the value of people

Submitted by antarchi on December 13, 2009 - 02:04

No salary cuts are allowed in today's world of corporatised 'charity' workers. I recently tried to suggest one in the (so-called) charity where I work, because there is something discomforting about working for an organisation whose mission includes spreading the human rights message and helping the poor and vulnerable, but which insists on paying its own workers more than the majority of workers in this country - this rich country. Of course, compared to the poor and vulnerable themselves - here or anywhere around the world - an NGO-salary puts you into the category of the super-rich.

Other workers in the organisation did not agree with my proposed wage cut: they 'needed' the salary they were currently earning. If salaries were cut, pensions or benefits were reduced - all of which the organisation was threatening as a way out of its own financial crisis - then nearly every member of staff announced that they would start looking for alternative employment.

I offered to take a unilateral cut. But the organisation was not happy with this: 'The trustees do not want to go down the route of paying staff differently', I was told. It would not be possible for one individual to take a salary cut. My salary was necessary too.

The reasoning of the trustees might be laudable, reflecting a true and rare commitment to equality - if only it was applied consistently. The trouble is that staff in the organisation already are paid differently. There is a careful sliding scale, from roughly £20,000 to roughly £60,000 - and that does not include a number of highly qualified, committed volunteers, whose labours go completely unrewarded.

To put these figures in the national context: £20,000 is about the median working wage in this country. 50% of people in the UK earn less than that amount per year. £30,000 - which is the amount earned by the majority of the (young, childless) employees in the organisation - puts you among the top 25% of earners in the country. And £60,000, which is roughly the amount earned by the senior managers in the organisation, puts you into the top 5%1. Outside the organisation, and away from the corporatised world of charity, around 13½ million people in the country - about a fifth of the population - live on less than £12,000 per year. This is just a little more than the minimum wage2.

I did not fully appreciate before this incident how very carefully and categorically each one of us had been measured, graded, valued, and then assessed against the others. And all of this, remember, in an organisation which preaches the equal value of every individual. Why, after all, should there be any problem if one staff member wishes to degrade, devalue, reassess herself - except, perhaps, that she is questioning the management's assessment of her value. The management have given thought to how much she is worth, and how much more or less the others must be worth: 'She is less than she is worth, but more than him, who's less than him (and her)'. But still far more than a recently graduated and recently indebted student, who must work for free.

Occasionally, if one of the hims or hers can indicate that she is very, very worthwhile to the organisation, then they are prepared to consider a pay rise (this has been known to happen, when an employee makes the case particularly eloquently). But a pay cut is right out of bounds, even if you show yourself to be quite worthless, because it messes up an ordered system.

Sitting in the system not only means that you must endure the hypocrisy of earning more than you - or anyone 'needs' - while others go without. It also means you must not question that hypocrisy, nor undermine it, and you must be satisfied with being valued more than others in the organisation - and outside - and less than those who are senior enough to do the valuing.

If charity workers need - really need £20,000, or £30,000 or even £60,000, then don't others who earn less need it as well? If they don't need it, why do charity workers? Or is it just that we all need it, but only some can have it?

That is indeed what it is. It is known as tough shit. And even people who do not in general believe in the principle of tough shit, and who believe that they are working for a more just world, can be reconciled to the toughness and the shittines of earning far more than they need while others go without. How they manage to persuade themselves that that is not an issue is another story.