I am going to let you guys in on something I bet most of you don't know about

[NNN0LHI]

The UAW historically set the pattern for other unions. The UAW was once on its way to making a four day workweek the standard in the US. Think about that. Could you use an extra day off per week?

After the UAW negotiated Paid Personal Holidays(PPH Days) in 1979 unemployment started dropping and the auto industry was hiring like hell. They had to. Had to have new workers to replace the ones who were off enjoying life a little bit with their families.

-----------------------------------------------

http://www.local387.com/Year_By_Year_Gains.htm

UAW-Ford History of Benefits Contract Gains:

1941 - 1996

June 1941

Recognition
Seniority
Representation and grievance procedure
Union Shop
No discrimination
20.4¢ per hour general wage increase
2 hour call-in pay
Time and one-half after 8 hours
Double time for Sundays and Holidays
5¢ per hour shift premium

1976-1979

More time off, P.P.H. Days
Hearing Aid Benefits
Wage increases 70¢ per hour over contract life
Skilled Trades two-step wage increase, 15¢ more
Inverse seniority for layoffs
Dental Care Program improved
Full time Benefits Plan Representative
Disciplinary Record Use shortened to 3 years
Separate vacation checks
Shift premium applied to all holidays and paid absence allowance, vacation, etc.
SUB improvements
Retiree inflation protection

--------------------------------------------

Now you are going to have some folks posting here about how a four day work week is impractical. They will be using the same old arguments that someone else used when we went from a six day workweek to a five. Its all BS.

Don

[xchrom]

1. Recommend

[liberalmike27]

42. Never Have I

Felt more like shooting myself in the head, than for a month where I worked 85 hours and 80 hours a week, alternately. It was the most ridiculous schedule I've ever worked, for Meadowgold ice cream, in distribution.

Sixty was bad enough, for another company, where I always felt bad, and sleepy, and like life was about very little but work.

Forty was manageable, though four 9's, or 4 tens would be workable. I love the idea of the 4 day work-week, and maybe now is the time, since our unemployment is so high.

Truth is, I think they like for people to work huge numbers of hours. When folks are off three days, they might do something silly, like, actually read some books, learn something, or find out more about what is going on with the media, or the political process. Keeping people busy, with work, AND recreational activity is what keeps a whole lot of rednecks in the dark about how fast and hard they are being pounded by republicans, and the government in general.

[Enthusiast]

86. 80 is inhumane and should

be illegal.

[Nay]

125. And don't forget--companies like working ppl 60-80 hours because

it costs them less in fringe benefits, hiring costs, etc., even if they have to pay overtime.

[BonnieJW]

56. I HATE when someone bad-mouths unions.

My grandfather came here from Czarist Russia. He was a tailor in Chicago. He supplied his own sewing machine and the only thing the boss gave him was the work. If they didn't want to freeze to death in the Chicago winter, everyone brought a bucket of coal to work. They worked from dawn until late at night and sometimes he would take work home. He got paid whatever the boss wanted to pay that day.

When people ask what good unions are, I tell them

good wages
health insurance
a 40-hour work week
paid vacations
workers comp
safe working conditions

My sister once said unions were good once when we didn't have those things. I asked her how long would it be before the corporations took all that away if not for unions. They won't do it out of the kindness of their hearts.

[AnArmyVeteran]

63. Reagan was president of a UNION but then turned anti-union to get votes.

Reagan did more harm to the middle class than any other president. Under Reagan it became necessary for two wager earners in a family to afford to have a house. And yet Reagan is worshipped by ignorant conservatives.

[valerief]

79. Yep, Reagan and the puppetmasters who had a hand up his ass. nt

[sulphurdunn]

81. After I got out of the military in 1970

I got a job as a rent a cop for Blue Cross. One of the CEOs came in after hours one night and was really tanked. Since there was no one else to talk to, he unloaded on me. He was ranting about all the trouble unions caused, and then he looked me straight in the eye and said, "but we're gonna take care of that. We've got a guy down in California, Ronald Reagan, and we're gonna make him President, and he'll kick labor's ass."

[Enthusiast]

87. Ignorant is the word.

Voting against their best interests. Because Carter is 'weak on defense'. So fucking stupid.

[NBachers]

112. Reagan was also a stool pigeon, snitching out the rank-and-file

From Time Magazine, Monday, Sep. 09, 1985

Ronald Reagan's acting career hit a lull in the late 1940s. Despite parts in minor films such as The Voice of the Turtle and That Hagen Girl, he became increasingly preoccupied with his more important role during Hollywood's "Red Scare" as head of the Screen Actors Guild. It was revealed last week that the future President played another role as well: as a secret FBI informant, code name T-10. According to an article published in the San Jose Mercury News, documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act indicate that Reagan and his first wife, Actress Jane Wyman, provided federal agents with the names of actors they believed were Communist sympathizers.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,142352,00.html#ixzz0qbUTO0kp

fuckin' rat

[hlthe2b]

2. Agree totally....Don

I am amazed at the anti-union sentiment that seems to be increasing in recent decades. I don't think we are educating our kids at all about what has been accomplished by unions.

At dinner a few weeks ago, I encountered a well educated professional (who I guess is probably libertarian, though he was socially liberal-moderate). His big beef with unions and thus his overt bristling when I defended them is that he feels the good pay they got for blue collar workers diminished him given his years of education and profession paid him little more. I tried to argue a bit on this issue, but it seems a visceral one that is probably tied in with all the Reagan-Ayn Rand BS the RW has been promoting the past decades, i.e. the pulling yourself up by the bootstraps myth... :shrug:

[NNN0LHI]

3. I educated my kids as they grew up

They were taught from a very early age that people who drive scab built cars(Including their teachers who did so) are imbeciles.

They are now teaching their own kids the same thing.

Don

[whathehell]

6. My parents did the same for me...and I've always been solidly pro-union. n/t

[reggie the dog]

8. Don? are you my dad posting without me knowing???

for real he is named Don and he taught me the same ways. Does your oldest boy live in the south of France????

scab is the worst insult, i crossed a strike line once on my last day of a contract to say goodbye to my students and even that felt bad....

[NNN0LHI]

13. Had two daughters and no sons

I have two grandsons now though. I am retired and still young enough(thanks to the UAW) to really enjoy having them around.

And I wouldn't have crossed that picket as you did even to say goodbye. I would have telephoned my best regards to them.

Don

[NBachers]

113. One of the prime rules I preach: "Don't Cross Picket Lines!"

[tango-tee]

123. Third-generation union member here.

And in our family that has always been an iron-clad rule: No crossing picket lines.

[MicaelS]

10. I'm not surprised

It's the denigration of those who work with their hands, by those who work with their minds. And you're right, it's jealousy. I see comments on other forums (technology forums) to wit....

"Why should they get paid all that money? Any idiot can use a wrench. They were too stupid or lazy to go to college, unlike me. I went to college for X years, spent all that money for college, and I don't make that kind of money, or here they are making the same money as me."

And many of them do express the libertarian philosophy of "I don't owe anyone anything."

And many of the liberal-moderates are fine with the working class, as long as the working class knows and keeps their place, which is at the very bottom of the scheme of things. After all the working class is not educated, and thus can't expect to know what is their true best interest. They need to do what their betters tell them to do. :sarcasm:

[Kalyke]

25. I love it when they say, "Any idiot can use a wrench," and, yet,

they don't fix their own cars, the plumbing in their homes, or repair their HVAC systems, roofs, etc., and couldn't if they tried.

