On Wed, 20 May 1998, Doug Henwood wrote:
> To one, Moore responded that instead of
> laying off production workers, he'd have fired middle managers. Middle
> managers may be a socially useless layer, but presumably they'd suffer the
> same consequences of unemployment that line workers would, but Moore seemed
> unmoved by this.
>
> Doug
>
Why are middle managers any more socially useless than any other modern
occupation? I have known several and they tend to work hard and see their
(diminishing) perks as a reward for loyal and dependable service getting
work out the door and yes, that includes making sure subordinates do their
work.
Left sociology has always had difficulty pinning down this group theoretically, a difficulty that goes back to Kapital. Erik Olin Wright and Barbara Ehrenreich have made heroic, but not entirely convincing, attempts.
My own take is that their situation is parallel to the party appartchick's in the Soviet Union of 1937. If Phelps Dodge was typical of an American "war against the Kulaks", scapegoating people at the bottom who managed to win a little extra for themselves, then the 1990s downsizings are the equivilent of the party purges, scapegoating lower level loyalists who can not, by law, unionize or expect OT for overwork.