WHERE DO YOU HIDE AN ELEPHANT

LABOR UNDER FIRE
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Full-Time, Part-Time, Contingent, Temporary, Labor Day Employment

WHERE DO YOU HIDE AN ELEPHANT?

By
Anthony M. Streckfuss
March 16, 2003

Nearly 2 years ago I set upon a quest to deve'lop a web site entitled "Labor Under Fire" and then to find and post all the information any employee could want to know or need so they could protect themselves, legally, against the ruthless employers who stalk and set upon the uniformed employee who would dare to try and do what I am 'now trying to do, "learn all there is to learn about labor and our rights as employees and pass that   knowledge along", or the employer who will take an employee to make an example of so to instill the fear of their "Mastery and Lordship" over all employees in their fiefdom. I also want to provide a platform for the employee to work from to identify the injustices they may have seen or experienced. I then saw that the deeper I dug into the tumultuous mound's of articles, web sites, lawyers and legal records, I realized how little I knew and how far I had to go to accomplish my quest. It was then I learned how deep of a hole had been dug to capture labor and the employee of today.

Realizing this I figured I would look into specific laws protecting the employee in-general only to find that 80% or more of existing laws were to protect the union's and union-organized employee's or the employer from the employee, with nothing more than the generally generic "Act's" being the only protection for the non-unionized employee's. The "ACT's" or legislation were for the most part law's of morality that the average employee could be fired or harassed with, such as sex, age, race, disability, religion or just out and out pure harassment and the employee, without documentation or support, could not in a year of Sunday's be vindicated of the inhumane treatment they may be facing or have faced. I looked for month's before I found "THE WEINGARTEN RIGHT'S ACT" which till recently were strictly for organized union-employees but have been extended to non-union-employees. The bases of which are all employees have the right to join together ina concerted effort for joint or individual protection.

Once this was done I made an attempt at researching the laws again and again I was overwhelmed with the twist and turns, the blind allies and dead ends legislated into the law. With frustration I turned this time to another new ides, looking into the types of employers and how they conducted their human resources with regard to the employee's and the volume of information quadrupled with no end in sight for possibilities. There was information on individual companies, on a companies departmental brake-down, different industries, different categories for each industry, endless resources for organizations and employers to dupe the employee into thinking that the employer was taking the employees interest to hart, just to have the caret pulled away at the time of need by the employee.

There are thousands of laws protecting the Employer in depth with thousands of lawyers working on their behalf, the employer has the Gold so the employer has the rule, and they have lobbyist at local, state and federal levels of governments talking up more support in their desire to take what the employee may now have. There are companies selling resources to companies on their behalf in such areas as employment hiring, pay rolling, life and health insurance, retirement etc., all with the intent to corral the employee, to make the employee a captive in ways so that the employer canreduce all aspects of financhiel overhead caused by employees, which cuts into their profit, and in return gives little as possible back to the employee.

Like me, how many of you had in the past,a job were you earned a descent wage, had medical and life insurance, paid vacation's and holiday's, a retirement plan and maybe even paid sick days only to come to work one day and find out you are either fired, laid off, suspended indefinitely, downsized (not like fast foods giant sizing) or some other method of being removed and you now have nothing? Nearly every employer will fight your claim for unemployment benefits you have earned, just to save some small interest on the money they would have to pay you or to harass you just one last time, and without specific documentation and/or witnesses you have no chance.

This happened to me in 2001, I was a shop-Stewart and I believe I was a good one, but I was a threat. Today I work day-to-day for temp agencies that are even more ruthless. I have performed labor such as grounds pick-up and apartment cleaning, tear down and set up after major events as well as trash pick up after events (being humiliated and pushed mercilessly by those in charge), factory work on a small scale, granite and marble detail work and the beat goes on. The highest I have been paid since 2001 has been $8.75 (for 4 days) to as low as $5.50 (as much as I can stomach). I have gotten up as early as 4:00 a.m. and gotten home around 7:00 p.m., travel ling over 150 blocks a day by bus to earn $6.50 per hour (and it wasn't always for l8 hours), and through all this the laws and the rights of the employee are ignored or manipulated to were today 03/16/03 I have only worked approximately 25 hours this year. No insurance, no vacation, no rights, no job security, no chance.

