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View Full Version : Unions in Wisconsin



Harpr33t
23 Feb 2011, 04:24pm
I've been hearing alot about it so far. At first my initial thoughts were "Wisconsin? Who gives a fuck?" But apparently I now do. the governor is trying to get rid of teachers and government employees benefits and their ability to collectively bargain ever again.

Here's an article that sums it up.


Washington (CNN) -- For many in labor unions, the political battles in Wisconsin, Ohio and now Indiana are seen as nothing short of a frontal assault on their very existence.

But what's happening in those states and elsewhere -- a push by Republican governors to control state budget shortfalls by going after union pensions, wages and benefits -- may have, instead, energized union supporters and polarized public opinion in favor of the labor movement.

A USA Today/Gallup poll shows that 61 percent of Americans oppose eliminating or restricting collective bargaining rights for public employee unions.

Governors in Indiana and Ohio are following the lead of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker in his attempt to limit the power of public employee unions in his state.

"There has been a coordinated campaign for the last 30 years to undermine the American middle class by weakening the power of workers to collectively bargain to raise their wages," said Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees International Union, which represents nearly 2 million workers, many of them public employees.

She contends that corporate America, in an effort to keep middle-class wages in check, doled out hundreds of millions of dollars to support Republicans running for statewide offices.

"We don't think that retirement security is wrong," Henry said. "What's really wrong is that 50 percent of us don't have access to it and that corporate CEOs earn 400 times what the average American worker earns."
Ohio governor: Pensions 'not negotiable'
Governor: 'We don't have any more money'

According to followthemoney.org, a nonpartisan organization that tracks state campaign contributions, organized business interests -- including real estate, transportation, construction and lobbying groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce -- donated $878 million to gubernatorial and other state candidates across the country during the 2009-10 election cycle. That includes more than $21 million to the campaigns of Wisconsin's Walker and Ohio's Gov. John Kasich.

Organized labor, on the other hand, donated far less to state campaigns: $225 million, according to the nonprofit organization.

But Walker said Tuesday that his moves are not about going after unions.

"Despite a lot of the rhetoric we've heard over the past 11 days, the bill I put forward isn't aimed at state workers, and it certainly isn't a battle with unions," he said.

Still, the looming threat has forced labor to focus their energies. The AFL-CIO, the SEIU and the Teamsters have put their differing agendas aside and have banded together, busing thousands of protesters to Wisconsin, Ohio and Indiana and speaking with one voice in campaigns online. Teamsters President Jim Hoffa arrived in Madison on Wednesday to support the unions' efforts.

They have also gotten some organizational support from Democratic groups such as Obama's Organizing for America. And labor supporters from as far away as Egypt have been sending money and even pizza to Madison help the protesters.

Meanwhile, Democratic state lawmakers in Indiana, mimicking their Wisconsin brothers and sisters, failed to show up at a House hearing Tuesday, effectively blocking a Republican-supported bill that would reduce private-sector union rights. They are reportedly holed up across the state border in Illinois.

Republicans who are pushing those kinds of bills are playing hardball. Walker threatened that if Democrats don't return to the statehouse by Friday, he'll lay off as many as 1,500 public employees. Other Republican lawmakers are blaming the unions' selfishness for further damaging fragile states' economies.

"We only need to look at Camden, New Jersey," said Ohio state Sen. Shannon Jones, who is behind that state's anti-union legislation. "It's an example of where the union refused to renegotiate, and now that city is suffering a 45 percent reduction in the size of its police force because management had no choice."

In January, Camden Mayor Dana Redd cut the city's police force nearly in half, citing budget shortfalls. She said she had no choice because she was unable to secure the $8 million in budget concessions she needed to save jobs.

Jones also contended that going after union costs is one way to tackle the tough budget decisions lawmakers face.

"We've got a projected $8-plus billion budget deficit that we have to deal with," she said. "And we're not like Washington. We can't just print more money and pawn it off on our children. We've got to balance these budgets."

