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Unions in Archaeology - Ep 290
540 Plays5 months ago
Join the crew for a discussion about the history of unions and why they have been slowly losing power over the years. Also they discuss their personal experience with unions, and how that could or should apply to crm companies.
Transcripts
- For rough transcripts of this episode go to https://www.archpodnet.com/crmarchpodcast/290
Links
Blogs and Resources:
- Bill White: Succinct Research
- Doug Rocks-MacQueen: Doug’s Archaeology
- Chris Webster: DIGTECH LLC
- Andrew Kinkella
Kinkella Teaches Archaeology (Youtube)
Blog: Kinkella Teaches Archaeology
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Transcript
Introduction to CRM Archaeology Podcast
00:00:01
Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network. This is the Serum Archaeology Podcast. It's the show where we pull back the veil of cultural resources management archaeology and discuss the issues that everyone is concerned about. Welcome to the podcast.
00:00:23
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the CRM archaeology podcast. Episode two hundred and ninety. I am your fill in host, Andrew Kinkela. And hanging out with me today is Doug. Hey, everyone. Also, Bill. Hello. And finally, Heather. Hi, everyone. Look at that.
Exploring Unions in CRM Archaeology
00:00:50
Speaker
And today we are going to discuss unions, unions and CRM archaeology. I think that's a really interesting topic. I can see arguments on both sides. I hope that this episode gets heated because I think it would be fun. I think we have a swath of opinions here, I think, on unions in in general. But I i would like to open it up to you guys just in terms of, you know, who wants to start just talking about
00:01:18
Speaker
Unions in CRM, I know that there's recently been some unionization movements in CRM. Who would like to go from there? I mean, I can talk about it from ah someone who's working at the University of California system, but maybe not from CRM. Yeah, shoot. Go for it, Bill. Okay, cool. Yeah. yeah The university side and the students and then, yeah. Right. Yeah. I mean, so I have the, I have the view looking from the outside in, right? And I'm also not a like unionized employee. So you not no, the faculty, we have our own unique faculty thing that supposedly is not a union, but it advocates and does a bunch of, yeah, I know. It's pretty interesting.
00:02:02
Speaker
yeah so you know This is fascinating just there. So you are a you are not a unionized employee? No. I am represented by a faculty advocacy organization that is includes you know many of the aspects of a union, but it is not actually affiliated with any of the union.
Unionization in Academia: Perspectives and Challenges
00:02:19
Speaker
Good God. So is this is this Berkeley only or is this? Of course it's Berkeley. Well, I only know Berkeley, right? So I don't know the other disabilities of the other UCs, but I only know my own unique less ability. Yeah. yeah just there That's fascinating.
00:02:37
Speaker
Andrew, are you able to unionize? See, I'm not i'm never yeah quite sure if like faculty are allowed to unionize in the US s because of the, you technically sort of have line management over, you know, postdocs and all those, you know, TAs. Oh man. Yeah, so see, there's so much here. So just just here, even before we get into anything, I find first I find what Bill said fascinating for me. So I work at a community college, right? And I'm I'm paid. I guess I'm part of a district. And so we are unionized and we are very kind of cliche, classically unionized, if that makes sense. Like if you think of K through 12 teachers or that kind of thing. So we we do have a union.
00:03:20
Speaker
Okay. Right on. Yeah. Well then, yeah, so so like i I want to compare, you know, notes, right? Like, I don't know how, I don't know if the UC faculty ever were unionized, I'm not sure. So I know we're represented by our own faculty group. and I don't really know any which way right cuz I worked in CRM my whole career until I worked at Cal so I don't know what it's like to actually have you need representation as someone who's pragmatic I'm one of the people who falls on the spectrum of like It could be good. It could also be awful, right? Just like everyone who was like, you know, if I finish my job and I work in the tech industry, it'll be part of this new remarkable industry where I'll never get laid off and I'll be an omnipotent lord. And it's like, no, now you see like it comes in waves, right? So I don't know. I have a feeling that unions could also be that way where it's like it helps you, but then it also hurts you. And so as someone who's working at the UCs, I'm watching the the students, they've been successful over the last few years.
00:04:18
Speaker
you know, they're unionized, the graduate students are, and their last few protests and everything have included lecturers and other folks who didn't have representation to the equation. And so, you know, that has has been good as far as like, you know, folks getting, I guess, some more wages than they were before, right? Now, the problem was in at the UC, the PhD students in our department and many other departments were already making more than, you know, most other graduate students, right? so yeah when they got the negotiation, this was for the different units. There's eight universities in the University of California system, and at some of those other ones, people were getting horrible wages, and so they saw a huge increase. right But the students in our department did not necessarily see a gigantic increase in their wages because they already were like at the
00:05:10
Speaker
pretty high on the scale and then our department was already giving them additional funding. We were doing the most that we possibly could. So they didn't necessarily see a huge boost in wages, but what yeah should have happened that that would affect them is a very clear statement of their duties as you know a graduate student researcher, as a graduate student, like a TA instructor. So I always was quite clear with my students about what I expected when they were you know helping me teach a class. I guess other folks were not necessarily. And now you're supposed to make this statement on ah you know how many hours. To me, it was super easy since I just wrote a simple document that explains what I already expect. So their duties, you know they're already you know outlined. But I think that one of the one of the
00:06:00
Speaker
like conundrums is that they're still employees, but they're students, right? So they're still beholden to the university for the degree, even though they work for the university. And it's different than you and I, Andrew, because like, yes we can just get in our car and drive away if we hate what's going on. The only thing that we lose is like whatever we've built at our employer, but everyone listening to this podcast knows job hopping, like you know what I'm saying? That is a thing. yeah But for PhD students, they're like kind of locked in because they need the degree. and so There's always this like interstitial space that they occupy.
