| From: | Sommers <sommers@*****.UMICH.EDU> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: Wageslaves (was:Rumours and Media in 2050) |
| Date: | Tue, 14 Jul 1998 14:14:00 -0400 |
>At 11:50 AM 7/14/98 +0000, you wrote:
>
>>Face it, how many of us are nowadays wage-slaves? And do you think
>>you're not an independed thinker any more? The wage-slave could be
>>highly critical about the activities of her company, but afraid to
>>speak out because she likes her job. Very likely the high casualty
>>rate in the average game of SR amongst corp-personnel is based upon a
>>mistaken idea that runners are morally superior and are wading through
>>hordes of mindless zombies.
>
>Well, look at today. There really is little feeling of loyalty towards the
>companies that people work for. The exceptions are those employers that
>offer all sorts of extras: child care, allowing pets in the office, profit
>sharing, paid gym time, paid retreats/vactions, etc.
That's the problem that comes back to haunt those companies that made huge
layoffs in the 80's and 90's. There was a fair amount of company loyalty
when you knew you had a job if worked hard and well. When the companies
started yanking that away, loyalty went out the window.
Now in the US trhe job market is tight, unemployment is low. So those
companies now need loyalty and don't get it. I think that the average
employment history for someone in the computer field is about 16-18 months.
Then some other company snaps them up, for more money, and the guy doesn't
look back once.
Right now at Ford, contract (as opposed to direct Ford) positions are about
30%. The department I worked in was 70% contract. When I got another job
offer for a company with some better benefits, I was out of there in a
flash. They didn't show me any loyalty, so I returned the favor. And from
what I saw that carried over to a lot of the direct employees.
>There's clearly a certain amount of uncertainty in today's job market.
>Vaulting forward to 205X and all the chaos, most people are going to
>consider themselves lucky to be employed, especially if they are metahuman.
> Sure, while inside the wage slave may be seriously pissed, but if they
>speak up, what happens? In megacorporate 205X, everything from simply
>being fired to being killed.
They still have to watch what they do. Look at what's happening to GM right
now. There are actually only a few thousand employees on strike. But since
everything is so inter-related no, those few have closed down 30 plants and
effectively prevented GM from manufacturing any cars for the last 2 months.
If you piss off the right people, you can do a lot of damage.
>
>That's quite an incentive to keep you mouth shut and just do your job.
>
>Are wage slaves mindless zombies? Hell no. They are just like the
>runners, they are just out to protect themselves and make some ducats. The
>wage slave simply chose and had to opportunity to take the much safer
>route. Most runners could be wage slaves if they so chose. But they don't.
Runners seem to be the ones to want to gum up the works. Slightly off the
topic, but it just came up to me. I've heard quite a few people say that
runners couldn't have that much of an effect on a mutlibillion nuyen
megacorp. But if you're nasty enough you could. What if the group of
runners sabotaged to the point of long term disabling a small factory. Only
employs a few hundred workers, but makes the key component to the
Americar/Predator/Cyber6/whatever.
All of a sudden, for a week to maybe a few months that product doesn't get
made. The company loses 50 million a day. They have to pay 50 million to
build a new factory, or maybe only 10 million to retool another one. Prices
for used versions of the product double. All stuff that's happening now
with GM could happen from Shadowrunners hitting that one plant.
>
>Thanks Martin. I've now got another topic for the Daily Life section of my
>web site.
>
>Erik J.
Sommers
"Thinking of a good gun-fest run for in a few weeks..."