SgtJoo
23 Feb 2011, 06:30pm
North Carolina has no collective bargaining for teachers.

problem?

c0bra067
23 Feb 2011, 08:48pm
ive commented on this wisconsin union deal before. not a big fan. here's just one example why.

afl-cio
average worker salary ~ 230,000
richard trumka's salary ~63,000

sources
http://www.careerbliss.com/salary/afl-cio-salaries-1104177/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/tatu123/aflcio-goes-big-and-aggre_n_731024_61047779.html
http://www.laboreducator.org/laborsvoice60.htm
http://www.unionfacts.com/unions/unionOfficersDetail.cfm?ID=106&OID=1385830&fname=Richard&lname=Trumka


teamsters
average worker salary ~60,000
james hoffa's salary ~250,000

sources
http://flyonthewall911.homestead.com/UnionLocal710.html
http://www.jeremiahproject.com/culture/ups_strike.html

these are only the organizations presidents. its reported there are plenty of other officers making over 100k in each union individually. hmm... for people who are suppose to be for the fair pay of the people who are giving them their salary, that's quite the pay disparity. kinda funny. oh and then there was that whole thing where unions supported the health care bill, but won't be under its jurisdiction (http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2011/02/22/unequal_protection_to_believe_in_108986.html). sweet. thanks unions. a basic study of economics will show that unions promote inefficient economic activity, and create a dead weight loss (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadweight_loss). the amount of money unions cost the people they are 'representing' and the employer in insane.

never mind the unwaranted (in SOME cases) job security that promotes inefficiency. im friends with people who have personally had to deal with the teamsters union, the ibew and the nyc parks and rec union. the teamsters union and ibew basically were the same. the workers would do things just to spite the 'corporate assholes', which in the example of raytheon would cost thousands of dollars a day. why? because the unions would support them. support them as in, call up a high-level officer when their job was done for them because they would leave it half done when it takes 5 minutes to complete. the worst was the nyc parks and rec union. pretty much impossible to fire people there. accused of sexual harassment and have evidence on file? don't show up to work for a week? don't worry. the union lawyers got your back :thumb:

im all for small unions, but these huge monsters need to stop. but because apparently corporations and municipalities seem to not understand that they are creating their own worst enemy by raping the workers of their benefits, unions will always exist.

toyota has it right. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/25/AR2007052502458.html) pay people fair and avoid all that nonsense. saves a lot of money.


edit: if anyone can justify why unions should be more powerful im all ears. i have my opinions, but im open to change as long as there is credible and justifiable evidence to prove me wrong

Lux
24 Feb 2011, 12:40pm
Unions have wayyyyyyyy too much power over here.

Train drivers who just sit on their arses all day get paid £45k and get 7 weeks holiday and if you don't like it they just strike and bring the whole country to a halt.

Same with airline workers striking on holidays etc......

People deserve good pay but because they have the ability to hold the country to ransom it's criminal IMO.

Teachers are different than train drivers but generally instead of looking at it like "no union power = dictatorship and loads of union power = free country"....you need to realistically look at a medium that stops both the government and the unions abusing the public.

If Wisconsin are going to fuck their teachers over then you'd assume that the teachers would just move to other states and let Wisconsin beg them to come back when they have a shortage of teacher.s.....

c0bra067
24 Feb 2011, 01:56pm
Unions have wayyyyyyyy too much power over here.

Train drivers who just sit on their arses all day get paid £45k and get 7 weeks holiday and if you don't like it they just strike and bring the whole country to a halt.

Same with airline workers striking on holidays etc......

People deserve good pay but because they have the ability to hold the country to ransom it's criminal IMO.

Teachers are different than train drivers but generally instead of looking at it like "no union power = dictatorship and loads of union power = free country"....you need to realistically look at a medium that stops both the government and the unions abusing the public.

If Wisconsin are going to fuck their teachers over then you'd assume that the teachers would just move to other states and let Wisconsin beg them to come back when they have a shortage of teacher.s.....


exactly. i know of a teacher who constantly under performs colleagues in a class where every student takes the same ap test. year after year its the same thing, plenty of complaints from students and parents. but they can't do anything about it because the teacher is tenured and protected by the union. 3 of them actually. the local teachers union, the cea and the nea. so the town is paying 80k+ for this tenured teacher who isn't doing her job. then people wonder why america's education is competitive only up to the fourth grade.

i know this is just one example, but just two teachers like this in a high school has a pretty sizable impact. that's 300 students of theirs who aren't going to do well in the classes they teach, and who could be taught by 3 young enthusiastic teachers for 10k cheaper than the two bad teachers making 80k were.

on the other hand there are people who barely make 50-60k a year and the town government is nibbling at every benefit they have. the only thing protecting them is the unions, so i guess it differs with the hand you're dealt.