00:06:33
Speaker
yeah so hearing that even though they're getting these contracts, they're supposed to limit their hours. Some people are spending like still tons and tons of hours on these classes. Some professors just have an army of TAs and they don't even teach anything. They're having the students do every single thing. yeah and not this is our you you know That's like way more than their hours of what they're supposed to be doing. I'm still seeing that like there's abuse happening. And even though they're represented by the union and they have the ability to strike or to file grievances and stuff, they still can't do anything to like file a grievance so that they would just get a degree, right? So yeah, as long as they want the degree that always keeps them in that in between space.
00:07:14
Speaker
Yeah, they're
Role of Faculty Organizations and Unions
00:07:15
Speaker
in a really weird spot. Like you said, somebody like you or I, it makes a ton of sense to be in a union like I'm very pro union because I've seen I've lived through it, you know, for decades. And I've seen the the the good side, you know, of of being part of the union. I think it's a very important part, almost ah a very important part of kind of America. you know, the history of America with unions and that kind of stuff. But in terms of the like the that does the grad students, it's weird because it's like this. It's not a full time job. You know, it's like this part time thing. And you have to they really have to know kind of what they're asking for. You know, cause I think a lot of them kind of didn't, they're just like, we just want to be unionized because, because we want to be unionized. And it's like, you need this, you know, what does that mean? What's your end game? What does that mean for the the years as they go on? And i've I've seen a lot of difficulties with them kind of on the ground level in terms of it's like, Oh my God, we've become unionized. And now, gee, we didn't, we're not living the way we thought we would.
00:08:14
Speaker
I was curious about ah the UC system and I looked it up and yeah, you guys have like 15 unions for basically everyone. Oh, Berkeley has some extra ones for like the print shop folks as well. oh right But like, yeah, basically everyone But what Bill is, ah apparently you you guys have a Senate and that's a bit like your instructors, your your academic researchers, they're all unionized. But yeah, the faculty and the UC system apparently are just not unionized. You have your your Senate. yeah Tell us a little bit more about what that does and yeah does it actually negotiate for you in wages and stuff?
00:08:56
Speaker
Yeah, it does. But also, so so the Faculty Senate is like a council of faculty that are actually at the University of California, Berkeley. I can't talk about like the Faculty Senate it at the office of the president, right? So so so to make things you know soup as clear as mud, there's eight UC campuses. At UC Berkeley, we have a Faculty Senate that represents the concerns of faculty. There's also ah Office of the President in a higher level organization that's like a confederation composed of administrators and professors from all the UCs that serve and do similar functions as they do at the campus level, but for all of the all the campuses. And that office is in Oakland, right? So there's like, you know, it's it's as a professor, you just think of these multiple different like shadow organizations. Then you just see these emails that come out of nowhere and you're like, wait a minute, so where's this in the hierarchy? like Basically, how important is this and how much should I listen to it? It's never easy to figure out here at UC, but the Faculty Senate is the one who, I mean, they have many different functions. I'm not going to list them all here, but they have like
00:10:09
Speaker
they are the ones who ultimately review your tenure cases and promotions. They're the ones who review like like when when someone's asking for more money for a lab, like if that's justified, right? But they also advocate for our benefits and they also advocate for our wages, right? So they've done, ah as far as I'm concerned, a relatively good job as far as providing pathways for equity as far as pay in the UCs. Now, I'm not going to say that it's perfect, right? Because One of the things that's quite common in academia is for a professor to start in a certain year and then to stay the course and just get their sequential cost of living adjustments and their raises for when they get promotions, but to easily be outpaced by newer professors who come in who get a higher wage. right so
00:10:56
Speaker
you know, it's difficult for you to hire someone at the 1990s salaries that you're once giving. They're going to need more, right? But those younger professors end up really outpacing some of the people who've been there for a long time. Also, people of color and women, once again, not advocating on their behalf. Well, the Faculty Senate provides a pathway for you to get an evaluation of your job title, you know, your position, how many years you've been there in your rank. And then you can advocate for an equity adjustment for your salary, right? So the attempt is to try to keep those kind of things from getting you know out of control. And I'm not saying it's perfect and that everybody's getting paid exactly what they should, but at least there's a pathway that the Faculty Senate is one of the vehicles that does that.
00:11:39
Speaker
Also, when it comes to curriculum, deciding what is taught and how it's taught, if it's an official class and everything, there's a subcommittee of the Faculty Senate that looks over all the applications for classes, right? DEI, there's a subcommittee that's looking to see, are organizations discriminating against people with disabilities? are they Are the departments not hiring people of color? Are they not reviewing people's cases in an even way? like that That's what it does. So, it's not the same as a union per se, right? like I don't see where they'll tell us that we could strike. We're, we're free to.
00:12:14
Speaker
strike or do whatever we want in a lot of ways, right? Like if we want to support students, we can just close down class and be like, that's right.
