There are no bad jobs, says Flaherty

[Regular_John]

There are no bad jobs, says Flaherty


The Harper Conservatives are signalling they are preparing to get tough with unemployed Canadians who refuse jobs they consider below them or too far away.

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said Monday new rule changes to define "suitable employment" and "reasonable" efforts at finding work have yet to come down, but as far as he's concerned people should be prepared to take pretty well any available job.

"There is no bad job, the only bad job is not having a job," he told reporters. "I drove a taxi, I refereed hockey. You do what you have to do to make a living."

I'm all for EI reform, and I can even get behind the "swallow your pride & pull up your bootstraps" idea here, but clearly there are bad jobs out there, worse yet their are employers who simply exploit workers for every ounce of blood they can get.

Yes, we have labour laws and what not that do protect the workers very well... when the employee is aware of them and prepared to use them. But given the choice between feeding your family or picking a fight with your boss over unpaid overtime?

[burn_this_city]

In a way he's right. If I couldn't find something in my desired field I would get a lesser job until something panned out. Just sitting at home hoping for the right job that might never come is a terrible idea.

[Reaper]

Flaherty points to driving a cab and refereeing hockey as his examples of undesirable jobs that he took to make ends meet. Wow, how out of touch is he that he thinks those are the worst jobs out there? He should spend his summer picking blueberries or cleaning stables and then see if he still says "there are no bad jobs."

[Kybosh]

Should a person be happy to accept a job that earns less $ money than EI provides?

[Lt.Spears]

There are Bad jobs, but there are jobs people are willing to do because they need/want that money.

Don't want to do that crappy job? do something else.

[Ozy_Flame]

I understand the thrust of the arguement here, but there is such thing as called under-employment, which can cause all kinds of issues such as high turnover, low productivity, wasted investment in human resources, training, etc.

I'm not so sure employers are ready to high just anyone as well. Being overqualified is a huge red flag for some business owners.

[Regular_John]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

In a way he's right. If I couldn't find something in my desired field I would get a lesser job until something panned out. Just sitting at home hoping for the right job that might never come is a terrible idea.

I don't disagree that people should be encouraged to work instead of sitting around indefinitely, however it does introduce other problems... why would an employer hire me if they know I'm not interested in working there long term?

Why spend the time/money/resources training me if they know I'm actively looking/interested in a better job and I'd jump ship at the first opportunity?

At the end of the day "there are no bad jobs" was most likely a poor choice of words, something like "there's more pride in working than collecting EI" might have gone further. But the statement he made just comes across as out of touch.

[KPJ]

Someone tell this guy there's no bad jobs...

[Rathji]

A few years ago when financial reasons made me move into working full time and school part time, I was in this position.

I wanted a job in a tech field but I really didn't care what it was at the time. I applied for everything, programming gigs, Tech support for Shaw and Telus call centers, whatever came up, but no one was willing to take a chance on a guy with 3 years university with no related experience in the field. A few of the places I knew I was overqualified for (like the Shaw TSR) but they wouldn't even take a look at me.

I ended up going to work at Cargill Foods in High River, a job I worked for a few years when I was younger. Pretty much the worst job ever, but I needed to pay the bills.

If EI was an option for me, I probably would have tried it, because even 6 months working there until I got a job in my field caused me injury that I have yet to fully recover from (hand issues + carpal tunnel). I knew that it would happen going in, since I had previously worked cutting meat for almost 10 years full time, but I really didn't have an option.

I don't know where that puts me in terms of if I support this move. Sure people should be willing to take any job, but the reality is that not everyone is suited for every job so it is really just kind of wasting everyone's time and companies money to force them to take crappy jobs in the mean time.

[vanisleflamesfan]

Take the "bad" out of that headline and he is exactly right!

So now nurses and teachers and even IT professionals who have the sheer nerve to want to find work in the fields that they racked up huge debt to go to university for, are being told to take crappy retail jobs? Fantastic! This will really "save the economy"!!!

[#22]

There are no bad jobs? Tell that to my friend working nights at the water treatment plant when he has his head up the condom shredding machine trying to unplug it for the third time. I just love how a guy with perhaps the cushiest job of all spouts off like this, and while I agree with the sentiment of trying to get people off EI, saying things like this makes him come across like a giant jackass.

