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Once again - I don't know where the OP came up with the idea that "republicans" hate unions -
Not only do I know republicans who are members of unions - including leadership - I know democrats who "hate" unions - won't have anything to do with them
Me thinks the OP just wanted to start a "Flame" thread??/
breaking up the unions has been on the conservative agendas for 3 decades now.
No flame thread intended, just want to know what the other side thinks. Whats wrong with that??? I have actually given rep points to those who oppose my opinion. Im sorry if I offended you.
Unions were created to cut 16-hour workdays and to keep children out of the "bessemer process" which is how they used to make steel. They were also created to give workers something to fall back on - a safety net - in the event of an accident or desperate need.
There is no use for any of this as there are laws to enforce most of these issues, and besides, we don't make anything anymore because unions drove the costs up so much that the jobs fled overseas!
All you do when you treat people bad, is lose them to employers that will treat them better.
Well, I can't speak for all corporations, but mine treats me just fine. My company understands the value and knowledge that I provide and they compensate me accordingly. It's a 2-way street. You provide a service to a company at a price. They compensate you for your service.
No one owes you anything. A corporation shows its gratitude by giving you compensation. Any time that compensation isn't sufficient, you can always try and sell your skills somewhere else.
Yet another example of Republicans voting against their own economic interests. Wake up Americans! This country's middle class is going down the toilet because we are rapidly losing any worker protections or power.
whats the deal, I don't get why you feel the hatred. What do you know that I don't know after being in a union that has protected my working conditions for years. Do you want to go to 1 dollars a day in aweful conditions like the china model. Hey china is profitable....at the expense of billions of lives.
Please explain your view. Please tell me in what way you are personally hurt by those EVIL unions.
Thanks.
Good question.
Here are my 2 cents based upon my father (republican) and what I've seen with my uncles (union members) and read etc.
Unions are not automatically good nor bad. They are very very good when protecting workers from abuse. They are very very bad when the union uses it's power to abuse others.
In general I feel most unions are a good thing especially if democratically formed and if they are not punative or coercive of their members. However, some unions have too much localized power and resort to sabotage, violence and other tactics to basically extort others.
Examples:
1) They can prevent progress at the expense of savings to consumers etc.
Manifest clerks on the west coast (long shoremen) basically take ship manifests and type them into the system for about 100k a year. These are cushy jobs with high pay that typically go to family and friends of high ranking union guys. They wanted to automate the system and NOT FIRE ANYONE but reassign and phase out jobs. Union opposed it.
2) Building a "green" building in philly that used low water gravity toilets. Plumbers union opposed it because there wasn't as much work for them.
They were so influential they wound up building the tower with a full set of pipes that didn't connect to anything.
3) Union plumbers in some areas requiring heavy metal pipes still be used instead of pvc because it's less "work" to install pvc piping.
Positive examples are more latent, basically enforcing decent wages and benefits. Safety standards perhaps at one point but with workers
comp laws and the tort system that's probably less important today than it was back in the day. (So getting these laws passed would be another plus)
Unions were created to cut 16-hour workdays and to keep children out of the "bessemer process" which is how they used to make steel. They were also created to give workers something to fall back on - a safety net - in the event of an accident or desperate need.
There is no use for any of this as there are laws to enforce most of these issues, and besides, we don't make anything anymore because unions drove the costs up so much that the jobs fled overseas!
Unions that support your politicians have put pressure to keep conditions livable.
To the second point, if the only way the industries can survive is by paying them 80 cents a day for a 13 hour day, then perhaps its better that these jobs do go somewhere else. When wages are decent, it helps out OUR economy. If wages are stagnate, as they have been for over 8 years, then we start heading very bad economic times. Jobs headed over seas because they have the tax incentives to do so, don't blame the unions.
Jobs headed over seas because they have the tax incentives to do so, don't blame the unions.
Tax incentives are a pretty complicated way to explain manufacturers going overseas. The simplest explanation is that labor costs are the biggest chunk of expenses in the manufacturing process, and that when labor costs are so reduced overseas that they offset the additional expenses such as shipping costs, businessmen are going to go where they can manufacture goods for the most cost-efficient price. We've moved into a global economy, and moving those jobs overseas potentially creates a new market for the goods the manufacturer makes. It's not tax incentives, it's profit incentives that have moved manufacturers overseas.
The problem I have with unions (and I'm not a Republican) is that they add another level of bureaucracy to the workplace. Bureaucracy stifles innovation, encourages mediocrity, and rewards attendance rather than achievement. I know many people who belong to unions and are hardworking individuals who have every right to be proud of the workmanship they bring to their employers. But they are only a part of the story. Unions protect employees, but they create an adversarial relationship between employee and employer that wastes resources. They too often exceed their mandate of advocating for the working man when what they are really doing is promoting the interests of the union management. I'm not saying they are past their time, but unions should be managed by the working people they ostensibly represent, not by professional unionists.
so do you wish we were more like China, make up your mind, do you like communism or not.
You say unions = communism...do you know what communism is? Im not sure how collective barganing has anything to do with communism.
and what is wrong with China? One of the largest growing consumer powers in the world. More money flows through that country than we have coming into ours.
Communism in China can rarely be seen
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