:rofl:

[Control-Z]

102. They're the same people

who had to memorize "righty-tighty, lefty loosey", and still get it wrong half the time.

edit: stupid typo

[laughingliberal]

26. You know, it used to frustrate me that sanitation workers made more than I did as a nurse

But my view of that was not that sanitation workers should get less but that nurses should get more. I really reject the idea that we can't all have a fair wage and time to enjoy our lives. Americans just settle for so little. People can talk all day about our horrible diets, etc...but I believe the conditions under which we work are the reason for our lowered life expectancy compared to our European brethren.

[Dappleganger]

35. For the responsibilities which nurses have, they're never paid enough!

My mother was a nurse and she was paid shit wages, but she worked so hard and loved what she did (elder care). She covered more doctor's asses with her skills. When she passed away almost two years ago, so many of her coworkers (nurses AND doctors) showed up to say how great she was at her job. But I have so many friends who are nurses who are the same way, they get treated like dirt at times and are expected to always make the doctor look good while taking the blame. If you know a nurse give them a giant hug and a kiss today!

[axollot]

124. My 20yr old son is a CNA (literal bum wiper at the old folks home)..

..going to nursing school. Never thought he would come this far. He busts his bum now doing 60-80hrs a week if he can get it. I love nurses and the care they give and so happy my son chose it as his profession!

Cheers
Sandy

[hlthe2b]

47. Exactly...

[WillyT]

4. K & R !!!

:kick:

[Loki]

5. My father was UAW

I know first hand what union families sacrificed during strikes to ensure that workers had these benefits and through their willingness to stand to to big corporations, all workers benefited from that. Republican's are always longing for the good old days, that is just a code word for "before unions" when the worker was for all intents and purposes a slave. Now we have a President who is using anti-union rhetoric and I'm angry, no beyond angry....pissed. If you are anti union, my wallet will be closed....period.

[reggie the dog]

9. I am beyond belief that the Democrats have become anti union

FDR must be rolling in his grave.....

[Sebastian Doyle]

62. The "Democrats" have become anti-Democrat.

You could hook up FDR's corpse to a turbine generator and power your house by now.

[Enthusiast]

88. Before unions and before civil rights. nt

[TxVietVet]

110. My wallet has been closed for the Democratic Party

since Pelosi said impeachment was off the table. No impeachment, no money. No investigating the bu$h/cheney regime, no money.:wtf:

I give to PROGRESSIVE CANDIDATES. They just happen to be Democrat. I contributed many an dollar to the Democratic Party's committees. Never again. I can say that I've tried to explain it to them a hundred times and they still don't get it.

Too bad. I'm not out any money to the party. It helps PROGRESSIVE candidates, though.

[reggie the dog]

7. I am proud to be a union man

SUD Education here in France, and am the son of a proud union machinsist (i still wear my dads old machinists for kerry t shirt when i go biking) WORLD WORKERS UNITE!

[Sherman A1]

67. +1, Agreed & Well Said!

Same here....

[lunatica]

11. You have no argument from me

As inadequate as my pay is I owe the fact that it's as high as it is to unions. The times I've spoken out in my workplaces have been because I have that right because of unions. I considered it my obligation to defend the rights unions have worked to give us.

[Broke In Jersey]

12. anti-union views are justified

I believe the negative attitude towards the unions are more & more justified. They used to be a morally strong unit against corporations that looked down on the worker & took advantage of their skills in every way possible. But now they seem to be as selfish as the companies are.

Here in NJ the teacher unions could have really helped public opinion in their favor but they sacrificed it for the almighty dollar. In my town the average property tax is over $9,000/yr most of which goes to the schools. The teachers make IMHO a very good salary (and justifiably so - avg is over $74K in my town). The teachers in my town could have skipped their 4% raise for just this upcoming year and had NO layoffs. Instead they decided to vote to keep their raises & lay off 68 teachers. You don't win fans with moves like that. Out of 24 professional people I know, only ONE has had a minor raise in the past 3 years, 5 had to take pay cuts and the rest are either are a the same salary as then or are looking for work.

[NNN0LHI]

15. That is because you fell for the right wing bullshit

The reason there is no money in your state to pay for teachers is because you lost your manufacturing base and in turn your local tax base that used to pay those teachers. Thank your neighbor with that Honda in his driveway for that. Not unions. Here see:

http://www.globalexchange.org/war_peace_democracy/oil/1589.html

Associated Press
February 22, 2004

EDISON, N.J. (AP) —When the Ford Motor plant closes its assembly line Thursday, it will continue the steady departure of manufacturing jobs from New Jersey, particularly in the auto industry.

New Jersey's auto industry once included plants in Mahwah and Edgewater and had more than 14,000 workers in 1970.

After the closing of the Ford plant, that number will drop down to little more than 1,000. General Motors, which operates the state's lone remaining auto plant in Linden, said last week it will lay off 350 of the factory's 1,350 employees.

In all manufacturing, New Jersey has lost 241,000 jobs, or about 40 percent, since 1990.

-----------------------------------------------

Can't lose 40 percent of your manufacturing and the taxes that come with it and keep paying everyone like you used to. That is for sure. Your property taxes are replacing the money your state used to take in from payroll taxes and isn't any more. That is what is going on in your state.

Forest for the tress ...

Don

[Broke In Jersey]

18. OK - excellent point about the manufacturing leaving & going overseas but.....

what does that have to do with my post of the public views towards unions?

We could lose 100% of manufacturing IF IF IF its replaced by other better paying jobs. Which we have done in this state to an extent. The avg salary is either 1st or 2nd in the nation. And the high prop tax are mainly because it costs $26,400 to educate a high school kid in my town - has to do with too many administrators making $300,000+, red tape, waste....and NOT the teachers but they aren't winning any friends by sacrificing their own for the almighty dollar.

And as far as you points on blue-collar jobs - I blame EVERY president over past 25 years for that. Wish we had someone that believed in FAIR trade instead of Free trade. How about someone giving a damn about the american worker instead of the slave labor over in China.

[NNN0LHI]

21. Can a president dictate to people what cars to buy?

Top 10 cash for clunkers purchases

1. Toyota Corolla
2. Honda Civic
3. Ford Focus
4. Toyota Camry
5. Hyundai Elantra
6. Toyota Prius
7. Nissan Versa
8. Ford Escape FWD
9. Honda Fit
10. Honda CR-V AWD

These are personal choices made by our fellow Americans. Doesn't have anything to do with any president or politician. Be nice if our politicians could legislate against stupidity but they can't.

Don

[Broke In Jersey]

29. not a logical argument

You are telling me to buy a so-called american made product no matter the cost, quality, or reliability. I'll bet you have a foreign built TV. Why don't you buy an american one??? I guess you're an example of YOU being the problem since we cannot legislate against stupidity.

[Broke In Jersey]

33. no,

but a president can even the playing field with US blue-collar workers vs. foreign slave & child labor making $1 an hour.

[Hawkeye-X]

66. Don, I love my car.

It's a Honda CR-V AWD. My parents, however, own two GM-made cars (Cadillacs). My purchase was out of necessity than convenience (Wife wanted a mini-SUV) and we had a good deal from our Honda dealership.

But when we buy a 2nd car, we'll look into American (again) and see what they can offer us. No Fords for us though (wife's rules)

[jeff47]

85. It should be noted

It should be noted that Toyota and Honda build many of their cars in the US. Also GM and Ford build many of their cars in Mexico.

Buying an "American" car isn't as easy as it used to be.

