gurn (alternative spelling of girn): to snarl. to grimace; pull grotesque faces, to complain fretfully or peevishly
Collins Dictionary
It seems that property developer Tim Gurner has support from the business community for his attack on Australian workers and his call for a big rise in unemployment to correct their attitude. Minerals Council of Australia chair Andrew Michelmore endorsed his comments (quelle surprise), accusing workers of enjoying “a lifestyle that was not sustainable” and of demanding the same pay for doing less. Higher unemployment was needed to make them work harder, he agreed.
Gurner’s comments, however offensive, will fall on fertile ground in business circles because of the belief in a “productivity crisis” gripping employers. Business lobby groups are fighting against the federal government’s current industrial relations reforms to curb exploitation of contract workers, and as always want to go further with deregulation to strip away what worker protections currently exist in the Fair Work Act.
That’s despite Australians actually working longer hours. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the June quarter and 2023’s national accounts showed “we spent 2.4% more time at work than we did last (March) quarter, which, excluding the COVID-19 pandemic, was the fastest quarterly increase in hours worked on record. We worked 6.8% more hours this year (2022-23) than last year, and with GDP rising by a smaller amount, labour productivity fell 3.2% in annual terms.”
So much for the idea of lazy workers.
Would unemployment actually improve productivity, as Gurner and Michelmore reckon? It turns out that, yes, it would — not because it somehow puts fear into the souls of workers and makes them grateful just to have a job, but because it removes the most marginal workers from employment. As the labour market gets tighter and tighter, it draws in workers who might otherwise struggle to find work — particularly those with low skills. And as economic conditions deteriorate, employers first tend to hang on to staff — which is why employment is a lagging indicator of a recession, and why labour productivity is declining now as GDP slows — but then it tends to be lower-skilled, less valuable workers that they let go first.
And as unemployment rises, more marginal, poorer-performing businesses also shut up shop, freeing up workers to move to other, more efficient and productive firms and industries, thus improving productivity and innovation. Or, as the neoliberals prefer to call it, creative destruction.
But that unemployment also comes with a substantial cost in terms of lost production, erosion of skills and employability, long-run damage to productivity, and damage to social cohesion and equity — not to mention costing taxpayers.
What business would really prefer is more industrial relations deregulation so they pay workers less, casualise their jobs and make them easier to sack. Will this increase productivity? Well, we know from experience that it doesn’t: as the Productivity Commission has shown, John Howard’s WorkChoices saw a substantial slump in labour productivity that was only reversed once Labor abolished it. Labour productivity improved significantly under the last Labor government; the current “crisis” only dates from the middle of the Coalition’s term in office.
Really, Gurner and Michelmore’s comments are from another era (as Brickworks’ managing director Lindsay Partridge observed). They have the flavour of the 1980s, a period of persistent warfare between a radically bigger and stronger union movement, some elements of which were still controlled by communists, and employers — warfare that saw massive numbers of industrial disputes and strikes racking most industries. Workers would be routinely scolded by business and business media commentators for being lazy, greedy and militant. It was the era of Singapore leader Lee Kuan Yew’s sneer that we were becoming “the poor white trash of Asia”.
Funnily enough, labour productivity growth in that benighted period from 1973-85 when the Hawke government’s accord began changing our industrial relations landscape was significantly higher than under WorkChoices — and higher than over the last 10 years. One might be tempted to conclude that industrial relations doesn’t actually have much to do with productivity at all.
From my observations several years ago it seems Alan Joyce’s enabler Richard Goyder applied pretty much the same attitude as Joyce and Gurner to workers at Bunnings.
And look where it got them. Productivity and worker morale trashed.
Don’t forget leigh clifford past chair of qantas and union buster from rio-tinto in the kimberly, who I think hired that thing joyce.
Worth noting that higher unemployment ultimately leads to increased social security payments, paid by taxes. Mr. Gurner and his like may well have used every device to minimise their taxes, so the burden falls upon the average Joe, the very workers he’s suggesting should be unemployed. A vicious and unproductive circle indeed.
With all this focus on productivity, why is there no mention of the productivity of the class that is eligible for (and receives in shovel-fulls) annual bonuses? And how is the productivity of unproductive bureaucrats measured objectively – school administrators, hospital administrators, university administrators and the “Karens in HR” and others like them?
I am no expert, but the “tradies” who I have used over the past 50 years have all been excellent: quick, honest, reliable, professional, friendly, responsible, informative and helpful – qualities not accounted for in any measures of productivity. (Carpenters, plumbers, electricians, motor mechanics, solar installers, cablers, fence constructors, concreters.)
I should have added that the administrators I have had to deal with have almost all fallen short on one or more of the qualities that I found and valued among tradesmen. Their worst quality is just ignoring me when I have a non-routine problem whereas tradies take the cheerful approach: “Well, I haven’t come across this before but I have a few ideas about how I can help you – let’s give them a try”.
Exactly and how enforced empiricism of ‘productivity’ can bypass intangible and qualitative aspects of production or delivery of services.
Like immigration dog whistling, it’s just another faux analytical facade to avoid improved wages, awards and conditions for the majority, but negative policies can gain unwitting support from above median age voter, with no skin in the game, rusted onto RW MSM and retired.
It could be read that these big business wankers are agreeing with the push to impove pay & conditions. Whenever there’s talk of giving wage rises or improving working conditions all the business group rent their garments & gnash their teeth & bewail the imminent job crushing effects paying & treating workers fairly will have. In other words people will lose their jobs if they get paid more. Anyone else see the irony? If these circle jerkers want higher unemployment rates they need to significantly jack up wages & conditions! That’ll learn those lazy workers. You know, you clearly don’t have to be smart to be a CEO. It looks like it helps if you’re not.
It helps to be a narcissist and a sociopath/psychopath.
We have a productivity crisis. Our captains of industry have become too productive/efficient at transferring public wealth into private hands and also in the externalisation of any and all costs.