Shadowex3
26 Feb 2011, 10:59pm
As much as I personally despise a lot of union behavior I'm also educated enough to recognize that abolishing them entirely (or utterly castrating them) is an extremely Bad Fucking Idea. Now I don't think we'll go directly back to openly murdering anyone who attempts to unionize like we used to, but I still think that without them entirely things would be a lot worse for everyone except the top executives and shareholders.

It's a balancing act. One I think, if we had remotely decent laws in other areas instead of the over/under mess of over-legislation in some areas and under-legislation in others, could be avoided entirely.

Harbor
26 Feb 2011, 11:36pm
If Wisconsin are going to fuck their teachers over then you'd assume that the teachers would just move to other states and let Wisconsin beg them to come back when they have a shortage of teacher.s.....

In the states, you get a license to teach in a specific state, move states- different license, which is like 40? credits in college. basically, you stay were you are. Which is why this is such a big deal, I live in wisconsin, went up there last weekend, over 100,000 people shit was insane. I got free pizza, good day.

Jazzyy
26 Feb 2011, 11:41pm
I don't understand, they're basically saying that unions can no longer collective bargain. Which is bad for unions, but if social workers get treated like shit they can just go on strike anyway, and just not work until demands are met?

Harpr33t
27 Feb 2011, 10:07am
The reason I put this article isn't because I support the type of unions that can bring a country to a halt if they strike. I brought it up because the fact that the governor is abolishing the Union and their right to collective bargaining. The teachers relented and AGREED with the governor that they will take a pay cut and a cut in benefits but he didn't budge.... he said he's going ot end Unions in Wisconsin except for Firefighters and Police Officers. yet the fire fighters union took the side of the Teachers and said they'll take a pay cut as well in their benefits/pay just so the teachers can have their collective bargaining.




If you read between the lines The governor is just a Proxy for these two guys. The Koch Brothers.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/02/22/us/KOCH-1/KOCH-1-articleInline.jpg

Btw we all know that bills carry extra baggage with them. And this baggage happens to be that the Governor can sell ANY state utility company or property without a public bid. Which would be illegal unless this bill passed which is financed by these two billionaires. (Who own electric grids throughout the country)

Might be wondering why am I bringing this up? Red herring? No, the provision in this bill that would be passed would destroy unions and allow private sales of public land (your dear tax payer funded land) basically under the table without a public bid. This is not only unfair to other companies but allows attracts the kind of corruption only seen in developing countries.

PotshotPolka
27 Feb 2011, 01:48pm
I've always wondered why unions aren't subjected to monopoly laws to be honest. What if unions were competing against each other, and therefore bid for contracts, audited member performance, and couldn't hold an entire sector of the economy when they strike? I understand this is the case in a few instances, for instance construction firms, and that it'd be difficult to implement since many members would be scattered across their respective fields, but why not? They could still collectively bargain, just not absolutely so. Their interests wouldn't be completely atomized as singular entities and their organizations would form an oligopoly as opposed to a monopoly.

c0bra067
27 Feb 2011, 03:47pm
I've always wondered why unions aren't subjected to monopoly laws to be honest. What if unions were competing against each other, and therefore bid for contracts, audited member performance, and couldn't hold an entire sector of the economy when they strike? I understand this is the case in a few instances, for instance construction firms, and that it'd be difficult to implement since many members would be scattered across their respective fields, but why not? They could still collectively bargain, just not absolutely so. Their interests wouldn't be completely atomized as singular entities and their organizations would form an oligopoly as opposed to a monopoly.

unions compete to a degree (http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/business/unions-competing-to-organize-toyota-94646989.html), but totally right about the monopoly laws. i don't think laws like that will ever be passed though because ultimately unions will fund democrats, who just want to make unions more powerful, and most big business will fund republicans, who just want to get rid of unions because they feel that they inhibit the 'free market'.

