This essay focuses on autonomy and control over the work. through 10 to enhance and improve on your Essay, answer the following question:
ins on all sides, double-spaced with a 12pt font (preferably Times New Roman).
Do Not Use Any Outside Sources!
Essay 2 (For Peer Review) will be due on Monday, July 26th by 11:59PM
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Using the readings from Week 6 as a foundation and then other readings and viewings from weeks 7 through 10 to enhance and improve on your Essay, answer the following question:
Are you for or against Taylorism? In other words, should we continue using Taylor’s methods now and looking to the future—for production not only of tangible goods (cars, computers, phones, etc.) and services (like the person who takes your order at McDonalds) but also for the “knowledge economy?”…That would be the knowledge economy you are preparing to enter when you get your degree.
Things to Consider:
The Work Is Deadening!
From the readings, it’s clear that by dividing up tasks, simplifying the work, using assembly lines, conveyors and the latest technology, we use people, electronic devices and machines to make stuff cheap and accessible to the masses on a global scale. But going all the way back to Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, the question arises, “at what price to workers do we get access to all these products?” In his day, Smith stated that, “The man whose whole life is spent in performing a few simple operations—with effects that are always nearly the same. There is no occasion to exert his understanding or to exercise his invention.
to remove difficulties that never occur. So he naturally loses the habit of such exertion, and generally. This becomes as stupid and ignorant as a human creature can possibly become.” Harsh words from the same person who marveled. This is at “the division of labor” and what it could do for society. And not so many years later, across the Atlantic, in the early to mid-19th century. There are owners, as well as employers of the late 19th century. They were very much about the business of figuring out. This is how to control labor and make “it”go faster and more efficiently…(“it” meaning workers—human beings).
Slaves and Workers Resisted!
It is also clear from the history that slaves and workers resisted! At Homestead, skilled workers fought to the bitter end to preserve and protect their autonomy and control over the work.
Taylorism and Your Future Job