[NNN0LHI]

97. Its very easy to purchase cars made by union labor if you want to

On the bottom right hand corner of the windshield there will be a sticker that says UAW on it if it was made by UAW union workers. If there isn't one there it isn't UAW made. See its not all that confusing at all.

Toyota and Honda also have plants in Mexico just as Ford Of North America does. I know this may come to a surprise to some people around here but Mexican people actually purchase cars too. Yea, they really do.

Honda actually got caught using prison labor a while back to build their cars in the US. Google "prison labor+Honda" once.

Maybe some day you can compete with prison labor wages of about two bucks an hour at your job?

Don

[axollot]

126. We only have Fords in our driveway! We know they still make them in the US

and still union (so is Brawney and Anglesoft fyi- hubby works for GP any paper product they make is UNION).
The union is weak in the South. Still union tho!

Cheers
Sandy

[rurallib]

22. I am 60 years old. As long as I can remember media has done a number

on unions. Every mention of a union in the media has been negative for as long as I can remember.
So if you think that if the union gives up something the masses, led by media perception, will look kindly toward them, I believe you are living in a dream world.

[Broke In Jersey]

32. well...I do live in a dream world...

and I don't support ANY group blindly like too many people on both sides. When unions are right I support them, when they are wrong, I don't. I don't listen to the media either.

But when unions act selfish & self centered, when unemployment is over 25% for people entering the workforce & in inner cities, saving 67 jobs of your younger fellow union peers instead of a single year of getting your 4% raise to make 6-figures I think people look at actions like that as selfish and are justifiably so.

[mike_c]

69. I don't understand your perspective....

First, unions are SUPPOSED to act "selfish & self centered." My union represents my interests-- god knows management is utterly self centered. One need only look at management's bargaining position during any contract negotiation to understand why my union being "self-centered" is a very good thing-- without that defense, management would roll back everything we've gained over the last twenty or thirty years.

I have a decent salary and reasonable work conditions because my "selfish" union fights tooth and nail on my behalf. I would not trade my union job for a non-organized equivalent position anywhere.

Solidarity!

[Broke In Jersey]

77. very true, that is their purpose

I have 2 friends that their unions have saved many an ass!!! Their union is a very small local one. I believe that the larger super-sized ones are too top heavy and nowadays aren't taking into consideration the new depression/recession times.

[Jakes Progress]

94. I think you are thinking about it.

But your views are very colored by media portrayals and right wing propaganda. Everyone working less than six days a week and getting insurance and vacation and retirement owe it to unions. That is whether their job is a union job or not. The whole point of solidarity is to have an effect. Without it, none of the progress that workers in all fields have had would be available.

[bread_and_roses]

99. Think a little down the road at the consequences of the union following the course you are

supporting. You seem like a reasonable person willing to think about things and not a mindless union-basher. So play it out a few years. The end result long-term would be worse for all the teachers in that district. Eventually all the teachers in your State, if it played out the same elsewhere. And eventually around the nation - as it is playing now, everywhere. The teachers and the public unions are the last significant organized sector in this country, and our Oligarch Masters are determined to break them. This is just part of that scenario.

oh - on edit - and lay the blame for your property taxes square where it belongs - on the upper 1-5% who don't pay their fair share of taxes and now hold - what? 40%? - of the entire wealth of this country in their miserable clutches. Not the unions.

[Dappleganger]

40. Raygun turned the public's view of unions to the right...

HE is the one who made it into a meme that the union was only after their own interests and not fighting for the middle class. Looks like you've bought into the same bullshit.

[Broke In Jersey]

44. stop looking with blinders on

and look at the present and not 30 years ago. The union teachers & administrators in my town that are making between $85,000 and $287,000 salaries voted to fire 68 of the entry MIDDLE CLASS teachers all of which are making less than $50,000 instead of not getting their 4% raises. sooo...these the union people you think are fighting for the middle class instead of their own self interest!?!?!? HAHAHA you are sooooo cute & guliable.

[Name removed]

45. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Broke In Jersey]

46. good comeback -

when you run out of ideas...name calling is the only thing you have left!!!

[axollot]

127. You started with the name calling mate....talking down to someone

calling them "cute and gullible" is an ad hominem attack. I see what you are trying to say - but the blame is still in the wrong spot. Should they not have taken their 4% raise this year? Dunno. But it leads to more and more and more concessions until the union is in name only with no strength. In these times of tough unemployment numbers with the need for 250,000 jobs a month for 5 years need to be created to only maintain 5% unemployment - well lets just say....it sure isnt the unions fault.

Cheers
Sandy

[liberation]

53. Sources please...

[liberation]

83. *crickets*

OK, I see...

[dflprincess]

65. Are you sure the administrators are union?

They aren't where I live.

[Broke In Jersey]

72. I looked into it...

and you are correct...all the higher ups are not part of the union. (not sure if they are part of a different union or not at all)

I also found out that the union leaders in my town totally straight-armed some of the teachers here who were willing to give up their raises for their peers. The teachers are once again getting the public anger because of corrupt union leaders and not the workers.

Except for peeps I know in the NJ Teachers union, most of my friends that are in unions are in much smaller local unions and do an incredible and honorable job with their members. They should be the role model for the larger super-size unions IMHO.

Thanks for making me look it up and learn a bit more!!! :)

[Enthusiast]

91. Administrators are not unionized. nt

[readmoreoften]

71. Administrators are, by definition, not permitted to be represented by unions.

Get your facts straight. Unions are only for workers, no supervisors are permitted to be union members by law. WTF is it with New Jersey people. The right-wing spin machine in NJ is viler and more disgusting than most states I've been in. You people REALLY HATE your public workers. I'm sorry, but a high-school teacher or middle school teacher deserves a good salary. I agree that administrators--the bosses--should make less, but teachers deserve 85K.

[Broke In Jersey]

73. correct -

I just posted my correction above. and I agree 85K is a fair salary! All the teachers I know have at least 17years experience & all make over 6-figures!!! They do an incredible job and I couldn't handle 10minutes of dealing with homeroom let alone teaching them haha

[Dappleganger]

39. Thank you!!

Let's point fingers at the RIGHT places for once.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

78. Stopped reading at the subject line. -nt

[Enthusiast]

90. Anti-union views are justified?

Because of the act of a single union during a single contract? Where in the fuck do you think you would be with out unions? You sicken me.

[hay rick]

100. Always ignore the facts that don't support your point.

I'm going out on a limb and guessing you live in Bridgewater (or Raritan). Article here: http://www.nj.com/news/local/index.ssf/2010/03/bridgewater-raritan_budget_cut.html

From the article:
"The budget cuts were made less drastic by an 11th hour deal struck with the Bridgewater-Raritan Education Association, the 1,360 member union that represents the district’s teachers and maintenance staff. While the union did not offer salary concessions, it voted to approve $1.4 million in give-backs early today by waiving $403,000 in promised tuition reimbursements and contributing 1.5 percent of teacher salaries towards health benefits.

The governor has chastised the union for refusing to budge on a salary freeze, and BREA President Steve Beatty fired back at Christie following the BREA vote.

“We reject the governor’s attempts to deflect blame for his devastating cuts onto our members,” said Beatty. “He could restore districts’ funding just by reinstating the tax on millionaires and dedicating those funds to our public schools.”

Your post mentions that the teachers refused to give up previously negotiated salary increases but omits the fact that they agreed to givebacks on health insurance and tuition reimbursements.

