Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Explain to us why we do need unions. They've done their job - effectively and well. We now have the legal framework in place, thanks to the unions, to render them obsolete. They only exist now to get undeserved pay and benefits for their members, and to make their own leadership very wealthy.
Anyone who believes that unions are actually still necessary is a fool. Most of the pro-union people I meet in real life and converse with online are already members of one union or another. Of course they're going to support unions - they'll keep getting them their undeserved raises. Deep down, though, I have to believe that they know that their employers are being bent over by these extortionists. And make no mistake about it - that's exactly what it is: extortion.
The most glaring example I've seen of unions abusing employers is in the entertainment industry. Why does anyone need multiple, overlapping health insurance policies? Why should someone be paid for eight hours of work when they were there less than fifteen minutes? Think about these things the next time you pay an astronomical ticket price for a movie or are complaining about half the TV show being commercials...
I knew there would be several detractors in regards to how people feel about unions. It looks like there are more people for than against, but not by a huge margin.
The two chief posters who vilify unions seem to be Fractured Guy and Swagger. I give Fractured Guy credit for addressing the issue that some industries DO need trade union representation. That opinion has been noted in several of his posts.
Regarding Swagger, it is very apparent that he considers unions evil-period. I won't get into how he feels about the union reps and the rank and file workers themselves, I believe the evil description fits his opinion. That's OK. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. At least Swagger is up front with it. Again, the comment, "If management would treat workers right you wouldn't need unions."
Swagger, it's apparent that you won't give me the benefit of the doubt. Did you ever consider that a supervisor of a company with happy employees would adhere to that statement? Yea, there are supervisors who feel that way. I personally know a few of them. And of course, the union movement feels that way. So who am I? Management? Labor? Thanks for not asking.
I rarely post in this particular forum and even rarer that I've ever talked about my personal life, But considering where I am at career wise, job wise, and future wise, I'm going to talk about a couple instances and organized labor has a direct bearing on these instances.
I was 19 when I joined the Teamsters Union, it was in the construction local. It represented work on highway paving, excavation, bridgework, tunnels, mines, pump stations, power plants, and the like. It's tough work. It's crappy work. Wages when I first got into the trade was $4.00 an hour depending on the truck you drove, the semi you drove, the warehouse you had responsibility for. This was 1969.
Our local seemed to have problems dispatching men to work at certain projects on certain work shifts, especially controversial projects. And it didn't get any more controversial than the Fort St. Vrain Nuclear Plant north of Denver. I was out there for about 9 months when an incident changed my life like I would have ever known.
When I first joined the teamsters my Dad told me how things were when he joined. Working conditions were usually poor, benefits were non existent, workers were treated like cannon fodder. When I joined up, benefits finally started regarding health and welfare insurance, vacation, and retirement. The contractor paid ten cents an hour into each fund per worker. My Dad offered me advice that would really hit home with this incident I will talk about in my next post. He talked about backing up your worker, to work for 8 hours pay you gave 8 hours work, you took pride in your work. But more importantly, you respected the other craft workers.
Location: Jonquil City (aka Smyrna) Georgia- by Atlanta
16,259 posts, read 24,766,887 times
Reputation: 3587
Quote:
Originally Posted by fracturedman
I have never seen a union that did not base promotions on seniority. That is not something that a union and a business should have to do. Unions have no right to tell a business how run...if you dont like working for them then quit no one is forcing you to work for them. However, if unions are allowed to set up meetings at all business between them and employees...and only a handful have to vote it in...30% or more. Then the union gets in...I do not support unions and If I want to work for a company it should be between me and that company. not me, the company and a union. I think a union should be a seperate entity that you pay on a monthly base per your choice. Then if a time come when you need them..they are there. Kinda like a lawyer who you pay similar to insurance. But the unions should not be allowed to force a business's hand. When a business is faced with a union they have two choices...allow the union in or go out of business...there is no compromise for the business.
If Obama gets his way Unions well be in all jobs and people like me will be out of work. We will have no where to go. Once a union sees that I went from working at a union to working "across the line" they will not hire me.
I am sorry but, if a union is on strike like albertsons was a few years back, and albertsons was paying $25 an hour for people to be "scabs"...I went. I was paid for my hard work and loyalty to the company...do you know how much those that where striking got? bout $10 a day...yep that seems worth it to me.
And now becasue I have crossed a picket line...I am blacklisted...I know, I have applied at union stores and was told by a manager that the union said they cant hire me...How is this right?
Show me a picket line and I'll show you loyalty and hard work.
What do you mean by "promotions"??? I have been in a union for decades- first NABET and now CWA and they do not control "promotions" at all. You are either "craft" (represented) or you are management (non represented). The union has NOTHING NADA ZERO to do with who become a manager. That is totally up to the company.
In craft there is no such thing as a "promotion" per se. There are different pay grades for different job titles and, yes, if an opening comes up in a different job title with a higher pay grade, the union contract states that QUALIFIED employees in a lower pay grade may bid for the job and that the job will be awarded to the candidate with the most senority that is QUALIFIED for the position.
To be QUALIFIED for the position, you have to take and pass all required written exams for the position, you have to have worked in your current title for 24 months prior and you must have no disciplinary reports in the past 24 months. Only then can you apply for the "promotion" and even when you get the promotion you have to pass all required schools for it to become permanent.
The only other thing that the union contract controls is not "promotions" but "bids and transfers" and these are done by senority too- as well they should be. If you are hired in and put on the 3 to midnight shift and you stay on it for the required 24 months and an opening comes on the 8 to 5 shift, why should a new employee get it instead of you if you want it?
