Bolitics The New Condem Government

[Risso]

 

 

However once we go down the route of making people take them then it changes that. This policy of making the unemployed accept a zero hour job is a slippery slope towards exploitation of the unemployed.

*correction zero hours do get accrued holiday pay.

It's the slippery slope of getting the unemployed back into work. So in a given week, they might not get any work at all, and would therefore retain their benefits. If they do get some work, they get paid for it. Everyone's a winner. When I was unemployed, I'd have loved that opportunity.

Employers are the winner if this situation becomes the norm.

 

 

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

[snowychap]

This is how you create a whole class of people called the precariat and increase inequality.

Indeed.

Though that's not how they'd* have you believe it - it's all about not leaving people behind and supporting people and, biggest laugh of all, full employment.

*Not a Tory 'they' but a political/corporate class 'they' (though some are worse than others).

Edited May 6, 2014 by snowychap

[MakemineVanilla]

 

This is how you create a whole class of people called the precariat and increase inequality.

Indeed.

Though that's not how they'd* have you believe it - it's all about not leaving people behind and supporting people and, biggest laugh of all, full employment.

*Not a Tory 'they' but a political/corporate class 'they' (though some are worse than others).

 

 

It is pretty simple to construct an argument in favour of such measures but that would rely on values which are not those of the present government.

 

There are definitely some important quality of life issues surrounding the problem of long-term unemployment but they just don't sound believable coming out of the mouth of IDS et al. 

[blandy]

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

 

That's a really good question.

I think it's a situation where it isn't a one answer fits all sitaution - i.e. either employers "win" or "people" win. It's more complex, obviously.

A small number of willingly unemployed "win" if they remain unemployed but on benefits, clearly. I don't believe there are a great number of them, and for every one of them, there will be multiple people who'd want a job, but can't get one.

Now those people, faced with travel costs, poor bus services, expensive trains or fuel etc. forced to take a zero hours job on minimum wage, unable to budget for guaranteed work, and thus buy a discounted travel card would quite conceivable be worse off, even if forced to work on zero hours contracts. Employers would get ultra cheap labour and force down wages for other employees. It doesn't look like a winner to me, that idea.

I think the only way is to have an economy that is based not around service industry "jobs" and finance, but around added value products - manufacturing, IP based stuff and so on. If you create an economy that is making and creating things, then people will be better off, as will the country. This is what the Gov't has largely got wrong.

[Kingfisher]

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

That's a really good question.

I think it's a situation where it isn't a one answer fits all sitaution - i.e. either employers "win" or "people" win. It's more complex, obviously.

A small number of willingly unemployed "win" if they remain unemployed but on benefits, clearly. I don't believe there are a great number of them, and for every one of them, there will be multiple people who'd want a job, but can't get one.

Now those people, faced with travel costs, poor bus services, expensive trains or fuel etc. forced to take a zero hours job on minimum wage, unable to budget for guaranteed work, and thus buy a discounted travel card would quite conceivable be worse off, even if forced to work on zero hours contracts. Employers would get ultra cheap labour and force down wages for other employees. It doesn't look like a winner to me, that idea.

I think the only way is to have an economy that is based not around service industry "jobs" and finance, but around added value products - manufacturing, IP based stuff and so on. If you create an economy that is making and creating things, then people will be better off, as will the country. This is what the Gov't has largely got wrong.

Exactly. Get people into sustainable, meaningful and secure employment.

Zero hour contracts only work if both parties are flexible. If the flexibility is not viable for the employee then it's an unequal deal. The danger then is that employers start exploiting that situation, which I think will happen.

Zero hour contracts should be banned.

[snowychap]

Exactly. Get people into sustainable, meaningful and secure employment.

I think there's a problem with this - mainly that the 1950s and 1960s are behind us.

Zero hour contracts only work if both parties are flexible. If the flexibility is not viable for the employee then it's an unequal deal. The danger then is that employers start exploiting that situation, which I think will happen.

Zero hour contracts should be banned.

I very much agree with your first line but disagree with the second.

Introduce a basic income and the labour market could be based mostly on zero hours contracts as far as I'm concerned (indeed there may be an argument that those contracts may then largely favour the existing/potential employee - or, rather, the owner and supplier of the labour power).

[Kingfisher]

Introduce a basic income? How do you mean?

Edit, sorry - to be more specific. What would it be set at? And how might you think would it work? In layman's terms. It's an interesting theory.

However, back in the real world we have a political class that would not subscribe to such policy in a million years. So within that framework, zero hours will just become another tool to exploit the poorest in society.

Edited May 7, 2014 by Kingfisher

[snowychap]

Edit, sorry - to be more specific. What would it be set at? And how might you think would it work? In layman's terms. It's an interesting theory.

What would it be set at? The level at which a basic level of susbsistence is met, maybe? I haven't even attempted to try calculating it but there are a myriad of sites and groups that have.

However, back in the real world we have a political class that would not subscribe to such policy in a million years. So within that framework, zero hours will just become another tool to exploit the poorest in society.

And therein lies half or more of the problem - the Overton window.

Plan to move it not just to operate within it.

[MakemineVanilla]

 

 

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

 

That's a really good question.

I think it's a situation where it isn't a one answer fits all sitaution - i.e. either employers "win" or "people" win. It's more complex, obviously.

A small number of willingly unemployed "win" if they remain unemployed but on benefits, clearly. I don't believe there are a great number of them, and for every one of them, there will be multiple people who'd want a job, but can't get one.

