In Poland, the gig economy is on the march

Katarzyna Duda is a regulation and political science graduate from Opole College and writer of a guide, Kiedyś tu było życie, teraz jest tylko bieda (“As soon as there was life right here, now there may be solely poverty”, 2019), by which she appears to be like at failed socioeconomic transformations in Poland. She additionally works within the social coverage division of the Polish Nationwide Commerce Union Alliance (Ogólnopolskie Porozumienie Związków Zawodowych, OPZZ). Her guide KORPO: Jak się pracuje w zagranicznych korporacjach w Polsce (“KORPO: How is it to work in giant international corporations in Poland?”) was printed in 2022.

Emilia Konwerska: After I began your guide, I believed it will be about one thing fully totally different. The “company” atmosphere I had in thoughts was that of Mordor [Warsaw’s business district, nicknamed after Tolkien’s creation], with its superb fits and tedious-but-well-paid jobs within the metropolis centre. We’re aware of David Graeber’s Bullshit jobs and but we’re discovering a very totally different story. You discuss Amazon staff, couriers, and so forth. Why deal with them?

Katarzyna Duda: I might divide my interviewees, who work in an organization, into two teams. The primary are the individuals I write about in my first guide, Kiedyś tu było życie, teraz jest tylko bieda (“As soon as there was life right here, now there may be solely poverty”, not translated). They’re usually of superior age, no less than 40, 50 and even 60 and over. They arrive from small cities and don’t have any job alternatives of their area, not to mention an excellent wage. They earn 3,000 zlotys [around €677, or €67 more than the minimum wage]. These individuals usually journey two hours simply to get to work. It simply goes to indicate that there are not any different alternatives.

Do not they’ve a selection?

After all they’ve a selection: to not work. The second group are college students or latest graduates – individuals who suppose that that is only a short-term job. They purpose to pay for his or her research and achieve work expertise.

These individuals occupy junior workplace positions, for instance manning phone hotlines to assist prospects with technical issues. They offered details about administration and remuneration.

These individuals suppose that their future is about to vary, and that every one they need to do is maintain slaving away. However that’s simply an phantasm, as a result of in actuality they keep for much longer, attributable to loans or different constraints.

Nearly all my buddies work at Citibank in Olsztyn. These are individuals of various ages, with totally different academic backgrounds: media graduates, attorneys, individuals with solely a secondary training. Typically I get the impression that these giant corporations are the largest employers in Poland. I ponder how many individuals work for them.

We do not have that sort of knowledge. However even when we did, it will be inaccurate. Amazon, H&M, and so forth – all these corporations use short-term employment businesses. The employees are their staff whereas not being their staff. FedEx, which I discuss in my guide, works with couriers: they aren’t staff, however moderately what we name “associates”.

So corporations have accomplished away with the thought of the worker and all of the rights that go along with it…

Corporations encourage self-employment with a view to offload duty for working circumstances. However they’re additionally doing this to guard themselves from staff organising themselves into commerce unions. They use business-to-business contracts, i.e., a transaction between two financial entities. It’s the huge corporations which can be behind this pattern.

How does this business-to-business relationship between an organization and a courier work?

It’s not a relationship by which the events are equal. It’s based mostly on the supremacy of the corporate, which makes the freelancers depending on one another. The corporate imposes its circumstances and makes any challenges onerous.

Staff are pressured to change into self-employed, every courier being a one-man enterprise. In my guide I describe, amongst different issues, the working circumstances of couriers employed by an American firm based mostly in Poland. In apply, self-employment implies that within the occasion of sickness the couriers should organise a alternative themselves, or else they may pay a penalty for being absent from work. Likewise, they’ve to take care of their very own car and pay their very own social-security contributions.

In different phrases, it is a means of offloading the duty for an worker.

In one other firm, within the finance sector, the managers are liable for recruiting and coaching the brokers. The brokers grant loans to prospects after which gather curiosity regularly. On daily basis, they’re liable for sending experiences to their supervisor on the work they’ve accomplished. The brokers go to a number of prospects a day, generally dozens of them, and need to journey important distances.

