A Soft Position on Exploitation
A Critical Review of “The Hidden Work of Challenging Precarity” by Kiran Mirchandani & Mary Jean Hande
A Soft Position on Exploitation
In their article “The Hidden Work of Challenging Precarity,” authors Kiran Mirchandani and Mary Jean Hande explore the social and economic costs intrinsic in precarious work through the added expense of hidden work. The authors define hidden work as “feeding and caring for a family, the body labour in high touch jobs and the pecuniary, prescriptive, presentational and philanthropic facets of emotion work in workplaces.” They argue that legislative bodies and regulatory boards first need to acknowledge that hidden work is worker exploitation. Once that level of understanding is established, they recommend that worker-related legislation should be updated to reflect the need of the growing percentage of the population stuck in precarious work. Sourcing for much of the data presented in this paper came from first-person accounts via interviews held with Ontarians working precarious jobs. These interviews were first published in 2020 and are therefore still relevant to the state of Canadian labour today. This response article will argue that precarious jobs lead to hidden costs being placed on workers, but this offloading of responsibility and unpaid work is also an intentional consequence placed on the workers’ backs by corporations and smaller employers. Furthermore, this paper will argue that these deliberate actions by corporations have the tacit support of government agencies and current legislation. A successful argument of this claim will likely be subject to one’s political ideology as those in power are unwilling to admit permitting exploitative workplace practices.
In an increasingly global society, workers in precarious positions have very few options in regards to having workplace grievances settled fairly or equitably. Mirchandani and Hande define precarity as “…the chronic state of inequality, instability and insecurity that characterize the social and economic context of austerity and debt in advanced capitalism.” When an employer breaks labour laws leading an employee to file a grievance, the responsibility of dealing with these grievances is placed directly at the feet of the employee. This is often due to low unionization rates and poor labour standards in these precarious jobs. “Precarious jobs are low-wage, part-time, temporary, and irregular.” Individuals actively fighting for their rights often receive little to no assistance in their plight, and the legislation in place heavily favours employers. This hidden work of filing and fighting for enshrined rights is just one facet of hidden work in the eyes of Hande and Mirchandani.
Hidden Work is A Net Societal Expense
Workers of colour, women and other marginalized people have been those most directly impacted in recent years by the reduced availability of stable full-time employment. This is primarily due to the reduction in the total number of regular, full-time jobs and the increase in the number of temporary jobs, contract work or “gigs”. Throughout my personal experience working for the past thirteen years, I would estimate that I have only had one job that would not fit the definition of precarious work as defined by the two authors of this paper. I would imagine that the same is true for the majority of university students and unskilled young people. The authors claim that workers in precarious jobs have become reliant on regulatory and legislative frameworks such as the Ontario Employment Standards Act (ESA) and that these frameworks are insufficient. Through my research, I would agree with Mirchandani and Hande in their diagnosis of the problem. Workers are becoming increasingly disposable to employers, even in previously secure jobs or careers.
In my opinion, the 2020s will be the decade of the gig economy due to neo-liberal policies that value profit and GDP over our fellow citizens’ well-being and security. Many former full-time or unionized careers have been replaced with at-will, insecure jobs. This process has only been accelerated by the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic and the increase in employment automation, specifically manufacturing jobs. With various communities being decimated, we have seen individuals and organized workers’ collective well-being decline drastically. Between 2013 and 2019, the life expectancy for Americans decreased for the first time since the Second World War. Workers are no longer actively being protected by the state, “This compliance orientation is part of a broader neoliberal shift towards “soft regulation” or regulatory new governance where state enforcement is minimal and employers are encouraged to voluntarily comply with fair labour standards”.
Assigning Hidden Work
Primarily, Mirchandani and Hande expose the increasing amount of hidden work assigned both explicitly and implicitly to workers in precarious jobs. There are two memorable examples in their article. The first examines the identity work of Celeste, who, despite knowing about the labour laws and requirements, chose to “play dumb” to avoid uncomfortable interactions with her employer, even when the cost was high. In the interview with Celeste, she states that her manager failed to post schedules in a reasonable manner. This violation led to her feeling isolated and being unable to schedule doctor appointments because of the uncertainty around availability. The explicit nature in which this hidden work was assigned to Celeste is not uncommon in the retail and restaurant environment where at-will work is the norm, not the exception.