Shadowex3
28 Feb 2011, 08:15pm
In other words democrats and republicans both suck the dicks of a given master whether it's the plutocratic elite or the left-wing themed plutocratic elite?

c0bra067
28 Feb 2011, 09:12pm
In other words democrats and republicans both suck the dicks of a given master whether it's the plutocratic elite or the left-wing themed plutocratic elite?

basically. i mean, you can even look at the health-care bill as the rich subduing the proletariat so 'they' won't rebel. this is all a twisted interpretation, but it can easily be argued that liberals are actually protecting capitalism more-so than conservatives; because they are quelling those who are on the shit end of the capitalistic stick, allowing the rich to get richer with less 'interruption'.

how's that for a mindfuck

PotshotPolka
1 Mar 2011, 02:47am
basically. i mean, you can even look at the health-care bill as the rich subduing the proletariat so 'they' won't rebel. this is all a twisted interpretation, but it can easily be argued that liberals are actually protecting capitalism more-so than conservatives; because they are quelling those who are on the shit end of the capitalistic stick, allowing the rich to get richer with less 'interruption'.

how's that for a mindfuck

Or maybe they're fulfilling their goals as a center-left party, dunno if we really have to drag Marx's imperialist stage of development into this.

SgtJoo
1 Mar 2011, 07:11am
Or maybe they're fulfilling their goals as a center-left party, dunno if we really have to drag Marx's imperialist stage of development into this.

Cough.

Communism = Socialism, didn't you get the memo?

Cough.

SgtJoo
1 Mar 2011, 08:29am
Also



lolwut

P.S. And yes, I have been lurking this thread waiting for Marx to be mentioned.

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.politicsdaily.com/media/2010/07/iowa-billboard-socialism-427mh0713101.jpg

Shadowex3
1 Mar 2011, 02:30pm
Without the bourgeoisie the proletariat cannot exist, and vice versa. To say that the one therefore "helps" the other is a pretty silly thing to argue.

Also, "liberals" =/= socialists/Marxists/communists (whatever you want to call them, although the correct term is probably Marxists).

Centre-left (or "liberal" - though they're still different things) has very little to do with communism or its values, American politics is just bland centre - suggesting any party in the US is socialist etc. is ridiculous.



Pretty much. I refuse to even refer to anything other than "american" left wing just because our furthest left is still further to the right than almost everyone else's furthest right.

c0bra067
1 Mar 2011, 02:57pm
Or maybe they're fulfilling their goals as a center-left party, dunno if we really have to drag Marx's imperialist stage of development into this.

i didn't mean it to look like i had the opinion that's what liberal parties are/aren't doing, i just meant to give it as a theory; nothing more, nothing less



P.S. And yes, I have been lurking this thread waiting for Marx to be mentioned.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/37/87875364_718b8e0b99.jpg

haha yeah... its just easier to bring up marx's argument about social classes when generally describing capitalism and its theories. but seriously, give evidence why you believe unions are awesome. im not being sarcastic or trying to start a flame war, i want to know why that's your opinion. anyone else reading this who feels the same as havok, feel free to chime in. im genuinely curious. if you can't already tell im fairly conservative, but who know, you might change my mind :thumb:

SgtJoo
1 Mar 2011, 08:36pm
http://economistsview.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451b33869e2014e866944d7970d-800wi

Shadowex3
2 Mar 2011, 12:58am
Not that Fox didn't try to report the results on that as the other way around...

(potshot at shoddy reporting more than anything else)

Harpr33t
2 Mar 2011, 09:14am
Thank you Joo

Hazmat
2 Mar 2011, 09:48am
This bill is causing allto of problems. Not just for teachers its for anyone in a union. many of my frinds parents wont be able to make ends meet if it passes (or when now). like i understand that the unions may baby the teachers and stuff but it is how it is. and to break all the unions at once and not allow them back is just to much.

ps: Madison is fuckin crazy. I live here and the capitol is a bitch to get to. thank god for buses.

PotshotPolka
2 Mar 2011, 10:19am
Better idea to move this thread in a positive direction: Address the underlying problems of municipal governments relying heavily on property taxes. Public workers take huge hits as opposed to tax hikes when there's a down turn in the property market, usually because backlash from a few, granted vocal unions results in less backlash.

These pensions are funded at the local level for the most part (at least in Florida, I honestly doubt the difference in process differs terribly much state to state), therefore the root problem lies at the local, not state level.

