What Polish migrants may mean for weekend workers

Simon Munton - Tue 06 Jun, 2006

...Lets take a look at the so-called "Polish invasion". Since the EU widened its membership in 2004, any of its citizens can pretty much freely live and work in any member state. Many Polish (and other former Eastern Bloc citizens) can earn as much in Britain in one week as they can in a month or more back home. And, by and large, theyre more than happy to do the kind of jobs that we dont want to...

I pick up inspiration for my weekly Trend Spotter email alert from lots of weird and wonderful places.

This week’s missive came to me in a flash at about 2:50pm Saturday. It was half-time in England’s 6-0 rout of Jamaica.

I needed milk so I leapt out of my armchair and robot-danced down the street to the corner shop.

It’s a typical ‘standing-room-only’ affair in Ealing, West London – packed floor to ceiling with essential groceries, confectionery, booze, medicines...

And a whole section dedicated to Polish breads, pickles, yoghurts, cakes, biscuits, meats, beers and other indecipherable goodies.

I’m guessing you’ve read that the influx of 350,000 Poles to the UK since 2004 is thought to be the biggest single wave of immigration for 300 or so years!

And businesses – like my friendly Ealing corner shop – aren’t stupid. Of course they’ll stock things that local people want to buy.

It got me thinking about the knock-on trends in the areas of commerce, employment, salaries and the wider impact on society. What’s it going to mean for us in ten, twenty years’ time?

And also, I’m pretty convinced that this trend will ‘dovetail’ with some other, equally ground-shifting societal developments that look set to grow over the next decade or so.

So let’s take a look at the so-called "Polish invasion". Since the EU widened its membership in 2004, any of its citizens can pretty much freely live and work in any member state.

Many Polish (and other former Eastern Bloc citizens) can earn as much in Britain in one week as they can in a month – or more – back home.

And, by and large, they’re more than happy to do the kind of jobs that we don’t want to. But that doesn’t mean they’re unskilled...

Talk to your Polish plumber, waiter or receptionist, and you’ll find that more than a fair sprinkling of them have university degrees!

Many lodge together to save money (West London and Crewe are particularly famous for their "Baltic enclaves") and they’ll send cash home... in many cases to buy property in their homeland.

Now, whatever your views on this you can be sure of one thing: the market doesn’t care. Just as businesses migrate to where labour is cheapest, so labour will pitch-up where it can earn more money.

Quite simply: most Polish service-industry and manual workers are prepared to work for longer and less than their British counterparts.

And the BBC reports that UK employers are pleased as punch – both with the cost-cuts they’re able to make, and the general hard-work attitude of the Poles they’re employing.

Now, if you’re not entirely enamoured with this development, you might not like what I’m about to say next...

Employers and business leaders in Australia are pushing to have the weekend abolished!

Businesses Down Under want employment laws to change and have Saturdays and Sundays re-classified as 'normal working days.' And this is being seriously considered by the Aussie Government.

It’s obvious why: they want to remove higher wage- rates for weekends. Employers say that if they are expected to open 24/7, why should weekends be viewed any differently, as far as salaries are concerned?
You have to admit they have a point. But what will this law mean if it comes in here?

If Saturdays and Sundays are no longer considered "unsociable", employers won’t have to pay double-time to weekend workers.

Now lots of us choose to work weekends for that very reason: we give up our free time because we can earn more per hour than on Monday-Friday.

But without that incentive, many weekend recruits will quit... And who will be waiting in the wings?

350,000 eager Polish workers, perhaps?

I also think the attitude of younger people in affluent Western societies like our own - the workforce of tomorrow – will have a huge bearing on the service sector in years to come.

Researchers in the US have found that Children no longer believe in the idea that ‘anyone can succeed’. Instead they feel that individuals actually make little or no difference to their own lives.

They feel their future is in some way pre-ordained by society and circumstance – instead of by their direct choices and actions.

According to the research they are more impulsive and impatient; less prepared to do difficult things or make sacrifices to get what they want.

I’d love to expand upon this apparent abdication of responsibility... another time, perhaps. For the purposes of today’s bulletin, the prognosis is clear:

In Britain, we like to have the freedom to shop when we want. For some of us, shopping is now a leisure activity in itself. It’s a natural consequence of rising materialism and consumption.

But employers think it’s unfair that they have to pay for this in the form of higher wages for what were once deemed "unsociable hours".

And our future generation is growing up to believe they can have everything NOW – but are not prepared (it would appear) to have to work hard to get it – and certainly not for less money.

So who is likely to step in and save the day? Who will keep our shops open at weekends, and ensure that our endless drive for material wealth continues apace?

350,000 eager Polish workers, perhaps?


Regards,

Simon Munton
for The Daily Reckoning