Public/private corporation will play job role in future

 

By JOEL SNELL

In yesterday's column, I discussed how we now live in a global information society with vast economic organizations that transcend numerous nations. Under the umbrella of these multi-national corporations are companies that come together and are torn apart to keep pace with the global market and the fast pace that is necessary to pro-duce a good or service.

The post-industrial society thrives on rapid change and global markets. In the end, people who can be "smart" workers and use numerous talents with many companies throughout their lifetime will survive in this system. In the meantime, the job security once associated with working for one company throughout one's life is probably gone. For instance, Time magazine in March suggested many of us will live lives of being temporary workers, constantly moving from one job to the next.

The column ended with a question about those who cannot always be "smart" and always physically and emotionally stable to make the personal changes necessary to survive in the global market. What happens to them in the 21st century?

The basic foundation for an ever-changing market will probably be a private/public corporation to continually assign workers to new jobs. And when a worker is no longer desired by anyone, the corporation will assign them a job that is socially useful.

Critics will make fun of these jobs, but in the end most will support an arrangement like the WPA of the ‘30s. Critics will say this corporation is inefficient, and they will be right. However, what most will acknowledge is that it will provide for social stability and probably replace the social welfare system as we understand it.

Anyone can fall

All at first will fear that they, too, will become too old, too inadequate for the marketplace. Even very confident, talented and healthy executives will harbor doubts that they, too, will fall from the heights of the marketplace. Thus, this private/public organization will emerge. The wage will be low, but it will be steady, and after awhile the organization will probably become permanent. All can fall, and that includes college professors. And this will apply during both "good" and "bad" economic times.

The community college will probably be of paramount importance in retraining. However, the college will also become a social and emotional center to help individuals constantly make changes. There will be numerous seminars and courses to help people with change, but there will also be a hidden agenda. One can find others in the same situation, and they can support each other in socially acceptable ways. When the professional and middle class meet each other in the hallways, one can predict it will be an acceptable alternative to a future society.

All other agencies will work to try to give some social stability to constant changes. Churches, support groups and other voluntary organizations will thrive if they can give a generation of people without roots a i warm sense of community.

The mass media that can convey through sitcoms and dramas communal feelings will endure. Like "Cheers," a friendly bar where everyone knows your name, the media through hundreds of cable stations, will act as a community and a friend for many.

Family: Haven from the world

The family will endure as a haven from a constantly changing world. Families will probably double-up under one roof, not only from economic necessity, but for the individual's well-being. Those with intact, extended families will be seen as very fortunate.

When someone finds a friend in one community or another, that may be one of the ' most precious gifts of all. Families will bud-get money to be able to make long distance calls to friends all over the country.

Will this be a happy society as well as an efficient one? When Alvin Toffler wrote "Future Shock," he defined that word to mean a sense of alienation from one's place and one's time. He suggested if a society is to survive emotionally, it must change its companies, clubs, churches and other organizations to support the individual who may have to make numerous changes. If various organizations can help all of us, even the most talented who has temporarily fallen, that indeed will be a real contribution.

In the end, we may come to a situation where a steady wage is one of the best certainties of all. If it keeps families together and provides the individual with a sense of purpose, it means all of us can feel "the only thing that we have to fear is fear itself."

 

Joel Snell is a professor of social science at Kirkwood Community College.

Published in the Cedar Rapids Gazette: Thursday, July 1, 1993