Here are the 54 statements, randomly numbered. The last statement is numbered 56 but that's because two statements that were originally numbered (24&27) have been deleted. Please send your reply directly to me at [EMAIL PROTECTED] and NOT to the futurework list. INSTRUCTIONS for sorting the statements are appended at the bottom of this message. 1 In the interest of the greatest progress in raising the standard of living of all, economic forces must be the guideposts for decisions about working time. 2 When people are free to decide their own level of need and their own level of effort, they tend to spontaneously limit their needs in order to be able to limit their efforts. 3 Despite whatever good intentions are presumed, when government shifts the focus away from creating wealth and toward creating jobs, it inevitably engenders a lower aggregate standard of living. 4 Greater inequality produced by unemployment is the regrettable but necessary price to pay for controlling inflation and improving economic efficiency in the long run. 5 If the work one does is esteemed enough by others to provide one with self-esteem, there will be a demand for it and no need to provide it as of right. 6 There are few economic problems that cause as much suffering as unemployment. 7 Working long hours is a protective shell. It allows people to hide from the responsibility of taking charge of their own lives. 8 Most union members would share their work week hours if it would generate employment for their family members, friends and community. 9 The 30-hour workweek will come as soon as the productivity of the average worker reaches the point that they want to take that much more of their time in leisure rather than work. 10 Voluntary and market-based job-sharing is already quite common; one sign of this is the growing number of people who choose to work part time. 11 If the government would pick up some portion of a company's payroll taxes in exchange for hiring more people, the net gain would trickle back in the form of lower unemployment costs and higher total tax revenues. 12 The popularity of arguments in favor of reducing work hours on health or family grounds may reflect an unwillingness to acknowledge the economic cost to the worker of hours reduction. 13 The monetarization of work and needs draws attention away from the crucial question: how much is enough? 14 Although voluntary reductions in work time may be worthwhile, it would be economically unsound to impose change through legislation or collective bargaining. 15 The strength of our economy depends in a large measure on our ability to overcome the economic illiteracy that fosters something-for-nothing schemes. Proponents of work sharing simply don't understand how the economy works. 16 A 32 hour workweek would create a million new jobs in Canada and increase productivity by five percent. 17 Canada is becoming a polarized society. The gap between good jobs and bad jobs is now accepted as a fact of life by corporate and political leaders. 18 People who have prospered owe something back to the community that has enabled them to prosper. 19 Work sharing is ineffective as a job creation measure due to its adverse effects on labour costs. 20 Increasing the overtime wage to twice the straight-time hourly wage would induce firms to cut back on overtime hours and instead hire more workers to take up the slack. 21 There is always a danger that additional free time will be wasted through idle amusements that have no lasting benefit, even recreational, for the participants. 22 Today's corporate culture says if you don't join the rest of the 'team' that stays late or takes the laptop home, you just don't fit in and you might as well get out. 23 Management must be free to plan for the efficient operation of their particular business. 25 Our current economic system prevents people from choosing to limit their work hours so as to prevent them choosing to limit their desire to consume. 26 The best strategy for fighting unemployment is to create a confident business climate and eliminate the obstacles to private investment. 28 Co-operation between workers and management cannot survive unless management effectively guarantees job security. 29 Organized labour tries to claim the lion's share of rises in productivity even though such changes are typically the result of capital investments in new technology. 30 Most employed workers are unwilling to cut hours and monthly earnings to provide jobs for others. 31 There are good reasons to expect an increase in employee effort if work time is reduced. 32 One impact of the shorter standard work week would be increased moonlighting. When you have an extremely short work week, people seek extra jobs, both because they need the extra money and because they have unexpended energy to do the extra work. 33 Work sharing rests on the belief that the economy can generate only a fixed amount of work. History provides little support for this gloomy view, which economists have labeled the lump-of-labour fallacy. 34 Employers are the main beneficiaries of extended work hours. Employers avoid the cost of benefits and enjoy reduced pressure for increases as workers put in more time to compensate for low wages. 35 Early specialization not only deprives students of the general knowledge and skills needed to adapt to a changing labour market; it also fails to provide the basis for democratic participation. 36 Politicians who blame 'corporate greed' for what is happening to the take-home pay of workers are diverting attention from the real problem: an overly intrusive and expensive federal government. 