[GP_Matt]

I don't want to get off on a tangent, but I really don't understand why retail jobs are considered crappy. Retail is a huge portion of our economy employing something like 25% of the population. Sure, your first retail position is an entry level position but is that any different than most careers? Retail jobs are highly mobile and the skills that you learn are very transferable. For the hard working, skilled employee who sees the job as a career instead of a crappy retail job there is a ton of room for advancement. A quality cashier will quickly become a supervisor, a quality supervisor will soon be running a department, moving into management and then into the corporate offices. Because the skills are so marketable a department manager in the food industry can apply for a job as a store manager with a clothing company.
And the salary that goes along with the positions aren't laughable.
I would be willing to bet that a person who started in retail at the same time as someone starts in university would be ahead financially for at least 10 years and far longer if the university degree isn't towards a professional designation.

[Senator Clay Davis]

I get what he's saying, and how people should accept some personal responsibility, even if they believe it demeans or belittles them to accept a lesser job. At the same time, many people who have invested years and dollars into wanting to work in a specific field, and they shouldn't have to accept a job below their qualifications. You pursue higher education to avoid these jobs. So i'm kinda torn on this one.

[Senator Clay Davis]

Originally Posted by GP_Matt

A quality cashier will quickly become a supervisor, a quality supervisor will soon be running a department, moving into management and then into the corporate offices. Because the skills are so marketable a department manager in the food industry can apply for a job as a store manager with a clothing company.
And the salary that goes along with the positions aren't laughable.
.

Having worked my way up a company from cashier to store manager, the salary was laughable. In fact when I was cashier, some paychecks with just a few hours OT, and I was making as much as the manager net. Corporations love to exploit workers they know have no better option, so they pay them as such. As a wise man once told me, the only reason companies pay minimum wage is because they can't pay you lower.

[CaptainCrunch]

I think people are judging pretty quickly here when the intent of what the government is doing is to define suitable jobs and define resonable effort to find work. Two things that have been a drag on EI for a long time.

I don't think that the expectation that a nurse needs to clean out a condom shredding machine at a water treatment plant. or a 98 pound computer programmer is going to need to go work at a construction site working a jack hammer.

I think that Flarehty probably mispoke a bit, but the opposition took that ball and ran.

However to me they do have to look at how reasonable is the persons effort to get off of EI and find a job, and is he refusing a job that might be a little junior or a bit outside of his normal zone of comfort because he wants a dream job?

[East Coast Flame]

There are condom shredding machines at water treatment plants?

We aren't supposed to flush condoms?

[kevman]

Originally Posted by vanisleflamesfan

Take the "bad" out of that headline and he is exactly right!

So now nurses and teachers and even IT professionals who have the sheer nerve to want to find work in the fields that they racked up huge debt to go to university for, are being told to take crappy retail jobs? Fantastic! This will really "save the economy"!!!

But if there are no jobs in the fields they want to work in what do you propose we do?

It's a nice dream to have a society where everyone gets to do what they want where they want for the rest of their lives but someone needs to do the "dirty work"...

[CaramonLS]

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

Having worked my way up a company from cashier to store manager, the salary was laughable. In fact when I was cashier, some paychecks with just a few hours OT, and I was making as much as the manager net. Corporations love to exploit workers they know have no better option, so they pay them as such. As a wise man once told me, the only reason companies pay minimum wage is because they can't pay you lower.

I can tell you this - if you become a Store Manager with the company I work for, you can get 6 figures each year with your bonus to start out with, later you'll be doing much better (6 figure base). No cashier makes that wage.

And yes, it is a retailer.

As GP Matt says if you apply yourself in Retail, you can make an extremely good living. Having a background and experience in Retail Management means you're going to be able to find work just about anywhere and at any time. High transferable and portable skills.

[Senator Clay Davis]

It all really depends of the company of course. But large corporations and multi-nationals are driven by keeping variable costs (I.E. labor) down as much as possible. I worked for Liquor Depot (ugh), and they really didn't value their employees or management very much. Some corporations do very much value their employees, but I've found that its rare. They view the jobs as easy enough that employees are disposable (not fireable, rather they can afford to lose people and can replace them with comparable help).

I'll also add I really enjoy doing retail management and would agree it has a great benefit in the long run. Managing people in an environment where quite frankly most of them could care less about the job is a real challenge, and at least in my experience, working within a strict budget and still trying to make a store profitable is quite the challenge and a worthwhile one if you can make it work.

[Doodlebug]

Out of curiosity, anyone know what percentage of EI payments are for maternity and parental leave?