Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap

As a compliment to Mark’s post on Wayne Swan’s book I finally got my fingers going to blog on a book that chronicle the lives of those that work for the minimum wage.

Elisabeth Wynhausen is a journalist for The Australia who took a year’s unpaid leave to experience life working on, or below, the minimum wage. She worked as a kitchen hand, in a factory sorting eggs, as a cleaner, in a nursing home and took on the checkouts in a department store. Her experiences are chronicled in the book Dirt Cheap.

Initially Wynhausen sets up some rules for the experience. Which she admits that she broke when the stark reality of living on the minimum wage became apparent. Also, she only stayed in each job for 2 -4 weeks. This was long enough to outline a chapter before moving on. She did not have to put up with months or years working at that level. She could quit at any time. Those she worked with could not. She also had savings as a financial buffer in case of emergencies.

The jobs that Wynhausen undertook during the course of the book shared certain characteristics. One was the difficulty of finding cheap accommodation close to the place of work. If accommodation was close it ate up a significant chunk of wages. The other option if affordable accommodation was found was a lengthy commute. Once employed, any notion of the employees being consulted on scheduling on shifts or explanation regarding the nature of their work did not happen. Those on the minimum wage are expected to be neither seen nor heard. Respect it not a part of the new economy. It flows through from the top. The fecklessness and callous bullying of middle management is passed onto the supervisors who then infect the employees. It becomes a vicious cycle of amoral rule by law and regulations. It does not matter if it seems pointless and absurd, that is how things are and you better shut up if you want to be offered more work.

Dirt Cheap reveals that notions of class still exist.

Those that do the menial tasks for the minimum wage do represent a class that are ignored, exploited and looked upon with disdain. However those working for the minimum wage do not see themselves as being working class. They are also the aspirationals. The idea of being aspirational comes from a false sense of being an individual; of having a choice (choice is the great pro-IR reform myth). The notion of being an individual with freedom of choice is reinforced by signing an AWA. The reality is that minimum wage workers have little choice. The AWA is presented fait accompli that it will be signed with no bargaining or input from the employee. Also, the myth of choice fails recognize that when every cent counts people often take what they can get to survive.

An interesting conclusion was that as tough as it is for those on the minimum wage, Wynhausen did not think (at the time of writing) that Australia was on the way to creating a working poor as found in the United States. As long as minimum wage employees are working full-time they will avoid poverty. It is tough but she does note that by scrimping and saving, people get by though their ability to do so is tenuous at best. However if the IR legislation is passed with the reforms as indicated by the Howard government, it would be interesting for Wynhausen to revisit her conclusions. An excellent suggestion of Wynhausen is for the advocates of IR reform to spend some time working for the minimum wage in the jobs she did. The reality is far different from the theory of dry economic arguments from upon high.

With the stoush escalating over IR reforms Dirt Cheap is essential reading. The problem with economic fundamentalism is employees are treated as an economic variable. This is fine in theory but in practice it means that the social impacts of any reforms are ignored. When workers are regarded as a cost to be reduced this is how they are treated by management. Any notion of fairness or equity is abandoned. Workers, even in low-paid, allegedly unskilled jobs still want to be able to retain basic human concepts of such as dignity and self-worth. The fact that many do is amazing.

The woman on the bus mentioned in Mark’s post is the same woman you meet a number of times in Dirt Cheap.