37 Highly skilled people and managers are required to put in more time on the job because of the increasingly complex and critical nature of the work they do. 38 Even if workers could always set their own work times, the state should still intervene because many workers prefer to work longer than is best for society. 39 Proposals to redistribute work time are met with a resistance that tangles cultural and economic factors with corporate short-sightedness. 40 Unless offset by rising productivity, shorter working hours will mean lower incomes, reduced consumption and, as a result, slower economic growth. 41 In the absence of unions, the employer has greater say over hours than over wages, since wages can be individually negotiated, but a standard hours schedule is offered to the employee on a take it or leave it basis. 42 People attach to economic growth an emotional, quasi-religious value that is out of proportion to any reason or purpose. 43 People who keep their jobs don't work eight-hour days, but 10, 12 or even 14-hour days. And people who lose their jobs scrabble together two, three, even four jobs in order barely to hold on by their finger tips. 44 Management is so preoccupied with its efforts to establish control over the workers that it loses sight of the presumed purpose of the organization. 45 Once the work week has been reduced sufficiently to minimize fatigue, no further improvements in productivity will be forthcoming from further reductions in work time. 46 Even if the entire workforce could be retrained for highly skilled, high-tech jobs there will never be enough positions to absorb the millions let go as a result of automation. 47 A work sharing scheme that requires skilled workers to work less could actually reduce the demand for the less skilled workers who make up the bulk of the unemployed. 48 Government reports on unemployment conceal a bleaker reality in which many job seekers have become discouraged or take part-time work. 49 Job creation does cost money, but it doesn't necessarily cost more than what we spend coping with joblessness. Government job-creation might be self-financing, at least in part. 50 Some involuntary unemployment is necessary to prevent workers from shirking on the job. 51 The glorification of hard work and the claim that working and living can be one and the same thing is a view that can only be held by a privileged elite that monopolizes the best-paid, most highly skilled and most stable jobs. 52 If an attempt were made to change hours by law to a level well below that sought by both employers and employees, one would see a sharp increase in incentives for employers to violate the law. 53 Consumer society promotes the hedonistic values of comfort, instant pleasure and minimal effort, while at the same time requiring semi-skilled workers to behave according to the opposite principles in their work. 54 Proponents of work sharing wrongly assume that hours of work and number of people employed can be substituted for each other at will. 55 Shortening of hours of work necessitates the use of less qualified workers, thereby lowering the average productivity of all workers. 56 There is a job available for everyone who really wants to work. INSTRUCTIONS FOR SORTING The procedure is to sort the above statements into 11 piles ranging from most disagree (-5) to most agree (+5). Don't be too concerned about the numerical values. They're strictly ordinal and don't really mean there has to be a full 'unit' of difference between a "+4 agree" and a "+5 agree". The final ranking and number of statements for each rank will be the following: |-5 | -4 | -3 | -2 | -1 | 0 | +1 | +2 | +3 | +4 | +5 | |(4)| (4)| (5)| (5)| (6)|(6)|(6) | (5)| (5)| (4)| (4)| People may complete the sort using either the do-it-yourself method or the step-by-step guided method. THE DO-IT-YOURSELF METHOD The sorting process is easier if you take it in small steps: first read through the 54 statements, then divide them in three groups of ROUGHLY equal size: "agree", "disagree" and "neutral" (or undecided). Next from the, say, 16 to 20 statements in the agree group select the FOUR that you agree with most strongly. Assign these four statements the rank of +5. Then go to the disagree group and select the four statements that you disagree with most strongly. Assign these the rank of -5. Alternate back and forth between the two piles until you've assigned a rank to all the "agree" and "disagree" statements, then finish by assigning the remaining "neutral" statements to the middle ranks, -1, 0 and +1. You may want to print out the statements to make them easier to scan through and sort. THE STEP-BY-STEP GUIDED METHOD I would be happy to guide anyone through the sorting process step by step. 1. Reply to my message containing the 54 statements. Make sure that the reply message's To: line is addressed directly to me [EMAIL PROTECTED] 2. Mark 16-20 statements with which you most agree by placing a Y in front of the statement and mark 16-20 statements with which you most disagree by placing a N in front of the statement. 3. Send me the marked-up list. I'll send you back a message with instructions for the next step. Regards, Tom Walker ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ knoW Ware Communications Vancouver, B.C., CANADA [EMAIL PROTECTED] (604) 688-8296 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The TimeWork Web: HTTP://WWW.VCN.BC.CA/TIMEWORK/