Now those people, faced with travel costs, poor bus services, expensive trains or fuel etc. forced to take a zero hours job on minimum wage, unable to budget for guaranteed work, and thus buy a discounted travel card would quite conceivable be worse off, even if forced to work on zero hours contracts. Employers would get ultra cheap labour and force down wages for other employees. It doesn't look like a winner to me, that idea.

I think the only way is to have an economy that is based not around service industry "jobs" and finance, but around added value products - manufacturing, IP based stuff and so on. If you create an economy that is making and creating things, then people will be better off, as will the country. This is what the Gov't has largely got wrong.

Exactly. Get people into sustainable, meaningful and secure employment.

Zero hour contracts only work if both parties are flexible. If the flexibility is not viable for the employee then it's an unequal deal. The danger then is that employers start exploiting that situation, which I think will happen.

Zero hour contracts should be banned.

 

 

It is happening.

 

Exclusivity clauses, which prevent employees working for rivals while hanging around waiting for their few hours, is the sort of abuse which would have been predicted had recent governments given the proverbial bowel-movement.

 

http://tinyurl.com/qyj5ll5

[Kingfisher]

Yeah, it's happening now. But it's only going to exasperate an already dodgy situation into outright exploitation if the unemployed are made to sign up to zero hours. Can an employee turn down hours in this situation without suffering sanctions?

[MakemineVanilla]

It has always been my own opinion that the better the unemployed are treated the better employers have to treat their workers.

 

Conversely, the worse the unemployed are treated, the worse workers are treated because the threshold of what is acceptable falls.

 

A decent example of the way the 'Overton window' changes.

 

So people should be careful of what they ask for.

 

One day you are cheer-leading legislation to crush the miners and the next you are an isolated worker, with no pension, poor wages, short hours and no means of redress. 

 

What goes around comes around, I guess.

[Eames]

 

 

 

However once we go down the route of making people take them then it changes that. This policy of making the unemployed accept a zero hour job is a slippery slope towards exploitation of the unemployed.

*correction zero hours do get accrued holiday pay.

It's the slippery slope of getting the unemployed back into work. So in a given week, they might not get any work at all, and would therefore retain their benefits. If they do get some work, they get paid for it. Everyone's a winner. When I was unemployed, I'd have loved that opportunity.

Employers are the winner if this situation becomes the norm.

 

 

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

 

JobCentrePlus staff?

[TrentVilla]

 

 

 

However once we go down the route of making people take them then it changes that. This policy of making the unemployed accept a zero hour job is a slippery slope towards exploitation of the unemployed.

*correction zero hours do get accrued holiday pay.

It's the slippery slope of getting the unemployed back into work. So in a given week, they might not get any work at all, and would therefore retain their benefits. If they do get some work, they get paid for it. Everyone's a winner. When I was unemployed, I'd have loved that opportunity.

Employers are the winner if this situation becomes the norm.

 

 

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

 

 

Jeremy Kyle?

[Eames]

 

 

 

However once we go down the route of making people take them then it changes that. This policy of making the unemployed accept a zero hour job is a slippery slope towards exploitation of the unemployed.

*correction zero hours do get accrued holiday pay.

It's the slippery slope of getting the unemployed back into work. So in a given week, they might not get any work at all, and would therefore retain their benefits. If they do get some work, they get paid for it. Everyone's a winner. When I was unemployed, I'd have loved that opportunity.

Employers are the winner if this situation becomes the norm.

 

 

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

 

[Tory]

 

Super strength lager brewers

BSkyB

Sportswear manufacturers

Elizabeth Duke at Argos

Flat Screen TV sellers

The criminal underclass

[/tory]

[bickster]

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

The employer obviously as wages stay low due to the excess supply in the market.

Getting everyone a job would push wages up, simple market forces innit.

You want to save the government money from the benefits budget the more effective solution would be to euthanise everyone over 65 who can't pay their own way. Thats pensioners who read the Daily Mirror to you and me. You could contract out the euthanising to small teams of street muggers, taking them off benefits too. With their zero hours commission only contracts mean they'd get to keep any items of value their customers no longer had a need for. The greens should vote for a policy like that as it involves recycling

[MakemineVanilla]

 

Who is the winner if unemployed people stay unemployed?

The employer obviously as wages stay low due to the excess supply in the market.

Getting everyone a job would push wages up, simple market forces innit.

You want to save the government money from the benefits budget the more effective solution would be to euthanise everyone over 65 who can't pay their own way. Thats pensioners who read the Daily Mirror to you and me. You could contract out the euthanising to small teams of street muggers, taking them off benefits too. With their zero hours commission only contracts mean they'd get to keep any items of value their customers no longer had a need for. The greens should vote for a policy like that as it involves recycling

 

 

Aahh! I delight in all manifestations of the Swiftian muse!

[Kingfisher]

Farage is on question time tonight, ...again. His 14th appearance since 2009 and continues the BBC policy of guaranteeing UKIP a seat on the panel.

...Oh and 'elected' MP - Caroline Lucas will make a rare appearance for the Green Party, so it might be worth a watch.

[rendelc]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

  Cant wait for this.

[mjmooney]

Curious PP broadcast this evening, by "An Independence from Europe". 

 

They appear to be a splinter group from UKIP, focusing completely on the EU issue (not immigration), and named purely with the aim of being alphabetically first on the ballot paper (a la "The Aaron A. Aardvark School of Motoring").

Edited May 8, 2014 by mjmooney

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

Dinosaurs fighting the inevitable.