Text 2. Works and wages in the UK

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 387.

Most of the working population in Britain – about 90 % – are employees who work for a wage, which is paid either weekly or monthly. Another 6% are self-employed, working on their own and paying themselves from the profits of their work. Another 3 % are employers who must first pay their employees and then pay themselves from the profits of their businesses. However, it is not simply true that the 3 % of employers directly employ all the employees. About a third of the working population are employed by the State. And many of the biggest “employers” in Britain are not individuals but trusts, or financial organizations representing hundreds or thousands of shareholders. These big businesses are managed; it is in the interests of managers to make profits, part of which will be put back into the business in the hope, that it will become even more profitable, and part of which will be distributed among shareholders. The management will be among shareholders.

Employees have different interests. They want more wages, easier working conditions, and as many benefits (extra advantages) as they can get out of the system, all of which must be paid for either out of the business before profits, or out of public money spent by the State. In private business, there is an inevitable conflict of interests between employers and employees, but usually specific examples of the conflict are resolved through negotiation bargaining, compromise. This is because the interests of both sides partly coincide. If the business fails to make profits, the employees can not be paid; if the conditions of work of the employees are unsatisfactory, they will not work well enough to produce profits. So workers have to calculate: “Do I insist on demanding more money and risk running the business? Or do I keep quiet and watch idle shareholders gathering in rich profits?” It a country where businesses fail regularly and where we have a high unemployment rate these are daily calculations.

State employees are in a different position. They include national and local government administration; almost all school teachers and university teachers, doctors and medical staff, many research workers, the police and all the service personnel (cleaners, caterers, technicians etc) required to the state organizations function properly. Many other groups of workers are also included (if not distinguishing between those employed directly or indirectly by central government and those employed by local government: they are paid out of public money).

Ultimately, their wages come from taxation, both of individual and businesses and from taxation on goods and services. So it is in the interests of these employees that the State should raise plenty of money — but preferably from business taxes rather than personal taxes. Also, it would be better if other parts of the State economy were less well-paid, so that they could be better paid. However, from the point of view of employers and employees in private industry, the less taxation the better, because they will have more money for bigger wages and bigger investments.

But employees are not only employees, whether they are employed in private or state sector of economy. They are also taxpayers, whose interest, naturally, is to pay as little tax as possible. And they are also consumers of State services, like health and education, where they want the best service possible – one which is well-funded from public money.

All these conflicts of interest mean that no part of the economy and no service provided by the society for its members can operate independently. Businesses are not “free”; markets are not “free”; the State is not “free”; though private industry and the State can operate with some freedom. In the middle stands the citizen, who, like any human being anywhere, wants food, housing, warmth, education, medical care, and then opportunities to move about, to enjoy himself, to make his home comfortable, and to make the future secure for his children. In order to do this he has to work, in order both to produce and acquire money so that he can buy.

(from “Understanding Britain” by Karen Hewitt)

Tasks:

put 8 questions to the text;

give the summary of the text;

retell the text as if you were:

1) an employer from a trust or financial organization;

2) an average citizen;

3) a clerk from a labor exchange;

4) an unemployed person.