I done a variety of things on my night shift, I was the sole teamster on a work shift that had over 175 craftsmen. The main contractor on this site had no use for unions and let everybody know so, despite the fact the craftsmen in THEIR company belonged to their own union.
I ran about 90 to 100 transactions a night, issuing material, tools, etc. to crafts from laborers to ironworkers to welders and everyone in between. I would drive the project ambulance if someone was hurt and had to get taken in to the hospital. I would jump into the pickup and pull a compressor for the painters, or haul acetylene bottles for the pipefitters. On occasion I would back the semi trailer to the loading dock so the pipefitters would load fabricated pipe on the trailer for the day shift. It was hard a*s work, but I was 19, ambitious, hungry. I was making a whole two dollars over minimum wage.
The main contractors employees took a dislike to me as they were denied materials, tools, and other items and I was under orders NOT to as they had their own warehouse to draw their material from.
One day I no sooner started the shift and the shift supervisor told me to get the project ambulance out to the main gate NOW! Down the road one of the day shift electricians flipped on his motorcycle and had a horrible accident (he subsequently never worked again). I had taken, on my own account, an advanced first aid safety course, and I am forever grateful that I remembered a few items. The injured worker was bleeding profusely for the next 20 minutes and two different times I had to pull over, with the lights still flashing, to help the medic control the bleeding. We got him to the hospital and I was just shaking. I had never seen anything like that before, I was 19 years old, for crying out loud!
On the way back, I got involved in an accident where I almost bit the bullet myself. I was coming over I-25 on the state highway when an RV driven by a senior didn't see me (not sure how you can miss an ambulance), and pulled out in front of me. I T-boned him as I had one second to react. The project ambulance did not have shoulder harnesses back then and a lap belt did not help in this case. My head hit the windshield which shattered, and I was hanging over the steering wheel. I was unconcious for a day and a half. Don't remember the surgeries.
While I was in Longmont hospital the main contractor (PSC), told my foreman I was going to be fired for piling up the ambulance. As this hit the paper and tv, I'm sure they were not wanting THAT type of publicity. Another reason being they figured I was not wearing a seat belt. They did not bother to check the accident report as the lap belt WAS buckled but I hit the rv so quick and so hard it didn't hold me.
It took the electricians no time at all to react, they dropped their tools and headed for the gate. They went to their cars and stayed there. As this was told to me in the hospital, I was blown away. My dad was right. When you get wronged, people will come to your aid. I was off work for three weeks, and another item happened. PSC caught so much hell about the fact that one teamster was servicing 175 men that when I left the site to run the injured man in things were chaotic at happy Valley. I'm not sure who drew up the manpower chart, but PSC's contention was the manpower chart stated that at this stage of the job x amount of laborers, plumbers, etc. would be employed, and one teamster. My company hired three people to work my shift until I was healthy enough to return to work. PSC was shamed into it by Gulf General Atomic, who was writing the checks for the project.
They had a big powwow that next day, and the electricians went back to work. I made a lot of friends I didn't know when I came back. At that time I understood what unions were about. The electricians were appreciative of my efforts. The main contractor wanted me gone. I'm thankful for those electricians, and a lot of the other craftsmen, who stood behind me.
Wal-Mart is a good example of an anti-union company, but in China all employees working in Wal-Mart stores are allowed to join a union, and it's the same story in Russia.
Wal-Mart failed in Europe because they did'nt do their homework, if they had, they would have realised that German workers were not going to accept the kind of crap that most of their American colleagues had been swallowing for years.
Wal-Mart had special phones installed in their German stores for employees to inform on their colleagues who were active in the union.
It's ironic is it not that a Wal-Mart worker in Russia has more rights than his American colleagues.
I'm a self employed professional, I've never needed a union, but there are people out in the world that certainly do.
Man, you are a predatory employers dream. You’re telling me that a brain surgeon should be willing to do his/her job for seven bucks an hour and do it well—work his/her **s off? In hopes that someday his employer (god) might be willing to throw him/her an extra crust of bread
I on the other hand hope that I only visit a neurosurgeon who is competent based on his/her surgical record not his/her membership in a union. We live in a capitilistic society that drives the cost of labor for a neurosurgeon to market values. These skilled surgeons (and their patients) would be ill served to be part of a union that normalizes pay without respect to their abilities.
Wal-Mart had special phones installed in their German stores for employees to inform on their colleagues who were active in the union.
Germans rat out their fellows Deutchlanders? Puleez... if they didn't smell the smoke from Buchenwald or Dachau, what makes ANYONE think they'll see the guy next to him pocket a pack of gum?
In a recent survival thread a few posters mentioned how "getting together in groups would help assure survival".....when I said , You mean like a Union?" I nearly killed the thread.
There IS power in numbers like in:
Armies
Lobbyists
Political parties(that's a BIG Union!)
Countries
Protesters
Strikers
And the idea that ALL union workers are lazy and incompetent obviously comes from people who have taken great pains to NOT notice the total incompetence of NON-Union workers(management/CEOs) in the financial/banking/automotive industry....
how have they been doin' on the job?
How many of them have been fired?
How many got HUGE BONUSES with YOUR taxes for failing?
Another FACT:
IF a Union worker wants to climb up the ladder they can.....I have seen many union people go into non-union jobs in the same company and had no problem leaving the union.
Of course, they never again got overtime for those 12-14 hour days or working weekends and they lost their pension and could be fired if their boss was having a bad day or wanted his son to have their jobbecause they nolonger had union protection...
but they had no problem leaving the union
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
