I haven’t thought about Robert Jones in a long time.

I was in my late 20’s when I got promoted to supervisor working for Mistix. One of the people working under me was Robert Jones. He was an old man at a time when people actually looked old when you said they were old. Robert was 64 and while he was counting the days down until he could afford to retire, he continued to be a hard worker at the company. Robert reminded me of a mix of two characters from Falling Down. He dressed like Michael Douglas, down to the glasses, but his look and attitude was like Robert Duval.

Robert always talked about the things he was going to do when he retired. He had been let go from his former job ten years earlier. He was too young to retire plus he was full of life so he kept getting jobs well out of his skill set to make ends meet. He was happy working at Mistix but in talking with him you could tell the man had a wealth of real life knowledge. He was overqualified to work at a call center, but he said working made him feel useful. In talking with him I learned he was let go from his former job because of age discrimination. It was the Reagan 80s and stuff like that happened all the time.

Robert kept an upbeat attitude because he had that goal for retirement. He wanted to do traveling. He wanted to visit his sister, who was his only family. He liked working but he was looking forward to waking up in the morning and not having a fixed schedule for the day. He was looking forward to the relative freedom retirement can offer.

Robert didn’t retire. One day he put in a request to take a vacation. In the few years I knew Robert he never took vacation time but his sister offered to fly him out to where she lived for his birthday. It was an offer he couldn’t pass up. A few weeks later he left for his vacation and a just before he was scheduled to come back I was called into my supervisor’s office. He told me Robert’s sister called and he had died in his sleep. Mistix wasn’t a big company, but it wasn’t cash strapped either. I suggested that we should at least get a sympathy card for his sister but that was rejected because it would set a ‘precedence the company didn’t want to venture down.’ I remember those words very clearly because it seemed so cold to my ears. I couldn’t understand how someone who worked hard for the company could be written off like that. I and a few other people got together and got a card and a little bit of money to send to his sister.

A few days ago my mother brought up her father. He worked at the same sawmill for close to thirty years. He had an accident there, well before I was born, where he lost three of his fingers. He stayed loyal to that company until it became too difficult for him to work. From my mother’s account, the company still looked after him with medical bills and helped him find more work. He would have his boss over for dinner sometimes. The company treated its workers like family.

I thought about Robert because I think that was the first time I started realizing the notion I had about work and labor in America was changing. Back in my 20s I assumed I would find a job and work for them until I retired, unless the company went out of business. For a good number of people in the early 80s, if you found a good job you could work there for years if you had a good work ethic. The situation with Robert left an impression with me that company loyalty might be something fading out in America. I kept that job at Mstix for almost 10 years, and then I got another job that was almost another 10 years.

By the end of the 90s, especially after 9/11, the economic prospects in this country changed. I cringe when I hear workers called ‘associates’ because around the early 2000s is when I started hearing that term used to refer to workers. To my ears associate isn’t the same as an employee or worker. I think it’s not the word as much as it is an association of the word with the attitude I see with employers. It used to be that workers and employees mattered. It seemed bosses, from the top of the company to middle management, made an attempt to know the workers. That was the management model I learned. You weren’t necessarily pals with everyone but you knew the climate and temperament of the work environment. If employees had problems they could go to someone to talk about them. There was an effort to keep good employees. Even in a situation with Mistix with their treatment of Robert, there were enough of us who knew how Robert had been with the company that we were willing to take it upon ourselves to make the situation right.

By the time I got to Arizona, to me it appeared the era of companies caring about employees was over. Associates became replaceable elements. Companies were more loyal to shareholders than associates. The economy was, and still is, bad enough that people are fighting for the few jobs that are out there, willing to put up with more pressure from employers for less pay and benefits. There was a recent article I read that talked about the changing work environment. It spelled out the impact this cut throat business model has on workers. There are companies that use the economic climate to refuse offering benefits that have long been an expectation of workers. There are companies that try to get workers to work off the books, deny days off or freeze pay raises. They can get away with this because the prospect of getting another job is difficult. Now, the truth is there are jobs out there. The economic indicators give concrete proof of economic growth. The issue faced in getting a new job is finding one that will pay at current wages.

To put it in plain language getting another job, for many people, won’t be a lateral move. It goes without saying that most people if they move from one job to another they may have to begin at the bottom at the new job, but in the past many have been willing to sacrifice for a while at lower pay because there was a reasonable expectation if you worked well enough at the new job there would be a pay raise. That isn’t the case today. The lack of opportunity can have a dampening effect on motivating workers. What is the point of working to improve the job environment if at the end of the day you will not be recognized, and more importantly compensated for your actions? People want to move ahead, want to better themselves. The fry cook at McDonalds probably has aspirations to becoming line boss or manager. The mid level executive works hard to move from the cubicle to the corner office. The boss whose company has a large share of the regional market will strive for a larger stake in the national area.

If workers at the low end of the scale are prevented from achieving a higher goal, if they are denied benefits and compensation that illustrates their worth in the company, they will be unmotivated to improve themselves. Unfortunately, psychologically that can affect them in their life outside of work. People who complain about the government giving too many handouts to people may want to look at the fact that if low paying jobs are the only things being offered to folks, there are some who will do the math and realize it makes more sense to take the handouts than work.  I’m willing to bet many Americans aren’t looking for handouts. Throw social shame out of the picture. I’m sure there are a good number of people who might feel shame getting government handouts, but I would venture to guess people are willing to work in an environment where they feel appreciated. If your income is low and the work environment is toxic, why would someone want to struggle through that when another path will give the same amount of money or more for less hassle? 

Something I learned from Robert was I didn’t want to end up like Robert. I didn’t want to wait until I retired before I could enjoy life. As I got older I didn’t want work to be something I had to do. Look, I know I have to work to make ends meet, but a job doesn’t have to be drudgery. It doesn’t have to be fun and games every day, but at the end of the day I want to feel like I’m appreciated at a job. As I’ve grown older and the economy has changed, that appreciation has been hard to find. I’m not a shareholder. While I don’t have the same title, it could be argued, I am an associate like many other workers in America. I’m a replaceable cog that can be thrown out with little thought.