In Thee I Do Not Trust

I've been reading articles about the growing number of employers who perform background checks, which includes hiring firms to research candidate's online profiles on message boards and places such as MySpace and Facebook. Nothing has been said about right to privacy in one's private time, so I guess I need to. What someone does in his/her own private time, whether that be debate political and social issues to sharing photos of that wild trip to the Bahamas is just that--personal. Personal in that this individual is free to express themselves in whatever way they so choose when it is done outside of work time. However, employers are finding new ways to discriminate. Speaking out against Bush? Supportive of Medical Marijuana? Gay and lesbian marriage proponent? Or opponent? Got a photo of you inebriated or showing a little too much skin? If a potential employer reads your views and doesn't support them, or finds your photo distasteful, this can disqualify you.

As the article in which I read stated, in today's world of finding a good employee, which is becoming much more difficult (according to the article that is), employers must employ a variety of sources and tactics to determine what kind of a person they are considering as an employee.

This begs the question: What about the personal life and views of the employer? And of the other applicants? Will this suspicious spying be allowed to go both ways? Another question screaming to be answered is: Why are "good employee's" so difficult, supposedly, to find these days?

Perhaps it's the crappy pay most employers offer today. The stagnating wages. The ever-increasing, at enormous percentages, cost-of-living. Perhaps it's the diminishing benefits. The At-Will Employment Law, which offers nothing of benefit to the employee but instead, the employer, which takes job security and tosses it out the window. Perhaps it is the Corportization of America that has most Americans fed up and distrustful of the entire "working for the man" agenda. Perhaps the more employers become distrustful of potential employees, employees in turn become more jaded and distrustful themselves of anything with the word "employer" attached to it.

Let's return to the days when a handshake and a word were enough to seal an employment arrangement. When a living wage wasn't a negative term and was the norm. When benefits were an expectation instead of a luxury or something to beg and bargain for. This growing investigate-at-every-level trend, surrounded in suspicion, sure isn't guaranteeing employers of an employee they can trust. It is only serving to fuel the disgruntled worker.