Introduction Given that the National Day of Mourning is on April 28, I thought that it was appropriate to write another post on this topic. I provide some quotes from various sources to show how worker health and safety is, in one way or another, not taken all that seriously in a society dominated by … Continue reading Working for an Employer May Be Dangerous to Your Health, Part Eight
Category: Health and Safety
Health and Safety of Striking Canada Post Workers and the Canadian Labour Minister’s Interference in the Collective-Bargaining Process
It has been announced that Labour minister unveils steps to end Canada Post strike by trying to have the Canadian Industrial Relations Board decide whether striking postal workers should be forced back to work. The union's response: The union has denounced the move, calling it an “assault” on its bargaining rights. Now, as anyone who … Continue reading Health and Safety of Striking Canada Post Workers and the Canadian Labour Minister’s Interference in the Collective-Bargaining Process
Denial of Human Beings’ Biological Nature Typical in a Society Dominated by a Class of Employers
John Clarke, former organizer for the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP), posted this recently on Facebook: Utterly monstrous. https://www.rawstory.com/texas-scraps-water-break-law-for-construction-workers-as-heat-bakes/?fbclid=IwAR2pqHyDekp0kfiGp_MCTrk6ZJpsj1ss8u2dJypf2QUok6vEraI0bN2SFtU The article above has to due with the elimination of a law which gave construction workers the right to a water break in some cities in Texas. Given the heat waves, such a situation is in … Continue reading Denial of Human Beings’ Biological Nature Typical in a Society Dominated by a Class of Employers
Safety (and Undoubtedly Other Issues) Often a Function of the Level of Class Struggle
John Clarke, former major organizer for the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty, posted the following several months ago on Facebook: John Clarke dotsprneSo6thc2iMatah20171t 4mgt9h92fhc7m9469lc4c1f5rt6a2h9u · In the early 1980s, not long after I came to Canada, I worked at a factory in London, Ontario. I had to have an operation, after some wire I was winding on a … Continue reading Safety (and Undoubtedly Other Issues) Often a Function of the Level of Class Struggle
Working for an Employer May Be Dangerous to Your Health, Part Seven: The National Day of Mourning in Canada and the Social Causes of Injury, Disease and Death
On April 28 is the National Day of Mourning in Canada to commemorate those workers who have suffered disease, injury or death at work. However, unions rarely if ever raise the issue of how effective such a day of mourning is for addressing the health and safety problems that workers experience. Why do more or … Continue reading Working for an Employer May Be Dangerous to Your Health, Part Seven: The National Day of Mourning in Canada and the Social Causes of Injury, Disease and Death
Working and Living in a Society Dominated by a Class of Employers May Be Dangerous to Your Health
In some previous posts, the title was "Working for an Employer May Be Dangerous to Your Health." I have changed the title since this post is not just directly about working for an employer. As has been implied in the previous post on this topic, the shift to legislative measures to address health and safety … Continue reading Working and Living in a Society Dominated by a Class of Employers May Be Dangerous to Your Health
Working for an Employer May Be Dangerous to Your Health, Part Six
Injuries, disease and death are the common experiences of many Canadian workers--and undoubtedly workers in all countries dominated by the power of a class of employers. This is so since, on the one hand, profit is the driving force of human life in such societies (see The Money Circuit of Capital for an explanation of … Continue reading Working for an Employer May Be Dangerous to Your Health, Part Six
Working for Employers May Be Dangerous to Your Health, Part Five
In Dwyer's book, Life and Death at Work: Industrial Accidents as a Case of Socially Produced Error, in a passage quoted below, he argues that so-called accidents at work are socially caused but, historically, have been defined otherwise--as technical problems, for example, or as a result of individual mistakes.In the passage below, he notes that … Continue reading Working for Employers May Be Dangerous to Your Health, Part Five
The Silences of the Social-Democratic Left on the Standards They Use in Relation to Health and Safety
I had a debate on the Facebook page of the Toronto Airport Workers Council (TAWC), an organization designed to facilitate communication and common actions among unions at the Toronto International Pearson Airport. The issue was health and safety and workers' compensation. In Canada, most workers who work for an employer are covered by workers' compensation--a … Continue reading The Silences of the Social-Democratic Left on the Standards They Use in Relation to Health and Safety
Working For an Employer is Dangerous for your Health, Part Four
There was an article published in the weekly Star Metro Toronto on September 4, 2019 on a health and safety issue. I will quote the article in full in order to provide the context and details of the incident: TTC [Toronto Transit Commission] fined more than $330,000 in worker's death Dedes suffered major injuries after … Continue reading Working For an Employer is Dangerous for your Health, Part Four
The Abolitionary 