Good news for our corporate overlords: We're working longer and harder for less money

Productivity of U.S. Workers Rises More Than Forecast (Update2)
By Shobhana Chandra


May 6 (Bloomberg) -- The productivity of U.S. workers rose in the first quarter more than forecast, signaling employers will take time to boost payrolls in order to contain costs.

The measure of employee output per hour climbed at a 3.6 percent annual rate, Labor Department figures showed today in Washington. Efficiency advanced 6.3 percent over the past four quarters, the biggest 12-month increase since 1962. Labor costs fell more than projected.

Employment may improve as companies such as Timken Co., which slashed payrolls and relied on becoming more efficient to lower expenses and protect profits during the recession, now look to expand as sales improve. The drop in labor costs is also helping limit inflation, giving Federal Reserve policy makers room to keep interest rates near zero.

‘Companies are still using productivity growth and cost- cutting as a major part of their business plan,” said Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist at Maria Fiorini Ramirez Inc., a New York forecasting firm. “They are still being very slow to bring back people. Labor costs won’t be an issue.”

Economists projected productivity would rise at a 2.6 percent annual pace, according to the median of 64 forecasts in a Bloomberg News survey. Estimates ranged from gains of 1.5 percent to 3.9 percent. The Labor Department revised the fourth- quarter gain in efficiency down to a 6.3 percent rate from a previously estimated 6.9 percent. .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=afyws0sSxu7c&pos=3

Last week I worked on BOTH my days off.
Next week I work on a day I normally have off.

::sigh::

Of course my employer won't hire another person when we CLEARLY need more people.

..... because my dept. of 2 people is doing the work of at least 10 people.

Sucks about the hours though.

USA workers toil like dogs and we don't even get it. We're "just all happy to be employed". Shouldn't we be striving for more than that?

I'm part-time and can't go over a certain amount of hours.

It sucks even more for full time people.
Instead of PAID overtime, they get UNPAID time off at time and a half.

I hope that isn't confusing.
Instead of paying full time people overtime, they give them unpaid time off at time and a half.

How disturbing. I would do everything I could to avoid working under such a plan just on principle.

they had layoffs last year and this year orders are booming. Instead of recalling or hiring we now run what would normally be 2 jobs each. And the sad thing is you can't really bitch about it becuase you're happy to be employed. At this rate I'll be a physical wreck before I hit retiremnet age in a few years.

why is it shocking that work would fall under that same umbrella? Corporate overlords are people too, and it seems like people generally want more bang for their buck.

just because it's your job that's been made redundant.

"Griffith also said that Timken has added about 1,000 people, more than half of whom are contingent workers that allow it to remain flexible."

It's nice that Timken has added some employees, however, while Timken is enjoying its' "flexibility", the employee is probably not enjoying having his/her income "flexible" when most of their cost of living is not. I know, I did the temp labor stuff for a year and it's pretty hard to budget.

Is a trend toward "contingent workers" all that we are aspiring to in order to reduce unemployment? Does anyone else see the un-sustainability of this trend? Or is it just all about the "numbers looking good" in order to boost consumer confidence?

http://www.allbusiness.com/government/government-bodies-offices-heads/11435192-1.html

Tuesday, July 1 2003

Economic growth and job creation were the central messages from President George W. Bush's remarks at The Timken Company's research facility in North Canton, Ohio, April 24. The President's 42-minute address keyed in on building support for his economic stimulus package that is before Congress. Timken was chosen for the speech because, as the president said, "it's a roll-up-your-sleeves company ... that does what it takes to overcome obstacles."

Chairman W.R. Timken, Jr. introduced the President to the crowd of associates, local and regional government officials, and a select group of area small business owners who met with the President for 20 minutes before his address.


http://motherjones.com/politics/2004/03/diebolds-political-machine

Fri Mar. 5, 2004

One of the longest-serving Diebold directors is W.R. "Tim" Timken. Like O'Dell, Timken is a Republican loyalist and a major contributor to GOP candidates. Since 1991 the Timken Company and members of the Timken family have contributed more than a million dollars to the Republican Party and to GOP presidential candidates such as George W. Bush. Between 2000 and 2002 alone, Timken's Canton-based bearing and steel company gave more than $350,000 to Republican causes, while Timken himself gave more than $120,000. This year, he is one of George W. Bush's campaign Pioneers, and has already pulled in more than $350,000 for the president's reelection bid.


http://www.counterpunch.org/brauchli06192004.html

June 19 / 20, 2004

Events conspire to make George Bush look foolish. It’s not that events are clever. It’s that Mr. Bush is not. His lack of cleverness, however, disturbs neither him nor members of his administration, a reflection on them all. A recent example involved the Timken Plant in Canton, Ohio.

On April 24, 2003, the president stood alongside W.R. "Tim" Timken in the Timken Company plant in Ohio and urged the employees to support his proposed tax cut for the rich. He didn’t use those words since that would have offended the hourly workers most of whom were not among the rich but many of whom were in the audience. If enacted, said Mr. Bush, the tax cut would spur economic growth assuring his audience of continued employment if not huge tax benefits. The only difference between the effect of the tax cut on the worker and the rich person was the rich person would get more money for doing nothing whereas the worker would get more money by remaining employed. ...