The second example Mirchandani and Hande outline is that of Brent, a man who worked in a butcher shop for over three years. Brent was harassed and threatened by his boss, who had an anger and substance abuse problem. He performed hidden work by emotionally restraining himself despite being a constant victim of workplace harassment and abuse. This is a scenario in which the employer implicitly states that this emotional restraint is necessary because the consequences of not complying are termination or increased abuse.
Explicitly and implicitly assigning hidden work is a practice that employers have used in the past and will continue to utilize unless something is done legislatively or constitutionally. From the capitalist’s perspective, the workers are not above abuse or exploitation because they are just the means to an end. From my perspective, the exploitation of workers to ensure higher profits or social cohesiveness is significantly out-valued by the increased mental and physical well-being that non-exploited employees possess. Mirchandani and Hande never explicitly state their outright position regarding the capitalist/socialist question. From my reading and understanding of the jargon used in the specific “wings’’ of the political establishment, I would predict that these two would self-identify as either Liberal or Social Democratic. I believe this to be the case because of their use of various statements that are consistent with a Liberal, leaning SocDem, capitalist vernacular. For example, they use the term “competent professional” whereas someone more right-leaning might say “blue-collar/white-collar”. Furthermore, someone further left might, like myself, might ponder the question, “Why are the authors so focused on performative traits and gender imbalances when the entire problem with the situation is that people cannot afford to feed themselves even while working three “fair-paying” jobs?” While I understand the importance of work like this, there is also a severe lack of discussion on the material conditions of the workers. It’s all fine and good to have diversity and inclusion, but if that means everyone’s included in the downfall of society, they’re going to have to count me out.
Government Ineptitude & Complacency
Mirchandani and Hande argue that the state needs to recognize hidden work as work and that hidden work is often gendered or racialized. While this claim has merit, they offer very few tangible solutions or policy proposals to pay workers for their additional work. There are at least two broad options to solve this problem of unpaid hidden work. First, a national or local universal basic income (UBI) program would be an excellent starting point. For those who lean pro-business, this is often the best solution to the problem because of the universality and equality of the program’s design. There is also evidence that workers who received unconditional cash assistance were more likely to work than those who were not receiving the funding. UBI is simply capitalism where income doesn’t start at zero. With a more significant income in low-wage earners pockets and extreme poverty eliminated by implementing a modest, universal basic income, the next target would be the codification of housing as a human right. Precarious jobs and hidden work are exasperated by the material conditions of the average worker. There are many other society-wide benefits that these two changes would have: better health outcomes, reduced homelessness, less violence and domestic abuse, less stress and anxiety in the home and at work. I fear that if we do not see significant systematic changes in how society operates, the outcomes from such inaction would be devastating.
The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the transition away from the career economy of the late 2000s and 2010s to the gig economy of the 2020’s Mirchandani and Hande clearly explain why hidden work was a problem for the average worker in a precarious job. This paper dove deeper into the idea of explicit and implicit hidden work and how those concepts need further investigation into possibly which is the more pervasive. In the end, I think that “The Hidden Work of Challenging Precarity” has an important place in Canadian Labour studies both today and into the future as a diving board to more profound, more impactful studies. The paper lacked solutions to the problems it investigated, which is the most noticeable omission. Overall, this was a fantastic paper to help a new labour studies student understand the breadth of research in the field.
Works Cited
Hasdell, Rebecca. “What We Know about Universal Basic Income: A Cross-Synthesis of Reviews: Stanford Basic Income Lab,” July 2020. https://basicincome.stanford.edu/research/papers/what-we-know-about-universal-basic-income/.
Mirchandani, Kiran, and Mary Jean Hande. “The Hidden Work of Challenging Precarity.” Canadian Journal of Sociology 45, no. 3 (2020): 265–288.
World Population Prospects, United Nations. “U.S. Life Expectancy 1950–2021.” MacroTrends. Accessed March 17, 2021. https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/life-expectancy.
Yang, Andrew. Twitter Post. February 13, 2019. https://twitter.com/AndrewYang/status/1095873918898974721
