Perry Work Report, May 16, 2014

 

May 16, 2014

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University Slammed for Firing

Latest update (at time of press) from the University of Saskatchewan: “Dr. Buckingham was removed from his executive director position for acting contrary to the expectations of his leadership role... Dr. Robert Buckingham, who was terminated from his position on May 14 [2014], will not return to that leadership position. He will, however, be offered a tenured faculty position.”

University of Saskatchewan, May 15, 2014: “University of Saskatchewan reconsiders part of the decision regarding Executive Director of the School of Public Health”

"The ‘outrageous’ firing of an outspoken University of Saskatchewan professor ‘undermines the very basis’ of the university, says Canada’s association of professors."

"Robert Buckingham, the now-former executive director of the University of Saskatchewan’s school of public health, was fired Wednesday [May 14, 2014] morning, less than a day after he sent a letter to the provincial government and opposition saying the university president was threatening to cut professors’ tenures short if they spoke out about the controversial TransformUS cost-saving plan."

"Within 12 hours of the letter being made public, Buckingham said he was asked to meet with U of S Provost Brett Fairbairn. Buckingham said that at the meeting he was fired as a tenured professor, then escorted from campus by security and told to never return.”

StarPhoenix, May 14, 2014: “University slammed for firing Robert Buckingham fired after speaking out against TransformUS,” by Andrea Hill and Janet French

"Tenure has long been seen as a virtual guarantee of lasting academic employment, but it may be under threat after the University of Saskatchewan fired a popular dean for criticizing the institution’s budget cuts.”

"So say teachers and labour experts who believe that the dismissal of Prof. Robert Buckingham could have a chilling effect on other faculty who openly question top administrators."

CBC News, May 15, 2014: “Robert Buckingham’s U of S firing a case of tenuous tenure: Tenure was like ‘armour’ for job security decades ago, fired U.S. professor says,” by Matt Kwong

CBC News, May 14, 2014: “Prof. Robert Buckingham fired after criticizing Saskatchewan university plan: Prof. Robert Buckingham had tenure revoked and was escorted off campus by security”

Robert Buckingham isn’t the only one recently out of a job. Jill Abramson, editor of New York Times, was fired on Wednesday, May 14, 2014. “[R]eports are trickling in that the sudden firing was prompted by Abramson’s complaints over what she saw as unequal pay compared with her male predecessor Bill Keller.”

Slate, May 14, 2014: “Reports: New York Times Editor Jill Abramson Was Fired Following Pay Complaints,” by Joseph Stern

The New Yorker, May 14, 2014: “Why Jill Abramson Was Fired,” by Ken Auletta

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New Canadian Labour Congress Chief Vows Aggressive Approach

"The Canadian Labour Congress has chosen a new president for the first time in 15 years, in a move that suggests a deeper shift within the organization that represents most of Canada’s unions."

"Hassan Yussuff, who served as secretary-treasurer of the CLC since 2002, defeated incumbent president Ken Georgetti in a close vote..."

“‘There is a wind of change blowing in Canada’s trade union movement,’ Mr. Yussuff said in a statement on his campaign website. ‘There is a desire and a demand to return to the offensive for rights and progress for workers after decades of retreat and decline.’”

"Mr. Yussuff has been a vocal critic of the federal government’s approach to labour negotiations and its interventions in several public sector disputes, which he argues has unilaterally stripped rights from workers in B.C., Alberta, Ontario and Nova Scotia. He has also been vocal about conditions in the private sector, particularly as pensions come under fire."

The Globe and Mail, May 8, 2014: “New Canadian Labour Congress chief vows aggressive approach,” by Grant Robertson

The Globe and Mail, May 8, 2014: “Hassan Yussuff elected new head of Canadian Labour Congress”

Financial Post, May 12, 2014: “Terence Corcoran: Labour’s new Canadian ground war,” by Terence Corcoran

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Labour Advocates: Workplace Deaths Must Be Criminally Investigated

“B.C.’s labour movement is urging the provincial government to beef up the way workplace deaths are criminally investigated and prosecuted, after several recent cases ended in no criminal charges.”