On May 16, 2004, slightly more than a year after Mr. Bush’s visit, Mr. Timken decided to close the plant in which Mr. Bush spoke and two other Timken plants in the Canton area. He made the decision even though the tax cut passed and even though he saved $59,000 in taxes as a result of its passage. The closure had nothing to do with the fact that the tax cut didn’t provide the promised benefits. It had to do with the fact that Mr. Timken decided to close the plant.

Closing the plant means that 1,300 people who were told by the president one year earlier that they had a bright future now have neither bright future nor jobs. They would be forgiven for asking what Mr. Bush had in mind when he uttered those words. People without jobs, after all, often think the future is not very bright.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x923908

Fri Oct-22-04

Republicans call it smart business. Democrats call it "Bush-style capitalism."

After executives of the Canton-based Timken Co. backed President Bush's election in 2000, the Republican president signed tax cuts, executed trade policies and began a military upgrade that has been good for Timken and its executives though, critics say, not as good for the workers in Canton, where three Timken plants might close.

Under Bush, who will visit Canton today to campaign, Timken has seen a 176 percent jump in its military contracts to more than $45 million compared with the last four years of the Clinton administration, a Plain Dealer review of government awards shows. Though not widely known in Ohio as a military contractor, Timken makes parts for the Apache attack helicopter, the CH-47 helicopter and the F-16 fighter jet, among other aircraft.

The Pentagon gave more than 60 percent of the weapons systems contracts to Timken without competition, according to a separate analysis by the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity.


http://www.timken.com/EN-US/about/NewsRoom/Stories/Pages/WRTimkenJrtoBeNominatedUSAmbassadortoGermany.aspx

7/19/2005

The Timken Company announced today that President Bush intends to nominate W. R. Timken, Jr., chairman of the Timken Board of Directors, for the position of U.S. Ambassador to Germany. The nomination will be forwarded to the U.S. Senate for confirmation. If confirmed by the Senate, Mr. Timken will be required to resign his position as a member of the Board of The Timken Company. Until then, he will continue as chairman.


http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,367881,00.html

08/01/2005

Washington's choice for future US ambassador to Germany has all the makings of a political bombshell. For years, a company owned by the multimillionaire and newly-appointed diplomat William Timken, Jr. has been profiting from anticompetitive tariffs -- at the direct expense of German companies.

As Washington's new ambassador to Germany, William Timken, Jr. will face, among other things, the task of patching up damaged relations between the two countries. But there's one small problem with this picture. The multimillionaire who US President George W. Bush nominated to the position two weeks ago also happens to be Chairman of the Board of Directors of The Timken Company, an Ohio-based firm that claims to be the biggest manufacturer of roller bearings in the world. And ever since the 66-year-old Timken, a major donor to the Republican Party and decorated with the honorary title of "Super Ranger," (reserved for those who contribute more than $300,000) has been slated to take over the position in Berlin, his company's questionable business practices have suddenly become taboo among German politicians and industry lobbyists.

Thanks for providing all the interesting reading!

for a bit less than I was making 5 years ago. :argh:

It sounds like your competitors have gotten quite a leg up on you. :shrug:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4357941&mesg_id=4358302

that charge $20 an hour? Incidentally, I DON'T believe whatsoever in supporting mediocrity.

I DO believe in being paid a fair wage for a skill few people have the patience or the acumen to acquire.

Just like the livelihood of autoworkers isn't your problem.

"Free trade" for everybody but you isn't going to work. Sorry. Just like you buy Japanese cars to save a buck, Indian IT saves me a bundle.

Same same. :hi:

:hi:

These are actually good leading indicators, although unpleasant to go through personally.

...and getting overtime pay for doing so. When I have been a salaried, 'permanent' employee, O/T pay was not an option, you worked whatever hours were necessary and got paid the same. Of course, paid time off (sick days, holidays, vacation) was included in the salaried positions, but are not in the contingent ones.

The benefits offered when on salary have also been a lot better than those offered when contingent (if any are offered at all).

of the attack on the rights of workers, unions and living wages.

"Employment arrangements in which the worker has a nontraditional relationship with the work-site employer have come to be grouped together in recent years as "contingent" work. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, as employers sought more flexibility, contingent employment arrangements became more common in the United States. From 1969 to 1993, the number of part-time workers nearly doubled, representing a quarter of all growth in the national workforce.1 From 1982 to 1990, employment in temporary agencies increased 10 times faster than did the workforce as a whole.2 During the 1980s, the use of independent contractors in coal mining and of contract company workers in agriculture doubled.3"
http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/extract/299/4/448

The contingent workforce has been permanent for two decades and grows every recession. It signals nothing but the continued degradation of real, living wage jobs with benefits.
That unpleasantness you refer to is permanent.

and their servants in government

Dare to compare the time-off extended to our European counterparts?

And yet, many of them have social safety nets that make S.S./Medicare pale by comparison.

Strange, no?

Not even close to what it needs to even be considered adequate.

Add to the fact that we're worked like dogs all in the name of "higher productivity" and we got problems.

I read your post up-thread. You hang in there. :hug:

/sarcasm