Workplace

Micro-Tasking: The New Digital Sweatshop?

Virginia Prescott — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:21:00 +0000

Every day, the internet is inundated with more information, and more data to be to be categorized, organized, scrubbed, and filed away in a timely manner. Millions of miniscule tasks need to be performed each day to keep things running smoothly. Computers can do some of this mind-numbing work; other tasks are done piecemeal by hundreds of thousands of people for almost no money; Amazon Mechanical Turk is a marketplace for this kind of work. Ellen Cushing is staff writer for The East Bay Express, she wrote about the work called “micro-tasking,” which pays a pittance, drawing comparisons to working in a sweatshop.

Is Social Net Speech Protected?

Virginia Prescott — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 14:29:29 +0000

From demanding access to employee Facebook profiles to soliciting job applicants via Twitter, the disparity in company policies surrounding social media are a marker of both its newness and its influence in our lives.

Women at Work

Jay Allison — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 13:00:34 +0000

The Exchange takes a break for this Labor Day special from Life Stories Radio: Women at Work.

Three women with vastly different jobs each take microphone and recorders in hand to chronicle their daily work. A pastor from a Chicago church, a seasonal farm worker, and a longtime judge all tell their own stories and reflect on what their work means to them.

Putting Your Paycheck Out There. WAY Out There.

Rebecca Lavoie — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 15:51:09 +0000

The popular website glassdoor has thousands of people posting their salaries, reviews of their companies, and other juicy corporate tidbits online for all to see. Does this mark the end of salary secrecy? And what do companies think about it?

For Freelancers, Landing A Workspace Gets Harder

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 07:42:00 +0000

The recession brought widespread unemployment across the U.S., but it also prompted a spike in the number of freelance or independent workers.

More than 30 percent of the nation's workers now work on their own, and the research firm IDC projects the number of nontraditional office workers — telecommuters, freelancers and contractors — will reach 1.3 billion worldwide by 2015.

Typically, freelancers get to choose when and where they work.

At Google, well-fed employees are a solid investment

Virginia Prescott and Gillian Ferguson — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 15:09:04 +0000

A look inside the thriving, health-oriented, and totally free food scene Google offers workers at its Mountain View, California campus.

The Factory Girls of China

Virginia Prescott — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 14:22:15 +0000

In the wake of the Mike Daisey debacle, we trace the true reporting of one journalist on the young, rural women fueling China's manufacturing boom.

Web only: Standing in the place where I work

Rebecca Lavoie — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 16:40:40 +0000

I've been standing at work for months and months. Not only am I less achey, but I'm more productive. Am I alone?

Stand in the Place Where You Work

Virginia Prescott — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 14:31:14 +0000

When workplace environments shift to standing, lives could literally be saved, says Dr. James Levine

Is White, Working Class America 'Coming Apart'?

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 21:33:00 +0000

According to the libertarian social scientist Charles Murray, America is "coming apart at the seams." Class strain has cleaved society into two groups, he argues in his new book Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010: an upper class, defined by educational attainment, and a new lower class, characterized by the lack of it.

Do you have Klout?

Virginia Prescott — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 16:59:00 +0000

A start up offers employers a new way to measure prospective employees by their use of social media.

Labor Tension Grows at Union Leader

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:49:00 +0000

Monday was the deadline for employees at the Union Leader to ratify a new 2-year contract. Company negotiators said failure to reach a new deal would result in layoffs and a 10% salary cut. Reporters, editors, advertising staff and others at the paper have unanimously rejected the new deal. Workers say this latest round of cutbacks threatens the paper’s standing.

Norm Welsh started working at the state’s largest newspaper back in the late 80’s.

He remembers those times fondly.

The Gas Dock Girls

Shannon Mullen — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 16:05:21 +0000

It's back to school time again, and lots of college students from around New Hampshire will be putting in their final hours at their summer jobs this Labor Day weekend.