To MQ Recruiter - From a solitary MT

A comment from a post a few days ago has really been eating at me, so I'm finally compelled to respond.

"I work for MedQuist as a recruiter. We understand how transient the transcription world is (employees hopping from one company to another)."

One common misperception of MTs is that we're transients, more or less gypsies.  Years  ago, a VP of one of the very largest MTSOs told me "behind closed doors" that we were really just prostitutes whose pretty little heads could be turned by a single penny increase in cpl.

Here's a message for management:

We are not gypsies.  Some of us are homeowners.  All of us are tax payers.  Some of us have longstanding marriages; children to feed, raise, and educate; and elderly family members who need our support.  Some of us cheerfully volunteer to aid the less advantaged in our communities.  Some of us have religious beliefs and give joyfully and sacrificially to those institutions to ensure their survival.  Some of us try daily to have a positive impact on the communities where we reside for our entire lives.  Some of us can even be described as having an altruistic bent, or at least we did before you put our very livelihoods at risk.

Do you think we enjoy "hopping from one company to another"?  I guarantee that most of us would have stayed with a single employer these many years if we had any sense of security.  When you change the rules of the game monthly, pull the rug out from under us, and don't bother communicating with us, we know we have to look elsewhere to survive.  We don't get pleasure from this, but we are smart, strong, resourceful, and educated, and we will do what we have to do.

We do not live in tents and dance in circles under the stars at night with our livestock tied to trees.  And FYI, 1 cpl is not a minor thing; it can equate to thousands of dollars, as you surely must realize.

I envision management types sitting around their boardrooms discussing our fates as if we don't matter; after all, we're a slightly less than desirable group of vagabonds whose work and dedication have built your castles.  If we don't like what you spoon out, you know we'll just pack up our tents and load up our ragged little children and donkeys and find another community to drain of resources, just one step ahead of the law.