Why Have Employers Gotten So Dog-Eat-Dog? (Rant)

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Ok... I see just about every employment experience of my own echoed on this thread:

http://www.wrongplanet.net/asperger.htm ... sc&start=0

Just about every poster there has held a mirror in front of me one way or another.

Now what I'm trying to understand is this: why have employers become so dog-eat-dog about everything to the point that:

• New employees are hired and kept in Casual / On-call status, that way there is neither any promotion ever nor any chance of ever getting onto the Company's benefits package no matter how much seniority is accummulated. This is exactly what my status is with my present employer although my scheduling and my hours tell otherwise. More on it later in this post.

• Some employers I could name are "spoon-fed" as I call them. That is they are extremely heavily reliant on government subsidies when hiring, so they circumvent paying employees from their own payroll. These same employers hire under temporary contract but never renew their employees' contracts. That way neither do they pay from their own payroll nor is any seniority ever had. I had a contract like that and the day that contract expired was the day it was time to crawl into the dumpster and wait for the garbage truck

• When and if an Aspie is ever hired, the same is almost always seen as a cow to be milked or a monster to be slain. I defy you all to show us an employer that sees Aspies as the strong horses that pull the carts and treats and respects them likewise, and by that I mean giving raises in pay and benefits both commensurate with performance and seniority.

• When given a chance and the right conditions, Aspies can contribute greatly to the success of an employer and many of us have proven so. Yet most of us continue a seemingly eternal sentence of earning slave wages and putting up with colleagues that are any and everything but colleguial. Despite all these odds, Aspies continue to be the most loyal employees.

• Very rarely do I ever see an Aspie (myself included) earn more than $10/hour. That is not a living wage.

• As a person having a recognized disability, I most certainly have the option of sponging off the system for life if I chose but in my book, being AS-autistic is just seeing things from another perspective and I see myself as being a lot more independent than that.

And now for the job I do have:
First, it was gotten with the help of an agency that places people with disabilities. The employer knew of my condition before hiring me. That alone is the best part in that I'm enjoying a degree of respect from my colleagues there that I've never known before in any workplace. That being said, quitting is easier said than done.

Secondly, I did complete my first 3 months and I still see instructions cut out for me every time I report for my shift. So far so good and by the looks of things, I could be there for a good long time, but as it stands, I'm still an on-call / casual, but I won't get into the worst case scenario now.

There was the promise of a raise after that time frame but did they deliver?



NYAH NYAH NYAH-NYAH NYAH




BTW -I did ask about it but they put on another hat and said: "No, but there is a review after 6 months and blah blah blah blah blah...
BBBBRRRRAAAAAPPPPP!! !"

As if I'm going to believe that! I've been through that mill many times already

Well then, I'm still willing to give them time up to the first anniversary of starting there. What will happen on their part will affect whether I take a new address closer to where they are as well as my asking for more hours which they would give before I even finish asking the question.

As far as I'm concerned, the ball is in their court.

Anyway... just my 2c worth and I'm open to any sharing or solutions.

Um, what exactly constitutes to you as a slave wage?

Stereokid,

I earn just over $ 10/hour. 20 years ago, if you could get a job that paid like that, it was considered pretty good money. Factor in now the elevated cost of living and that statistically speaking, wages offered by nearly all employers have not kept pace with inflation. I could also cite many examples where wages offered in some sectors, especially in service and retail, that have actually declined as compared to bygone times. The tactics those big companies are resorting to widen their profit margins never cease to amaze me.

Another thing that keeps on getting less and less common if for employers to hire full time with raises and benefits commensurate with performance and seniority. What ever happened to the honest, old-fashioned sense of recognizing good workers when they do come up and giving them incentives to invest their future with the employer?

Instead, employers (and the majority if not all big companies have gotten really bad for that) just hire staff on an on-call / casual basis and regardless of how many hours the staff members work, they never get beyond that stage and unless the good fortune of finding better conditions under another employer could be had, the present job remains a dead-end affair without there ever being raises and benefits despite the logging of and accummulating thousands of overtime hours during the tenure as an on-call / casual.

That being said, I could stay as long as I chose to with the present employer but 10 years from now, I will still be an on-call / casual earning just over $ 10 /hour, no raises, no benefits. That is what constitutes a slave wage.

What is an Aspie in his mid-forties with a checkered work history to do? I could arrange again with my agency and change jobs but the song will remain the same. Any solutions? I'm open for discussion.

Well --- .

I get good pay, benifits, etc - but mostly I feel like a techno pet. Instead of dog biskets for doing silly tricks - I get pats on the checkbook for doing smart stuff, and fun toys to experiment with but - but am never taken seriously for advancement.

When ever I ask for more I get another toy but at age 46 - I'm looking for a place where I can be more than a clever pet.

I was paid by the piece at my last job for the same rate I was paid in 1987 if you wanted more they'd tell you to work weekends. In 1987 it wasnt bad mone but when I quit in 2002 it wasn't so hot. Plus the jobs you had to do had gotten harder.

I started my own business Make close to the same amout but work 1/4 as much

sounds like you work in Washing DC Papillion. They treat employees around that city like machinery, versus people. When you become "obsolete" you're out the door with all the junk compters and Fax machines. I job-hopped myself, never maintaining a job longer than a year or two dealing with this crap. I dealt with idiodic employers that micro-manage. another employer specifically pitted employees against each other for performance. I ended up in customer service positions after specifically saying that I don't do good directly dealing with cutomers. The worst part about it was all the countless interviews and crap. I don't interview well at all because I just can't put on that "show" like the NT's can.