Unionization of Archaeologists and Legal Challenges
00:12:21
Speaker
We're just, we're doing solidarity. Oh, actually we cannot close down class, but we can decide that we're going to change the evaluation system or yeah our meeting spaces so that essentially, you know, the class is essentially paused, right? And that's not a violation. So yeah, I mean, it's, it's complicated on what we can and can't do, but that's what the faculty Senate does at UC Berkeley. God, you guys just need a union. It's so much easier. Like for us, there's just a pay scale and it's based on like degree and number of years in, you know, like and anyone could look it up. You're like, oh, you're this far over on the columns and this far down on the list because you've done it this many years. You know what I mean? It's very straightforward. The problem with that one is like they can tap me to be part of this podcast and then try to reach out and create more advertisements and generate revenue or something like that, or to do poll based research or something like that. And I'm just sitting here doing all this stuff. Meanwhile, you're just chilling out surfing and you've been there longer than me and you're just getting more money, right? So like, no well, who's kicking ass? Who's writing books? Who's getting grants versus like, who's just been here a long time?
00:13:29
Speaker
It's I will say it's more complex than that because also on the columns, it it depends on you. You have to have like a certain degree. So it moves across and up and down. There are. reasons for merit, if that makes sense. you I can't just like sit on a couch and smoke weed and surf, you know what I mean? Unfortunately, I mean, how dare they? Why can't my union stand up for that? Well, I mean, I guess you could always research that and then research couches and research weed and you could probably put them together. But actually, does Andrew, do you actually even need to do research as
00:14:03
Speaker
Working as a new college, do you have like a a certain research output requirements and stuff like that? The short answer is no. The longer answer is as you go to get tenure, you it depends on what you say you're going to do, like in your tenure packet, like when you first get hired, it's like, hey, in order to get tenure, you're going to do these five things. You know what I mean? And it may or may not include research, depending on what your discipline is and stuff. I would i would say it usually does to a degree like in archaeology or something. But but no, once you you know, once you get tenure, like I'm not I'm not tied to like, oh, my God, I have to run an archaeology project every year. I do just because it's part of the classes I teach, but I don't have to ultimately like publish in journals or something. No.
00:14:50
Speaker
yeah know yeah Part of your continuing your merit and like standing at UC Berkeley, you also have to continue doing research or like you know if you're an artist or a dancer, you have to continue performing or organizing performances. You can't just sit there. Otherwise, you'll miss your merit increases. You'll miss opportunities for promotion and ultimately, they'll be like, yeah. I mean i don't know how long you would have to go before they finally were like, you need to move on. but I do know that eventually they would be like, yeah, you're just dead weight. For us on our side, it's all about teaching, right? Cause we have to remember that like my teaching load is weight. Like I have to teach five classes minimum per semester, you know? So that's, that's the rub. That's the difference. yeah So the rub of UC Berkeley is that is minimized. Yeah. Teaching is not the like,
00:15:42
Speaker
main reason right you get promoted at UC. Right. In my neck of the woods, that's the whole thing. Right. It's how do you teach? Like that's what that's what every everyone is on you for. They're not on you for research. They're on you for teaching. They're on you for teaching quality. But that's what that's what you get hammered for. I guess I would say when we return, let's bring CRM into the mix of unions and we'll go from there. We'll see you guys in a minute.
00:16:09
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to this CRM archaeology podcast episode 290 and we have been talking about unions and as I think many of us have already heard There was a group of archaeologists who just recently unionized in Utah. And you know what does that really mean? What are the long term ramifications of this choice? You know, that's something we want to get into. And I know, Doug, I was wondering if you could explain to us some of just some of the more overarching rules and laws of how unionization works.
00:16:42
Speaker
Yeah, so I guess a sort of personal comment on that, and this goes back to what you guys were mentioning earlier about how some of the grad students unionized but didn't really see a lot of effect or change. And of course, throughout archaeology, you see this, ah well, I shouldn't say every archaeologist, different countries are different, but especially in the sort of UK, US, you know the Facebook groups on there, you're seeing a lot of people being like, oh, we need to unionize, that's going to solve all our problems. and I mean all our problems. Everything is going on in the union, whether the union wants it or not. I think it's a bit unfair. and even like I'm going to take an example over here in the UK. The biggest Facebook group is the Badger One, first archaeological jobs resource. And actually recently, like sort of the admins have been sort of
00:17:31
Speaker
dissing on the unions and that they're not doing a lot and they're they're looking across and they're being like, oh they've they've unionized in Ireland and why can't they do it in the UK? You see a lot of sort of imagination of what a union could do. I imagine most people imagine what's going to happen is there's going to be a union and they're going to be on site and they're justnna someone's going to just be like, oh man, I've had enough. and They're going to throw their trial down. do it Do an inspirational speech, ah you know like a band of brothers. you know Those who walk off with me today are my brothers and my sisters, yada, yada, yada. Everyone's going to get up, down their tools. The digger drivers are going to see this, and and they're going to down you know they're go turn off the machines in solidarity. There's going to be a great picket. And then you know people are going to hawk as they go by, showing solidarity as they picket. And it's going to work. And you know they're going to get higher wages, and that's it.
00:18:26
Speaker
all our problems are solved. And exactly what's going to happen is that person's going to throw down their trial and they're going to be fired instantly. There's no protection. Not only are they going to get fired, the union that exists is going to denounce them. There's ah there's a whole letter that they're going to send saying that this person was wrong, that they were a horrible human being. Not exactly. I'm exaggerating on that part. But the union is actually going to denounce them and they're going to get fired. And the reason behind that is because in you know both countries, the laws have been systematically tilted against unions. So I'll talk first about the UK, and then I'll talk about the US. So basically, starting in 1980 with Thatcher, essentially, it's been death by 1,000 cuts. So everything I just described and what you know the imaginary could happen actually could happen in 1979 in the UK.