New Jerseyans are angry about property taxes and the teachers are a highly visible scapegoat. Their pension and health care liabilities are huge budget items, but I think context is important. The pension obligation has spiraled out of control largely because recent administrations (both parties) have substituted wishful thinking for annual pension contributions. Article summarizing NJ's budget follies here: http://money.cnn.com/2009/05/12/news/economy/benner_pension.fortune/index.htm.

The rapidly increasing health care costs are simply a reflection of rapidly increasing health care costs in America. We now spend almost twice as much per capita as Canadians or Europeans. One article here (read it and weep): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_compared#Canadian_health_care_in_comparison

[axollot]

128. +1000 - excellent post to bring the facts of what is going on in NJ to light. ty. n/t

[TxVietVet]

108. Your taxes increased

because your manufacturing base left and what businesses that are still there have bribed their way out of paying their fair share of taxes.

I've worked under a union contract for the last 34 years. The "merit" raise people I've worked around get screwed and blame the unions. WTF! Because they don't have a union contract or a union to negotiate their wages???? Go figure.

[truedelphi]

122. The notion of people getting 4% more while sacrificing the entire paycheck

For other union members is one of the more sinister aspects of the modern unions. What ever happened to solidarity?

That is one of the big negatives about the Unions today.

[hay rick]

129. Actual story a little more nuanced.

The story here: http://www.nj.com/news/local/index.ssf/2010/03/bridgewater-raritan_budget_cut.html

The "forego entire 4% raise or we lay off 68 people" was the district's initial bargaining stance. The union agreed to other give backs at the 11th hour that amounted to about half that amount. Some of the jobs were saved.

Union members, like everyone else, are facing hard choices.

[truedelphi]

135. except I have seen this happen over, and over, and over again

Starting in the late nineteen seventies. Through the eighties and the nineties and now on into the teens of the twenty first Century.

Again, why some people get 4% more while the new hires get laid off sickens me.

Regardless of the "nuances."

[hay rick]

136. What sickens you?

The choices that unions make or the bargaining dilemmas that leave them with a choice between two or more evils?

You seem to be echoing the "greedy union members" meme that the mainstream media has been pushing since Reagan, NAFTA, and the Bushes.

In the NJ teachers example,the original budget proposal was foregoing a 4% raise or cutting 68 jobs. The last-minute compromise was the equivalent of giving back half the raise and saving 16 jobs and some sports and extra-curricular programs. It sounds like they could have sacrificed the entire raise and they still would have lost a significant number of jobs.

Remember, these budget cuts came about as a result of a $10.8 million reduction in state aid. That's why the teacher's union brought up the subject of Gov. Christie's refusal to reinstate the surtax on millionaires, pointing out that if the surtax was restored to previous levels, the income generated would completely eliminate the need for reductions in state aid to local school districts.

So you can say the story here is about greedy unions or about greedy millionaires. You write the headline.

[Statistical]

14. 4 day workweek would rock. Also it may be REQUIRED to reduce unemployment.

[NNN0LHI]

17. And the auto companies weren't planning on discontinuing their 5 day schedule either

Got to keep them presses going up and down. Just like many companies would have stayed on a five day schedule. The auto companies were going to just hire another 20 percent more workers to cover for those days off. If every company needed to hire 20 percent more workers imagine what our unemployment rate would be. In the negative?

And guess what every one of those new employees did after they were hired in 1979? They went out and bought a new car. Same thing I did when I hired in.

Don

[Statistical]

19. This is something that most people miss.

Productivity has exploded over last 3 decades.

Today a worker does 70% more (not in terms of how hard they work but in terms of finished product) in a week than 30 years ago.

Obviously the global demand for stuff if finite. As productivity continues to improve and improve and improve and improve less and less workers can produce more and more stuff.

People like to blame China for US problems and China is part of the problem but systemically there is a larger issue. Even with China the US industrial sector outputs more than at any decade in the past but manufacturing employment has fallen off a cliff.

How can we reconcile these two seemingly disparate statistics (higher output, less employment)? Productivity.

So given workers do MORE per hour maybe they should be working less hours (and thus require more workers).

I don't know if it will ever happen but then again nobody thought the 40 hour workweek or 5 day workweek would happen. When productivity was very low (1940-1950) it wasn't unusual for someone to work 60, 70, 80 hours a week and 6 to 6.5 days a week.

[NNN0LHI]

20. The exact plan was to create more well paying jobs for more Americans

When we first negotiated 30 and out for retirement the condition was that our retirees were not allowed to retire and go out and get another job thereby denying a new worker that job. If a retiree went out and made a hundred bucks a month, a hundred bucks a month was deducted from their retirement check. Now with the benefits cuts we have had to take the UAW has unfortunately had to abandon that condition.

It was better the other way for everyone.

Don

[npk]

92. I would actually rather work 10 hour days

and only work 4 days a week, than the current 8 hour days and have to work 5 days a week. To me it wouldn't really matter. Yes the days might be a bit longer, but I am actually used to working 12 hour shifts from my previous job as a security tech It was nice to have that extra day off every week.

[Oceansaway]

16. K&R...n/t

[90-percent]

23. a few comments

Union growth in the thirties helped American post war prosperity in the 50's through 70's.

However, as a former Machine Tool customer support type, I've been in, and have talked to other colleagues that have worked within shops with very strong unions. They seem to develop a culture where the workday is spent trying to avoid work and doing everything possible to make a 15 minute job last four hours! Like a game. Real adversarial and not very good for the company.

I have a brother in law that works for the post office. He works at avoiding work as much as possible. Really playing the rules and filing grievances and all this them or us gamesmanship.

I like unions and collective bargaining, but the behavior of some unions over the past 75 years has in many cases not acted in the best interests of the unions or their employers.

I'm very interested in productivity gains vs. worker salaries, as it seems recently that productivity is going up pretty dramatically, but the salaries of the workers does not reflect that at all. Salaries are pretty flat. Where is the extra profit going? To the elites running the companies. Back in the fifties when the company prospered all the workers at the company shared in that prosperity. Nowadays, the more you work, the more you are making some corporate fat cat even more rich.

Lastly, there's some people that work with their hands that have the skills of artisans and the brains of the best engineers; AUTO BODY COLLISION REPAIRMEN I was in that trade on and off for about 10 years in my youth and the good collision guys needed excellent intuitive mechanical skills and also the skills of a fine craftsman. Every crash was different as every brand of car was different and every repair had to have a differing type of process to get to the fix.

I have always been infuriated that people that work with their hands do not receive the same respect as white collar people. Forgive me, but I feel that physical work can require more talent than white collar work in many cases.

There's another historical trend I find ironic. Over the last 30 years, when Corporate America dismantled a good portion of it's manufacturing base, the white collar guys said; "Gee, too bad all you blue collar guys are loosing your dull receptive jobs. Now you should go out and retrain and learn how to program computers or learn some other white collar skill so you can remain employed. Got to keep up with changing times, you know."

Thirty years later, much of the lucrative white collar work has been offshored and the white collar people with the so called good jobs are out of work for years, or have to do less prestigious work for less money. Almost like American corporations are learning how to extract money for their upper echelon's from the very workers that create the products that generate the sales to make money. They are literally turning their own customers into paupers.

I remember going to work for a guy that was a sales manager for a machine tool company. He had a fearsome reputation and was a real back stabbing treacherous cut throat at work. A friend that knew of him said; "Urban thinks he's the only one here that should be making any money." Which I think is pretty typical thinking of our corporate ruling elite.