State VATs aren't popular, even though they're a viable option to this problem (and legal one at that) for the same reason a Federal one isn't, it collects and distributes income disproportionately, but what government doesn't? At the very least, VATs are more stable than property taxes.

c0bra067
2 Mar 2011, 01:16pm
potshot you basically summed up my town. all residential property taxes with little commercial revenue for the town. just strip malls and a handful of offices. so the 20k residents are stuck with pretty much the entire bill year after year. the town then pays top dollar to employees in order to stay 'competitive' with the surrounding towns, towns with more business growth and development, who can actually afford it.
here's the top 20 earners on the education side of the budget. its not that we're paying more than the other towns around us, we just don't have the money to fund anything. nearly all the roads need to be replaced, but there's no money for that because it all goes to paying people we can't afford to pay.

School Superintendent
$189,304

Assistant School Superintendent
$153,920

High School Principal
$144,186

Director of Operations, Technology and Performance Management
$139,868

Director of Student Support Service
$137,884

Middle School (1) Principal
$137,716

Middle School (2) Principal
$134,553

Instructional Service and Professional Development
$134,475

Elementary School (1) Principal
$131,221

Elementary School (2) Principal
$131,122

Elementary School (3) Principal
$130,372

High School Assistant (1) Principal
$125,668

High School Assistant (2) Principal
$125,668

Middle School (2) Assistant Principal
$113,794

Teacher 1
$112,962

Teacher 2
$110,795

Teacher 3
$109,277

Athletic Director
$108,068

Assistant Director of Student Support Service
$107,995

Teacher 4
$106,743

there are 10 more on the non-education budget making 100k+, and probably more education budget employees making >100k but didn't make the list.
all of our pensions are local.
starting salary for teachers is ~55k.

Lux
2 Mar 2011, 06:01pm
Whilst it's not as big a problem (or is it?......) there's SO much union power (at least for specific unions) these days that it's not even about human rights, working conditions etc....it's about how much money they can squeeze out of the government no matter what the cost, and whilst they're at it get over the top benefits, pensions etc too.

Not ALL unions are like that, because there's some jobs where the people are not getting paid so much less than other jobs of lower importance/requiring less or not more skill or qualifications.

c0bra067
2 Mar 2011, 07:16pm
hmmm very good points. ive always been vehemently against regulation, but it seems i gotta agree with you that may be the best route to go. simply because firms hire ceos to make profit, not to look out for the welfare of the employees; i mean that's their job, that's why they get paid. but regulation needs to be heavily moderated. i emphasize heavily. look at spain. the regulatory measures passed by the government regarding (benefiting) unions has completely killed the country. i think unemployment is around 20%(?) and growing; small business owners can't afford to employ anyone even when they are making profits because of regulation regarding benefits and wage rates. then we get examples like the squatter article on here about this massive diaspora due to the economic conditions. italy is another excellent example. i could mention the whole greek thing too, but i think that has to do more with a combination of large government and their kleptocratic government than anything else.

so would you agree that regulation would be an appropriate replacement for unions? it doesn't seem to make sense to have both, since in theory they both work to do the same thing.

Lux
2 Mar 2011, 07:21pm
So we need regulation....but the regulation has to be regulated? Who's going to regulate those who regulate the regulators?
:troll:

Simply put if you're going to have regulation you need to put trust in someone to do it right......the problem is that when it's the government regulating it's usually going to be terrible and when it's someone else they have their own agendas that aren't always in the public interest.

c0bra067
2 Mar 2011, 07:46pm
So we need regulation....but the regulation has to be regulated? Who's going to regulate those who regulate the regulators?
:troll:

Simply put if you're going to have regulation you need to put trust in someone to do it right......the problem is that when it's the government regulating it's usually going to be terrible and when it's someone else they have their own agendas that aren't always in the public interest.

if lobbying became illegal there could be a serious chance that a lot of issues could be solved. government is good at regulating some things after all lol. the finance industry is regulated like fuck, and look, banks are still making profits. its yet to be seen if the new regulations will do any good, but regarding things like insider trading, they happen, but its not as bad as it would be without regulation.

edit: pretty sure england's banks have it even worse off. no clue how they're doing. haven't heard anything bad though.

Lux
2 Mar 2011, 08:05pm
edit: pretty sure england's banks have it even worse off. no clue how they're doing. haven't heard anything bad though.

