Santa Monica, CA (ICYMI)—Temporary workers who clean Santa Monica’s beach bathrooms are trying to get full-time jobs by organizing with, oddly enough, the Industrial Workers of the World (aka the Wobblies).
The IWW is the early 20th-century union that coined the phrase “Workers of the World Unite!” and whose goal is to abolish the wage system and take control of the means of production.
While the temp workers’ signing with the Wobblies occurred late last year, one of the workers explains her rationale in a post on LaborNotes.
The public sector used to be a conduit to middle-class, union jobs for many Black and brown people. But state and local governments are increasing employment of permatemps like me.
The use of temporary workers has increased since the recession, as city budgets have been slashed. “Public-sector agencies are increasingly trying to minimize their obligations to workers by staffing through temp agencies—even for long-term jobs—and outsourcing to private contractors,” said Chris Tilly, Director of the UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment.
We have a chance to stop the growing problem of the permatemp economy here in Santa Monica. If we don’t, I’m afraid that the city will take the next step and start outsourcing more jobs to third-party contractors.
To bring fairness to its beaches, Santa Monica needs to make all of us permanent workers. If we had permanent status, I might be able to support my family on one job—rather than juggling two and working 80 hours a week.
My co-workers would be able to get proper medical care instead of having to come in to work sick or with dangerous infections. We might feel more like dignified workers instead of expendable labor.
While the Industrial Workers of the World allows for dual unionism, most other unions do not. This raises the question whether the union that represents Santa Monica Beach’s permanent workers will accept Wobblies into their ranks.
For those readers unfamiliar with the Wobblies, here are the first two paragraph’s of the preamble to the IWW’s constitution:
The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of the working people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life.
Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class, take possession of the means of production, abolish the wage system, and live in harmony with the Earth. [Emphasis added.]
[Read the whole IWW preamble here.]
No one should be surprised that the beach workers in Santa Monica are organizing a union with the IWW. Historically, Wobblies have organized among workers the trade unions have neglected: the farmworkers, the migrant workers, and people of color. It’s no different today. Wobblies are organizing incarcerated workers, harm reduction peer workers, and, yes, permatemp workers who maintain Santa Monica’s beaches.
Show your support for the beach workers’ demands by signing the petition:
https://www.coworker.org/petitions/permanent-employment-for-santa-monica-beach-temp-workers
By the way, we’re the INDUSTRIAL Workers of the World. We are an INTERNATIONAL union, but our name is Industrial not International Workers of the World.
Thank you for the correction.
It has been changed in the text.
While “Workers of the World, Unite!” Was a slogan of the wobblies, they did bot originate the phrase, you can even find it in the Communist Manifesto, which predates the IWW by over a half century.
You are correct…
Thanks for pointing that out.
My bad.