That is obviously where working life in America is headed and I just wonder how it will all turn out? My current outcome is that I was laid off 16 months ago and it's sink or swim time for my economic future. Thankfully, my wife is a great money manager and all our debts are paid in full every month. I interviewed for a teaching position in manufacturing at a local community college, about a 20% cut in pay, but I really enjoy teaching and young people, and the teachers have a Union! At it's best, I could play a small part helping young people find their way to a prosperous rewarding future. I just wish that our institutions weren't all simultaneously collapsing from their own sociopathic corruptions. I wish our institutions were working aggressively towards providing a better future for us all. Instead of molding us into obedient corporate drones.

-90% Jimmy

[NNN0LHI]

24. Any job I have worked at I didn't have time to find people who I thought were trying to avoid work

I was too busy doing my own job to be critiquing other workers. That is what we had supervisors for.

I have had 15 minute jobs last more than four hours before. Why? Because I refused to do a job that I considered unsafe until it became safe. I have been sent out to an area to do a job that constantly had an overhead crane lifting tons of steel over where I was supposed to be doing that job and refused to do it until they got the tons of steel away from over my head to give me time to do that job.

I suppose to someone with an untrained eye and plenty of free time of their own to stand around to critique other workers performance might say "Hey, that guy is being lazy not working under that roll of steel.", like he was told to do.

But someone who might be a little more informed and less inclined to be worried about about what someone else is doing and more concerned with doing their own job might understand the danger involved and wouldn't say anything. They wouldn't even think about it.

See how that can work?

Don

[laughingliberal]

30. Your example was perfect. Another is the SBL guys who left the drilling platform in the Gulf

due to safety concerns 6 hours before the explosion. Now, if that platform had not blown, some of those present might have been talking about those lazy SBL fucks who were whining about safety to get out of doing their job.

[NNN0LHI]

36. And the thing is if a steel coil had fallen on my leg and not killed me I would have been fired

Fired for working unsafely. And I would agree with that. But for someone just standing around who doesn't understand whats going on might have seen me leaning on my tool box for three and a half hours waiting to get that job safely just as my supervisor instructed me to do might think I am just being lazy.

I sure wish those oil workers had spent more time on safety too.

But like you say there would have been someone calling them lazy if they had.

Don

[90-percent]

37. To be more specific

The scenario I was discussing above was that of an outside contractor. We would go in and install new machine tools in big union corporate shops. Like a Sikorsky or Pratt and Whitney type big shop. And working in those shops vs. an average machine job shop was excruciating! Hooking up electric, plumbing, rigging, etc. The work on our side went promptly and effectively in the job shops. The big union shops the same tasks took 100-400% longer by virtue of how things were done in the union shop.

This was not a scenario where doing it the safe way must take four hours, but you could short cut it in five minutes. The work that our guys were doing could be done in five minutes in the most safe manner possible. The same work in shops with an entrenched us vs. them adversarial culture could take orders of magnitude longer than a time is money job shop.

In our machine tool show room, we had a 25 ton crane to haul the big big cnc's in and out. 2 tons to up to maybe ten tons. We sub contracted outside professional riggers to go from the truck to placement on the showroom floor. The company, in the downturn of 2008, got rid of the lavish use of outside riggers and had us Apps Engrs do all the rigging in and out. I was extremely aware of how dangerous it was and what the best safety practices were. And, as a requirement of my job, I would on occasion climb on top of a 25 foot high machine on the truck to wrap and tarp the machine tool. Standing on oily sharp jagged surfaces where a slip of the foot could get you killed. How do I know you could get killed? A serviceman I was acquainted with from a former company was installing a big machine at a customer. The work required being on top of the machine. The tech fell off the machine and landed on his head and died!

I was laid off February 09, and I hope my former company is now prosperous enough to hire the outside riggers again, for the sake of my former colleagues that certainly do not deserve to die on the job, and are now required to do dangerous rigging work as part of their job. They try to make it safer with harnesses off the crane, but using the crane for a body harness concurrent with using the crane for rigging is cumbersome.

You implication that doing the job safely requires four hours, and unsafe shortcuts can do the same job in five minutes is erroneous in the case of my specific examples. I don't think any employee in any company should have do do jobs where the consequences of an accident could mean loss of limb or death. I used as much methodology as possible to make sure I was safe as possible doing this rigging work, and hooking up 480v/3ph wiring. When ever the overhead crane was in use, I would never ever get under it except as fast as possible.

Also, apparently, from the Massey and BP accidents, it seems that companies can take unsafe shortcuts with impunity without repercussions. Ain't working life in America great!

-90%

[snooper2]

38. Another perspective...

I've been in Telecom my whole career, Started working for WorldCom (yes that WorldCom) in the early 90's. Working troubles with the union bell techs was a pain to be nice, but they did know what they were doing.

When Bernie Ebbers bought MCI with our fake money, MCI had a lot of union guys working in the Central Offices (where all the switching gear is kept for a layman). Talk about wanting to kick somebody's ass. I would be trying to get a customers DS3 back up to restore their ATM (not the type of ATM that gives you money :) ) and would call a CO where MCI and Worldcom both always had a presence. Whenever I got a union guy on the phone he was worthless. (Keep in mind the only reason I needed the guy in the CO was for his hands- I can walk him through anything.

See, the WorldCom techs would do anything you ask of them. Put patches in, loopbacks, swap cards, move cross-connects, check for alarms. We all made overtime and did what it took to maintain the network and customer's service. The Union guys had some kind of fucked up rules. There would be 4-5 in every MCI CO where there were 2-3 Worldcom techs in our traditional CO.

Here's what I heard from those MCI guys-
I can't reset that card for you, that's in a data swtich, I only work on FXS modules on the DMS
Oh, I'm not allowed to put a monitor on that T1, Jason does that and he's out on an install
Can I be available at 8:00PM to hit that button for you, oh, that will have to get approved by my manager but he's gone for the day.


You need me to swap a CMS module in a frame relay switch because it is running single threaded, well we don't have anybody that is trained to do that.

me- Dude, it's got a tab on the top and bottom, you flip them both and the card pops out. Put the new one in.

But the switch is powered on?

me- Dude, the cards are hot swappable, just take the new card out of the box, stick it in the switch.

I'm only supposed to work on fiber runs, the guys that do this are on an install- I can get in trouble for touching that piece of equipment.

me- Dude, it's a fucking card- I've got customers down now. You are a Central Office technician, I just need your hands. Pull the old card out that's clearly marked in the switch in Aisle 6 Bay 04 Rack 10- SLOT 5 and put the new one in.

Your going to have to talk to my Manager...




It was absolutely fucking ridiculous

[Dappleganger]

43. WTH are you whining about??

That they didn't jump when you said to?? Every business has their way of doing things, you either work with them or around them.

My father is a retired union Bell tech, they knew what they were doing and they protected their people. My father made a decent living wage with good bennies and it wouldn't be that way if it wasn't for the CWA.

[liberation]

50. I have heard literally the same "anecdote" in 3 different fields.

"...trying to get a customers DS3 back up to restore their ATM..." LOL

BTW, you do know some of us are in the tech field too...

[NNN0LHI]

51. Same as the "welfare queen" in a Cadillac story people are so fond of telling

They tell it like they just experienced it at the store.

They learned that one from Reagan.

Don

[laughingliberal]

55. I thought it had that flavor, also. nt

[snooper2]

70. Well, it wasn't just the ATM machine...

That was just something they were pretty concerned about along with their credit card swiper...Customer was a large gas station if I remember correctly.

