John Buell

Good Jobs in a Neoliberal Era?

President Trump thinks he has an achievement of which he can be proud. Happy times are here again in the form of good jobs. As the president puts it, “America’s economy is back and roaring and its people are winning. I want every American to have good jobs, rising paychecks and the opportunity to live a life of meaning, purpose and joy.” Yet in an irony probably lost on the president, this celebration occurred alongside an unusually militant and unforeseen labor uprising, the statewide teacher strikes in West Virginia, Oklahoma, Kentucky and Arizona. And spreading? For activists on the left as well as for Mr. Trump, there are lessons to be learned from this teacher movement.

Corporate media dwell on the recent political history of these states and express surprise that red states would see such worker related activism. However, what this activism may suggest is that these red blue dichotomies are really skin deep. Teachers and other public servants may harbor concerns and anxieties insufficiently recognized let alone alleviated by the mainstream elements of both major parties.

West Virginia may be red, but it has a history of militant unionism going back to the twenties in response to the economic exploitation of the coal barons. Veteran labor activist and co-founder of the rank and file journal Labor Notes, Jane Slaughter, comments in that journal:

“The West Virginia labor history I remember was more recent: the decade-long wave of wildcat strikes in the 1970s and the victories of the Miners for Democracy. That’s part of the teachers’ heritage, too as near to some as a retired dad, if he survived the Black Lung. In fact, those no-holds-barred wildcats, against both the coal bosses and utterly corrupt—even murderous—union leaders were a big part of the reason Labor Notes was founded, in 1979.”

Slaughter’s reference to wildcat strikes and Miners for Democracy points to another significant aspect of the current teacher activism. Much of the current activism is rank and file based and often with little or no support from leaders of the formal unions.

Like much of the Midwest, West Virginia has been a victim both of deindustrialization and the declining market for coal. This economic punch became an occasion for further cuts in government spending. As Steven Fraser, author of “Class Matters,” puts it,” deindustrialization dried up sources of industry-based tax revenues which had once helped maintain a modicum of social services, including ones as basic as public education. … Millions of children arrive at school burdened by the costs of secular decline before they ever enter their first class. Teachers try to cope, often heroically, but it’s a losing battle…” But rather than blame capital flight and the market fundamentalist doctrines that facilitated it, government spending was faulted and its most vulnerable recipients, including teachers, were blamed.

Teacher activists have responded to far more than their own economic marginalization. These rank and file activists have reached out to and supported claims on behalf of other exploited municipal workers. They have provided food for their students, many of whom depend on subsidized school meals. Teachers today are fashioning their movement to echo broader desires. Fraser reports: ”In Oklahoma and West Virginia, for example, they have insisted on improvements not just in their own working lives, but in those of all school staff members. Oklahoma teachers refused to go back to school even after the legislature granted them a raise, insisting that the state adequately fund the education system as well.”

Ultimately the campaign by teachers for economic justice is also one for respect for the job itself. In this context Trump’s celebration of the good job as one that leads to a life of “meaning, purpose, and joy” rings hollow in light of the Administration’s education agenda, with its emphasis on vouchers for private schools, a narrow skills based curriculum, and standardized testing. Too many teaching jobs offer little opportunity for creativity. These jobs are subject to a speedup reminiscent of the industrial revolution assembly lines, and their holders are continually reminded that scores on a standardized test will determine one’s future.

In many communities teachers and parents are resisting this agenda. To what extent these concerns helped energize the current rank and file movements will likely not become known for a while. Unfortunately corporate media and the political establishment of both parties view labor management conflict, to the extent they cover it at all, as a matter of salaries and benefits rather than such qualitative concerns as autonomy and creativity within the workplace. And for both political parties education is regarded as little more than a conduit to a job rather than more broadly as preparation for democratic citizenship. Liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans argue only over the funding and taxation policies to achieve this narrow goal. A democratic education—both in substance and modes of presentation—would ask why the privately controlled, hierarchically organized workplace and the jobs it offers play so prominent a role in our community life and politics.

When broader concerns about the tyranny of the workplace broke out during the seventies, especially at GM’s state-of-the-art auto plant in Lordstown, Ohio, media expressed surprise. Today the AI revolution is a subject of grave concern with regard to possible loss of jobs to the vast productivity gains these technologies will supposedly produce. I think the immediately greater risk is further intensification and monitoring of the work process itself. If this is the case, it suggests further misery for blue and white collar workers. Nonetheless, Kim Moody, author of “On New Terrain,” argues the emergence of a common problem and common enemy opens up the possibility of broad working class organization across gender, race, and sexual orientation. Moody also feels the emergence of a widespread radical protest movement is hard to predict. Nor can we count on top down political parties or even progressive NGOs to do this for us. Where have most Democrats been as this remarkable labor drama unfolds? Organizers working at the rank and file level within unions and grass roots community movements need to assume this burden, collaborate, and seize this opportunity. That is why these teachers merit out thanks, attention, and emulation.

John Buell lives in Southwest Harbor, Maine, and writes regularly on labor and environmental issues. Email jbuell@acadia.net.

From The Progressive Populist, June 1, 2018

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