00:19:25
Speaker
It can't happen anymore. The idea that digger drivers would suddenly stop and join in with the archaeologists, that's what we would call a sympathy or a secondary action. That is illegal. It's illegal in the UK. I'll get to the US. It's illegal there, too. You can't just randomly throw down. That's what you'd call a wildcat. Basically, you'll pick it or strike a wildcat strike. That is also illegal. You have to go through a whole process. In the UK, it has to go through mail. So you actually have to do a ballot. you The union has to let the ballot know. And you know they have to let the employer know that they're going to be balloting. They have to go through this whole thing. They have to get a certain percentage. And it has to be done by mail. And you're thinking, like you know letter yes, letter, you can't use email. You can't use any modern technology. It's designed
00:20:18
Speaker
by that way and purpose. So, you know, if you're an archaeologist, your dress, your home address that might get sent to might not be where you're living at the moment because you're digging. So you have to go back and you have to get it and then, you know, it has to be mailed in and eventually they could go on a strike. but Basically, the strike can't really last that long. After 12 weeks, basically they can fire everyone. So you're protected if the union does it, and the union gibs has to give like advance notice by a couple of weeks, and you know, has to go through this whole process. And you can only strike basically at your only at your employment. Strike can only be related to your employer. You can't have like a sector-wide strike usually. there's There's sort of some ways around that, but for the most part, you're basically stuck there. So like all these ah sort of
00:21:04
Speaker
The glory imagination that people have about what a union can do is basically illegal. and Actually, they wrote into the laws, when why I said the union will denounce you, that's actually written into the laws. like The unions will be fined if anyone at a union company tried to start a strike without permission, without going through the laws. The union has to go up there. There's there's even a template they have to do where they basically have to be like, yes complete idiot. This is unsanctioned, yada, yada. And the union basically has to denounce, or they're going to be fined you know hundreds of thousands of pounds. But there's good reason for that, right? No. there's there's The only reason of this is literally death by a thousand cuts. And and it actually literally has continued. So obviously, ideologically driven from Thatcher conservatives. But then you got 1997, Blairites came in and actually they literally put, so that's labor.
00:21:57
Speaker
literally a political party funded by the unions and created by unions to represent, you know, it tends to be the left side of politics, but it was meant to help working people literally put in their manifesto that they're not bringing back secondary action, they're not bringing back wildcat. They basically, they slightly tweaked the laws where they're like, oh, instead of getting fired after eight weeks, you could do 12. But systematically, for 40 years, unions have been destroyed, slowly cut by cut in the U.K. So the point now, they really have almost very little power. In the U.S.,
00:22:32
Speaker
That all happened at once, and that actually happened 70 years ago. It was the Taft-Hartley Act, 1947. Truman actually vetoed it, but they got enough you the two-thirds, both Democrats and Republicans, you know back when you could do some good ah bipartisan work. basically did the same thing. which is You can't do wildcat start strikes, you can't do secondary action, and then you know they've slowly been killing them in states with the ah right to work, which is trying to cut off you know money to the union. so It's basically you know systematically destroying most of the power. so When people look at Ireland,
00:23:12
Speaker
Ireland's a bit different. you know There's trade-offs, good and bad, but in Ireland, you can actually have secondary strikes. so A couple of years ago, I think it was the bus drivers or the train drivers were going to go on strike. But what also happened was, I can't remember who it was, you know the taxi drivers, the bus drivers. Basically, all transport people also went on strike at once, so you couldn't break the union. It basically brought the country to a standstill unless you had ah your own car. um which I know in America, it doesn't sound like a big deal, but in other countries, it's not. A lot of people use public transportation. So yeah, like people look over at Ireland and they're like, oh, they're unionized and at work. But the laws are very different in Ireland. Unions are actually written into the Constitution thanks to their support of the Irish independence. you know There's historical reasons for that. But basically, you're you're talking different laws. And so people sort of
00:24:09
Speaker
have this idea of what unions could be. Actually, what they have are ideas of what unions used to be and what the power they used to have. And I honestly, like if archaeologists are really interested in changing how they work, they really need to think about changing the laws. I'm thinking of the movie, The Mission. I don't know if anyone, you know, this is I think nineteen late 1970s, early 1980s, Robert De Niro, Jesuit priests in the middle of the Amazon, but there was a ah line, I'm gonna get it wrong, but basically the two of the priests are talking and you know one of them's like, oh, you know, the world is thus and we need to work, live in the world and work in the world or something like that.
00:24:49
Speaker
And then the cardinal's like, well, we made this world this way. And he's like, oh, actually, I made this world this way. And that's the same sort of thing. So like if people want unions to matter, and they might be able to change things, they have to go after the laws, which are a bit bigger than archaeology. But yeah, if they want to work in the UK, if you want to work in the US, or pretty much most countries, you have to be able to change the laws so that unions actually have the ability to make a change. Most of them yeah are actually limited now, where you can only sort of strike only related to your work and your one company. so You can't like drive things up. and so if you you know There's the thing. If you drive up the prices of wages in one company, eventually, it will
00:25:37
Speaker
cost the company to fail. And unions, there's a quote from the, I can't believe I'm i'm going to quote the Cato Institute, but yeah know you have to read both sides. But they said something like, you know unions will push push companies to the edge, but they'll never push them over. And yeah, if if you if you want to have unions powerful, you actually have to have allow them to do roaming strikes as well, being able to go to companies that don't have a unionized workforce and be able to pick at them. That's illegal in both countries. And if you could do that, you have a much better chance of actually changing things. But at the moment, the laws are such that you're basically kind of screwed. Sorry, on that happy note, I see Bill has his hand up. Well, no, no, I have a question on wages, right? Because I think that people can handle all those limitations as long as unionization will increase wages and benefits. So do they? I mean, do they?
