Report: Restoring Balance to the ‘Gloves-Off Economy’

by Seth Michaels, Sep 10, 2009

As we look across an economy that isn’t working for far too many workers, it’s obvious the wages, retirement security and freedom to bargain for a better life are eroding—and our economy has suffered as a result. How do we restore fairness and workers’ rights to our economy?

In a new report, “Confronting the Gloves-Off Economy: America’s Broken Labor Standards and How to Fix Them,” some of the country’s top scholars on workplace issues take a critical look at what’s gone wrong in the relationship between workers, their employers and the government—and what we can do to turn it around.

The report was coordinated by the National Employment Law Project (NELP). Scott Martelle, the author, summarizes a larger study by NELP’s Annette Bernhardt, Heather Boushey of the Center for American Progress, Laura Dresser of the University of Wisconsin and Chris Tilly of the University of California-Los Angeles. These researchers examine the collapse of workplace standards and conclude we need to fundamentally re-examine the nature of work and design new policies to protect workers:

What do we mean by the gloves-off economy? Simply put, it is the decision by employers to evade or break the core laws and standards that govern working conditions in America. And we believe the practice has been spreading from classic sweatshop operations to core sectors of the economy, running the gamut from construction sites to industrial laundry plants to restaurants to home health care and domestic work.

Our goal is to provide advocates and policy makers a window onto one of the key trends in the American labor market, and a resource to help them fix an economic system that rewards employers who break the law and punishes those who try to play by the rules. This is a moment for potentially great change in the way our society operates. Workers, government, unions, and responsible employers all have a stake in finding ways to put the gloves of worker protections back on.

The authors point to a decline in both workplace norms and in the efforts of public institutions to protect workers. In the past decades, the radical deregulation of the workplace and the assault against workers’ freedom to form unions have taken a toll on the kind of treatment and benefits employees can expect on the job.

Rebuilding an economy in which workers have a level playing field begins with the Employee Free Choice Act, so that workers can exercise their freedom to form unions and bargain without management intimidation. That’s a first step that gives workers themselves the power to improve their own lives and working conditions. But as the authors note, we also need to focus on building and enforcing stronger laws—at the local, state and federal levels—for the minimum wage, overtime, worker classification, discrimination and workplace health and safety.

You can read the full report here.

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