There’s a disturbing trend going on in the U.S. workplace — more and more employees are raiding their 401(k) plans for a quick buck.

Here are some numbers on the uptick from the Wall Street Journal today:

Eighteen percent of workers had a loan outstanding from their retirement plan in 2007, up from 11% in 2006, according to a survey to be released today by the Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies, a nonprofit corporation funded by Aegon NV’s Transamerica Life Insurance Co.

Major retirement-plan providers are reporting a similar trend. The number of participants taking a loan from their 401(k) plans rose by 7% at the end of last year from six months earlier, according to J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.’s analysis of 350 plans nationwide that cover 1.3 million people. Those results followed a period from January 2005 through June 2007 when loans from these 401(k) plans fell by 15%.

There are a host of reasons for why you guys are tapping into your retirement plans, everything from the housing crunch to consumers loaded with too much debt. But cashing out, even a bit of money, can come back to haunt you.

In today’s who-knows-what-the-heck-will-happen economy, you could loose your job tomorrow, or realize you should changes jobs for whatever reason. That means you’ll have to pay back what you took out of the 401(k) in full or risk major penalties.

I know times are tough for many of us, but robbing Peter to pay Paul is never a good idea. It seems like easy cash because you don’t have to beg a bank for money or further max out credit cards, but this money is for your retirement, which unfortunately comes faster than any of us can imagine.

This is a great time to scale back spending, get on a budget and downsize your life.

Maybe it’s time to sit down with your boss and ask for that raise you deserve. Or maybe you should consider looking for another gig, which is how workers typically end up boosting their earnings significantly. Looking for a quick fix, which is your retirement savings, could spell doom. People, this is a temporary Band-aid, and it’s going to hurt when you have to rip it off.

Are they kidding me!?

From 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. yesterday, Starbucks shut down 7000 plus stores in the United States to “energize” its work force.

OK, at that time, they probably will have to pour a lot of serious espresso into their workers to get them moving, since that’s about the time employees are saying “see ya later buddy” and heading home to their loved ones.

I love how management at major companies think all they have to do is take three hours and then, suddenly, the downturn will head for an upturn. And, it’s all about those lazy, unenthusiastic workers. All we have to do is “energize” them and suddenly Wall Street will throw bails of money at us.

I think it’s an interesting stunt but getting workers motivated is about treating them right and getting them excited about how great a company is. Starbucks sort of had that, until they got so big it was like taming a global octopus. Have you been to a Starbucks on the New Jersey turnpike lately…it’s like the Wild West of hack baristas. My mom paid for a nearly $5 latte with $20 bucks and she got back $5 as change. When she asked for the rest of the cash, she was practically run out of the place.

An email to Starbucks got her a $10 certificate to Starbucks and an explanation that the company didn’t really own those Starbucks on the Pike. A third party supposedly managed those coffee shops and Starbucks just sold them its name.

OKAY, this is the problem folks. A company getting too big for itself.

Workers don’t know what storyline to follow because there really isn’t a storyline anymore.

The CEO Howard Schultz thinks a three-hour, almost bedtime story will help reinvigorate the caffeine giant but he may be dillusional:

“We are passionate about our coffee. And we will revisit our standards of quality that are the foundation for the trust that our customers have in our coffee and in all of us,” Schultz wrote in a memo titled “Howard Schultz Transformation Agenda Communication #8.”

You want passion from your workers, earn it. Unfortunately, committing three hours to the effort is like Starbucks coffee lately — weak, cold and limp on the foam.

In this blog, you’ve heard me rail against corporations that disregard workers, and the consumers of their products. And you’ve read my posts pointing the finger at government agencies who are supposed to protect worker safety and uphold the rights of workers but drop the ball.

Well, today I want to point the finger at workers.

A lot of people across the country are outraged at the recent meat recall at a major meat packing company in California that supplied ground beef to schools around the country. There are actual videos of workers prodding and poking sick cattle to get up as the animals headed for slaughter.

This is a bad thing because the government strictly prohibits to consumption of sickly cows because they may carry Mad Cow disease.

Despite this fact, workers supposedly were encouraged by managers to brush aside this fact and get the bovines dancing.

From the Wall Street Journal today:

The video showed workers at the company’s plant here forcing sick or injured cows into slaughter by kicking them or ramming them with forklifts.

Thanks to those workers and managers, the meat from those cows ended up heading right for the bellies of little kids. And the workers must have known this. Did they themselves feel okay eating this meat?

I know, the U.S. Department of Agriculture must take some blame here, especially since this particular meat, because it’s heading for school kids, required even more inspections by the goverment agency.

And I know, the company, Hallmark/Westland Meat Packing Co., must take some blame here as well. The top dogs know what’s going on in their own facilities. I have seen first hand how plant supervisors keep on top of every bathroom break their workers take. I can’t imagine they missed something like this.

But folks, I want to lay a lot of the blame at the feet of workers today. If the workers at the facility refused to engage in this illegal behavior this would not have happened. If workers reported the problem to government inspectors, who had come to the plant often, this wouldn’t have happened.

