By John MacDougall
I have been interested in Kenneth Hurst’s Viewpoint
submissions, “Wine workers’ demands irrational,
unproductive” (May 31), and “UC workers’ demands
lack logic, rationality” (April 8), and in the pro-labor
responses, which did not directly respond to his points.
Hurst’s views raise a key question: Is labor simply a
commodity, like oil, steel or widgets, or do employers have a duty
to their employees that goes beyond simple free-market supply and
demand?
There is a very long, established tradition, going back at least
as far as the Old Testament, that requires that a master fulfill
his duty to his servants and slaves by taking care of them.
Most religions and cultures, including secular philosophies,
include rules on how masters should treat their servants.
In feudal times, lords had great power over their serfs. But the
lords also protected the serfs. They had a duty, though they did
not always honor it, to provide for at least the basic needs of
their serfs. Thus, Scrooge was a socially unacceptable
employer.
Today, the majority of us are not bound to our employers by
slavery or feudal power. In return, employers have escaped some of
their duty to protect and care for us. Still, that does not reduce
labor to a pure commodity.
In practice, most employees lack the pure free-market freedom to
leave at will. In good times, they don’t need to leave. In
bad times, they can’t. For many laborers, there are no good
times.
Hiring an employee is more important than buying a mule. But
even a mule needs to be treated humanely and given a “living
wage” of sufficient food and shelter.
Surely, we should not treat humans worse than we would treat
mules. Hiring means accepting responsibility for compassionate and
humane treatment of employees.
Employers provide benefits such as retirement and health
insurance not purely for economic or competitive reasons, but as a
part of their social duty. Treating employees by the Golden Rule is
not merely good business practice, it is a moral necessity.
Of course, the laws of economics cannot be ignored. If employers
are forced to pay more for labor, they may not be able to compete
in the marketplace. They can’t afford wages and benefits that
their competitors don’t match.
Higher wages could increase the price of the product to the
point that no one buys it at all. To some degree, the government
has to step in to set certain minimum standards for all employers,
so that there is a level playing field among competitive
employers.
Still, the bottom line remains: If you cannot make a profit
while treating your employees decently, then you should not be in
business.
When minimum wages and benefits are increased, we all pay for
them. Similarly, if decent wages and benefits are not provided, we
all pay the social costs of poverty, crime, ignorance and disease.
Furthermore, we pay the spiritual cost of ignoring the plight of
our exploited fellows.
Not every union demand is a matter of a fundamental right and
human decency. Employees are every bit as greedy as employers, and
will take everything they can get. Wants quickly get re-categorized
as needs.
Both sides of such disputes tend toward simplistic statements
about problems and trade-offs that defy such simplistic answers.
But labor is not just a commodity ““ labor is people and their
lives.
MacDougall is a member of the UCLA Capital Programs
staff.