"The moves come as a CBC exclusive revealed a criminal investigation into the case of 28-year-old Jeff Caron, who was crushed to death while laying sewer pipe in a trench on Oct. 11, 2012, has only just begun, 18 months after the incident."

“A WorkSafeBC investigation has already determined pipe-layer Caron should not have been working in a three-metre trench, under the huge concrete retaining wall which cracked and crushed him.”

"...Jim Sinclair, president of B.C.’s Federation of Labour, says B.C.’s Criminal Justice Branch, which conducts prosecutions, has not prosecuted a single employer under the Criminal Negligence section of the code since the law was changed." The change was made ten years ago after 26 men died in the Westray coal mine explosion.

CBC News, May 12, 2014: “Workplace deaths must be criminally investigated, say labour advocates,” by Natalie Clancy

B.C Federation of Labour, 2014: “Justice and Deterrence: A Plan for Criminal Accountability in Workplace Fatalities and Serious Injuries”

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Jobs Recovery Overstated, Bank of Canada Report Finds

"[A new research] paper, by economists Konrad Zmitrowicz and Mikael Khan, estimates Canada lost 430,000 jobs in the recession, with unemployment rising from 5.9 per cent in May 2007 to a peak of 8.7 per cent in October 2009."

"It has since recovered those lost jobs and created 600,000 more, but ‘an unusually large share of the unemployed have been out of work for six months or more, and many workers who would like to work full time have been able to obtain only part-time employment.’"

"The unemployment rate in December 2013 was around 7.2 per cent, but that figure does not accurately measure underutilization of labour in the Canadian economy, the authors say,"

"Khan and Zmitrowicz create a composite labour market indicator -- LMI -- that combines factors such as long-term unemployment, wage growth and average hours worked that attempts to paint a more accurate picture of what has occurred since the recession of 2008-09."

"In the recovery period between 2010 and 2013, the bank says the unemployment rate fell 0.9 percentage points. But the LMI fell only 0.5 percentage points during the period, suggesting the improvement in the labour market has not been as good as the drop in unemployment indicates."

CBC News, May 13, 2014: “Jobs recovery overstated, Bank of Canada study finds”

Bank of Canada Review, Spring 2014: “Beyond the Unemployment Rate: Assessing Canadian and U.S. Labour Markets Since the Great Recession,” by Konrad Zmitrowicz and Mikael Khan (12 pages, PDF)

CBC News, May 9, 2014: “Canada loses 29,000 jobs in April”

CBC News, May 9, 2014: “Map: Jobless rates across Canada”

Statistics Canada’s The Daily, May 9, 2014: “Labour Force Survey, April 2014”

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Why Canada has a Serious Data Deficit

"Forget big data. Canada needs good data."

"The middle class is doing great, or maybe it’s not."

"Is the country becoming more unequal, or less?"

"Job vacancies are falling, but employers insist they can’t find workers."

"These are just a few of the critical areas where key information is missing, incomplete or contradictory."

"Canada has a serious data deficit. And the dearth of facts threatens to cause a host of policy mistakes, affecting everything from who gets unemployment benefits, to where governments spend their limited training dollars and whether employers can import foreign workers."

"And it’s a data problem of the government’s own making. Ottawa has cut funds from important labour market research, slashed Statscan’s budget more savagely than many other departments, and scrapped a mandatory national census in favour of a less-accurate voluntary survey."

"The Canadian government has demonstrated ‘a lack of commitment’ to evidence-based decision-making and producing high-quality data, according to a global report on governance released last week by the Bertelsmann Foundation, a leading German think tank. The report ranked Canada in the middle of the pack and sliding on key measures of good governance compared with 40 other developed countries."

The Globe and Mail, May 12, 2014: “Why Canada has a serious data deficit,” by Barrie McKenna

BertelsmannStiftung, May 2014: “Sustainable Governance Indicators 2014 Canada Report,” by Andrew Sharpe, Anke Kessler, and Martin Thunert (43 pages, PDF)

2014 Sustainable Governance Indicators -- Canada

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The Distribution of Employment Growth Rates in Canada: The Role of High-Growth and Rapidly Shrinking Firms

"A new study looks at whether large positive or negative growth rates can be found among growing and declining firms. The study moves beyond examining average job growth rates to examining the variability in the distributions of the growth rates of firms of different sizes and ages. In doing so, it looks at the extent to which job growth, either positive or negative, is concentrated in what are referred to as high-growth or rapidly shrinking firms."