England's banks are laughing all the way to the bank...if that makes sense.

Not all of them had a lot if any government bailout......but almost all of them are back to making huge profits by manipulating the low interest rates amongst other things...and instead of passing these profits onto the customers they're paying out massive bonuses. Now don't get me wrong.....usually I'd just be disappointed that banks did that...but when the taxpayer has paid to keep these banks afloat and we supposedly own massive stakeholdings in these banks you expect your interests to be at hand.....

I'd regulate the shit out of banks....can't be trusted.

Shadowex3
2 Mar 2011, 09:01pm
if lobbying became illegal there could be a serious chance that a lot of issues could be solved. government is good at regulating some things after all lol. the finance industry is regulated like fuck, and look, banks are still making profits. its yet to be seen if the new regulations will do any good, but regarding things like insider trading, they happen, but its not as bad as it would be without regulation.

edit: pretty sure england's banks have it even worse off. no clue how they're doing. haven't heard anything bad though.

Actually lobbying in general isn't the issue, it's how we look at corporations today vs what our laws were built to handle.

Our laws were more or less designed to handle corporations that were for the most part local, and even if they were national they were still american, paid taxes, and were totally subject to our laws and jurisdiction and could readily be held responsible if necessary. On the side of politics a corporation had no rights. None. It could do business, yes, but only the individuals in a corporation had rights.

A modern corporation is an entirely different animal. Most all modern business is not done at a local level but my staggeringly enormous multinational corporations who are more or less impossible to actually pin down. Look at a grocery store aisle. Hell look at the whole store. Odds are virtually everything in that store is owned by less than 10 total corporations if you go upwards enough. Those corporations are enormous, multinational, have no real alliegance to any one nation, and the corporate structure while superficially the same now more or less acts as a means of maximizing profit while specifically minimizing legal liability.

They're totally self sustaining, self reinforcing, and because of the way our laws work more or less invincible. We can't arrest the high level people because they say they "didn't know" or had a responsibility to the shareholders, we can't arrest the low level people because they really DIDNT know and had to follow orders from above. So we fine them. The problem is even if we fine them hundreds of millions of dollars... they make it right back. They can literally afford to break the law because we simply can't fine them enough to make a difference.

And then we go and engage in this nonsense of "Corporate Personhood" where supposedly a corporation as itself has all the rights of an individual citizen... that just doesnt work. These corporations can now (thanks to citizens united) dump as much as they want on politicians, and probably still don't pay ANY taxes on that money. How can even the entirety of the US citizenry compete with that on a political level? Whoever we vote out they just buy again, however much we donate they just outbid us.

The problem is that corporations ARE too large to fail, not because of their necessity but because of their sheer influence and utter lack of accountability.

c0bra067
2 Mar 2011, 09:43pm
And then we go and engage in this nonsense of "Corporate Personhood" where supposedly a corporation as itself has all the rights of an individual citizen... that just doesnt work. These corporations can now (thanks to citizens united) dump as much as they want on politicians, and probably still don't pay ANY taxes on that money. How can even the entirety of the US citizenry compete with that on a political level? Whoever we vote out they just buy again, however much we donate they just outbid us.

well corporations are legally their own entity, and don't share all the same rights as a citizen, but do maintain quite a few. that's actually why you can't sue employees or shareholders if the company fucks up (as long as there is no malicious bullshit on the individual level). there are talks of capping how long people can campaign for, such as the uk model, so... cheer up, there's a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel :clap2:

Lux
3 Mar 2011, 09:33am
From the brief experience I have with unions (I work in a unionised workplace) yeah, they're very much relevent. Employee contracts, working & break hours, work conditions and all that jazz still need to be fought for today (even pay recently)

I've been trying to say that I'm not talking about EVERY unionised workplace...generally it's the more prominent jobs I'm talking about e.g. train drivers...rather than factory workers or something like that.

I've worked in places where there isn't a union as such..and I definitely think the place could've done with one....because the way the management treated employees was pretty shitty.....and I'm talking about Waitrose here......so much for us all being "partners".

Harpr33t
3 Mar 2011, 02:20pm
I've been trying to say that I'm not talking about EVERY unionised workplace...generally it's the more prominent jobs I'm talking about e.g. train drivers...rather than factory workers or something like that.

