Temping

[Doug Henwood]

This temp thread makes me think that it's politically wrong to name temp
and part-time work as problems in themselves, rather than focusing on
insecurity, low pay, and lack of benefits in general. And since there seem
to be more than a few temporary and part-time workers who are not entirely
unhappy with their work situation, denouncing their kind of employment as a
general could alienate lots of people.

Life is no picnic for lots of "full-time" workers, either. The BLS's new
displaced worker survey <ftp://146.142.4.23/pub/news.release/disp.txt>
reports in its opening paragraph:

"A total of 3.6 million workers were displaced between January 1995 and
December 1997 from jobs they had held for at least 3 years, the Bureau of
Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today.  The
number of displaced workers declined from 4.2 million in the previous
survey that covered the period from January 1993 to December 1995.  Both
surveys covered periods of strong employment growth and falling
unemployment."

Doug