Losing Ground: 
Measuring Workers’ Rights in Alberta, 1975-2001

The following is an excerpt from the AFL publication Losing Ground, written by Jim Selby and published in May 2001. For copies of the complete booklet, contact the AFL office at 780-483-3021.

Introduction

In previous generations of Alberta working men and women there was an expectation or at least a strong hope that the lot in life of working people and their families was going to continue improving in the future.

In the last half of the twentieth century, it seemed that these hopes were finally being realized. Social welfare, Unemployment Insurance, social housing, urban sewer and water systems, Medicare, public education and many other public and social benefits combined to radically improve the lives of working people in Alberta.

A dramatic rise in the unionization rate in the post-war era nation-wide had produced tangible workplace benefits and increases in real wages for union members and spin-off wage increases for non-union workers.

During the past decades, however, things have changed. Recessions in the mid 1980’s and early 1990’s, combined with huge cuts in public and social spending, sent unemployment figures up, wages down and public benefits plummeting.

The dismantling of the welfare state with its mix of public enterprise and services and regulated economic and social life accelerated under pressure from free trade agreements and corporate and right-wing political influence.

What follows is a snapshot of daily life for workers today that is then compared to a similar snapshot taken 25 years ago in 1975. This provides the perspective of an historic view that compares the lives and working conditions faced by two different generations of Alberta workers and their families.

What’s Happening to the Job Market?

The single most important factor in a worker’s life is their job. If you have a good job, you will be able to enjoy the limitless possibilities of our consumer-based, market-driven economy.

A good job pays a decent wage sufficient to allow home ownership, the possibility of raising a family without hardship, and a degree of economic security.

Good jobs are permanent, full-time and well-paid. Where are the good jobs? Generally, they are in the goods producing sectors. Jobs in manufacturing, transportation, utilities, construction, and primary production (forestry, mining, oil and natural gas) have all traditionally been good jobs. Jobs in public administration (government sector), while not as well-paid, have been considered secure and comparatively well paid.

Jobs in the wholesale and retail trade sector, the financial sector and the service sector, on the other hand, have traditionally been less well paid and less secure.

Unfortunately for young Albertans today, the job market looks quite different than it did a generation ago in 1975. The service sector now accounts for 42.2% of all jobs in Alberta. Although important sources of good jobs like the manufacturing and construction sectors have expanded at the same pace as the workforce, important "good job" sectors like transportation, communications and utilities, and public administration have not kept pace.

It’s clear that, for young Albertans today, the job market is much worse than it was 25 years ago. There is a greater proportion of low-paying and insecure jobs – and the trend shows no signs of abating.

The Rise of Insecure Employment

One of the most serious problems with jobs in the service-producing sectors is the prevalence of part-time employment. Part-time work obviously produces smaller weekly paycheques and a reduced standard of living.

But there is another, overlooked effect of a large part-time workforce. Workers who are employed part-time have far less job security.

There are 295,000 part-time workers in Alberta today – 200,000 more than there was a generation ago. Nearly one in five workers is a part-time employee. In 1975 only 12% of Albertans worked part-time.

Over half of all part-time workers are women over the age of twenty-four. Over a third of part-timers (105,800 out of 294,600), are youth under the age of twenty-five.

B. Are Wages Getting Better?

With a booming economy and low unemployment, there are good reasons to expect that wages should also be rising. The question is are we really gaining any ground? Are wages any higher today than in 1975?

At a casual glance, the expectation that wages are improving over time seems justified. However, the effects of inflation on wages have to be accounted for. The cost-of-living is, after all, substantially higher today than it was in 1975.

Once the 1975 weekly earnings are corrected to current (2000) dollars, a far different picture emerges.

Workers in Alberta, in most industries are making less in real weekly earnings than they were twenty-five years ago.

In the broadest overview, the average Alberta weekly wage, including overtime has declined from $681.97 in 1975 to $642.81 in 2000 in real (2000) dollars. This represents a 5.7% drop in real weekly wages.

C. Rights at Work

One of the most important rights workers have is the right to join a union and bargain collectively.

