The unstoppable rise of the Nanny Company

THE phrase “the nanny state” was coined in 1965 by Ian Macleod, a Tory MP who was furious about the Labour government’s decision to introduce a 70 miles per hour (113 kilometres per hour) speed limit. Surely true-born Englishmen had a right to condemn themselves and others to a horrific death by driving as fast as they could?

These days the nanny is just as likely to be the company as the state. And, for the most part, the nannying makes sense for everyone concerned – employer, employee and society at large. It is time not only to note but to celebrate the rise of the nanny company.

Nanny companies have a long history. In the early 20th century, US Steel spent US$10 million a year on employee welfare programmes – “to disarm the prejudice against trusts”, as the chairman of the board informed his colleagues. Milton Hershey built a town to service his chocolate factory in the middle of Pennsylvania where, he pledged, there would be “no poverty, no nuisances, no evil”. Henry Ford sent inspectors to visit his US workers to check for whiskey bottles and communist tracts. He went further in his factory town in Brazil, called Fordlandia, putting the meat-loving residents on a vegetarian diet of oatmeal, canned peaches and rice, and, still worse, obliging them to participate in group dances.