I know, if an employee stands up they risk their job. I understand that. Employers retaliate in this way against their workers often. But when is enough enough?

I address this issue in my column today on MSNBC.com.

I am in no way diminishing the importance of holding the USDA or Hallmark/Westland accountable.

But it’s about time that we realize we also contribute to the ills of the workplace, ills that unfortunately end up pouring out into our society at large.

We’re all responsible for the bad beef out there, no?

UPDATE BELOW –

Is our government turning a blind eye to worker injuries, and even death?

I know you’ve all heard a bit about the deadly sugar plant explosion in Georgia. Maybe you caught a bit of the story on the nightly news. Yet another accident kills workers. We let these stories just disappear into the next day’s news. Remember the mine workers in Utah? Probably not.

I don’t blame you. We get bombarded with news everyday. We all hope someone investigates these tragedies. We all hope someone, or some agency, or some corporations is held accountable. The sugar refinery tragedy was heart wrenching.

From the Associated Press:

SAVANNAH, Ga.—A vase of red roses sat in front of the church altar Saturday, flanked by portraits of Truitt Byers and a blue baseball cap with the logo for Dixie Crystals—the brand of sugar produced by a refinery where the 54-year-old was killed in an explosion.

The first memorial services for Byers and the other victims came a day after crews recovered the final body from inside the Imperial Sugar refinery in Port Wentworth west of Savannah. The explosion killed nine people Feb. 7—eight found dead inside the plant, and a ninth worker who died of burns at an Augusta hospital.

The major question is: Could these accidents have been prevented? In this case, the answer might be yes.

(more…)

As expected, the nation’s unions are lining up behind their favorite candidates.

Last week, the Service Employees International Union, representing nearly 2 million workers, threw their support behind Obama.

“This is about more than one election. It’s about building for the next generation of America,” said SEIU President Andy Stern. “Barack Obama is creating the broadest and deepest coalition of voters we’ve ever seen.”

The Teamsters have yet to endorse any candidate, but AFSCME chose Clinton; the Food and Commercial Workers chose Obama; the American Federation of Teachers and Machinists chose Clinton; Unite Here and the Plumbers and Pipefitters chose Obama: and the Letter Carriers and Amalgamated Transit chose Clinton. (All this according the the Wall Street Journal.)

Now, many of you may have thought union support would be a no brainer for Hillary. Well, there was one little thing in her husband’s past that is coming back to haunt her–NAFTA. You remember NAFTA right? The North American Free Trade Agreement. Many in labor saw Bill Clinton’s support of NAFTA as a slap in the face of U.S. workers. Lots of jobs did indeed go South of the Border, and manufacturing jobs continue to disappear in this country.

Obama made a shrewd move on Wednesday, choosing to pander to a crowd of auto workers.

This from the Detroit News:

JANESVILLE, Wis . — Calling the current economic downturn “a failure of leadership and imagination in Washington,” Sen. Barack Obama pledged Wednesday before an audience of General Motors workers here to restore economic balance to a nation that has forgotten the middle class.

In a speech heavy on policy specifics, Obama spoke in a makeshift auditorium just above the assembly line floor where more than 2,000 workers build GM’s largest sport utility vehicles — vehicles Obama has criticized in the past as signs of a domestic auto industry unwilling to adjust to a new, environmentally conscious era.

Hillary is doing what she can as well to pander to the rank and file.

This from the Wall Street Journal:

Mrs. Clinton described herself as the “candidate of, from and for the middle class of America” to roundtable of voters in Cincinnati.

“It is wrong that an investment money manager in Wall Street making $50 million a year gets a lower tax rate than a teacher, a nurse, a truck driver, and autoworker making $50,000 a year.”

It might be too late for autoworkers. Their numbers are shrinking more and more every day.

I chose the word “pander” to refer to what these two candidates are doing because at this point it’s just that, pandering. Many workers are at their weakest point as far as job stability and negotiating power in the workplace today. And these candidates know the right thing to say to them. But the proof will come after one of these candidates, or McCain, are in office.

Hopefully, these labor groups that are so vocal now about getting their support behind these candidates will keep the fire burning when the next president doesn’t live up to his or her election promises.

Has it gotten that bad?

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission thinks discrimination in the workplace is so bad they had to enlist to help of jazz musician Wynton Marsalis.

From the EEOC:

The announcements should help heighten awareness of race and color discrimination as the EEOC advances its national initiative to bring a fresh, 21st century approach to combating racism, which remains the most frequent claim filed with the agency. E-RACE (Eradicating Racism And Colorism from Employment) is an outreach, education, and enforcement campaign to advance the statutory right to a workplace free of race and color discrimination.

“The EEOC is proud to partner with Wynton Marsalis to convey this information,” EEOC Chair Naomi C. Earp said. “His participation enhances our message and ensures that a broad audience will be apprised of the importance of equal employment opportunity.”

Discrimination and harassment have reached ridiculous levels in offices and plants across the country. I wrote about this issue for MSNBC a while back.