00:26:29
Speaker
Well, so that's the thing is like, so like years ago, i was when I was at university undergrad, they came over, one of the unions, they were trying to unionize, well, they were going against one of the ah catering companies, Sodexo, I think it was at the time, or Ammar, or, you know, one of those companies, one of the big three, and I had really interesting conversations because the guy was, you know, an organizer and, and basically unions work really well. in the old model of factories. where like you know If you're an owner, you invested a ton of money in a factory. There's a lot of equipment. You you can raise the prices. you know there's there's low There's a barrier to entry to starting a factory, you know lots of capital, all this stuff. so You could push things up, because you know the company wasn't about to
00:27:17
Speaker
get rid of all their investment. Now, with ah you know internet international trade, basically they moved them all to you know Honduras for like apparel. you know China took everything. so You're able to outsource and basically kill a lot of the unions. Unions work fairly well in certain circumstances where you know you can't just sort of outsource and move around. around and In archaeology, It's really tough. because essentially i well Bill Stephen. Heather and Andrew, I don't remember if you guys... Did you cross over with Stephen? I i did. and i did not I remember him. Stephen had had a great saying where like in archaeology, he called it the two men, a truck, and a shovel. and that that's That's basically your're youre the capital that's required to start an archaeology firm in the United States. and Actually, in the UK, you don't even need the truck.
00:28:11
Speaker
And you probably don't even need the second person in either thing. It's you know a man, a truck, and a shovel. Or a woman. you know Or are they. you know We're going to be modern on this, on whoever however they want to identify and their gender. But basically, a person and a shovel. And if you're in the US, a truck. But anywhere else, probably not. And that's that's your your barrier to entry. So you know if you raise wages at one company, which is the only thing a union can legally do, Eventually, the work is going to go somewhere else. and Anyone else you know with a shovel and a truck can basically take that work for cheaper. and so Unless you allow unions to say be able to go picket that person in that truck, which you can't currently do in either of those countries, you're not able to enforce it. so you know Unions will basically have a sort of ah ceiling of how much they could push wages up unless you're pushing up wages for everyone.
00:29:02
Speaker
and You have to push them up across the sector, and you have to be able to do it in a way where you can't outsource those that work somewhere else. When I say outsource, that could just be to another company in the same state, not necessarily you know outsourcing and where we think like sending it to China and stuff like that. so yeah you really do have to kind of you know Think about changing the laws so that unions could be effective, and there's a way to basically stop you know that. Be able to have a sector-wide impact. because At the moment, unions are basically limited to wherever company is unionized. They can only strike related to that. They can only negotiate related to that.
00:29:38
Speaker
and That's a real limit because you basically have union busting and all sorts of stuff that basically keeps it out of other companies.
Improving CRM Conditions Beyond Unionization
00:29:45
Speaker
and Then it's a you know it's a circular. its Basically, people see like, oh there's a union, but they haven't done anything. They haven't raised wages, so I'm not going to join a union. and Then you know it goes in a circle where they can't break out. and It takes a lot of work for union basically to get in there, raise wages, get enough people convinced that other companies to join, and then push it up and then, you know, it just takes a really so much work. yeah That doesn't happen. It's basically the laws are structured to make that that way. So it's killing unions or, you know, making people disillusioned because you basically see every country unions peaked in 1980 in the UK and across every single field, every discipline union membership has gone down. And that's because they basically killed the
00:30:34
Speaker
their their ability to have a wider impact. Yes. It is that death by a thousand cuts. I have experienced that personally, like over time. There's their weakening unions over time. Yeah. Sorry, guys. I i realize I've just taken like 15 minutes on like a whole spiel of of laws and various things. So I'll throw it around to everyone else. Yeah. doug This is the first time not that I ever have an issue with your rants, but I really, this but what what are your most valuable rants? Because but I mean, obviously you know a lot about this area and you, yeah, but I appreciate it because I really didn't know quite a bit of that background.
00:31:13
Speaker
Yeah, and I hate myself for agreeing with Heather. OK, like I agree, Doug. it was This is complex stuff. We have 15 minutes. it needed fifteen We have this recorded. Yeah, I know. yeah Yeah, you guys agree. Yes. Damn it. that we play this Oh, my wait I got to push stop. Yeah. Wait, wait. Well, we'll be we'll be back maybe.
00:31:36
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to the CRM archaeology podcast episode 290. And we are wrapping up our scintillating discussion on unions and Heather, I know that you have been waiting to say some stuff. So. what Well, so like I said, I really appreciated that background. You know, my knowledge of unions is is limited. I have done some study on it just because I'm really curious about the potential for improving things in in the in this country for CRM. And then I'm a history buff of the Industrial Revolution period. and And so, you know, I understand the unions from the beginning of it in this country. But, you know,
00:32:17
Speaker
Doug said one thing that really resonated with me and that is if people want unions to work, they're going to have to go and like go deeper than just fighting for a union. They're going to have to fight for the laws to actually make the union be an entity or a option that is actually going to help. Totally. And so I actually think with that same mindset that rather than doing that, and it it could maybe it's a twofold, right? Maybe people can work on that. But that going to take an area where you're diving into, you know, changing laws that I mean, that's what this country is based on is people fighting for changing, changing laws. and And, you know, it's what's wonderful about America. So that is, I'm not saying that we shouldn't do that. But in the interim, there should be another avenue, I think, and that is
00:33:10
Speaker
fighting to improve the conditions within CRM as it is. And that's it is happening now. It's happening because of some situations that have nothing to do with CRM. It's really pushed and driven the the the pay up. But I think that rather than having people come up the ranks and be warriors for for the union, how about we bring people and come up the ranks to be warriors for creating CRM companies that that treat people right and and that are providing opportunities for people at work.
