Month: March 2025

This week in class we learned about labor unions, including what they involve, why people join them, and their current trends in the working world. There are pros and cons for both employees and employers when it comes to labor unions.

The Pros

• Unions can advocate for employees to get better benefits and wages
• Unions help workers perform with striking to achieve better terms of employment
• Employees who are part of a union tend to earn more money (Kristof)
• Unions lessen economic inequality among working men in the U.S. (Kristof)
• Employees have better working conditions because of unions (Klawans)
• Union members become empowered and will be more productive at work (Klawans)
• Workplaces become safer because of the work of unions (Klawans)

The Cons

• Union dues can be expensive (Kasperkevic)
• Some unions have political affiliations or donations that some union members may disagree with (Kasperkevic)
• Unions may require an employer to spend more on their employees for better benefits, higher wages, etc.
• Unions may impose strict rules on workers and employers
• Strikes may happen more often because of unions

Discussion

Because I have been working as an intern in the construction industry for the past three years and I will go into construction full-time after graduation, I am very familiar with unions, as many subcontractor workers are represented by unions. The information I learned in class this week is similar to what I already know about unions and what I found out during my online research. The overarching idea is that unions are an ideal way for employees to protect their interests and bargain with their employers to achieve ideal employment terms and working conditions. Some other key takeaways I learned are that labor unions can produce more fair pay and treatment for workers, and that although union requirements make things more complicated for employers, unions are necessary to keep employees content with their jobs. Especially in construction, unions play a crucial role in protecting workers and ensuring they have adequate compensation and working conditions. If I were to work for a subcontractor in the future, I would certainly join a union to ensure I had representation on the jobs I worked and that I was being treated fairly with good compensation.

Citations:

Kasperkevic, Jana. “Why unions are so worried about right-to-work laws.” MarketPlace. February 24, 2017. https://www.marketplace.org/2017/02/24/push-nationwide-right-work-law-could-weaken-unions/.

Klawans, Justin. “The pros and cons of labor unions.” The Week. October 1, 2024. https://theweek.com/business/labor-unions-pros-cons.

Kristof, Nicholas. “The Cost of a Decline in Unions.” New York Times. February 19, 2015. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/19/opinion/nicholas-kristof-the-cost-of-a-decline-in-unions.html?smid=pl-share&_r=0.

Job stress is something that seemingly everyone in the professional world experiences, and it is essential to develop healthy habits to cope with job stress to avoid negative effects like burnout or illness that could reduce productivity. To learn more about how I personally cope with stress, I took the three tests required for this assignment.

Test Results

Based on my results from the three tests, I learned firstly that as of right now in my life, I have a low amount of life change and therefore a low susceptibility to stress-related health problems. This is likely because I have yet to experience many big events in my life that I will start to experience over the next few years after graduation, such as starting a new career, moving into a new place, or marriage. I also learned from the test results that when dealing with stress, I tend to focus more on the problem and trying to fix the problem, rather than working on changing my emotional reaction to the problem. According to the Type A test, I learned that I sometimes exhibit impatient or irritable behaviors while under stress, however I am not Type A enough to where I would be likely to experience health problems from that.

Steps I Can Take to Manage Stress in My Career

• Focus on work-life balance to reduce stress that can be caused by spending too much time at work
• Exercise to release endorphins that can help relieve my stress
• Recognize what changes I can make at work to reduce stress, such as not taking on more assignments than I can handle
• Participate in wellness programs provided by my company to improve my wellness and take advantage of company provided health benefits

The Role Organizations are Playing to Improve Employee Health

Organizations recognize the impact stress and other health problems can have on employees and therefore their presence at work, and how unhealthy employees may lead to greater turnover, higher health costs, and more absenteeism at the company. Specific conditions that companies are currently concerned about include obesity, mental illnesses like depression, low physical activity, high blood pressure, diabetes, infertility, substance abuse, and plenty more. Specific concerns in the construction industry, the industry I am going into, include suicide and physical fitness. To address their concerns, more and more companies are offering ways for employees to cope with job stress and live overall healthier lives. Some of these include:

• Fitness competitions: Companies may host individual competitions at work like step competitions where employees compete against each other to get the most steps, or they may sponsor competition teams like for the Hood to Coast race in Oregon to encourage employees to move
• Wellness programs: An organization may offer reimbursements for things like massages, gym memberships, nutrition therapy, or exercise equipment that can help improve employee wellness
• Expanded health benefits: Companies can include coverage for specific treatments within their health benefits that can help employees with problems relating to mental health, fertility, or oncology, for example
• Healthy workplace environment: Providing elements like ergonomic chairs, standing desks, healthy snacks, water, quiet rooms, and windows in an office can contribute to a healthy workplace environment where employees may feel less stress and experience fewer health problems

URLs to Websites Used for Research:

https://www.weforum.org/stories/2024/10/employee-health-programmes-obesity

https://articles.percihealth.com/employee-health-issues-in-workplace