About Staffing Agencies

[harpo-my-“SON”Participant 2410]

I have strong opinions about this growing trend. That does not translate to anger towards these agencies or the companies that use them. I have a right to work, and also the right to interpret  and/or define what that right entails to me personally. I define my right to work like this: “I reserve the exclusive right, to contract my skills, services and time of life as I see fit. Exclusive being an important word here. If I don’t exclude others from contracting my skills, I have consented to my own slavery. The older I get the more precious my time of life becomes, and the more important to obtain full value of the skills that it took years to acquire.I have on occasion because of desperation had to use a temp or staffing agency. It was a demeaning experience as a worker. I will relate this experience later in a post called “selling myself short”. I found this an interesting read which further cemented my opinions on this matter.

The employment services industry, which includes both
temporary staffing agencies and more permanent employee
leasing firms, is expected to rank among the fastest-growing
sectors in the country in the next decade.
Staffing work is one part of a larger story about the declining middle
class in our country. More and more, major corporations are separating
themselves from the workers who make their products and supply
their shelves by inserting labor intermediaries who are nominally the
“employers” of these workers.
The competition between staffing agencies to undercut rivals’ bids
places downward pressure on wages and working conditions. Staffing
agencies may take over all of the former employer’s responsibilities
for wages, health and safety, compliance with discrimination laws, and
provision of workplace benefits. But they still need to make a profit. This
means that working conditions almost necessarily must degrade when a
host company turns to a staffing agency. Intense competition produces
intense pressure to cut costs by whatever means necessary, leading some
to seek out the most vulnerable workers,  cut corners, and cheat.

 

http://www.nelp.org/page/-/Reports/Temped-Out.pdf?nocdn=1

I was bound to be misunderstood, and I laugh at those who misunderstand me. Kind mockery at the well intentioned, but unfettered cruelty towards those would be prison guards of my creative possibilities. This so as to learn as much from misunderstanding as from understanding. Taking pleasure in worthy opponents and making language fluid and flowing like a river yet pointed and precise as a dagger. Contradicts the socialistic purpose of language and makes for a wonderful linguistic dance, A verbal martial art with constant parries that hone the weapon that is the two edged sword of my mouth.

[Author]

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