the U.S. through most of the 20th century demonstrated that willingness.

Lower taxes, growing demand

However, that is not the case today:

Taxes are no longer rising. They fell to 18 percent of G.D.P. in 2008 and, because of the recession, to a 60-year low of 15.1 percent last year.

Nevertheless, we still want more:

Yet our desire for government services just keeps growing. We added a prescription drug benefit to Medicare. Farm subsidies are sacrosanct. Social Security is the third rail of politics.

Who will pay?

This has led to a growing disconnection between our demand for government services and benefits and our willingness to pay for them:

This disconnect is, far and away, the main reason for our huge budget problems. Yes, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the recession and the stimulus have all added to the deficit. But they are minor issues in the long run. By 2020, government spending is projected to equal 26 percent (and rising) of G.D.P., mostly because of Medicare and Social Security. Taxes are on pace to equal just 19 percent.

The anti-taxation drumbeat of the past 30 years coupled with growing expectations of getting something for nothing are setting into play a social, political, and economic train wreck.  It will not be pretty.

Leonhardt column

Equality, Not High Income, Makes For Happier and Healthier Societies

Widening income and wealth gaps and exorbitant executive pay have been among the central qualities of our economy over the past few decades, with the middle class on the decline.  From the standpoint of what makes for a happier and healthier society, we are going in the wrong direction.  British epidemiologist Richard Wilkinson has been studying the effects of equality and inequality on societies:

In his latest book, The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better, co-written with Kate Pickett, Wilkinson details the pernicious effects that inequality has on societies: eroding trust, increasing anxiety and illness, encouraging excessive consumption.

The good news is that increased equality has the opposite effect: statistics show that communities without large gaps between rich and poor are more resilient and their members live longer, happier lives.

In their book, Wilkinson and co-author Kate Pickett emphasize inequality’s psychosocial effects:

This is about the psychosocial effects of inequality—the impact of living with anxiety about our feelings of superiority or inferiority. It’s not the inferior housing that gives you heart disease, it’s the stress, the hopelessness, the anxiety, the depression you feel around that. The psychosocial effects of inequality affect the quality of human relationships. Because we are social beings, it’s the social environment and social relationships that are the most important stressors.

Yes! Magazine Interview with Wilkinson

Hat tip to Judy Richman

Jobs, Unemployment, and the Great Recession: Articles Worth Reading

The mainstream moderate-to-liberal press is finally starting to get it: America’s high unemployment rate is having a devastating effect on individuals, their families, and their communities.  It is impacting hopes, dreams, and bare survival.  It is fueling a public health crisis that we largely have chosen to ignore.

While some columnists have been sounding this alarm since the beginning of the 2008 meltdown — Bob Herbert of the New York Times is a shining example — only within the last few months have their host periodicals started to put the jobs crisis front and center.

Fortunately, the emerging news coverage and commentary are sharp and insightful, reminding us that job loss is more than simply an economic event.  It is the reality of blogging that few busy readers will be able to make the investment of time to dig beyond the post itself, but here are three cover/lead articles worth printing out and reading, along with a sampling of recent Herbert columns that also merit your attention:

“How a New Jobless Era Will Transform America,” Don Peck, The Atlantic (March 2010)

The Great Recession may be over, but this era of high joblessness is probably just beginning. Before it ends, it will likely change the life course and character of a generation of young adults. It will leave an indelible imprint on many blue-collar men. It could cripple marriage as an institution in many communities. It may already be plunging many inner cities into a despair not seen for decades. Ultimately, it is likely to warp our politics, our culture, and the character of our society for years to come.

“Lay Off the Layoffs,” Jeffrey Pfeffer, Newsweek (Feb. 15, 2010)

Much of the conventional wisdom about downsizing—like the fact that it automatically drives a company’s stock price higher, or increases profitability—turns out to be wrong. There’s substantial research into the physical and health effects of downsizing on employees—research that reinforces the seemingly hyperbolic notion that layoffs are literally killing people. There is also empirical evidence showing that labor-market flexibility isn’t necessarily so good for countries, either.

“Millions of Unemployed Face Years Without Jobs,” Peter S. Goodman, New York Times (February 21, 2010)

Economists fear that the nascent recovery will leave more people behind than in past recessions, failing to create jobs in sufficient numbers to absorb the record-setting ranks of the long-term unemployed.

Call them the new poor: people long accustomed to the comforts of middle-class life who are now relying on public assistance for the first time in their lives — potentially for years to come.

A Sampling of Bob Herbert

At times he has been a voice in the wilderness:

“The Worst of the Pain”

Those in the lower-income groups are in a much, much deeper hole than the general commentary on the recession would lead people to believe.

“Time is Running Out”

Rescuing the U.S. economy will require a commitment, and undoubtedly sacrifices, that need to start now.

“Constraining America’s Brightest”

Instead of getting a chance to set the world on fire, college graduates are facing a gloomy economy, unpaid internships and unemployment.

***

Addendum (October 2010) — This has become one of the most read posts on this blog, an unfortunate testament to how many people are searching the Internet for news commentaries on the Great Recession. With apologies for my growing devotion to the New York Times coverage of the human impact of the recession, I want to add several suggestions drawn from their work:

• Bob Herbert continues to be one of the most devoted chroniclers of the ground-level destruction of this recession and the need for strong public sector responses. His columns can be accessed here.
• The paper has been running a periodic series of extended news features under the banner “The New Poor,” which are collected here. One of the more bracing and noteworthy pieces in the series is Motoko Rich’s “For the Unemployed Over 50, Fears of Never Working Again.”

