Pen-Elayne on the Web

Trouble on the Verizon

White Rabbits! You know, the idea of working as an executive secretary for a major corporation has a lot of appeal to me. It may be a "grass is greener" thing, I've never worked for a really large company, but I like the (illusion of) stability, the fact that I wouldn't be the only secretary in the whole dang place, the relative anonymity that being "one of many" sometimes affords, and particularly the promise of a decent salary and benefits that "strength in numbers" can engender. So I was intensely interested in Verizon's "diner ads" - where "Pete" talks to diner owner ''Joe'' about his friend ''Charlie'' who just underwent major medical treatment, but because Charlie works for Verizon, ''His job covered almost all of it...He's got it good. Great medical, lots of vacation, good pay.'' - to the point where I was considering applying for a job there. But you know the old saying: if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. As Robin astutely pointed out to me at the time, and as the linked article confirms, IBEW technicians are top-line specialized employees to begin with; most clerical jobs pay considerably less, around what I make. Which still seems to be a good deal - a clerk at a big company making as much as a glorified secretary at a small one! - were it not for the looming strike by Verizon employees, coming on the heels of Verizon's announcement that it's looking to reduce its work force by 5000 employees (that may or may not include the 2300 folks laid off last year whom they've been forced to take back) and a proposed plan that would move 24 percent of their jobs outside the US or to the southern part of the country over the next three years. So in short, and in direct contrast to the commercials' implication, this is probably not a good prospect for job-hunters... Very likely most mainstream papers will report all this from management's perspective (after all, that's why they have business pages and not labor pages) and play up the "inconvenienced consumer" angle, so if you want to know what's going on from the workers' end you might need to follow it on CWA's website.