I Love My Job
Not everyone hates their job. So if you’ve got a great boss and a great workplace, tell us about it!
We want this to be a site everyone can enjoy, so please keep your comments on the up-and-up.
Blog
May 11th, 2010 | Workers’ rights sacrificed “At the Altar of the Bottom Line”
Cross-posted from Blog at Work:
Stressed. Exhausted. Exploited. Abandoned. In a new book, Tom Juravich exposes and examines the degradation of work in the United States today. At the Altar of the Bottom Line, based on in-depth interviews with workers, lifts up the experiences of working people from diverse sectors of our economy.
Juravich, a writer, researcher, and professor at the University of Massachusetts Labor Center, spent six years interviewing workers in four different occupations:
May 3rd, 2010 | Join us at the Good Jobs, Green Jobs National Conference
Cross-posted from Blog at Work:
Want to hear innovative companies discuss the importance of working with unions to support workers’ rights, sustain the environment, and benefit the company’s bottom line?
Join American Rights at Work at the 2010 Good Jobs, Green Jobs National Conference taking place from May 4-6, in Washington, DC.
We’re proud to join our partners at the Blue Green Alliance as a sponsor and convener of this event, and excited to host a panel highlighting real-life examples of how working in partnership with employees and their unions helps companies weather turbulent times while increasing demand for green products and services.
Our Socially Responsible Business Director, Nikki Daruwala, is moderating the panel and will be joined by Michael Peck of Gamesa USA; Molly Bordanaro, Senior Vice President at Gerding Edlen Development, Inc.; Ron Kenedi, Vice President at Sharp Solar; and William “Butch” Johnson, CEO of Flambeau River Paper.
Please register and join us at the session “Partnerships That Work: Good, Green Employers” on Tuesday, May 4, 2:30-4:00 p.m. at the Hilton Washington Hotel.
We hope to see you there.
I love my job because of the good people I work with. I’ve been with this company for 27 years and was one of the first 200 employees — in a company that currently employs over 10,000 around the world. What astounds and angers me about my job is the difference between my salary after 27 years and the CEO’s salary after 28 years. His income is more than 200 times what mine is and neither of us risked our own $ or captial when we started out.
The company has grown to a multi-billion $ world-wide corporation but we no longer hire R&D folks in the U.S. — those positions are in India and China. The reasoning is that the company can be more profitable if we employ cheaper workers. The profits don’t go to the workers — we haven’t had raises in almost 3 years — they go to the CEO.
I was an independent contractor. I had a great job for 8+ years. Got really sick. Lost my job. $400,000 in bills. Not now. No unemployment insurance. Lousy welfare payments. Scrambling out of dumpsters for recyclables to turn into cash. It sucks.
Very fortunately, I am a union member (in fact I am a member of both the IBEW and the CTA). At least I have recourse if something unfair happens to me at the workplace. I also love teaching the population that I teach (individuals with special needs) and I know that my students, their parents and, my administrators, are very fortunate to have someone as hard working and dedicated as I am. So yes, I love my job!
I’m a senior lecturer (non-tenured) at the University of Massachusetts. I teach too many students, and I should be paid better, but I totally love the job, which I’ve had for 26 years. Everyone in the university treats me with respect, no one counts my hours or questions how I spend my time. They know I work hard and teach pretty well. Last year, I got one year’s leave without pay and spent it half in India, half in Sri Lanka, being paid by other organizations to teach in those places. I also do freelance writing, editing and consulting. I like working, I like the people I work with. And yes, I have a halfway decent medical plan and retirement plan. Also, I do belong to the faculty union — it was obligatory, and that’s okay — and sometimes I get to teach writing to union organizers in the university’s Labor Studies program.
All these things said, I must add that I know our university’s funding will be insufficient to protect everyone’s job there this year, and whether I get to keep mine is not the point. We are public employees, and our state doesn’t have the money to pay all its current public employees. We’re all connected, and the people who hate their jobs have their good reasons.
I love a lot of parts of my job. I work in a public school teaching first grade. I love working with the kids. I love it when kids are engaged and interested. I love getting to do a lot of my own planning. I work in a school where we are left alone if we are doing well. I appreciate the protection and contract organization of the association. I like getting to collaboratively work with fellow teachers. I do not like the political pressure from people who often have no clue what they are talking about.