00:33:45
Speaker
in these CRM companies. This concept that, you you know which I think is pretty is really prevalent, especially with people that are just starting, and unfortunately it's because of social media, because of some things that that they're told when they're in school, and that is that you know the people, the managers don't care. that but I'm a manager, and my focus It always goes down to one thing. Yes, I love archaeology, but my focus is to make the lives of the people that work for the company that I work for better and to make sure that in in I'm always, yes, am I always working on trying to build business and I'm trying to make sure that we are staying on our budgets? Yes, why? Because I want to make sure that the people at work on that work and I have any kind of influence over
00:34:34
Speaker
Have a job so you know everything is based on that and I. My desire is that people can make as much as they possibly can. There's, there's, you know, that is my ambition, but it also, it's not just about, let's just give everybody a hundred dollars an hour. You know, there's, there are so many other aspects that you have to look at it from the business perspective, from the business side. And I think that people that are starting off in this business, you really have to, it's going to do you well long-term.
00:35:09
Speaker
to really understand the business side but it's also going to keep things from being so frustrating to you if you understand the business side of serum and i think that it can't just be we can't i think the serum companies that don't do well in the ones that are always trying to undercut everybody and pay them to our terrible wages. It comes out of one thing, they're horrible managers. They're not good managers. And they obviously do not, you know, and I'm actually not going to apologize because if you're listening, you're one of those, you deserve to hear this.
00:35:42
Speaker
You are not a very good archeologist either. You're not producing quality because if you were producing quality, then customers would be willing to pay that. And then people will argue, argue, well, wait a minute, they don't really care. They just want to check a box so that they can move on. Yeah. But your job as a manager is to show the client that the quality of archeology, now I'm talking about quality, not just in, you know, you dig a hole really well or you do really good analysis. That's not all. It's you understand the regulatory environment and you know how to usher your client through that process. And that is where the quality is. And if you and so there's a lot of CRM companies that are not savvy enough to do that. And so what they do is they're just trying to do quality quantity instead of quality.
00:36:33
Speaker
And if you do quality, and you know it takes some time, the first step is you have to produce quality. You have to get your company to a point where you are capable of producing quality. Second, you need to sell your client on that. And that's going to take a strong personality. It's not some you know person who just wants to do analysis in the laboratory. We need people like that, but you're going to have to have a seller and a doer to promote this This avenue and if you promote this avenue you sell your client on why it's important that quality that quality is important that defensible products are important. And that you have the regulatory understand understanding and savvy to get them through the process.
00:37:18
Speaker
Then you sell them on quality. They're willing to pay for quality. And now that's how you're able to bring up the wages. In the meantime, I think you should be paying people good wages anyway, because part of business is not you're going to make money right out the bat. I mean, it takes years to be making good money in any business. So this concept that I'm going to have to pay my people, you know, a pittance until so that i so that the company can continue to make money. That's you know, if you're starting a business, you should assume you're not going to be making money for the first couple of years. So, anyway, I kind of just went on a rant, but... Yeah, no and i'm I'm hoping that I ah hope that this, you know, students who move through this unionization movement and the folks who unionize in those other offices, you know, I, first of all, commend them because, you know, that isn't easy to try to bring back this old thing that was, you know, so important in the US history.
00:38:11
Speaker
that has been eviscerated, as Doug was just telling us over the years.
Impact of Industry Dynamics on Wages and Unions
00:38:14
Speaker
So i'm I am hoping that folks can you know get that going, remember, think about what Doug was saying, like strengthen those laws and everything, because Heather, you were just basically talking about folks who run CRM companies being ethical and caring. And you end up being like part of the 1% Heather, because I mean, I've worked for these companies, they don't give a rat's ass. They don't care if people break, they don't care if we starve, they don't care about really anything, except for just making their small amount of money. Destroy them, destroy them with competition. the sad the sad thing is those ones have grown to be the most powerful in the whole country. And that's just all I always do it. So I am hoping that through strengthening regulations,
00:38:55
Speaker
Joining together maybe you make any adjustments possible to make this a more equitable and and you know employee oriented field i do hope that folks move through this and remember these things and go into the next level bringing those two cultural resources. Yeah, i I really don't. i I understand what you're saying. Yes, they ah they are out there. I work for them too. so But I don't think it's 1%. I think it's greater than that now. And I do think that in the meantime, I'm not saying give up this concept of unions, but in the meantime, people need to not give up. They need to come in and fight for, bring yourself up. don't I see so many people just quit.
00:39:38
Speaker
you know they move into another into another area you know i when i started i was a single mom i had no money. No i was poor and i bought my way up now i'm not saying that you know that i'm sure that you know there were opportunities that i had but. I was given opportunities because I had placed myself in that position and I really think it's doable. I'm not saying this to log myself. I'm saying this because it is possible. And if you get yourself to certain you know ah levels in a CRM company or an environmental company, it allows you to have
00:40:17
Speaker
you know to be in a position to make things better for others. I would also add that so helping unions is one way of doing it. There are other ways that you can make without changing laws that you can serve of empower the ability for unions to work. um so I was going back to like that union organizer. He he was working for the Well, this I should say this is just a ah side thing, totally off the side, but like you know there's always those TV shows about like rich people and and and the drama there, but like the drama of unions, man. So he worked for a union that was basically the you know shirts, sewing, all that sort of stuff.