The right to unionize is important for many reasons.

First and foremost, union membership and union coverage (includes those who are covered by a collective agreement but who do not belong to their union) provides a substantial financial benefit.

Nationally, average weekly wages for unionized workers are 18.3% higher than for non-union workers. Average hourly wages showed an even greater gap with union workers enjoying 19.5% higher average wages.

But the wage difference is most striking for part-time workers. Unionized part-time workers not only earned 37.5% more than their non-union counterparts, they also averaged three more hours per week. This gave them 47.4% higher average weekly wages.

Unionized workers also enjoy superior pensions and benefits and safer workplaces.

Aside from the monetary advantages, union membership also protects workers from unfair, arbitrary and discriminatory treatment on the job. Unions uphold workers’ dignity – a benefit that is beyond price.

Given all the benefits of union membership, it would be reasonable to assume that the unionization rate in Alberta has gone up over time.

Rather than going up over time, union membership has actually declined in Alberta. Workers entering the labour market in Alberta today have a smaller chance of working in a union job than people did in 1975.

The reasons for this decline are complex, and include the transformation of employment to the traditionally harder to organize service sector.

However, the main cause is the restrictive provisions of the Alberta Labour Code. In 1975 a simple majority of workers at a jobsite could simply sign cards and they would be certified.

Today, workers must show 40% support after which there is a mandatory vote. During the period between application and vote employers have a window of opportunity to campaign against the union. With no effective penalties against unfair employer tactics in certification drives, and no "mandatory first agreement arbitration" clause (Alberta is one of only three provinces without this provision), it is small wonder that union membership has declined.

The fact remains the Alberta labour laws in 1975 protected workers’ rights to join a union better than our current legislation.

Employment Standards

Alberta’s basic floor of rights for workers is contained in the Employment Standards Code and its accompanying Regulations.

Alberta’s basic provisions for overtime, vacations, general holidays and standard worktime follow the general national pattern.

However, since the system is complaint driven, a worker has to expose themselves to employer reactions, which can include dismissal in order to serve their rights.

Perhaps the most important employment standard regulation, especially for young workers, is the minimum wage.

Minimum wage levels set the wage for entry level, low skill jobs – and influence the rest of the labour market accordingly.

Alberta’s minimum wage in 1975 was $2.50 per hour – which represents about $8.20 per hour in today’s money. That is over 50% higher than today’s minimum wage.

D. How Safe is Work?

There are two major components to occupational health and safety. The first deals with prevention – the maintenance of safe workplaces. The second, the workers’ compensation system, supports workers who have become injured or sick on the job.

Occupational health and safety is one of the few areas of worklife that has actually improved since 1975. In 1975 there were not general occupational health and safety regulations in place, and it showed.

Alberta Workplace Accidents

Since the enactment of general regulations in 1976 there was a substantial improvement in workplace safety. That year a new Division of Occupational Health and Safety was created with a budget of $2.79 million. Two years later, it became a separate department – which, by 1985, had over 250 staff and a $12 million budget. Full programs of inspection, research, education and support services were provided.

Since 1986, however, the Department has ceased to exist – and is now a small component of Human Resources and Employment.

The Workers’ Compensation system in Alberta provides no fault insurance against workplace injury and disease. There is no quantifiable way to compare operations between 1975 and 2000. However, a recent outcry by injured workers has convinced the government to run two investigations into the operations of the Board.

In summary, the current generation enjoys a measurably safer workplace – thanks largely to a real government investment in the area between 1976 and 1986.

E. Teaching our Children Well?

Public education has always been strongly supported by the labour movement. Working people wanted their children to have the opportunity for a better life that literacy and education provides.

How have our K-12 school system and advanced education system faired over time?

Classroom sizes are a real problem in Alberta schools. A straight division of total educators to total students in 1997 - 1998 shows a pupil teacher ratio of 19.3 to 1. This figure includes school administrators and educational support services. Actually classroom sizes are much higher. Another Statistics Canada method of establishing the figure shows a lower figure of 17.8 to 1 but that is still the highest in Canada.