I’m one of the lucky ones- I’m an artist and I work for myself. The only time I hate my job is when I have a client who is hard to work with, and that is fairly infrequent. I have to purchase my own health insurance, and it’s been tight the last few years. Fortunately, my partner , who is also self-employed, makes enough to fill in at times when people aren’t ordering art. My heart goes out to people who hate their jobs and feel trapped. As I said, I’m very lucky.
I love my job. I am a Union bricklayer. Like any job it has it’s moments that are not great, but overall I really enjoy being a bricklayer. There is something great about building something and looking at the final product. But I work to live not live to work. If I had to work for the pay and benefits my non union counter parts make I would find another line of work or be one miserable S.O.B.
I’m retired now. I was an electrician. I loved every job I stayed with. If there was a serious problem, I just quit and went looking for another. I loved the fact that the electrical trade demanded both hard labor and brains. It kept me fit all those years, and I had to use my mind all the time, every day, which helps keep a person sharp.
I have the best job in the world. I too work for the Postal Service and perform maintenance on its infrastructure. There a lot of things wrong with the USPS but it still provides me and my family with a great standard of living. The APWU in which I am an officer is solely responsible for this. We have semi-annual COLA’s, a health care benefit unequaled and most importantly a no-lay off protection. In the last 10 years postal management has done everything in its power to give Americas mail service away to those companies who would limit delivery to hubs in major metropolitan areas and would charge you by the zone for mailing a leter. If you think paying 44 cents to mail a letter from Miami to Anchorage is to high ask brand X or oops how much for the same size envelope. We as americans need to stand up and take our country back from big business where every decision made by our leaders is botton line based…….
I work as a nurse at large hospital. My nurse manager is great. Others in the hospital are not, but I have a great one. My working conditions are largely pretty good, mostly because we have a strong union that has negotiated at least some kind of pay increase each year with benefits and decent health insurance. We have to fight for it every contract renewal, but at least we have grounds to fight. Organized labor makes a huge difference. We need the Employee Free Choice Act so others may do the same!
I work for a Labor Union, the Communications Workers of America, so not only do I work for to protect workers but I also have a labor agreement that protects me.
I am asalaried worker and althogh I work many hours after 40 I don’t mind the additional work because I love the work I do and I know that I am recognized for my contributions.
We need to push for the Employee Free Choice Act to ensure that unorganized workers have a voice in their workplace.
The organization that I work for represents union health care workers and the best part of my job is when we help employers recognize when they have abusive supervisors working for them and they fire the supervisor! Also, when employers terminate the employment of our union members without just cause, and the union gets their job back through the grievance process.
I love my job, when I actually have work. I am a union millwright. Good pay, training, pension and healthcare. The only thing I need is for the economy to pick up so there are some actual jobs to go to. Construction and maintenance shutdowns have really slowed things down.
I love my jobs because I work though two unions (IATSE Local#16/Sign Display Local#510) in the San Francisco Bay Area that represent the collective interests of their workers. Given the present state of the economy I am only working half-time, but I still earn more than some poor folks working full-time as wage slaves for the ‘big box stores’ like K-Mart and WalMart. As a mature male fast approaching retirement age (60 this week) I have literally worked all over the world (North Sea, Persian Gulf, etc.) for a number of overseas employers, under a variety of circumstances, so I have seen a lot in my time. I strongly support the Employees Free Choice Act because many employers still put the ‘bottom line profits’ before the interests of their employees. What I don’t understand?
This is ‘America’ and our founding fathers had a vision that this would be a ‘land of opportunity’ for all. Unfortunately, from where I sit, that vision is fast disappearing and being replaced by the vision of “free enterprise bottom line profits” for the few rather than the many. Vote for the Employees Free Choice Act to strengthen our workers rights.
Just wanted to write that I notice a pattern of love/hate jobs. The “I love” jobs are a majority of UNION jobs, yet the “I hate” jobs never mention being a union job.
