> This reminds me of the 1999 declaration of what freedom-at-work looked
> like. A software developer on an email list engaged in an extended
> argument that programmers had changed the world: they had altered the
> entire landscape of work to include foos ball tables, free gourmet
> lunches, not just casual friday but flip flops, shorts and wrinkled
> t-shirts all day everyday. In the absence of a unionized collective
> consciousness, folks came to see the ability to job hop and pick and
> choose where you wanted to work, not as the result of collective
> struggle but as the hard won effort of the individual. Anyone who
> stayed at their job and questioned what actually happened in their
> workplace was chastised as a whiner. Don't complain, get another job!
> Under these conditions, lots of jobs and plenty of work to be done,
> the result was a sense that the individual was king, maker of his own
> life, boss of his bosses. A place where, as someone once related,
> rebellion was telling your boss, "bwahaha. I have your balls in a
> Mason jar." I'm wondering how, since I'm sure it's got to be
> different, implementing a full employment program - which supposedly
> has the same salutary effect on worker consciousness does as full
> employment in the late 90s bubble - would foster labor consciousness
> in a way that isn't quite so individualistic.
I urge you to read some history on this.
Just start randomly. Go to Google Scholar or JSTOR. Search for "full employment" or "tight labor markets." When you find articles by labor historians, click on them.
See if you find any evidence that full employment has tended to promote worker quiescence. Report back on what you find.
SA