An advertising campaign by the Swedish contruction worker’s union has the temerity to suggest that preventing immigrants from competing on price helps them avoid exploitation. Basically, by not working, you’re not being exploited, goes the reasoning. Of course, unions, like any other interest group, should look after their members, so if Swedish construction workers want to lobby the government for mercantilist laws to protect them from having to compete with eager hardworking Poles and Latvians, let them; but they must not be allowed to get away with baldfaced lies: They are not on the side of the poor; immigrants are not being exploited when they undercut Sweden’s union rates. Instead, it is Swedish consumers who are being exploited by high prices when they cannot access competitive labor markets.
The whole point of free trade and the free movement of labor — indeed, the raison d’être of the EU — is that countries specialize in producing those goods and services they have a comparative advantage in. For Poles, their advantage is price. For Swedes, it is technology. Both countries will have far more winners than losers when they trade goods and labor, but it is important to realize that you cannot have those winners without the losers. The solution is not kneejerk protectionism, it is training those who lose out so they can find new jobs. A generous welfare state makes this solution all the easier.
No luck getting this message across in Europe. Except for Ireland and the UK, all current EU member states will prevent acceding member states’ citizens (except the minuscule ones) from looking for work on their turf when they join, for up to seven years. Read this Guardian Special report. It reads like an ode to callousness.
And it is the perfect recipe for disillusionment. Take one EU, problems and all, then throw out the redeeming bits. Now stuff it down the newcomers’ throats. The upshot: Belgian EU citizens can work in Sweden because they are already rich. Polish EU citizens cannot, because they are too poor.
At least the British government “says it expects economic benefits from migrant workers,” according to the Guardian. Why can’t anyone else see this? Jean Monnet is turning in his grave.Under helgen bestämde jag mig redan att jag skulle skriva här på svenska om Byggnadsarbetareförbundets annonskampanj som jag märkte up i tunnelbana förra veckan. Idag, lyckligtvis för er som pratar bättre svenska än jag, skrev Peter Wolodarski på DN allt som jag ville säga, men i mycket bättre svenska och i mer detalj. Kampanj är skamlig.
Jag vill bara stryker under några saker. Jag kan förstå att Byggnads vill tillvarata deras medlemmars intressen, och att det betyder att de inte vill ha invandrare som jobbar för mindre pengar här i Sverige, därför att Byggnads inte är konkurrenskraftig med invandrare. Men Byggnads ljuger helt enkelt när de påstår att de vill hjälpa invandrare undvika utnyttjande. Invandrare som kommer till Sverige som byggnadsarbetare tjänar mer pengar här än hemma. Det är inte dumpning. Dumpning betyder sälja under kostpris för att ödelägga konkurrensen.
EUs utvidgning bevisa att det inte är invandrare som utnyttjas, det är vi svenska konsumenter som är utnyttjat av Byggnadsarbetareförbundet. De är för dyra i den nya EU.
Jingoism is certainly on the move in Europe, whether in the form of cultural protectionism, anti-Islamic symbolism or the Dutch plan to expel 26,000 asylum seekers – including people who have been in the country for over a decade and whose children,have been attending Dutch schools for years. I just read about that one in today’s FT.
Given the constant social strains in my home country, USA, I don’t feel schadenfreudal or righteous. Just sad to see erstwhile liberal democracies behaving badly. But this happens in any democracy; moods swing against rationality; politicians pander to base instincts. There’s nothing to do but fight and write, argue and annoy, slog and blog.
As I understand it, in most of the current EU countries, it’s not absolute bans on workers from the accession countries, rather fairly high limits on their numbers that are put in place. So, it’s undignified and ugly, but in the grand scheme of things, not that callous.
Actually, it says “guest workers”, not “immigrants”. Otherwise I couldn’t agree more with your analysis.
Free trade seems to be running into difficulty all over. I wonder, though, if the current bulge in protectionist and mercantilist sentiments actually reflects a trend, or is simply a combination of US presidential candidates’ pandering to frightened voters (“I’m about saving US jobs!”) and wealthy EU countries’ jitters about the upcoming expansion (“The Poles are coming!”).
On a different note, these posters implicitly equate cheesecake poses with exploitation. Evidently that’s a strong enough meme in Sweden for these ads to work. Would the average urban American or Dutchman automatically make that connection?
Anyway, hats off to you for your brave battle with the rigors of Swedish.
And Jame…Jingoism? Don’t you mean something more like xenophobia?
I feel uneasy myself using the term “guest workers”, as if they should be grateful for the trouble they’re putting us through for hosting them. Perhaps “migrant worker” is a better term, one that also incorporates illegal immigrants.
I take those terms to mean different things. Though I’m not sure whether there’s any difference in their legal status.
An “immigrant” is a legal alien: a person with a permanent residence permit who may (or may not) be in it for the long haul. “Migrant worker” is resonant of my California childhood: workers, mostly Mexican, who follow the harvest – presumably short-termers, and very likely illegal.
“Guest worker” or “gästarbetare” presumably springs from “Gastarbeitar”. It has the feel of a translation in either English or Swedish. Sounds legal. In Sweden, they’re also called “arbetskraftsinvandrare”. In the sixties, Sweden had such a labor shortage that companies recruited workers in Turkey and the Balkans. The workers were given ordinary work and residence permits and employed on the same terms as locals. I agree that the term sounds condescending, as if the jobs were some sort of generous alms.
Nowadays, many Poles and Balts work in Sweden as direct subcontractors to building companies. Since they bill their employers as subcontractors rather than working under collective agreements as Swedish employees, they deftly circumvent Sweden’s odious employment rules. They’re not guest workers, in the sense of those workers from the sixties. They’re not immigrants (invandrare) either. They’re foreign nationals making what for them is good coin. And they’re brutal competition for Byggnads, who are understandably miffed.
Tough.
The ugliness of those glarey pictures is spot on.
Yeah, xenophobia. But I’ve had Teddy Roosevelt on my brain recently.
Robert: I don’t agree that the term sounds condescending. If it’s from German, for most people it means what it says, no more, no less.
real men don’t unionize. real men build own house. real men found own WMD.
This is “welfare nationalism” at work. It is quite logical that this campaign has been very successful, since LO – the Swedish Trade Union Confederation of which Byggnads is a member – not only funds a large part of the Social Democratic Party (SAP) but lobbies i n s i d e the party. The president of LO is on the board of the party. Thus, there is no clear distinction between party and trade union. In effect, this means no clear distinction between union and government since SAP has virtual monopoly on government power. And this in a country with a weak judiciary (not for us a constitutional court), a clown of a figure head of state-monarch and a parliament in which MP:s rubber stamp whatever the party leadership decides, lest they be ostracised. In the end the result is that Polish and Baltic workers will come anyway (they are already here) and work for much less pay, without any legal protection. Byggnads can pride themselves with having protected their (probably dwindling numbers of) employed members. And by the way, how come there is a shortage of housing in all bigger cities in Sweden?
dumpning är rätta ordet varför betala en svensk medborgare 150 spänn i timmen när dom kan få en polack för 35 spänn i timmen? ska dom hit och jobba så ska det va på lika villkor! så det blir den som jobbar på bra och gör ett bra arbete som har jobb och inte den som jobbar dumpar lönerna