I am pretty sure there is not one DS3 provsionined in the country used for a single ATM machine. 44.746Mbs would be just a LITTLE bit of overkill don't ya think :rofl:



So where you heard this anecdote from makes no sense to me...0, unless you just made it up...

[liberation]

82. OK, let's ignore a few things from your story...

... like the fact that in the US what you described is usually refereed to as a T-3.

Let's ignore the fact that T-3 lines were rather expensive, and usually only contracted for backbone purposes.
Let's ignore how retarded would be to have a T-3 circuit with such a monumental single point of failure.
Let's ignore the fact that this gas station has bandwidth requirements larger than some medium sized research universities.
Let's ignore the fact that you were talking about ATMs which do not give money (huh?)

Whatever, none of those details are important in these sort of anecdotes.


What I am always fascinated about these sort of stories is something very simple: how on earth, everyone who tells this sort of story in its multiple incarnations.. has the psychic abilities to figure out the person at the other end of the phone is or isn't a union member?

Separation of duties in these cases make perfect sense, because in complex systems one has to know where the fuckup occurred. A person who is not qualified for a specific duty, especially in a data center will not touch a damned thing he or she is not qualified to operate/modify/service. Because if he/she fucks up, it adds another variable of uncertainty to the people who are in charge of fixing up the mess. I have seen electricians bring down whole production facilities, because it was just a "silly" switch... or patch a circuit that seemed unused, so what's the harm?

Sometimes, systems and processes are there for a reason. And this has nothing to do with union vs. non-union. Many non-union shops operate in the same manner. That is why these sort of anecdotes are useless because they are tangential and have nothing to do with the concept of organized labor.

[Statistical]

109. "talking about ATMs which do not give money (huh?)" Right here...

I assume he was talking about Asynchronous Transfer Mode. That is the only ATM that doesn't give money that I know of.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_Transfer_Mode

I got no idea if the story is true or not just "no money ATM" was immediately recognizable as Asynchronous Transfer Mode to me. Maybe that makes me a nerd?

[snooper2]

133. You understand you have no idea what you are talking about...

Nobody says T3 dude, DS3...DS3..DS3 burn it in your head...

Contracted for backbone purposes :rofl: Are you an IT hack? I should have told that to the thousands of ATM customers we had and MFS had when we merged with them. Oh yeah, and by the way, the only interfaces MFS sold were DS3 off that core ATM network. And, I don't have any idea what else this customer was running there equipment wise. I do know MFS was basically giving shit away back in the day, especially if it was on-net(now go look that up). Oh, and call your local carrier and ask them what pricing are for two circuits providing access loop redundancy and ensure they are on diverse fiber routes. Just for fun....

I'm sure this company had a need for ATM vs. Frame Relay, but you don't understand the difference so I'll help you. ATM services were used when you had needs for streaming data traffic. Frame relay was traditionaly used when a customer had really bursty traffic, especially IP. You learning anything yet? Look up 53 byte cell and leaky bucket when you get a chance too.


You have reading comprehension issues as well-
(Separation of duties in these cases make perfect sense, because in complex systems one has to know where the fuckup occurred)

Carrier networks are maintained from a central location. You don't let Tom, Dick and Harry in every central office have access to your Core networks. That's just (A) stupid and (B) inefficient. We controlled the maint., capacity planning and traffic for the ATM and Frame relay networks at the Infomart in Dallas Texas. 4th Floor. The Optical and IP Backbones were maintained in Tulsa Oklahoma. So the guy in the C.O. (Central Office, not an acronym for Commanding Officer) was just hands. GET IT, fucking HANDS. He had the box with the spare card. You open up the little box see, and follow instructions. The guys in the C.O. have enough to worry about maintaining the DACS(go look that up), fiber equipment, backup diesel generators, etc.

Union jobs have their place and I'll tell you where, and this will probably piss you off. When the job is for the most part the same day to day. Bell line repairman, that is about where the cutoff should be. Factory workers doing solder and slide- solder and slide. Yep. Restuarant workers, yep. Road crews, Yep.
Doctors- no, Engineers, no, Biologists, no. see the trend....


Now go look up all I told you so you don't write ignorant posts again.

[Dr.Phool]

59. It's called "seperation of craft"

And it's built into many union contracts.

I was a Locomotive Engineer. If I were waiting for a hand-off from another railroad, or charging my brake system, that's what I do. If I'm standing next to the broom, and a yardmaster wants his office swept, while I'm sitting there, it's not my job. That's the janitors job, and if I do it, he can rightfully put in a time claim for it. Likewise, nobody else can do my job.

[Dr.Phool]

58. Same thing here.

I worked on a steel mill railroad. I could get together a drag of scrap, and shove it down the hill in 30 minutes, if everything fell into place. But, to do it safely, I had to let the brake system on the cars charge up, so that I had control of my train. People would say "look at those railroaders sitting there doing nothing for an hour". But according to safety rules and federal law I had to.

I also wouldn't pull through a slab rolling mill with slabs stacked higher than seven along the tracks. Too bad if the crane operator has to shift the piles. I'm not getting crushed.

[ieoeja]

27. My best friend spent most of his life working as a machinist in NON-UNION shops.

And he said beating the tar out of anyone who worked too hard was standard practice almost everywhere he worked.

Stretching out the job appears to be pretty common whether union or not.

For the record, he justified this on the claim that too much production led to too many mistakes. And mistakes in a machine shop are not only costly**, they can also be life-threatening.


**Conversely, I was the programmer who started out doing the work of 4 or more programmers. And you know what? I made a lot of errors. But my errors took no physical form and could be completely corrected with no more cost than wages (which wasn't much). Still, now that I work slower, I do seem to get more work actually completed 100%.

[liberation]

52. Correlation does not imply causation...

Here is my anecdote, last month I was at an union shop to pick some machined part for one of our experiments. It was raining that day, and the boxes got wet. The weather conditions also made my commute back to the lab half an hour longer because there was an accident on the road. Ergo it must mean that unions wasted that half an hour of my day and got the boxes wet to boot. No?

Of course, It could not possibly be that unions like every other collection of human has lazy idiots among their ranks, just like EVERYWHERE ELSE IN SOCIETY?

[Overseas]

28. K&R. //nt

[Catherina]

31. Rec'd. Recommended! n/t

[Blue_Tires]

34. i'm on a summer 4-day week and LOVE IT

it's the perfect balance -- i've discovered the secret of life...

how can i ever be asked to go back to the standard week after i've tasted this??

[NNN0LHI]

41. What color is it?

[jgraz]

48. Exactly. THIS is where labor's huge productivity gains should be applied.

Instead, we're using them to make a few people obscenely wealthy while millions of American workers sit idle.

[bananas]

49. and don't forget the meager two-week vacation. nt

[Dr.Phool]

120. That's the thing I almost miss about my old job.

I got seven weeks of vacation. And the weekly pay was calculated on 1/52 of your gross pay from the previous year. So if you worked a lot of overtime, you still got paid for it on vacation.

Goddamn Unions! I didn't deserve that!

But, after management ran the place into the ground. They had $800 million cash on hand, and bankrupted the place within a year.

Now, I got to retire at age 49 on a decent pension. Kind of like 52 weeks of vacation per year. And I take home almost as much as I did working.

Goddamn unions! You fucked me to death. I even had to move to Florida. And go kayaking. And golfing. And drinking. I'm reduced to horrible labor, taking care of my garden.

If I ever get my hands on those union guys again, I'll fix them. I'll give them a kiss and buy them drinks. Lots of them.