Finally, let me reiterate my recommendation above of Don Peck’s article in The Atlantic. The bleak picture it paints remains a plausible scenario.

Addendum (January 2011) — The Economist, which leans toward free-market conservatism, weighed in with a feature in its year-end issue on the crisis of long-term unemployment facing millions of Americans, “In the bleak midwinter: Poverty looms for the long-term unemployed“:

Fifteen million Americans are now unemployed, according to the most recent jobs report. The unemployment rate for November inched up to 9.8%. The grimmest numbers, however, are for the long-term unemployed…: 6.3m people, 42% of those unemployed, have been jobless for more than 26 weeks. That number does not include 2.5m people who want a job but who have not looked for a month or more, or the 9m who want full-time work but can only find part-time openings.

The Looming 21st Century Generation Gap: Economic Challenges Facing Younger Workers

Younger adults preparing to enter today’s workforce face a confluence of economic challenges unknown to many of their predecessors. These include rising student loan debt, barriers and higher thresholds to entry-level jobs, reduced wages and benefits, and heavier responsibilities for funding their own retirements and those of preceding generations.

Consider these trends and developments:

Student Loan Debt

• During the past 25 years, tuition has outpaced inflation and loans have supplanted grants as the main form of financial aid.
• More students are borrowing larger amounts of money to pay for college, and they are facing repayment periods up to 30 years.

Entering the Workforce

• Older workers who are financially unprepared for retirement are staying in, or returning to, the labor market, which in turn makes it difficult for younger workers to obtain entry-level jobs.
• Younger workers face flattening paychecks and self-funding of retirement
• Once secure paths to upward mobility appear less so, and decent paying jobs secured by union contracts have diminished.
• Student internship practices favor the privileged, especially those who can afford to work without pay for an entire summer.

The Spectre of Generational Conflict

• A smaller number of younger workers will be paying taxes into a system supporting ever-growing numbers of retirees.
• A generation burdened by a less-favorable job market and student loan repayments may be pressured to pay for the Social Security, retirement, and medical needs of the Boomer generation.

Many of these concerns were in play before the recession, but the economic meltdown has intensified all of them. Although the exact mix of these factors remains speculative, potentially we face a long period of generational strife that will play out in our workplaces, boardrooms, and legislatures.

To avoid what appears to be an inevitable clash, we need to embrace both opportunity and support for younger generations and a path to a dignified retirement for older individuals. Doing so will require our best minds and most inclusive instincts.

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This post is drawn from a short (3 pp.), newly published essay, David Yamada, “The Looming 21st Century Generation Gap: Economic Challenges Facing Younger Workers,” in the Winter 2010 issue of Perspectives on Work.

Work and Workplaces of the New Decade: Notes on a “Dignitarian” Agenda

As we turn to a new decade, permit me to set out some notes on a “dignitarian” (to borrow Robert Fuller‘s wonderful term) agenda for work and workplaces for the next 10 years. Obviously this is far from the last word on the subject, but establishing some basic themes may be helpful:

1.  Let’s put human dignity at least on par with markets and management.

Enough of this blind worship of unfettered free markets and management power. This mentality led us to the current meltdown and to workplaces that are top-down and stressed out. We need to place human dignity front and center in our systems and practices of employment relations. How these values play out will vary among workplaces, public policy initiatives, and whatnot, but recognizing their centrality is a good first step.

2.  Let’s tackle all forms of mistreatment at work, especially bullying and discrimination.

Bullying and discrimination remain significant problems in the modern workplace. Better management, worker activism, enactment of workplace bullying laws, and effective enforcement of existing discrimination protections will point us in the right direction.

3.  How about a genuine safety net for the unemployed, injured, and sick?

If you lose a good job or suffer some other misfortune that prevents you from working, life’s challenges can pile up pretty quickly. We need to develop a better safety net for those who face life’s inevitable ups and downs. Health insurance (it looks like we may be getting there), adequate disability and workers’ compensation, and transitional assistance and training should be integrated in a way that helps people reclaim and rebuild their lives.

4.  We badly need to reform our ways of resolving workplace disputes.

Current approaches to resolving workplace disputes too often lead to expensive, lengthy, angry, and torturous proceedings for all parties involved. Even claimants who “win” their lawsuits often feel like they have been battered along the way by our justice system. We need to streamline these proceedings and find a way to use them to repair, not fracture, troubled employment relationships.

5.  The revival of an active, inclusive labor movement will fuel a dignitarian agenda.

Labor unions provide an important source of countervailing power to the authority exercised by management. Good, inclusive unions can give rank-and-file workers a rallying point for living wages, decent working conditions and fair treatment when problems arise.

6.  Automation isn’t the only reason why that new VCR costs only $40.

The globalization of markets has led to the exploitation of workers at home and abroad. It’s easy for us to forget this reality when we pick up that $40 VCR at the local “big box” superstore. Too many workers are toiling in sweatshop conditions in order for some of us to enjoy life niceties at a lower cost.

7.  With rights and privileges come responsibilities.

I fear that we are suffering from an integrity deficit in our workplaces, highlighted by scandals, corruption, and excessive executive compensation. This is not a screed against the big bad corporation; it cuts across the private, public, and non-profit sectors. We cannot have dignitarian workplaces without deeper individual commitment to doing our jobs ethically and competently.

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This is something of responsive sequel to my post last week, “The Terrible 2000s: Goodbye and good riddance.” 

For a much lengthier, law & policy oriented discussion of these themes, see my law review article, “Human Dignity and Employment Law” (University of Richmond Law Review) which can be freely downloaded by clicking the title.