I've finally settled down in Richmond, about 100 miles south of DC with a family run organization that gives us raises, benefits, and treats pretty darned good. We work as a team, and I love it. I'm not making a fortune, but plenty to get by. I've been recognized as a valuable player to the performance of the company, and they make sure I have the proper tools to do the job, like a modern computer, test equipment, a company vehicle, companycell phone, etc

And this is in Canada, remember. $10 there is a lot less than it is here in the States. I'm out on my own trying to be independent as possible, with rent and a car payment plus the regular bills each month. $10 barely cuts it for me.

Papillon, I hear you about full-time. I quit a full-time TV gig for an equal part-time gig with no guarantee of full-time (though they did give me $1.50 an hour more than the others because of my experience). So I cut my hours and ended up doing a full-time job that just wasn't me and paid a dollar less an hour. Fortunately, that job's over and I'm on the way to a new full-time job that pays double what my last one did, plus gives me benefits from day one. The good jobs are out there if you're lucky enough to find them, and I hope you can find one soon.

i'm sure my first job absolutely killed my confidence in myself even now....it was a job as a cook at a pizza place....they require that you memorize all the pizzas, sandwiches, and salads. i had 2 different managers yelling at me about two different things. i'd be on the salad/pita sandwich line one week and when i was actually starting to catch on, i'd be moved back to the sandwich/pizza line in the back the next week then i'd forget how to do the salads and be basically put down and scolded at when i'd forget the salads and mess up the rush and all. in the month or so i worked there, i had a panic attack almost every day because of how they did their business and how they treated me.


but hey...their business got about 12 feet of water in the hurricane so ha to them.

Actually, I can't complain. I was hired for my skills, not because I could fill a niche in the "Equal Opportunities" statistics. In fact, I've never told my employer about my diagnosis. My coworkers refer to me as "Mr. Wizard" because of the things I can do on the computer. I'm in a unionized job so individual accomplishment isn't rewarded financially (although seniority is), but at the same time I've attracted the attention of senior management on several occasions (all good), receiving both awards and offers of management positions. My boss is thrilled because I've told them time and time again that I'm happy where I am.

MY bosses were always thrilled at my ability to solve their problems they'd tell me they were happy and I accually belived one was but there was only so much he could do. As a result I ended up with everyones problems and making less than I could there were perks but when a realy big company bought us out they disipeared then so did I.

Papillon, one thing I'd add to your original post, is that if there are going to be any redundancies from a company, Aspies are surely going to be at the forefront when it comes to selecting people to be made redundant.

And surely, we are more vulnerable to getting sacked than most.

I only had one paying job here an the state of NC Voc Rehab helped me get it. It was with a non profit agency that provided respite (a form of babysitting) amd life skills training for families that had developementally disabled individuals. I was hired as an admistrative assistant. My first boss was a dream. For the sake of this story I will call her Sue. She had a degree in special education and would bend over backwords for me. I started the job in Jan. 1999. By October of that year I went from 20 hours a week to 40 but also by then there was rumblings of the place splinting into two offices, one in Charlotte and one for the Piedmont area. I wasnt allowed to choose who I would go with because if I did I would have gone with Sue and probably still be employed to this day. I was to stay in Charlotte. My office area was moved form one side of the hall way into the filing cabent room that housed all the client files. Talk about clausterphobia. SHEESH!! !! The office next to mine housed the office manager and the one who was hired to take care of the files. I would keep notes about what files were missing and would give them to my boss, this time it wasnt Sue, it was a black man who had social worker experence only. Sue would still stick up for me from time to time though. The two in the office next to mine would rather talk about their personal lives than actually get work done. Needless to say filing would get backed up and I would be blamed for the back up filing. But how can you file when the file you need aint there. By the time I was fired I was taking three medications to hold down that job. I was fired in March of 2000. I remember that the black boss and the head of personal came in and watch me clean out my desk like I was a criminal or something. It was very very degrading. When I arrived home early that day, Ma was shocked and was like what are you doing home early. I told her nonchalently that I was fired and she then had me call the state. Of all the people that knew that this should have been coming, it should have been them. But they were just as shocked.

Working with the state wasnt no picnic either. They made me look for potental job sites when I feel like that it was their job to do so not mine. The reason I got the one job I had was that they already had someone on the inside so to speak meaning that one of the people working for the non profit worked for the state before switching jobs. I suggested the post office. The state said no. There was one ocassion where they wanted me to come by one afternoon for something. I sat there at the office for over an hour and the person I made the appointment with was a no show. That person was my job coach. I had several during my tenur with the state. Also I had a volunteer job that I loved and had signed up weeks in advance to do the local spring show here in my city. The day came for me to do the show and the state called and said that they needed me to come by and sign some papers. I said no that I had other plans for the day. I somehow knew that they probably pulled this stunt with some of their other clients but werent about to pull it with me. I complained to the state and the head of the job coach office called me and chewed me out for complaining. I quit seeing my social worker at the time and the state called and said that they closed my case on the grounds I violated my IEP with them. Where is my unwritten contract for professonal service because the service I was getting wasnt very professonal at all. The state finally got frustrated with me and told me to file for ssi. In hindsight I think they are used to working with people who are lower functioning in the head than I was. To them I was a trained parrot because I could manipulate a computer and their clients were more or less geared to workshops or janitoral type of work. Glad I dont have to deal with them any more.