[Yuugal]

54. K&R

[pundaint]

57. How is it that the French and Germans keep employed with those huge benefit packages, anyway?

Solidarity against the politicians. Government for the People. Up the unions!

[Bluenorthwest]

60. Unions, not just the UAW, set the trends in labor

My Union is a bit older than UAW, so I suppose I could demand that UAW was just following us.
The point is that it is Unions, not just UAW, who are to be credited with the many gains labor has made since we started each of our two Unions, within a few years of one another, and of many other Union starts.

[NNN0LHI]

74. Not going to get into a 'Who's union is bigger.", argument but what year did your union ...

...first negotiate domestic partner benefits for its members if you don't mind me asking? The UAW first negotiated domestic partner benefits in 1982. I would call that pretty cutting edge for 1982.

Solidarity.

Don

http://www.working-families.org/newsletter/winter09.html

Domestic Partner Benefits on the Rise

Since workers at the Village Voice in New York City and the United Auto Workers (UAW) first negotiated domestic partner benefits in 1982, a growing number of employers have followed. As of March 2006, 49% of the Fortune 500 offered domestic partner health benefits, compared to 25% in 2000. The trend toward domestic partner benefits is increasing regardless of business size, although the most substantial gains are among large employers. But many public and private sector LGBT workers do not have access to these benefits. In a 2003 study, 48% of LGBT workers identified domestic partner benefits as the most important consideration in a potential job change. And where state and federal laws provide little to no rights, union contracts provide the only protection.

Workplace benefits make up nearly 40% of overall compensation. Without full access to these benefits, LGBT workers are being denied a significant portion of their overall compensation. Refusing to offer these benefits deprives LGBT workers of one of the most important facets of their work: the ability to care and provide for their families. And although one purpose for workplace benefits is to improve workers’ focus, performance and retention, leaving out LGBT workers excludes a large portion of the workforce. Appearing before the US Senate, the President of Human Rights Campaign, Joe Solmonese, testified that “LGBT workers experience the same levels of stress, lack of productivity, distraction and fear of job loss as do others when their domestic partners become ill, are hospitalized or cared for by others.”

Today’s union members can be guided by decades of fighting for equal benefits for LGBT workers. In 1991, the AFL-CIO issued a policy resolution on “Benefits for Changing Families” that read: “The AFL-CIO will work as appropriate to insure that fringe benefits are extended to all persons living in a household as a family.” The resolution acknowledged that eligibility for benefits is typically based on a definition of family that fails to account for changes to family composition. The number of unmarried households is a large and growing percentage, and its growth is outpacing married households.

[2Design]

61. people just don't get unions and have believed the republicans and media = shoot in foot

when it is all gone - they will wonder where it went

[wolfgangmo]

64. We are moving our clinic to a 4 day week this year.

We can get all we need done in 4 days a week. It's a win for us, our patients (more flexible hours when we are open) and our employees.

It's a winning idea.

Thanks unions. Good work. Now let's all do our bit and support the nurses strikes that are happening. If you are a patient don't cross the line. If you are hospitalized (and able to) tell them to move your ass to a union shop. If you are scheduling during their one day stike, reschedule. And for goodness sake tell the WHY you are rescheduling.

[TheKentuckian]

68. Big K&R

[pleah]

75. K&R!

[Fire1]

76. Yes, it is all bullshit. "Workin for the man every night and day....."

[Kermitt Gribble]

80. K&R! And bookmarked.

Thanks for the link.

[shanti]

84. k&r

union member here :hi:

[npk]

89. You can thank the unions for minimum wage laws

The unions were instrumental in the federal government establishing base minimum wage laws. While we can argue about whether minimum wages are too low, at least they are there.

[Butch350]

93. I grew up in a WORKING CLASS FAMILY...

I always thought that auto wokers union demanded too dam much.

* High wages
* Above average health care
* High pension plans
* Discounts on cars
etc, etc!

Shit you'd think they were doctors or something - personaly i thought they helped to destroy the auto industry
with tehir demands every year for more of this and more of that.

Who paid for all this crap - the individuals buying the cars.

Now, foreign cars rule.

PS
I am not against unions - I truely believe in their benfits - BUT - sometimes, they just ask for too much!

[bread_and_roses]

98. Right. Let's all be serfs and live in the factory barracks

and get our crappy over-priced food from the company store. The unions destroyed the auto industry in US? Give me a break. Management, gov't policy, the vast aggregation of wealth into the upper 1% and away from wages and benefits, outsourcing (with no penalties for slave labor and environmental destruction - gotta have that "free" market, doncha know?)and the appalling cost of US health care destroyed the auto industry in this country - not the unions.

Why shouldn't all workers have
"High wages
* Above average health care
* High pension plans" ?

And discounts on what they make? (from my point of view workers should own the means of production - forget "discounts" - but we don't even need to go there to point out what nonsense your post is).

[Butch350]

104. And what ..HELPED.. contribute to outsourcing....

?

[Dr.Phool]

121. Corporate greed.

LTV Steal went to the Steelworkers crying we're going under if we don't get wage and benefit concessions, and a new contract. After some tough negotiations, the steelworkers gave the company what they wanted.

In less than a week after the deal was signed, LTV announced they were going to build a non-union mini-mill in Alabama. With the money they just negotiated away from the union. A couple of days later, all the execs got nice fat bonuses.

They built the mill, along with a shitload of tax incentives and subsidies from Alabama. They fucked it all up, and the place lost money every day it was operating. It closed down 3 years later.

In the mean time, the union mill in Cleveland was setting North American production records regularly. Towards the end, the company had $800 million cash on hand. But management kept doing stupid shit. I remarked to another union official, that the stuff they were doing made no sense unless you looked at it from a context that they were TRYING to run the place into the ground. Within the year the plant was shut down and bankrupt.

But, management wasn't done yet. The last night they were operating, on third shift, they ordered the blast furnaces to not bank the furnaces with coke. This meant that they were going to let them collapse internally. A 3-to 400 million dollar repair for each furnace. In other words, they were going to destroy the plant permanently. A friend of mine, on the railroad, the third shift yardmaster called me at 1:00 am and told me what was going on. He said he's just gotten Dennis Kucinich out of bed, and he was on his way down. He brought the Mayor of Cleveland with him. They made some threats of severe consequences to the mill management, and the union saved the mill.

They found a buyer, and thousands of people are still working there. Good, high-paying union jobs. And, the owners told them recently that they have the lowest production cost of any mill in the country. Lower than a mini-mill.

It's amazing what can be accomplished when two sides approach each other honestly, and some corporate raider from Texas isn't trying to suck the life blood out of a company.

[Butch350]

105. I don't know you tell me. WHY to the extreme?

[spoony]

117. You're a fucking idiot if you think benefits are "extreme"

End of sentence.

[axollot]

130. Or worse - prison labour. Not often mentioned but the US PIC (think MIC).

..are the largest manufacturing base left in the US. Since we also privatize our prisons AND have the most people in prison - well you can get the drift of where they want this country's labour to head in the future. No unions. Serf like pay. Poor, unsafe working conditions and no benefits. The private prison system is just well...frightening!

From a 2008 mother jones article - http://motherjones.com/politics/2008/07/what-do-prisoners-make-victorias-secret

Each month, California inmates process more than 680,000 pounds of beef, 400,000 pounds of chicken products, 450,000 gallons of milk, 280,000 loaves of bread, and 2.9 million eggs (from 160,000 inmate-raised hens). Starbucks subcontractor Signature Packaging Solutions has hired Washington prisoners to package holiday coffees (as well as Nintendo Game Boys). Confronted by a reporter in 2001, a Starbucks rep called the setup "entirely consistent with our mission statement."


