Site search
sponsored by
News
Sports
When Dell Inc. settled a lawsuit brought by former employees, it closed an era that began with high hopes for employment growth and ended with workers dressed in pajamas standing in the Dell parking lot.
The class action suit, brought by two Roseburg men who claimed they were not compensated by Dell for some of their work time, resulted in an agreement which affected more than 1,400 employees in five states.
A new Dell call center in Roseburg in 2002 was the cause of considerable celebration. More than 3,000 people called the Dell job line within a month of the announcement that Dell would locate here. Hundreds of local people attended a job overview and information sessions.
Securing a new employer that promised 200 or more new jobs was a rare success for job creation in Douglas County. Making that happen involved the state of Oregon, Douglas County commissioners, Roseburg City Council, Umpqua Community College, Cow Creek Tribe and Umpqua Training & Employment, among others.
Incentives were part of the package to persuade Dell to locate here, the largest of which was a $2 million worker training grant. Those incentives were worrisome for some people. While they are a common tool for many communities, they were exceptional for Douglas County.
Employment at the call center reached 350 people by the fall of 2006. There was considerable community speculation about the high rates of employee turnover at Dell. Over time, with some training changes, employment appeared to stabilize.
Appropriately, many people are aggravated by the Dell experience. Dell churned through employees and many remain unhappy. Maybe most unhappy are the 200 people who reported for work one day, many dressed for pajama day, and found the doors were locked and their jobs were gone.
We don't understand, however, those who vow never again to aggressively court and recruit employment growth for current and prospective businesses with incentives.
Not all new jobs have the same economic impact. Costco, as an example, will create new jobs and most of the funds for those jobs will come from dollars already circulating in the community, presumably spent at other stores.
The Dell payroll, estimated at $10 million per year, brought outside money into the community. The loss of imported dollars is one of the many reasons that our loss of timber jobs so diminished the local economy.
The largest share of incentives to bring in Dell were for training and most of the people who received the training live in Douglas County. The city still owns the parking lots that were acquired.
There are many reasons for job growth, or the lack of it, that go beyond tax and training incentives — work force costs, productivity and capabilities, along with access to resources and markets, are high on the list. In a close race where communities are equally acceptable to a prospective employer without geographic requirements, incentives can be a tie-breaker.
We would have preferred to see Michael Dell jobless in the parking lot wearing pajamas rather than the closure of the local call center. Still, the result of bringing Dell to Roseburg meant many people received training, work experience and several years of paychecks.
Those paychecks would come in pretty handy right now.
The class action suit, brought by two Roseburg men who claimed they were not compensated by Dell for some of their work time, resulted in an agreement which affected more than 1,400 employees in five states.
A new Dell call center in Roseburg in 2002 was the cause of considerable celebration. More than 3,000 people called the Dell job line within a month of the announcement that Dell would locate here. Hundreds of local people attended a job overview and information sessions.
Securing a new employer that promised 200 or more new jobs was a rare success for job creation in Douglas County. Making that happen involved the state of Oregon, Douglas County commissioners, Roseburg City Council, Umpqua Community College, Cow Creek Tribe and Umpqua Training & Employment, among others.
Incentives were part of the package to persuade Dell to locate here, the largest of which was a $2 million worker training grant. Those incentives were worrisome for some people. While they are a common tool for many communities, they were exceptional for Douglas County.
Employment at the call center reached 350 people by the fall of 2006. There was considerable community speculation about the high rates of employee turnover at Dell. Over time, with some training changes, employment appeared to stabilize.
Appropriately, many people are aggravated by the Dell experience. Dell churned through employees and many remain unhappy. Maybe most unhappy are the 200 people who reported for work one day, many dressed for pajama day, and found the doors were locked and their jobs were gone.
We don't understand, however, those who vow never again to aggressively court and recruit employment growth for current and prospective businesses with incentives.
Not all new jobs have the same economic impact. Costco, as an example, will create new jobs and most of the funds for those jobs will come from dollars already circulating in the community, presumably spent at other stores.
The Dell payroll, estimated at $10 million per year, brought outside money into the community. The loss of imported dollars is one of the many reasons that our loss of timber jobs so diminished the local economy.
The largest share of incentives to bring in Dell were for training and most of the people who received the training live in Douglas County. The city still owns the parking lots that were acquired.
There are many reasons for job growth, or the lack of it, that go beyond tax and training incentives — work force costs, productivity and capabilities, along with access to resources and markets, are high on the list. In a close race where communities are equally acceptable to a prospective employer without geographic requirements, incentives can be a tie-breaker.
We would have preferred to see Michael Dell jobless in the parking lot wearing pajamas rather than the closure of the local call center. Still, the result of bringing Dell to Roseburg meant many people received training, work experience and several years of paychecks.
Those paychecks would come in pretty handy right now.
