December 19, 2005


Sorry, singles, we get stuck at work

By Larry Ballard
Des Moines Register

Workbytes has reached an important decision.
 
It's time to take a bride.
 
Maybe I worded that wrong. I should have said: It's time to take a bride,
pronto.
 
The reason is clear, and it has absolutely nothing to do with love, or emotional
security, or test strips that turn color.
 
This monumental matrimonial move is based solely on sound research.
 
And I've never been one to argue with research (even though I once proved,
beyond a shadow of a doubt, that cats don't always land on their feet).
 
The data tell me it makes good career sense to get hitched.
 
Just ask Thomas Coleman of the American Association for Single People. (The
organization's name sounds a little stiff, I know. But I can sum up their
holiday parties in one word: Dude.)
 
The AASP is a 3-year-old public advocacy group in Glendale, Calif. Coleman is
the executive director. He says, among other things, that single people are
treated unfairly at work.
 
He has plenty of statistics and a few thousand examples to back him up, such as:
 
• The guy who was told he couldn't bring a guest to the company picnic, even
though a co-worker was allowed to haul in a wife and eight kids.
 
• The office worker who was forced to work unpaid overtime when someone in her
department went on maternity leave and the company was too cheap to hire a temp.
 
• The telephone lineman who sued when the boss wouldn't add his longtime live-in
girlfriend to the company health insurance plan.
 
Coleman said insurance is where singles really get hosed. He calls it "the
marriage bonus," because benefits now make up close to one-third of the typical
American worker's overall compensation.
 
In other words, those of us who occasionally eat dinner while standing at the
kitchen sink are subsidizing those who drive minivans and finish each other's
sentences. ("We loved that movie!")
 
"It doesn't feel right, and it creates resentment," Coleman said. "The effects
are both economic and social, and it sends the message that single workers are
somehow less valuable."
 
He predicts the long-term impact will be bad for American businesses. I agree,
based on census figures and a bunch of other numbers the Workbytes staff pulled
from the Department of Thin Air. (It's in Colorado.)
 
The number of single employees in the U.S. work force with no dependents has
risen steadily to about four in 10. I'm no math whiz, but I'd say that's a
percentage of some sort.
 
Elected officials and government bureaucrats say they recognize the trend and
have started to do something about it.
 
For example, mayors and governors in about 33 states issued proclamations this
year that declared the third week of September "Unmarried and Single Americans
Week."
 
(It comes right after "Geez, Mom, Would You Please Just Get Off My Back About
It? Week.")
 
"With the United States on the verge of becoming an unmarried majority nation in
terms of its living arrangements, it's time elected officials took a crash
course on equal rights," Coleman told Workbytes.
 
Then we figured out that about 85 percent of Congress is married.
 
"Demographics don't change things, people do," he said. "And it's usually the
squeaky wheels."
 
Coleman said that employers have been slow to react because they think single,
childless employees are less committed to the company.
 
And singles keep their yaps shut because they don't want to be labeled as
malcontents or kid haters.
 
Workbytes recently conducted its own study, based on a conversation with my
friend Renee. She grew up in Decorah, matriculated at Central College in Pella,
and hooked on with a company that, if I mentioned the name, would probably make
her work weekends until she retires.
 
When I asked if she felt "singled out" at work, Renee joked: "Oh my gosh, yes.
Having to suffer through those office dinners without a significant other,
someone who will lurk with me in the corner and help me make fun of others, is
certainly painful."
 
Then I told her about Coleman's group.
 
"I guess I do get the feeling sometimes that people with kids and spouses are
more easily excused for appointments, pickups and drop-offs, etc.," Renee said.
"We singletons can be regarded with an 'Oh, it's OK if you work 16 hours a day,
because you have no one to go home to, anyway' sort of mentality."
 
Coleman said that the lineman with the longtime girlfriend lost his case in
federal court, so the couple got married — just to make a point.
 
Renee and I are registered at European Motorcars in Urbandale.