Fear-induced Self-Slavery (the NOTPP ripple effect)

NOTPP

In a modern, post-industrial society there is a potential for what I would qualify as “self-slavery”, i.e. one choosing deliberately to serve a corporation or another individual/entity without getting paid (or getting some form of material reward in return). Note that I do not refer to people working for free in a voluntary service context, but rather working for private businesses generating considerable profits. There are mostly negative aspects related to this behavior (in fact I do not see many positive ones), which I will herein present.

I will start by describing precisely what I mean by “working for free”. I exclude from this analysis management-type functions, which are generally paid for on a yearly basis, meaning you get paid XYZ$ a year for your work. Self-employed individuals will also be excluded from the current analysis. I will refer here to non-management employee positions, like say a 30-hours-a-week job, or a “40H job”, etc. Those jobs are paid by the hours of labor that the individual has worked throughout the week (usually 2 weeks are paid on the same banking transaction). Nowadays, businesses often hide the fact that the worker is paid by the hour (even though it is the case in reality) by specifying a yearly income amount on the hiring contract, etc. This is primarily in order to cause confusion on the worker's part, i.e. to make him think he is occupying a yearly-paid job like the one of a manager, etc. Note that the yearly income concept can have positive aspects, for example it can help a worker to easily predict what will be his income for the current year period and thus better prepare for taxes, etc. What happens is that, even though the individual is supposed to work for N hours/day (as per his work contract), he is asked to work more hours. When a business does pay for OT hours, it then becomes obvious that those type of jobs are paid for on an hourly basis, since the additional hours will be paid for; thus the real yearly income will consequently be of a superior amount than that specified initially on the hiring contract (which is a good thing, right?).

The labor code of most developed countries will specify that those additional hours (overtime or OT), must be paid to the employee. What may be observed on the workplace battleground is that more and more businesses do not adhere to this rule anymore, though, and will add complexity to the HR processes in the goal of justifying the downgrading of many workers' pay. Those corporations will then cut on payroll expenses in a major way. The profits generated from not paying OT hours to a sizeable portion of the workforce will then be distributed among higher echelons of the hierarchy, i.e. upper-management. Those same profits will most likely have the shares go upwards, which is also a good thing mainly for the upper-management folks since they hold the most shares. The business knows that this process is basically unethical (even sometimes downright illegal) but does not care; the profits generated from payroll cuts will compensate for any expenses that could eventually be generated by lawyer fees, in case some workers would go against the whole scheme and try to invalidate the corporation's tactics. The only reason it could back out on its tactic is if said manoeuvring becomes publicly known and affects the reputation/image of the business. It could also impact on hiring perspectives for the businesses employing such tactics in the long run (though that remains to be seen; people are often weak in spirit these days and will accept pretty much anything without resisting if properly conditioned).

Impacts on the overall workforce (of a no-OT-paid policy for a portion of the workforce)

1- Impact on the workers (who do not get paid for OT hours)

A) The worker will lose motivation for the job since he will feel as he is being exploited; one who feels exploited does not think his job is rewarding; he is thus not proud to do his job.

B) The worker will feel guilt when refusing to work OT hours. His guilt could evolve into depression and cause the worker to be less productive, etc.

C) The worker will be afraid to lose his job in the case he would refuse to work OT hours. Since the business will profit immensely from those unpaid hours it will ask the worker for more and more OT hours; the worker will have to refuse a fair portion of those requests; he will then be full of fear: fear to lose his job, fear to be in a conflict with management, etc. The fear will be prone to cause psychological problems for the worker (depression, paranoia, confrontational psychological schemes, etc.)

D) The worker will resent other workers that do get paid for OT; the resentment will impact negatively on his relationships with other workers.

2- Impact on the other workers

A) Since some workers do not get paid for their OT hours, the workers that do get paid for OT hours will feel the impact of the resentment felt by the former. In other words, the jealousy that will most likely be generated by this situation will thus create feuds and quarrels amongst the workforce. “Outside workers” or contractors will be seen as mercenaries who profit from the situation and receive ill-gained money from doing the exact same work that the “inner workers” do not receive any compensation for. The NOTP policy will thus breed disharmony and resentment in the workspace environment and will cause the work atmosphere to deteriorate for all involved.

B) The workers who do not get paid for OT hours will try to avert working for free, and will thus maneuver to dispatch some of their workload to contractors (whose OT does get paid). The former will view this behavior as logical and justified since the latter is getting paid to do it; the latter will perceive this same behavior as illogical and unjustified since it is not their function/role to compensate for management decisions in taking a greater workload on their shoulders.

My conclusion is that the NOTPP (No Overtime Paid Policy) will probably have negative impacts on the work environment and on workers' mutual relationships. It then remains to be confirmed if it can be a sustainable and productive tactic for any business in the long run.