Statistic Canada’s The Daily, May 15, 2014: “Study: The distribution of employment growth rates in Canada: The role of high-growth and rapidly shrinking firms, 2000 to 2009”

Statistics Canada’s Economic Analysis Research Paper Series, May 15, 2014: “The Distribution of Employment Growth Rates in Canada: The Role of High-growth and Rapidly Shrinking Firms,” by Jay Dixon and Anne-Marie Rollin (33 pages, PDF)

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Graduate Students Seek to Build on Momentum for Unions

"Spurred by the outcome of the NYU unionization effort, which resulted in a vote for a United Auto Workers affiliate on the campus, graduate students at Yale University are the latest to press for the right to form a bargaining unit. The Yale students say a union would ensure fair treatment of a class of employees with growing workloads who play an increasingly larger role in the university."

"Advocates of unions are also encouraged by the prospect that the National Labor Relations Board may reconsider a key 2004 ruling involving Brown University that for the past decade has limited the ability of graduate students at private universities to organize. The 2004 decision said graduate assistants are not employees because their relationship with the university is primarily educational. But in March, in a case involving a bid by Northwestern University football players to unionize, a regional office of the NLRB said scholarship athletes are employees, with the right to unionize. The College Athletes Players Association, in their argument to the full labor board in April, said the Brown case should be overruled. Experts say it appears likely that the labor board would eventually revisit that ruling.”

"Graduate students at public colleges, too, have sought to improve their working conditions through unionization. Public universities are subject to state labor laws, so the NLRB ruling does not apply to their graduate students."

The Chronicle of Higher Education, May 12, 2014: “Graduate Students Seek to Build on Momentum for Unions,” by Vimal Patel

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Do Elite Universities Improve Research Output and How Staff and Students Feel About Their Schools

"Most academics would view a post at an elite university like Oxford or Harvard as the crowning achievement of a career -- bringing both accolades and access to better wine cellars. But scholars covet such places for reasons beyond glory and gastronomy. They believe perching on one of the topmost branches of the academic tree will also improve the quality of their work, by bringing them together with other geniuses with whom they can collaborate and who may help spark new ideas. This sounds plausible. Unfortunately, as Albert-Laszlo Barabasi of Northeastern University, in Boston (and also, it must be said, of Harvard), shows in a study published in Scientific Reports, it is not true."

"The upshot is that elite universities do not, at least as far as physicists are concerned, add value to output. That surprising conclusion is one which the authorities in countries such as Britain, who are seeking to concentrate expensive subjects such as physics in fewer, more elite institutions -- partly to save money, but also to create what are seen as centres of excellence -- might wish to consider."

The Economist, May 10, 2014: ”Why climb the greasy pole?: Getting a job at a top university will not make you a better researcher”

Scientific Reports, April 2014: “Career on the Move: Geography, Stratification, and Scientific Impact,” by Pierre Deville, Dashun Wang, Roberta Sinatra, Chaoming Song, Vincent D. Blondel, and Albert-Laszlo Barabasi (7 pages, PDF)

"[F]or the first time, Times Higher Education can publish an overview of how the individuals who work in our universities, across all ranks and roles, feel about their jobs.”

"What do staff think about their department, their colleagues and their institution? Do they feel included in management decisions, do their employers listen and respond to their ideas and concerns? Do they feel motivated or downtrodden? And what factors influence their well-being at work? THE’s inaugural Best University Workplace Survey aims to answer all these questions and more.”

Times Higher Education, January 30, 2014: “THE Best University Workplace Survey: the results,” by Chris Parr

But how do those attending these universities feel? THE has the answer to that question, as well. The results of their 2014 Student Experience Survey were released on Thursday, May 15, 2014.

"Universities are working hard and succeeding in their aim to improve life for their students, [the] Times Higher Education’s Student Experience Survey results show.”

"The University of Sheffield tops the [survey], up from third place last year."

