The “Temp” has gained Respect!

A fresh report from the Freelancers Union now shows that nearly 55 million Americans are freelancing. If you tally this up against Labor Department data, it means more than a third of the work force…

via Are There Really 55 Million Freelancers in America? — 24/7 Wall St.

As some of my reader know from my writings, I do hearken back a decade or two. This article from 24/7 Wall St. made me reflect upon the way it way. Once upon a time, most folk worked a full-time job, 40+ hours a week, 2-weeks vacation per year (with pay), maybe a couple of “sick days” available with pay, healthcare insurance (if a family man/woman) probably family healthcare insurance. A “full-time” job had its “perks” even if the “daily grind” could be physically and/or mentally challenging.

If a person was fired, quit, was”laid off,” lost his/her job for whatever reason, there were alternatives to earn “income”, mostly through signing up with an “agency” and doing temporary work. Temps NEVER received any respect from their “temporary” co-workers, meaning those people whom they worked with at the company that the temporary agency sent them to work. If you were working “temporary” you needed the job, the money.

I have a very short story of what happened to me on one assignment. I was “hired” to fill in for a woman who was pregnant, she was very close to her “term”, delivery of her baby. I cam to work, showed up on time, had agreed to the (2) week assignment as offered by the temporary agency. After I was  “on the assignment” for a couple of days or so, the employee left on her pregnancy leave of absence as scheduled.  Well, a couple of days after the pregnant secretary left…her boss was fired! I was “re-leaved” of my temporary assignment immediately! I was out of work! I was told I was not needed because the boss had been fired! So here I was, without work having committed to the 2-week assignment “in faith.”

Temporaries were placed in “compromising positions many times with assignments because of the environment of the assignments  that they accepted. The Work World, as we knew it in the 1960s and 1970s was changing more rapidly than we “Boomers” could ever have realized. Technology, which that time meant “computers”, were moving to the desktop quite rapidly, in fact ONE (1) secretary would work for 20 TWENTY at one time, (that was one of my temporary assignments back in the early 80s.)

Anyway, in reading this article, I feel “we’ve come a long way, baby.” The article mentions a Freelancer’s Union. I don’t intend to get into any discussions “heated” or other wise about “unions.” My intent is to draw attention to the fact that the Work World has indeed evolved. It has taken decades for the US Federal Government to recognize that, hopefully labor legislation, law, and maybe even “taxes” will evolve within a “reasonable short time, or more timely manner. Just like many other traditions or ways of doing business the World Work has radically changed.

Enjoy the article from 24/7 Wall St. and here is my archive of blog articles on the theme of jobs and jobs training.

Part 1:  Jobs, jobs, jobs and job training dilemma

Part 2:  Past Prescriptions to employment problems

Part 3:  Jobs, jobs, jobs and and the Job Training Dilemma

Part 4:  Jobs, and jobs training, the more things things

Part 5A:  Jobs and the retooling of a Industrial Titan: Chicago

Part 5B:  Jobs Training and the search for long term solutions

via Are There Really 55 Million Freelancers in America? — 24/7 Wall St.