‘The truth that issues have been higher earlier than might be a vestige of the communist period. There have been nonetheless sure requirements that gave staff the correct to relaxation. These requirements have been then tailored to the working circumstances prevailing in capitalist techniques’

A supervisor is employed in line with the quantity of labor to be accomplished per job. When an agent resigns (or two of them resign, a supervisor’s nightmare), the duty falls to the supervisor. So, along with his or her personal work, she or he should additionally go to the shoppers for whom the previous agent was accountable.

The case of FedEx is attention-grabbing. FedEx works with couriers who themselves make use of different couriers. The corporate outsources all duty. Within the occasion of sick go away, all the pieces falls on the shoulders of the courier.

All the roles you describe have one factor in frequent: they’re getting worse. Corporations are tightening their belts increasingly more. For instance, it was once doable to work sitting down in factories, however sooner or later a productiveness officer calculated that it was extra worthwhile to work standing up. Amazon staff used to have the ability to carry their very own sandwiches. At present, that is forbidden within the warehouse. And so it goes on. Are working circumstances getting worse? The place does this all finish?

It might finish, because it did at Amazon, with the loss of life of an worker who was merely exploited to his final breath. I am speaking about Dariusz Dziamski, who died within the warehouse within the city of Sadów in September 2021. He was 49 years previous. Since 2019, he had held the place of “water spider”, the place his job was to gather and transport containers containing merchandise. Amongst staff, they name this job “the motorway”, as a result of the journey is lengthy and the “water spider” is all the time on the transfer.

In Dziamski’s case, there was a number of negligence and many alternative components that led to his loss of life. Firstly, the labour inspectorate was at fault: of the 9 emails despatched by his spouse, none obtained a reply, and no motion was taken. Secondly, his boss, the bottom supervisor within the hierarchy, had been transferred from one other division as a result of staff had complained about him. Everybody knew there was an issue.

The truth that issues have been higher earlier than might be a vestige of the communist period. There have been nonetheless sure requirements that gave staff the correct to relaxation. These requirements have been then tailored to the working circumstances prevailing in capitalist techniques. In the beginning of this transformation, within the Nineteen Nineties, there have been nonetheless canteens in corporations the place you might chat with everybody, however that was solely a interval of transition between communism and capitalism. 15 or 20 years later, canteens have been a lot rarer. At present, issues are getting worse as a result of the purpose is to do extra for much less.

What struck me most in your earlier guide was the case of a safety guard who did not have a bathroom and urinated on herself. An anatomical theme additionally options in your new guide: to train management over staff’ our bodies is likely one of the worst types of humiliation?

One of many name centres I described has arrange a timer to time staff’ breaks. Each time you exit, it’s important to use an identifier that counts the time you’ve got been away. Authorisation should even be looked for a break of greater than three minutes. This is applicable specifically to staff working in on-line chat rooms. Time spent in the bathroom is counted as break time. If the scheduled break time is exceeded, staff threat a disciplinary interview.

In one other firm, a automotive producer, one of many staff declared that “one of the best factor can be so that you can come to work having already shat and pissed”, and when you ask to go to the bathroom too usually, you’ll be able to see by the look on the supervisor’s face that he would not prefer it.

One of many traders in a international firm stated that the “price of labour in Poland is affordable”. Polish staff earn lower than staff in Western Europe.

An worker in Poland found that he was incomes lower than an worker within the West, although he had a extra senior place. Corporations suppose it is regular to pay 3000 {dollars} in america and 3000 zlotys in Poland for a similar work. Commerce unions are stronger in Western Europe, so employers face a stronger opponent.

Precisely, within the corporations you discuss, there’s a number of antagonism between staff, which stems largely from inequality of remedy. Staff usually are not inspired to spend time collectively or to have contact with one another. One of many first guidelines of the unhealthy employer appears to be “divide and conquer “.

Corporations are not looking for staff to speak to one another. A commerce unionist, who was laid off from a automotive plant, stated that corporations are afraid of conditions the place staff are involved with one another. The concept is that they need to not change data. Inequalities additionally stem from the totally different types of recruitment. For instance, short-term employees at Amazon obtained a bonus, which didn’t please everlasting staff. However short-term employees might be made redundant at any time, as if they’re a reserve workforce. Typically staff discover out on the bus cease that they not have a job. Or managers merely deceive staff, telling them that others have accepted one thing they have not actually accepted in any respect.

You commit a complete chapter to the “net scrubbers”. I believed that was largely the job of algorithms.