"The steel city institution was rated highly by students in all 21 aspects of university life covered by our poll, but its first-place finish for ‘good social life’ and ‘good students’ union’ helped to seal its number-one status."

Times Higher Education: “Times Higher Education Student Experience Survey 2014,” by Jack Grove

Times Higher Education Student Experience Survey 2014 -- Digital Supplement

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The Big Snoop

"In the latest Brookings Essay, Stuart Taylor, Jr. collects the divergent views of four prominent experts to help frame the debate over the future of the NSA in the post-Snowden era."

"Two of them are U.S. senators: Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), a liberal on reproductive freedom, gay rights, and gun control but, in her capacity as chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, the NSA’s most powerful congressional defender; and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the agency’s leading critic on Capitol Hill. The other two are outside government: Joel Brenner, a former NSA inspector general who is still broadly, but not uncritically, supportive of the agency; and Jameel Jaffer, the deputy legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and a leader of the movement to bar the NSA from hoovering up phone records and curb its surveillance of Internet and other electronic communications."

"All four not only believe deeply in the Constitution -- they know it well. Despite their differences, they also understand that the right to privacy is itself a conundrum, and that it has become more so with the passage of time. Therefore all four would agree with the proposition that there need to be reforms that take account of a changing world. What those reforms should be is where they come to a parting of the ways."

Brookings, April 29, 2014: “The Big Snoop: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Terrorists,” by Stuart Taylor, Jr.

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Why Being Rich Might Make You a Jerk

"Driving his teenage daughter to school each morning in Berkeley, California, Dacher Keltner thought he noticed a trend: people driving expensive cars were more likely to ignore the rules of the road than drivers of less expensive vehicles. The most belligerent drivers, Keltner thought, were behind the wheels of Mercedes. Black Mercedes, in fact."

"In 2012, Keltner and Paul Piff, psychologists at UC Berkeley, decided to put these observations to scientific study. They looked specifically at driving behaviors, but the researchers were asking some much bigger questions about ethics: Were rich people more likely to think they were above the law than poor people? Did they believe their needs were more important? Did their ethical behavior somehow differ?"

"The study, and several that followed, came to some unsettling conclusions: as people climb the social ladder, their compassion for others declines. In fact, research has repeatedly demonstrated that high earners behave less ethically than low earners. They are more likely to make morally dubious decisions, to lie, and to cheat. All these traits, researchers found, were created in part by more favorable attitudes toward greed."

Slate, May 13, 2014: “Why Being Rich Might Make You a Jerk,” by Mitch Moxley”

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, March 2012: “Higher social class predicts increased unethical behavior,” by Paul K. Piff, Dacher Keltner, Daniel M. Stancato, Stephane Cote, and Rodolfo Mendoza-Denton

PBS NewsHour, June 21, 2013: “Exploring the Psychology of Wealth, ‘Pernicious’ Effects of Economic Inequality” [video, runs 9:23, transcript available]

TED, October 2013: “Paul Piff: Does money make you mean?” [video, runs 16:35, transcript available]

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Power Point, Standing Desks and Blackberries: Stories about Office Culture

Every weekend, Longform shares a collection of great stories from its archive with Slate. This weekend the Robyn Jodlowski compiled "The Longform Guide to Cubicle Culture," which features stories written about the past, present, and future of the American office.

This story, from The Atlantic, is a must-read:

“Here’s your ‘buzzword bingo’ card for the meeting,” Wally says to Dilbert, handing him a piece of paper. “If the boss uses a buzzword on your card, you check it off. The objective is to fill a row.”

They go to the meeting, where their pointy-haired boss presides. “You’re all very attentive today,” he observes. “My proactive leadership must be working!”

“Bingo, sir,” says Wally.

This 1994 comic strip by Scott Adams is a perfect caricature of office speak: An oblivious, slightly evil-seeming manager spews conceptual, meaningless words while employees roll their eyes. Yet, even the most cynical cubicle farmers are fluent in buzzwords

The Atlantic, April 24, 2014: “The Origins of Office Speak,” by Emma Green

Other highlights include:

  • Businessweek, June 30, 1975: “The Office of the Future” -- “Communication in the office, just before word processor and fax use exploded.”
  • The New Yorker, May 28, 2001: “Absolute PowerPoint,” by Ian Parker -- “The definitive story of a ubiquitous software. PowerPoint’s origins, its evolution, and its mind-boggling impact on corporate culture.”