Do you think Marsalis will make a difference?

Would it have been smarter to also use some famous white guy in the PSA telling people not to spew hate?

“This is not our grandfathers’ economy,” says Andy Stern, president the Service Employees International Union, today in response to the end of the Hollywood writer’s strike.

“Today’s global marketplace asks creativity and forward-thinking from us all,” he adds. “As new technologies continue to change our country and the world around us, we need to ensure that all working people are justly rewarded for their work.”

Stern, who head up one of the biggest unions in the country with nearly 2 million members, is referring to the concessions the writers got regarding Internet royalties. Basically, they wanted a cut of the money made by studios when shows, that the writers wrote, end up streaming on the Web or on cell phones, or other techno gadgets. This type of repackaging of shows and movies on the Web is fairly new and no one is quite sure how much money it will translate into down the line, but the writers believed they were owed a piece.

After three months on strike, workers are ready to go back to work and unfortunately, it seems, they didn’t get that much. But that’s the way negotiations go, especially when new technology is involved and there’s little incentive by businesses to share the wealth.

So, back to Stern’s comment about it not being “our grandfathers’ economy.” He is not kidding.

We are going through a monumental change in the economic structure of this country. We all know about the fall of manufacturing.

Just yesterday General Motors announced it’s offering buyouts to 74,000 employees.

With reductions in a host of industries, what will be left and who will have the leverage? You would have thought writers, who are not easily outsourced, would have carried a lot of weight. But even they spent 3 months on a picket line and then felt compelled to take less than they wanted.

Tell me all you employees out there. Do you have power in the workplace? Are you treated fairly and paid a fair wage? I’d love to know the industries/professions that even our grandfathers would be proud of.

If you don’t like the look of my blog, or aren’t that impressed with its functionality don’t blame me, or any other women out there.

A man designed it.

Not that there’s anything wrong with men or the fact that a man designed my blog. That’s just the way it is.

In fact, there are few women out there designing blog interfaces. And for that matter, there are few women doing tech stuff overall.

I know, I know, there are some. (My good friend Sabina designed my book website and her talent is unquestionable.) There are some great women who are masters in information technology but they are few and far between. And the numbers of female IT professionals are actually declining.

I address this issue in my MSNBC column today. Where are all the women IT nerds? You would have thought women would make up at least 50 percent of the IT ranks by now.

Should we care that fewer women are entering IT? Technology is advancing quite nicely with little input from women. Is that a bad thing?

How do we make the world a better place? We stand up and make our voices heard when we see something that’s just not right.

That’s what an employee from Merck did. He was asked to engage in unsavory behavior and ended up becoming a whistleblower who ended up pocketing millions for his efforts.
This from the Associate Press:

A sales manager who “just couldn’t abide” by the way Merck wanted him to market the drugs Vioxx and Zocor to doctors took the lonely step of filing a whistleblower suit against his employer.

Seven years later, Merck & Co. will pay $671 million to settle complaints it overcharged government health programs and gave doctors improper inducements to prescribe its drugs.

And whistleblower H. Dean Steinke, the Michigan sales manager whose lawsuit led to about $400 million of the recovery, gets a $68 million reward.

“He did it because he really, truly thought that Merck was doing the wrong thing and he just couldn’t abide by it, even though he was putting his career on hold,” said Steinke’s lawyer, Steven Cohen of Chicago. His small firm, which specializes in such cases, will receive an undisclosed share of the award.

To be fair, this is one of those unusual stories. Whistleblowers rarely end up rich and famous. Many times they just end up without a job and struggling.

But it always pays off for the person who says no to unethical behavior, or exposes unethical behavior — way beyond money. Why? Doing what’s right is nourishment for your heart and soul.

And these tiny acts make the world a better place. I’m not just being a wide-eyed idealist here. I’m serious. Only we can make this spinning ball less bouncy.

There’s been a bunch of news that doesn’t bode well for employees of all levels.

The service sector, which includes everything from hotels to your local hair salon, is showing signs of serious weakness. The Institute for Supply Management reported its service sector index fell to 41.9 in January from 54.5 in December — the biggest drop in a decade.

Typically, in an okay economy, the service sector continues to thrive because most people don’t cut back on things like shopping for clothing or eating out. But when you have companies that provide such services saying they expect to cut back on purchases, which is what the Institute’s study found, that means consumers aren’t doing their part by spending, spending, spending.

So, that means, service sector employers, everything from retailers to banks, will have to cut back on, what else? Workers. And in the service sector, you will probably see those rank and file jobs disappear first.
But management is not immune. In another ominous sign, Macy’s announced today it was cutting 2,300 management jobs.

Now is a good time to pick your head up and look beyond your cubicle and assess where you think your employer is in this economic mix. Does it seem your bosses are putting money into the business and looking to grow? Or, have you noticed that the office manager isn’t replenishing pens lately?

I’m not saying anyone should panic, but you need to know what’s going on around you so you can be in control of your career’s future.