My experiences over the past two years has shown me that until the employees take the time to learn to protect themselves and protect each other, 90% of the employees in America and other industrialized nations, will be working for temporary agencies, leasing agencies, pay rolling agencies and many other agencies earning 60% less, no health or life insurance, no paid holidays or any other benefits to keep our families and ourselves health, feed, clothed and schooled. We will become temporary labor, leased labor, contingent labor, captured labor and peon labor.

The employee needs to look at "LAW's" , "ACT's" and "ORDANCE's" to find the elephant, the employee needs to know the employer and their methods for resorting insurance, retirement plans and payroll to find the elephant, the employee needs to know their Legislator's, Mayor's, Governor's, Congressman's, Senator's and President to find the elephant.

The number of employees who have been ruthlessly treated in resent years is staggering. Many today are unemployed, homeless, living in shelters or working for sub-standard wages. Even in the era of "THE LIVING WAGE" movement progressing through out the country the employees are not getting wages they should because the employer of record or the contractor or both is not using their payroll employees but rather leasing, pay rolling or renting temporary labor from agencies such as Labor Ready, Action Temp,  T.D.L., Tandem Temp and others who lease, payroll, or rent out their minion's day-to-day to maintenance companies such as "Centaur Building Services" and "Spann Building Maint. Co." who in turn lease, payroll or rent these same employees (minion's) to stadiums, convention centers and civic center's to tare down and set up or the clean up trash after professional sporting events, nationally touring performances, ice shows, rodeo's and many other events and performances, were the "Living Wage" should be paid rather than the $5.50 or $5.75 per hour now being paid for the labors of the mutably leased, pay rolled, rented employees. Were do you hide the "Living Wage" ordnance. Why in the act of leasing, payrolling and renting and releasing them again and again. Employer, co-employer, co-co-employer, as Jerry McGuire say's "SHOW ME THE MONEY"..

If the "Living Wage" in St. Louis Mo. is real then the government of St. Louis has an obligation to the leased, pay-rolled and rented employee to investigate the venues within the city of St. Louis such as the Savvis Center, The E.J. Edwards Dome, Convention Center, Bush Stadium and others even unto the city offices to find out if the employees pushing the brooms and mop's, dumping the trash, washing the windows, making your lunch or typing your letters are being denied the wage set forth in the city ordnance. Are the venues receiving annual subsidies of $100,000 or more. Are the contractors, contracting the contract to other contractors for the labor of the employee (minion). Opps! Did we just find an elephant?

I stand on my personae belief if an employer were to pay me $1.00, I try to give $1.25 of service in return. All I ask is to give me what are mine, decency, respect, honesty, integrity and my fair wage. In return I give respect, loyalty and the best I have to give. I will do what many others wont for the employer, but not just any dictatorial employer, a fair employer, but I don't see myself finding the enigma of a fair and honest employer before I can retire to the fishing hole. All I can hope to do is to help troughs along who may and will some day follow this course I have set.

Employers I ask you how much is enough, how much blood can you get from a turnip, were will it get you when you have driven 60, 70 80% of the working force into poverty and they don't have the dollars to spend that you seek. Ask yourselves this, were does the largest majority of your profits come from?, those you employ, the supper rich may posses 90% of the wealth but were do they shop for clothes, food, entertainment, or basic needs? Where do the lower 30% of the economy shop for clothes, food, entertainment or basic needs?
Destroy your market's you destroy yourselves, you have to decide if we need you more or if you need us more. Now where is that dammed elephant.

If you look the answer stands out in this article. Can you find it?