I’m not often nostalgic about the way businesses and business owners once conducted themselves. No matter the Supreme Court ruling in 2010, corporations are not people, and they typically are not driven by the milk of human kindness. That’s not a negative perspective but rather an acknowledgment of the reality of capitalism, and what drives it. Profitable companies put the bottom line first and, often, the contributions of employees are not valued or even recognized.
Case in point: billionaire Jeff Bezos, who spent billions launching his Blue Origin New Shepard rocket, an attention-grabbing flight into space last July. There are billions more to be made from the commercial space travel Bezos is touting. His trip happened about a week after another billionaire, Richard Branson, launched his Virgin Galactic space flight. Bezos was excited to talk about his successful 10-minute, 10-second trip in a post-landing news conference. That’s when he made a point to mention his employees, saying, “I want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer because you paid for all of this.” His words weren’t received well by many Amazon employees who’ve had ongoing complaints about workplace safety, wages and what some described as abusive treatment on the job. Unfortunately, too many employees have come to expect the kind of tone-deafness Bezos expressed. And they’ve come to expect that their contributions to a company’s success will likely not be valued.
This brings me to my nostalgic business moment — remembering the actions of an employer who put his employees first. Aaron Feuerstein, former chief executive of Malden Mills factory, died last week at 95. Located in Lawrence, the textile factory was one of the last of its kind 26 years ago when a devastating fire destroyed the plant. Malden Mills burned for 16 hours, injuring more than 30 workers. It was December 11, 1995, the middle of the holiday season, and suddenly the 1,400 workers were out of work — they assumed for good. Feuerstein not only added a holiday bonus to their regular checks, but he also pledged to keep them all on the payroll for the next month. I cried learning of his generosity, and I know I wasn’t alone. It was a pledge he extended several times. Before he poured millions into rebuilding the factory, he and his employees worked together to get the mill going again in the finishing building, which survived the blaze. In one week, operations started up again. By January — just a few weeks after the fire — hundreds of Malden Mill employees were working full-time. In just under two years, he opened a brand-new complex. Feuerstein told 60 Minutes in 2002 he was “proud of the family business and wanted ... that to survive,” and he added, “I also felt the responsibility for all my employees, to take care of them, to give them jobs.”
In this still lingering COVID moment, workers have been inspired to reevaluate their lives in the context of their workplace environments. According to the Labor Department, in just the month of August, 4.3 million workers left their jobs. It’s the highest number in the two decades since the government has been documenting the numbers. As the GBH News series, “The Big Quit,” underscores, some employees have decided that a paycheck alone is not worth enduring toxic and or unsatisfying workplace conditions; they are willing to risk taking a risk by leaving. And just last week, Bloomberg reported a survey from Principal Financial Group Inc, which revealed a quarter of U.S. workers are considering either leaving their jobs or retiring early — a number that jumps to 34% when researchers included the workers currently on the fence.
Certainly, it’s a tough time for many employers coping with an extreme worker shortage, and for employees seeking wages and conditions that allow them to thrive. It wasn’t easy even back in Feuerstein’s time: he was forced to sell Malden Mills to Polartec to satisfy debt, and eventually, in turn, he was forced out of the company he loved. He told 60 Minutes he wanted his tombstone to read “I try to do the right thing,” and “He done his damnedest.”
Would that more would follow his example.