My best job was also a union job. We organized and gained unionization w/AFSCME at a public university. I was an officer of our clerical union. I never would have left the job, however my husband’s employment required us to move out of state.
I’ve been through HELL and back at many jobs I worked for. Now Im lucky enough to work for someone who is not only intelligent, appreciative, pays me MORE than what I deserve, but she’s also someone I hope to remain friends with even when I no longer work for her. Too bad telemarketing is a dying business. Ive tried and tried to get customers for her to keep busines afloat, but people just get more and more resistant to even the friendliest voice on the phone. I’ll be looking for work in another place of HELL after this folds up, and Im sad.
I actually did like my job while I had it.I received raw paper for a direct mail company.R&R Donnelley has an established well know company that prints magazines and books primarily but when my company More Wallace which had purchased my original company called Communicolor that I originally hired on to 17 years ago sold to R&R Donnelley they were at the beginning of getting into the direct mail market.The pay was good and the benefits were ok.But then just about three years ago I had a grandmal seizure at night which was the first of what was only going to be four seizures.Thank god for the way the medicine has worked for me for this statistic.My company did allow me to come back to work doing something other than drive a clamp truck or a forklift after about 8 weeks I think it was.Then after doing this shipping ground non driving work for about 2 months I believe my former company allowed me to go back to my regular job of receiving raw paper.But then as everyone knows the economy started taking a nose job starting in 2007. I won’t give my boss’s name in this instance because even though I got along well with all of the bosses I was unfortunately one of the people that was let go in a work reduction.My group was let go in May of 2008.My company did give me a severance package which did help out a lot.During my exit interview where I was given all the information I would need as well as my severance package no actual reason was given for my being let go.I had a lot more seniority than some of the people that were kept in my department and I didn’t think it would do any good to ask the reason if their was one at that time anyway.But actually given all the information about the companies circumstance and the state of the economy and given the fact that even if I had only four seizures at night while asleep who is to say that I might have had a seizure while driving one of the pieces of equipment and had a seizure this time while awake and hurt someone.I would have felt really bad if this would have happened.So at 57 years old and on medicine I think you can see that I am not in a very good position.But I thank God for the support my lovely wife Cheryl has given me as well as everyone in my family.Good luck to everyone that reads this and may God Bless.
I love my job because I get to help students untangle their lives every day: I get to help them deal with personal crises, lead them to interesting possibilities for courses, majors, careers, extracurricular endeavors, and volunteer opportunities, and listen to them as they make discoveries about themselves and the world. I make a real difference! My boss thinks I work too hard and tries hard to keep me from overdoing things, partly because she cares about my well-being and partly because she wants me to delay retirement for at least one more year. My colleagues are intelligent,caring, creative and a pleasure to work with. None of us gets paid what folk make on Wall Street, but I don’t think one of us would trade our jobs for something that pays in the six figures but fails to give us the satisfaction we get from our work in advising.
It sounds like you are truly fortunate to have the boss and co-workers that you do
I love AND hate my job. I am a relatively highly paid healthcare professional. EVERYTHING I do is reviewed and commented upon..I should see people faster and spend more time with them; I should order fewer tests but be able to diagnose things that are not readily apparent in less time; I should not mind taking the rap for all the people who work ” under ” me even though I have no power OR input into hiring/firing/or training. I should do the work of those ancillary personnel that the “employer” refuses to provide….hey, I don’t mind, but remember that it means that they’re paying a real premium for my secretarial and other services…and when will the president, congress, and public wake up to the fact that there are “secretaries” out there earning well over $100/hour!! Talk about no power. I adore the job that I trained so long to do. I wish I could just do it.
I LOVE my job. I should, I’m a self-funded, self-employed artist. I love the work I create. I love the response the work evokes in my viewers, I love being able to put to visuals and sometimes words how I perceive the world around me and within me.
What SUCKS is that this country, this society has tossed away artists like me, for those who have “made it.” Or for sports, or for celebrity distractions, or reality television. Or those with connections to large funding corporations. What SUCKS is that artists like me, who don’t suck the corporate ivory tower of art are not recognized (even though I have awards for my work) because we refuse to play the politics of a scene or corporate business model.