In 1975, every school had access to staff psychologists, speech therapists, librarians and other educational resource people. Now they don't. Twenty-five years ago, teachers had blocks of free time for lesson planning and marking now they do that in the evenings and on the weekends.

At our advanced educational institutions, the story is the same: increased class sizes coupled with shrinking resources.

Real undergraduate fees for a student in Arts and Sciences rose 166% between 1975 and 2000, from approximately $755 per term to over $2000 per term in 2000 dollars. If you added rent, food, books and tuition costs for a full-term (September through April) enrollment at the University for an undergraduate, it would cost well over $10,000.

It’s getting to the point where working Albertans will no longer be able to afford advanced education for their children – and no summer job is going to provide a student with that amount of savings.

In the past twenty-five years, there has been a decline in the quality of education, and for post-secondary schooling, a decline in accessibility.

F. Health Care at the Crossroads

In 1975, the Medicare system in Canada was a well-funded system, universally appreciated and without serious flaws.

Since that time, the federal government has changed its dollar for dollar funding agreement with the provinces to a set transfer amount – which has shrunk in real (constant) dollars over time.

Cutbacks in health care funding by the Alberta government caused bed and ward closures in hospitals, increased waiting lists and overloaded emergency wards.

Alberta is below the national average for both general practitioners per 100,000 people and specialists per 100,000 people. Alberta has 85 GPs and 76 specialists per 100,000 – the national average is 94 GPs and 91 specialists.

Alberta has also led the way with privatizing health care. Private clinics do surgeries on an out patient basis that used to be done in the public system. Early hospital release policies have downloaded the cost of care, including drugs, onto families.

By 1998 Alberta families were spending more money on health care than anyone else in Canada – both in actual dollars and as a per cent of their after tax spending.

Although the system is clearly under immense financial pressure, the good news is that general health outcomes are actually better today. Infant mortality rates (per 1000 live births) are down from 14.9 in 1975 to 4.8 in 1997. Life expectancy for both men and women has continued to rise.

How much of these improvements are due to superior medical technology and practice, better nutrition and increased public awareness is unknown. However, in terms of government support for health care, and generally government’s willingness to put health before budgetary concerns, it is clear that Albertans were better off twenty-five years ago.

Conclusion: Ebb Tide

Between 1975 and 1999, the Alberta economy flourished. In just twenty-five years, real (constant dollar) Gross Domestic Product grew by 141.3%. The total economic activity (GDP) generated per person increased by 43.9%, and real corporate profits increased by 56.2%.

But, that phenomenal economic growth and increase in provincial wealth did not trickle down to working people and their families.

As we have seen, real wages for most Albertans actually declined during this period.

And, despite the fact that workplaces are measurably safer today than they were 25 years ago, there has been a recent decline in government commitment to occupational health and safety – and growing discontent with the Workers’ Compensation Board.

Real minimum wages in Alberta are grossly inadequate and are actually a third lower than in 1975. Restrictive changes to the labour laws have caused a decline in Alberta’s unionization rate.

The social safety net that supports working people who are unemployed is in tatters. Employment insurance supports less than 30% of unemployed Albertans – it used to support over 90%. Social assistance levels are far lower than twenty-five years ago – and are totally inadequate, creating real poverty and hardship for Albertans in need.

This long, slow, measurable loss of workers’ rights has many causes. The increasing political power of big business most typified by the new international free trade agreements has undermined workers’ ability to bargain.

Corporate concentration in the media has created a culture where workers’ voices and the labour movement are marginalized and ignored.

The undermining of the authority of democratic institutions and the fragmentation of labour’s political solidarity have also contributed to the loss of workers’ rights.

While this measurable decline in workers’ rights and standard of living has been taking place, working people and their institutions have been frozen in time.

Unions organize the same way they did in 1975. They interact with their rank-and-file members and with other unions the same way they did twenty-five years ago. Political action and relationships with labour’s official political arm, the New Democrats, remain much as they were in the past.

Meanwhile, the world is changing – and not for the better from a worker’s perspective in most cases.