00:40:55
Speaker
They were part of another union. They split. But the thing you told me was like you know ah apparel. I think it was apparel union, is what they called it. Basically, they'd given up being able to do much because 1990s deals were made, I think it was Honduras and Guatemala, where they were able to move essentially all of the apparel offshore. and they're they're basically He was saying that like you know the they'd actually started a bank. I'll put it in the show notes. Really interesting stuff. so They had a lot of money. The bank's really interesting history. um They like bailed out Martin Luther King, paid it for his bail, all these things. Basically, they they didn't have any power because essentially they could offshore any of the apparel factories at any time they wanted to. um so They were basically using the the resources from their their bank to help other unions.
00:41:45
Speaker
They're looking to unionize sort of you know people in catering, things like that. But where I'm getting back to this is like he you know he was talking about how unions could be powerful. And actually, like archaeology is pretty perfect in the sense of like it would be a good profession to unionize and that you can't really outsource, at least the excavation part. I guess you know maybe you could ship all the artifacts out of country for the analysis or something like that. But in terms of like digging, you you can't outsource that. You actually physically need someone in the middle of Arizona or the middle of California or you know Illinois or wherever to actually do the work. And so there's that. The real problem is is this you know anyone can set up you know a person, a truck, and ah a shovel.
00:42:34
Speaker
But if you put barriers to entry, you can, you know, that's why those wages are much, much higher in the West than the East of the US because, you know, permitting from BLM, that's a barrier to entry and that causes wages to go up. And so, you know, there's that one way. There's another way. I'm not going to go into more detail about barriers to entry because of legal issues with the UK. And I, I shouldn't really be on recording talking about how you can do illegal things, but you know that there's other ways, but you raise that or consolidation. So, you know if it it comes down to there's only three archeology firms and you know barriers to entry, essentially unions, even if they're limited, even kneecapped with the current laws, can be very effective. yeah And we somewhat see it in the UK where like
00:43:21
Speaker
you know Unfortunately, there's just you know the the average surplus or profit is 2%. Half the archaeologists in the UK are actually in a company or organization that's unionized, but the wages are about the same because there's just no money to take it from. But if you had barriers to entry and there's lots of profit margins in archaeology, unions as they are now could still work. But this, you know, some things do have to change. Right. Even even like like my union, even though it's been kind of kneecapped and hobbled over the years with the stuff we've been bringing up, it's still like works for us because I'm telling you, if we didn't have a union, we'd have horrible wages. We would have a terrible work week and we'd have like no health care.
00:44:08
Speaker
I guarantee you because sometimes people are like, oh, well, you know, the as long as the state or the company is they'll just be nice to you, but they won't. Right. They're there just to like take the maximum amount of money. The union is constantly fighting against the administration.
Non-Wage Benefits and Union Dynamics
00:44:23
Speaker
You know, it is a constant battle. Right. I like behind the scenes for to keep, again, decent wages in this kind of thing. So in my situation, even though, of course, unions are never perfect, you can always point the flaws or this kind of thing. I'm so happy to be part of a union. And so in order to do that, I have to pay dues right every month. And I want to say it's like, I don't know, it's 150 bucks or something like that. Now, one of the things that Doug was talking about in terms of hobbling the unions, it used to be basically that it was mandatory that everyone pay these dues. And recently, just in the last handful of years, they've made it like not mandatory. So you can kind of
00:45:00
Speaker
You basically can very easily opt out of the union, which that's it sounds like it should be fair. That that sounds like a fair thing, but it's actually a terrible thing because what happens is people will opt out of the union, but they're using everything the union's giving them anyway. You know what I mean? Oh, you walked out, opted out of the union, but you took the raise that the union fought for. You know, oh, you're using union representation when when the administration is trying to fire you. You know what I mean? wait had a years ago Yeah, I do know for a fact because I have i know someone who opted out of a union. It was not not academia, but yeah and they did not have the full representation legal representation. Right. Oh, well that's good. That's good. Yeah, therere there are some things they don't get, and sometimes it could be the one thing you really need.
00:45:52
Speaker
Yeah, just I think it's the world's stupidest thing in my situation to opt out of the union. It's like, what are you doing for for basically what is a pittance? You get, you know, so much. And it's funny, people don't realize behind the scenes for I'm sure this is exactly the same for K through 12, all that where like the administration is constantly nickel and and diming you constantly. And the union is like the only shield, you know, that's there. I would like to say one thing. there's There is something that's different than academia. So you can't, in CRM, you can't. Oh yeah, it's different. Yeah, people are ignoring this fact.