Around the Big House: Texas inmates produce brooms and brushes, bedding and mattresses, toilets, sinks, showers, and bullwhips. Bullwhips?

Windows dressing: In the mid-1990s, Washington prisoners shrink-wrapped software and up to 20,000 Microsoft mouses for subcontractor Exmark (other reported clients: Costco and JanSport). "We don't see this as a negative," a Microsoft spokesman said at the time. Dell used federal prisoners for PC recycling in 2003, but stopped after a watchdog group warned that it might expose inmates to toxins.

Back to school: Texas and California inmates make dorm furniture and lockers, diploma covers, binders, logbooks, library book carts, locker room benches, and juice boxes.

Patriotic duties: Federal Prison Industries, a.k.a. Unicor, says that in addition to soldiers' uniforms, bedding, shoes, helmets, and flak vests, inmates have "produced missile cables (including those used on the Patriot missiles during the Gulf War)" and "wiring harnesses for jets and tanks." In 1997, according to Prison Legal News, Boeing subcontractor MicroJet had prisoners cutting airplane components, paying $7 an hour for work that paid union wages of $30 on the outside.
~snip

How those jobs would better serve the people of this nation and why on earth do we not get pissed and talk about prison labour when we consider how high unemployment is currently.

Cheers
Sandy

[liberation]

103. "I am not against unions...."

Phew, good thing you're not against unions. I can't imagine what more you could have piled on them had you been against them.

[patrice]

95. 4 10s? I could LIVE with that and so could one other bread-winner if we'd just agree that there are

8 days in a week.

4 days on, 4 days off, hell I might even accept a significantly lower wage for that if we also had real Universal Health Care.

[Seedersandleechers]

96. I work 3 days a week

3-12 hour shifts. It works great especially if your needed 24/7, as you only need to staff two shifts per 24 hours as opposed to three.

[BrklynLiberal]

101. Thanks for this. I will be using these points in my arguments with twits who do not understand the

importance of unions.

[deaniac21]

106. Probably some of the best goons ever!

[TxVietVet]

107. I'm a proud IBEW member.

34 years. I plan on retiring at the end of the year.

I've earned good wages. I'm licensed. I'm required by contract to attend continuing education classes to stay abreast of electrical code changes. I have excellent health care bennies, along with retirement plan and 401K/annuity.

After Vietnam, not many employers would take a chance on me. The IBEW offered me an apprenticeship in '76 and I took it up. No regrets.

[Octafish]

111. Pro-Union was ENORMOUS part of the the Party Platform in 1960.

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=29602

[NNN0LHI]

114. Damn our politicians hardly ever even mention unions these days. From your link

Collective Bargaining

The right to a job requires the restoration of full support for collective bargaining and the repeal of the anti-labor excesses which have been written into our labor laws.

Under Democratic leadership a sound national policy was developed, expressed particularly by the Wagner National Labor Relations Act, which guaranteed the rights of workers to organize and to bargain collectively. But the Republican Administration has replaced this sound policy with a national anti-labor policy.

The Republican Taft-Hartley Act seriously weakened unions in their efforts to bring economic justice to the millions of American workers who remain unorganized.

By administrative action, anti-labor personnel appointed by the Republicans to the National Labor Relations Board have made the Taft-Hartley Act even more restrictive in its application than in its language.

Thus the traditional goal of the Democratic Party—to give all workers the right to organize and bargain collectively—has still not been achieved.

We pledge the enactment of an affirmative labor policy which will encourage free collective bargaining through the growth and development of free and responsible unions.

Millions of workers just now seeking to organize are blocked by Federally authorized "right-to-work" laws, unreasonable limitations on the right to picket, and other hampering legislative and administrative provisions.

Again, in the new Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act, the Republican Administration perverted the constructive effort of the Democratic Congress to deal with improper activities of a few in labor and management by turning that Act into a means of restricting the legitimate rights of the vast majority of working men and women in honest labor unions. This law likewise strikes hardest at the weak or poorly organized, and it fails to deal with abuses of management as vigorously as with those of labor.

We will repeal the authorization for "right-to-work" laws, limitations on the rights to strike, to picket peacefully and to tell the public the facts of a labor dispute, and other anti-labor features of the Taft-Hartley Act and the 1959 Act. This unequivocal pledge for the repeal of the anti-labor and restrictive provisions of those laws will encourage collective bargaining and strengthen and support the free and honest labor movement.

The Railroad Retirement Act and the Railroad Unemployment Insurance Act are in need of improvement. We strongly oppose Republican attempts to weaken the Railway Labor Act.

We shall strengthen and modernize the Walsh-Healey and Davis-Bacon Acts, which protect the wage standards of workers employed by Government contractors.

Basic to the achievement of stable labor-management relations is leadership from the White House. The Republican Administration has failed to provide such leadership.

It failed to foresee the deterioration of labor-management relations in the steel industry last year. When a national emergency was obviously developing, it failed to forestall it. When the emergency came, the Administration's only solution was government-by-injunction.

A Democratic President, through his leadership and concern, will produce a better climate for continuing constructive relationships between labor and management. He will have periodic White House conferences between labor and management to consider their mutual problems before they reach the critical stage.

A Democratic President will use the vast fact-finding facilities that are available to inform himself, and the public, in exercising his leadership in labor disputes for the benefit of the nation as a whole.

If he needs more such facilities, or authority, we will provide them.

We further pledge that in the administration of all labor legislation we will restore the level of integrity, competence and sympathetic understanding required to carry out the intent of such legislation.

[Art_from_Ark]

115. Back in 1976 or 77, one of the TV networks ran a story on unions in England

It was on one of the nighttime shows, not Nightline, I think, but something similar. At ant rate, the gist of the piece was that unions were so radical in England, it was just a matter of time before England went Communist.

[axollot]

131. That was Thacher-ism; The Tories are the aristocracy party. n/t

[NBachers]

116. Thanks for this thread and all these posts

What a relief it is to be among like-minded people like you-all!

[amborin]

118. Big K&R

[liberal_at_heart]

119. It astounds me that some people are insulting Greek people for retiring at 54.

Of course that's not the American way. The American way is to work two minimum wage jobs until you die.

[axollot]

132. When I still lived in Australia during the 90's I couldnt believe

the stuff going on inside the US (now that I had an outside perspective, worked in a great union job in TEXTILE for Billabong clothing, the health-care etc).

The thing that stuck out to me the most (besides not getting universal health care) was the min wage issue. If you recall during the 90's the RW Congress gave themselves raise after raise while striking down every attempt to increase the min wage to the point it had not changed in over a decade.

The most other hair raising thing I noticed was privatized prisons and US prison labour. (post up thread from me regarding this issue a bit more)

You are very correct - the American way is to work till you die. Even my most right wing relatives in Australia who are multi-millionaires disagreed with everything the right/Republicans do/support here in the US. They are actually more LEFT than Obama! (universal health care they'd never give it up; unemployment benefits, holiday pay etc and these relatives are considered Right Wing in Australia).

Cheers
Sandy

[whathehell]

134. That's the relatively "new" American Way....My father worked one

job and my mother stayed home and raised two kids, both of whom went to college. We weren't rich but we lived in a nice, safe neighborhood, never wanted for anything and were generally fine.

Those were the "good old days" Post-New Deal...before Reagan.