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Temp Work: Beneficial And Convenient?
Larry Rogers knows all too well the life of a Manpower temporary employee.
In 1995, Rogers took a Manpower job at the South Charleston Stamping and Manufacturing
Plant, assembling car parts with 850 other workers on MacCorkle Avenue. Rogers knew he had to work 15 months at $4.25 an hour with Manpower before he was hired full time at the stamping plant. His younger brother
and two uncles found their full- time jobs at the plant through Manpower.
Fifteen months didn't sound so bad. He hoped his relatives could speed the process
along. "I thought they could do a little talking, get me on a little earlier, but that didn't happen," Rogers said.
For Rogers, his wife, Debra, and five children, a year and three months felt like an
eternity. "I lost everything when I worked for Manpower because I just had to pawn it off to get by," Rogers said.
"My wife's earrings, my toolbox," Rogers said. In the background at Rogers'
Cross Lanes home, Debra Rogers overheard her husband's telephone conversation and reminded him: "The TV, the VCR."
Now, Rogers makes $14.75 an hour with benefits as a full-time employee. "I got my
time in and they hired me and that was one of my best days," he said. Also, "I got the UAW. I couldn't ask for anything more."
In July, plant employees voted for the United Auto Workers after years of failed
attempts to unionize the stamping plant. Perry Norvell, president of the United Auto Workers, wants to rid the plant of temporary employees altogether.
"We want as few as possible and we want them full time," Norvell said.
"For the most part, the temporary workers are a good part of the plant, and are good people and good workers, so we want them in there all the way."
Since a ruling last month by the National Labor Relations Board, temporary workers can
join the same union that governs their placement company. Previously, temporary workers could only join if their temporary agency agreed, which rarely happened.
The ruling was applauded by labor unions such as the AFL-CIO and the UAW, but some
local staffing companies and their workers said the decision is unlikely to affect them.
Since 1998, the number of temporary workers at the stamping plant has dropped from
about 182 to 100. Manpower no longer staffs temporary workers at the plant. Callos, an Ohio-based company, has the contract.
Callos Manager Jami Gardner opened the Charleston branch Aug. 21. When asked whether
the UAW will affect Callos workers, Gardner said, "We really haven't had a chance to think about that."
West Virginia's temporary workers have increased from about 6,080 in 1995 to about
7,170 in 1999, according to the state's Bureau of Employment Programs.
Bradford Sims, president of United Talent in Charleston, is expanding his office
throughout the state. By the end of the year, he hopes to have a satellite office near Ripley or Ravenswood.
Sims countered the perception of temporary workers as underpaid and exploited.
Nonprofit and union leaders who pushed for the recent NLRB decision consider temporary workers "one of the key causes of the growing inequality that we face in this country," said Betsy Leondar-Wright,
spokesperson for United for a Fair Economy in Boston.
"It's so obvious that temporary workers get screwed," agreed Jason Pramas,
associate director for another Boston temporary worker group, Campaign on Contingent Workers.
"The temporary agencies claim that they're doing a service for society, that
they're providing jobs, when in fact what they're doing is allowing companies to chop up good jobs and turn them into bad jobs," Pramas said.
Sims and Susan Barnhouse, executive vice president at United Talent, said many of
their employees choose the work for its flexible schedule. When they want to work, they can. When they don't, they don't.
Most employees wouldn't want union representation because they work short-term
positions. "Why would you want to pay union dues to support changes that are going to happen long after your gone?" Sims said.
Anita Kuhn has worked on and off with United Talent for eight years. She quit a
full-time job with benefits at Union Carbide to stay home with her four young sons. She works temporary jobs when she needs extra money. Her family's health insurance is covered by her husband's job.
"It gives me flexibility with my family's schedule," Kuhn said. "It's
not like a permanent position."
United Talent's largest client is Union Carbide. Of about 360 temporary workers, 150
work at Union Carbide. Union Carbide uses "contract workers" for its mail, cafeteria, janitorial and grounds service, said Dwight Sherman, a spokesman for Union Carbide.
"The employees that are focusing on doing the work which is core to our business,
are very, very important," Sherman said. "[But] there are other folks that are experts in doing things such as [mail service] ... so we hire them to do that."
Mary Darnell has worked for United Talent for 12 years in Union Carbide's mailroom.
She's a full-time United Talent employee with benefits because she is a mailroom supervisor.
Last week, she finished her mailroom shift at 4:30 p.m. and cleaned company offices
until 7 p.m., completing a 12-hour day. The cleaning job was an extra one she picked up for extra money, she said.
She wouldn't say how much she makes an hour at the Union Carbide mailroom.
Occasionally, she said she picks up extra cleaning jobs or catering jobs at the Embassy Suites hotel. Darnell likes her job at United Talent. It's a lot better than her previous position as a hostess at Bob Evans,
she said.
"I'm real happy with it. They've been real good to me," Darnell said. She
said she has no interest in joining a union.
Another United Talent employee at Union Carbide who didn't want to give his name said
he felt like a "second-class" worker.
Other United Talent workers have been with the company at Union Carbide for more than
10 years, he said. "There are people that I work with who are making a career out of this in this one location," he said. "They have no retirement, no health care benefits."
He's looking for another job. "If my boss walks in tomorrow and says, 'We can't
afford to have you anymore,' I'm gone. No notice. No rights. No nothing."
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