I chose social (service) workers, because Social Worker is a protected title in many states in the US but there are many people who do not have their degree/licensure who engage in the same if not similar work so I wanted to capture that.
Gonna preface my ideas with the fact that I have a basic understanding of the classes so I could be off base and would love feedback/corrections if I'm not applying the terms correctly.
I think the kneejerk reaction from people when they hear that someone works in social services would be that they are petty bourgeois, but I believe that because the field is so broad, and there is so much overlap in work that it is both petty and proletarian. For example, licensed Social Workers can engage in private or group practice where they work for themselves. At the same time, they have the option of working in the public/private/nonprofit sector if they would like, doing the same type of work or different, where they sell their labor to their employer. They can also do both of these things at the same time, or do one and then the other as they choose to change jobs. There are also people who do not have these qualifications who do essentially the same work, but can ONLY sell their labor to their employer, and do not have the option of starting their own practice, therefore I would consider them specifically proletariat. Their wages are often very, very low, typically to the point of qualifying for different types of low income assistance programs.
I think this probably gets more complex, too, due to the fact that the work has been professionalized over time with the advent of the degree and the licensure requirements while non-professional workers are still widely used and exploited in tandem.
Or, would Social Workers and social service workers necessarily exist in different classes from one another due to the professionalization of one and not the other (in the eyes of the employer)?
So yeah I'd love to hear any thoughts on this
Phew, okay, I have been so burnt out the past few days but I'm finally gonna respond to your thoughts here! I am VERY disorganized in my response, sorry if it doesn't quite make sense, I think I'm struggling mentally more than I realized. So if you don't have any responses here that's okay, I'm still super thankful for your thoughts and links to texts!
Idk if you read the comments between myself and ProfessorOwl, but there may be a lil bit more context there than what I will include here. They also noted that I was thinking of this question in terms of the workers relationship to capitalist society rather than it's relation to capital itself and I think that was helpful for me. I still don't know how I would classify the workers when looking at the relationship to capital specifically, though. I also would hope that my job would cease to exist in a communist society. If it would cease to exist, could that answer the question?
So this is part of where I feel a source of friction when I think about the work. I came to the profession because of my family background of poverty/trauma, and over time I have learned this lesson which was a tough pill to swallow, but it is true. However, in the US Social services are split between state run, public sector work, nonprofit, and for profit businesses. While nonprofits have origins in charity and served the purpose to substantially weaken social service unions in the public sector, they are able to broaden their range of services and their missions since the requirements aren't directly controlled by the state. So I feel that more recently, perhaps in the past 1-2 decades, more nonprofits have popped up that have missions in direct contradiction with capitalism; they recognize the harm that the state enacts on people and they want to mitigate that if not free people from it entirely. But "mitigate" is probably the key word, that's really all they can do at the present time...
That is interesting that you mention your government is trying to rid the profession of the educational requirements though....I'd be curious to know more about that, and I wonder if it is an attempt to follow in the footsteps of the US?
I think as I've tried to respond to you and ProfessorOwl, I really let my personal experience of this work influence my perception of it as a whole, and I'll be excited to read more and learn how to view things in a more scientific way. But to this, specifically since I work with the unhoused, I feel like helping these people survive is in direct contradiction with the wishes of the state though. Like, our government wants to throw them all in jail or to just die out, or at least that's how it feels. So in my day to day I do feel like my work is a sort of resistance. Idk, I think it's a hard pill to swallow, to think of this work as counterrevolutionary and so it should be abandoned and that more people should die....I know that logically this is not what is meant, but I don't know what it DOES mean, then? I would like to know if you have thoughts lol.
In the United States, one does need an advanced degree and licensure in order to do some forms of social work, most specifically therapy....But there are many, many positions where a degree is not needed, or only a Bachelors is required. So I have been able to engage in survival supply distribution, case management, and group facilitation, all without a Masters degree or licensure. Those of us without degrees, however, are often paid minimum wage or very, very close to it...Which if you know anything about America, minimum wage is pretty close to poverty wages. And this is where the big contradiction lies, for me.
Once I finally get my licensure, I will (hopefully) be able to double or triple my salary. I have 7+ years of experience, but because I don't have a degree and cannot bill to someone's health insurance, I am low income. And, much of the work that is available for people who do not have advanced degrees is in community mental health, which typically entails working with people who are unhoused, with substance use issues and severe and persistent mental illness, AKA close to the most complex population to work with. Long days, dictated by your employer, with impossible work loads of people who really do need skilled clinicians, all while being able to qualify for similar low income programs to your clients. These working conditions can be similar across public, private, and nonprofit versions of the same work. So in many ways, I see a lot of us workers closer in alignment with our clients, or other low income workers as opposed to anything middle class. I suppose there isn't really an answer or easy category to fit the entirety of the profession in, then?
Really appreciate the response and will respond properly later, also low in spoons.
Please take your time or if you have nothing to respond to or add thats okay too!
Also I would LOVE to read your dissertation, I feel like it would be super important work to add to the discourse. And if you would ever want or need info on the systems here in the UD I'd be happy to share my experiences