In Poland, there are no less than two subsidiaries of a multinational that clear up social media. An worker receives on-line video content material to be moderated, and has to verify that there are not any scenes of violence, rape, and so on. The workers subsequently act as a filter. The multinational has subsidiaries all around the world the place individuals from totally different nations work, together with the Polish subsidiary, the place there are individuals from all walks of life and talking totally different languages. Their job is to look at scenes of homicide and violence, or search for them. You do not know whether or not you are going to see somebody stroking a kitten or killing it.

What might be accomplished about this? To start with: begin remunerating correctly the individuals who watch this type of horrific content material. These movies come from Africa, Asia and South America. However, in these corporations, one of the best remuneration goes to the individuals who converse the language of the content material they’re . Wage variations rely on how tough it’s to search out somebody who speaks the language in query. For instance, Japanese audio system are nicely paid, as it’s tough to search out somebody in Poland who understands the language. Polish audio system, alternatively, are simple to switch.

One change may very well be to switch remuneration in line with the diploma of violence of the content material seen. In any case, this content material needs to be checked by a human being: a machine will not be a hundred percent dependable by itself.

And staff cannot discuss to anybody about what they see.

Typically they discuss it, and I describe circumstances like that in my guide. After all, psychological assist is important and accessible, however it isn’t that easy. A psychologist is readily available however staff are afraid to go and see him, as a result of they’re afraid of being seen as weak, of not coping, and subsequently of being the primary on the checklist to be made redundant. However corporations do not rent Danes from Denmark, they search for individuals in Poland who converse Danish.

You additionally dedicate one of many chapters in your guide to particular financial zones. It appears to me that no person talks about them nowadays, whereas they was once an actual situation on the left. But the historical past of those zones reveals the facility of capital over the state.

These zones have been created on industrial wastelands to fill the void left by derelict factories. For the authorities, it has all the time been extra vital to create jobs than to make sure their high quality. What issues is managing the unemployed, in order that they’ll boast of getting a low unemployment charge.

And that is how the state eliminates the issue.

Sure, that is why the state would not get too concerned. It would not need to complicate life for the large corporations, as a result of it is afraid that they will not need to arrange right here. The businesses, alternatively, really feel no obligation. They arrange right here as a result of it is low-cost, but when in 5 or ten years’ time they really feel protected in Romania or Bulgaria, they’re going to relocate there.

The repatriation of Fiat’s manufacturing to Italy brought about a scandal, when it ought to have been a pure factor to do. American corporations may give jobs to individuals in Detroit, however they like to make use of somebody from Katowice to wash up the online. Since huge enterprise would not care about its personal compatriots, why ought to it really feel any connection to foreigners? It is not the Poles or Ukrainians stealing somebody’s job, it is the large corporations stealing individuals’s jobs. We do not discuss it, we use summary ideas as an alternative: the world economic system, globalisation, pure processes, and so forth.

However does the state have any energy in any respect?

Sure, however the query stays: does the state need labour inspectors to change into enemies of corporations? The massive companies are not any exception to the rule. In apply the specter of inspection inside giant corporations, together with Polish ones, will not be an actual incentive to implement respectable working circumstances.

These particular financial zones usually are not there to assist staff combat in opposition to corporations. The state may look into the scenario round short-term job businesses, for instance. The state may do lots, but it surely’s not essentially .

I might like to complete on a optimistic observe. In your guide you discuss the potential for altering work and altering the office. You give examples of small modifications that staff and unions have managed to realize.

Typically strikes by staff result in a fairer distribution of firm income and pay rises. As income improve, so ought to employees’ wages. The distribution must be fairer between employers and white-collar employees.

That is what occurred in 2022 on the Solaris group, the place staff went on strike and did not hand over for nearly six weeks! It is a scandal {that a} multinational with such a repute and such big income ought to need to abuse its staff to such some extent. However the unity and willpower of the workers prevailed, which simply goes to indicate that there’s energy in numbers.

Usually, it is not huge modifications, however small issues that enable staff to take again a specific amount of energy. For instance, by regaining management over advantages, staff can resolve the place the cash goes.

At FedEx, severance funds have been negotiated within the occasion of mass redundancies.

This doesn’t apply to couriers, however solely to staff employed instantly. And generally it is simply symbolic issues, like beginning to write “please” and “thanks” in emails.

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