00:46:31
Speaker
so you could, they could, they could have treated you, you didn't have a union, they could have treated you badly. And, and, and the quality of the work, the quality of the teaching could go down. And it's in academia, it's really not going to and do a whole lot. I mean, the the concept of these, you know, certain colleges that people want to go to, Sometimes, you know, that is affected. But as far as CRM goes, you really do. And it becoming more and more prevalent. You have to have a defensible product. And without that, so clients are starting to realize that now, you can't just have any old person doing archaeology that is going to just check the box. And actually, You can also have some of the finest archaeologists in in the world that are working on your project and you're still not going to have a defensible product because they don't understand the regulatory side of things. So they're just good archaeologists, but they don't know the regulatory side of things. And so people, clients are starting to pay for
00:47:34
Speaker
a better quality. And that is where you're going to that that is where you don't necessarily need. Now, I'm not saying again, I'm not saying unions are the wrong way to go. But what I'm saying is I'm trying to give some hope to my approach, which is not anti-union, but is let's work on this in tandem here. And that is fighting for quality of archaeology, which then this argument that, oh, clients aren't willing to pay and everybody's going to low ball. Well, they can go on low ball, but then they're going to get sued down the road because the product was not defensible. And then the other thing is, I really would like people to think about is that we shouldn't just be thinking about people that are taking people that are in the field. That's not just that's not the most important thing. And honestly, I don't even know if that's what archaeologists should be doing. I think archaeologists should be in the field and they should be supervising. They should be watching. But
00:48:33
Speaker
Is it the right move to have every single person who's digging be a archaeologist? Is that why people went to art to get a degree is to dig dirt? Like, so yeah, I think I think that we really need to change how we look at archaeology in so many different ways in order to improve. Yeah. at Pay scale. I think that's really important to think about, too, because for in my case, in a way, I'm the easy poster child for a unionization. It's kind of like Doug was saying, like I'm kind of a version of almost the factory model, you know, where where it's not offshored, although the administration, I'm sure, would love it to just offshore everything and make it online classes only. Right. But it's as of today, I'm still I i am that factory model and I can work
00:49:19
Speaker
You know, as ah a unionized almost factory person, the CRM world, it's way more complicated. Like you're saying, Heather, it's it's it's a tougher beast. Anyway, Doug, I know you wanted to say something about that. Yeah, it was it was best back to we've been mainly talking about unions in terms of wages. But going back to what you had said, Andrew, about, you know, They're great for other things. I've seen this on other sides. So I work for FAME, Federation of Archaeological Managers and Employers in the UK. That's the trade body. I get to sit in the meetings with the owners, the managers of companies. And yeah, the laws are such that they're not going to really be able to affect wages anytime soon in either country.
00:50:05
Speaker
But there's huge differences. So I'm just thinking of one example that was huge. yeah There's been a lot of reports about you know harassment and bullying in archaeology. And just I'm going to use those. So I'm using UK technical terms. So like harassment is when it's related to a personal characteristic that's illegal. Bullying is you know you're just being an asshole to someone, not necessarily because of you know their gender or their religion or whatever. So theres there's been a lot of reports out recently. you know there's There's been those reports about field schools and you know lots of research. But you know with any research, so essentially, it's one of those things where like if it didn't happen to me, I don't believe it. And that's you know a lot of people's reactions. But I don't know. If you could give out like a a prize, a Nobel Prize, i know whatever, something some huge prize, it should go to the Union at Oxford.
00:50:58
Speaker
because Essentially, they went and they did a survey internally about harassment and you know all the all these shit things that happen when you're out in the field. and They took it to their managers and they convinced their managers. and I could tell you right now, nothing has changed the conversation faster. then when you're talking about harassment and bullying at the senior level, for people who, you know, they've been senior people for a while, they haven't experienced anything like that in 20 or 30 years because they're the boss. they don't They're the ones, you know, they're not the ones who are getting bullied.
00:51:33
Speaker
But it was huge because they convinced the management at Oxford and it was amazing to see the change of a meeting when basically the you know older white male graying stood up and said, actually, no, this is an issue and we should all pay attention. because he'd been convinced by his union. And unions are really good for non-pay stuff in your work. So, you know, if um or even even pay, you know, like getting cheated those extra like half hour here, you know, hour here where you're doing overtime, and you should be paid for it. And they're just. Yes.
00:52:06
Speaker
Oh, no, no, that didn't happen. A union will be like, no, no, that did happen. Pay us or you know whatever. there's There's a lot of small things that a union can do now for your individual work. And you know again, I've been in a job where basically they wanted me gone. They pushed me out. I really wish I'd been paying union dues to have that union person with me because I was basically on my own. And you know and any any organization, if they want to get rid of you, they'll get rid of you for whatever reason they want. And a union can really, really help on that. So I would just say, you know right now, the laws are so that they can't affect really wages in a lot of places, but they can affect your quality
00:52:51
Speaker
of, I want to say life, your work life, but also your regular life, because that affects it as well.
Conclusion and Future Discussions
00:52:57
Speaker
There's a bunch of fringe benefits, you know, and and in my case, they do affect wages on top of that. But with that, we got to get out of here. It was a fun topic. I think an interesting topic. I'm always in to talk about unions, but I could do it. I could still go on forever on this. But with that, We will see you guys next time. And I guess as Chris says, Chris, you know, that guy who used to be a part of this used to. What does his voice sound like? I don't know. Anyway, with that, we'll see you guys later.
00:53:28
Speaker
That's it for another episode of the CRM Archaeology Podcast. Links to some of the items mentioned on the show are in the show notes for this podcast, which can be found at www.arcpodnet dot.com slash CRMARC Podcast. Please comment and share anywhere you see the show. If you'd like us to answer a question on a future episode, email us. Use the contact form on the website, or just email chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork.com. Support the show and the network at archpodnet.com slash members. Get some swag and extra content while you're there. Send us show suggestions and interview suggestions. We want this to be a resource for field technicians everywhere, and we want to know what you want to know about. Thanks to everyone for joining me this week. Thanks also to the listeners for tuning in, and we'll see you in the field. Goodbye. See you later. Bye-bye. Bye. Change the laws.
00:54:12
Speaker
Take it easy, everyone.
00:54:23
Speaker
This episode was produced by Chris Webster from his ah RV traveling the United States, Tristan Boyle in Scotland, DigTech LLC, Cultural Media, and the Archaeology Podcast Network, and was edited by Rachel Rodin. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork.com.