Deliverers in a hurry of generalized uberization, butchers of junk food pigs, overqualified professionals of culture and education on the cheap, underestimated hairdressers or relentless domestic workers: the series The new proletarians paints the portrait of a new exploited and precarious world of work.
There is a family atmosphere in Martine Thibodeau’s bright house hair salon, near Joliette. The first three customers of the day laugh as they chat with Odile’s six-month-old son, Albert, who is bouncing on Audrey’s lap. Outside, the flakes of the first snow are slowly accumulating.
“Sometimes I play pranks, I say it’s $50 for psychological counseling and $60 for hair, because clients come here to tell me about their lives, and I make them laugh,” says Ms.me Thibodeau while preparing the pinkish blonde color for Odile’s locks.
The hairdresser, who has 42 years of experience, starts a working day of about ten hours, during which she will receive a dozen clients. No time to sit down and not much time to eat either, between shampoos, haircuts, cleaning tools, applying bleach and dyes and tasty anecdotes.
Like 61% of hairdressers in Quebec, Ms.me Thibodeau is self-employed. This is a trend that has increased by 5% since 2016-2017, according to the portrait of the profession produced this year by Personal Care Quebec, which is the sectoral labor committee for this sector.
To live decently, this single mother of two adults usually works more than 50 hours a week. “If you calculate by the hour, no, that doesn’t make a good salary”, admits the one who says she lives decently, “not rich, not poor”.
It takes passion to continue doing this job for so long, believes the talkative hairdresser with curly black hair. From her childhood, she loved “the smell of Spray Net” and wanted to beautify heads to follow in her aunt’s footsteps. But she deplores the lack of recognition given to this profession.
“I’ve often been told: you went to hairdressing because you didn’t know what to do at school. But I knew what I wanted in life,” says the holder of a vocational studies diploma in her field.
It is a profession that is 86% female, which requires a great deal of technical knowledge, continuous training, creativity, a lot of interpersonal skills and, for the many entrepreneurs, a sense of business and management.
Financial insecurity
A lot of stress is also part of it, because income is not guaranteed from one week to the next. For more stability or to obtain additional income, approximately 13% of hairdressers hold another job. In the event of health problems, the majority of these self-employed workers are not entitled to employment insurance benefits or sick leave, and they are at risk of seeing their clients go elsewhere.
“I had to have a hip replaced, and during that time I had no money coming in. I had cancer, I worked during my treatments, because I couldn’t afford to stop,” says Ms.me Thibodeau.
However, occupational injuries are quite common in this profession, which consists of repetitive movements and uncomfortable positions for the arms, back, neck and shoulders. “There aren’t many parts of the body where I haven’t had cortisone shots to be able to continue,” she points out.
It is also difficult for hairdressers to take advantage of their pregnancy or maternity leave. Manon Gendron, who has 31 years of experience, pays rent to occupy a chair in a salon in Rimouski. She worked throughout her two pregnancies and resumed her scissors after a two-month break.
“I had to keep paying for my chair, because otherwise the owner couldn’t keep it for me,” she explains. I was afraid of losing my customers. »
The pandemic has somewhat upgraded the profession of hairdresser, believes the Rimouskoise. “People realized that we were essential to their morale,” she says. But working conditions and incomes have not followed this impulse. Several hairdressers have indicated that they dare not raise prices to match the cost of living and the increase in their business expenses, especially the products used, since they face dissatisfaction from customers. They must therefore work more hours for the same salary.
“If I charge too much, my customers will come less often,” says Martine Thibodeau, who says she also receives less tips when she raises her prices.
Rose Harvey, she retired after 43 years. Although she loved hairdressing, this resident of La Malbaie says she put in so many hours of work “to [se] break the body, [se] empty “. Despite this, she and her spouse, also a hairdresser, today have “not much to live on”.
Shortage in sight
Carole Perron, hairdressing teacher at the Center de formation professionnelle des Riverains in Repentigny, is worried about young people starting their careers. She observes that a hairdressing elite, very present in particular on social networks, succeeds in rolling in gold. But there are all the others, struggling to make ends meet.
“She is sick, our profession”, declares Mme Peron.
If they choose to be employed, many hairstylists can expect minimum wage, often with commissions on services or products. However, it is possible for young people to obtain better incomes by working in the catering service, for example. Combined with the lack of social recognition, the job is not very attractive, believes Mme Peron. Public hairdressing schools have therefore lost 41% of their students since 2010.
Several hairdressers told the To have to that, according to them, the lack of supervision in their field harms the image and working conditions of the profession. Almost 40 years ago, the skills and background required to work, minimum prices for services, workers’ wages and even hours of operation were governed by joint committees that monitored what was going on in salons. hairdressing. However, today, anyone can theoretically improvise as a hairdresser and the prices vary greatly from one place to another.
“Those who do low-quality work tarnish the reputation of those who do extraordinary work,” laments Annie Gravel, hairdressing teacher in Montérégie, who believes that the 1,455-hour professional training, which is not compulsory, is far from superfluous.
Without hoping for a return to rules as strict as in the past, Mme Gravel is one of the many stakeholders in the sector who want certain standards to be put in place that would guarantee greater uniformity in the services and income of hairdressers.
The president of the Association coiffure Québec, Stéphane Roy, believes that fairer tax rules should be introduced to curb undeclared work. Self-employed workers only have to deduct sales taxes from an annual amount of $30,000, which would lead many to declare lower incomes than the reality. This could lead to unfair competition for other salons, according to Mr. Roy.
Martine Thibodeau makes it a point of honor to treat her customers with care. She has their heads and stomachs at heart, as she offers chocolates, candies, free coffee and even salted caramel Baileys. Like many other hairdressers, she would sometimes like certain clients to show her more kindness, by being less demanding and more respectful of her expertise. After 42 years, she has mastered her art.