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feminists@law -- An Open-Access Journal of Feminist Legal Scholarship

feminists@law is an open-access journal of feminist legal scholarship that “aims to publish critical, interdisciplinary, theoretically engaged scholarship that extends feminist debates and analyses relating to law and justice (broadly conceived). It has a particular interest in critical and theoretical approaches and perspectives that draw upon postcolonial, transnational and poststructuralist work. The journal publishes material in a range of print and multimedia formats and in English and other languages. The journal is committed to an international perspective, to the promotion of feminist work in all areas of law and justice, and to making that work widely available through open access publishing.”

The current issue focuses on “Gendering Labour Law.”

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Striking Chinese Workers Are Headache for Nike, IBM, Secret Weapon for Beijing

"The Chinese government is gaining an unlikely ally in its effort to overhaul the economy: striking Chinese workers."
"While China’s communist party was founded to benefit the country’s ‘workers and peasants,’ Chinese leaders aren’t known for their patience with protest. This latest wave of labor unrest -- at least when confined to pocketbook concerns -- might be different. The government wants to rebalance the slowing economy to rely more on consumption. Higher incomes for workers would be a good start."

“‘The government is trying to play a game that uses worker demands to push its broader economic goals,’ said Mary Gallagher, director of the Center for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan. ‘They have a belief they can use this kind of activism.’”

"[However, t]here are limits to the government’s tolerance. China’s Communist rulers are determined to maintain their monopoly on political power. That means avoiding the rise of an independent labor movement..."

Bloomberg, May 6, 2014: “Striking Chinese Workers Are Headache for Nike, IBM, Secret Weapon for Beijing”

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Pope Francis to World: Redistribute the Wealth

"What does it mean when the world hears the same message from the Catholic Pontiff and a French economist? Both Pope Francis and Thomas Piketty are saying, in different ways, that the trajectory of unchecked modern capitalism is toward greater and greater wealth inequality, and the nations of the world need to tackle this with much greater wealth redistribution."

"On April 28 [2014], Pope Francis tweeted, ‘Inequality is the root of social evil.’ A few days later the Pope expanded on that point in a speech to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the heads of major U.N. agencies who were meeting in Rome... [T]he Pope specifically called for ‘the legitimate redistribution of economic benefits by the State.’”

"Economist Thomas Piketty, in his much-lauded book Capital in the Twenty-First Century also calls for wealth redistribution through taxation as a way to deal with capitalism’s inevitable increase of economic inequality.”

The Huffington Post, May 11, 2014: “The Marx Brothers? Pope Francis and Thomas Piketty Both Want to Redistribute Wealth,” by Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite

The Huffington Post, May 9, 2014: “Pope Francis Calls For ‘Legitimate Redistribution’ Of Wealth To The Poor,” by Nicole Winfield

CBS News, May 9, 2014: “Pope implores governments to redistribute wealth to the poor”

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Book of the Week

The Quest for Security: Protection Without Protectionism and the Challenge of Global Governance, edited by Joseph E. Stiglitz and Mary Kaldor. New York: Columbia University Press, 2013. 432 p. ISBN 9780231156868

From the publisher: "The essays in this collection boldly confront the quest for security arising from the social, economic, environmental, and political crises and transformations of our century. Joseph E. Stiglitz and Mary Kaldor begin with an expansive, balanced analysis of the global landscape and the factors contributing to the growth of insecurity. Whereas earlier studies have touched on how globalization has increased economic insecurity and how geopolitical changes may have contributed to military insecurity, this volume looks for some common threads: in a globalized world without a global government, with a system of global governance not up to the task, how do we achieve security without looking inward and stepping back from globalization? This book also examines how these global changes play out, not only in the relations among countries and the management of globalization, but at every level of our society, especially in our cities. It explores the potential for cities to ensure personal security, promote political participation, and protect the environment in the face of increasing urbanization."

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