I've worked in places where there isn't a union as such..and I definitely think the place could've done with one....because the way the management treated employees was pretty shitty.....and I'm talking about Waitrose here......so much for us all being "partners".

Corporations like to make their employees feel like they are part of a team. Trust me they try to make the managers deceive their employees into thinking they care about them so much. Just pick up any managerial handbook for any company and you'll see what I'm talking about.

c0bra067
3 Mar 2011, 03:23pm
From the brief experience I have with unions (I work in a unionised workplace) yeah, they're very much relevent. Employee contracts, working & break hours, work conditions and all that jazz still need to be fought for today (even pay recently).



Unions work for the workers. As far as corporations and TNCs go, that's a different story (and a mess) but unions on their own should serve the pure purpose of representing the workers for bargaining to improve their work conditions. That's it. Regulation may have some effect that could serve a similar purpose but there's no guarantee due to the nature of a corporation, and in any case it's a crude method.

As far as other stuff goes, it should have nothing to do with unions. A lack of regulation and failsafes on a market create the need for unions but the capitalist method by which people make money in markets means you can't guarantee that there would be no need for unions even if there was regulation.

Also in our country's case the government did a good thing by devolving power to the Bank of England and as far as regulating interest rates go - it's important for growth out of a recession.

yeah, unions are for the workers, but they cost both the workers and the company money. which in turn means that the price of the product has to increase, making everything more expensive for the buyer. it just breeds inefficiency.
read this (http://curiouscapitalist.blogs.time.com/2010/06/14/the-problem-with-too-much-labor-protection/), it gets to the heart of what im talking about with strict regulation and overly-controlling unions.

The reason is that employers don't want to create jobs. It's simply too costly. Blame the country's overly strict labor laws. Mandated severance payments – of as much as 45 days per year of service – make laying off employees prohibitively expensive, and that makes firms reluctant to hire them in the first place. Managers do have the option of taking on temporary staff on fixed-term contracts. If those workers get dismissed, they don't receive the same giant severance payments as permanent employees, allowing companies to downsize at reduced cost. But that choice has its own downside. With workers around for only a short time, they have little commitment to their jobs, and employers have even less reason to train them properly. That affects company performance and competitiveness.

The labor laws in Spain have created a distorted economy, where those workers in permanent positions almost have jobs-for-life, while the remainder can't find stable employment, or jobs period. That may be good for the protected workers, but nobody else. Not companies, not young people (who, as new entrants to the workforce, have the hardest time finding regular jobs), and not the overall economy. If Spain can't put people to work, it's going to have a rough time rebounding from the Great Recession and its own disastrous housing bust. The government has to make labor laws more flexible.

hence the oversight of regulation. i worked in a non-unionized warehouse, and everyone was paid fairly, received health insurance and had holiday/sick days. regulation should be there to promote and enforce corporate responsibility, that's something unions can never do, because as you said, they're only looking out for the employees.

c0bra067
3 Mar 2011, 06:22pm
It costs the companies less the more they ensure their workers have good employment (and the union needs subscriptions to exist - usually membership isn't very expensive).

don't quite understand the first part, it costs companies quite a bit of $$ in time spent dealing with unions. this includes time all the time lawyers, the financial department, and officers have to spend negotiating with unions. time is money. the value of the people involved decreases to the firm, because they aren't being as productive as they could be. its very similar to the housing equilibrium. the person (firm) ends up paying more money in searching (negotiating) than they would if the price ceiling (union) wasn't there. [which eliminates the main purpose of the price ceiling - cambridge, mass is a good example of a flawed housing system]



Market fluctuation is to blame for companies struggling to create jobs when demand goes down, not unions. Unions do tread on peoples feet, yes, and they can be counter-productive for smaller businesses in bad economic times, but they can't be blamed for a rising cost of living or a drop in demand. They still have important purpose and the government has been/should be more responsible to protect business (particularly national industries). Tariffs could and have in the US' case protected loads of industry from struggling or failing due to cheaper leabour overseas. It's why we fell in love with public sector - because it's secure. It's easier than regulating and we don't have to worry as much about unions.

I can't really disagree or defend either point of view - unions do work against a business when the business is struggling, but they're still needed (and we shouldn't forget the real cause of why unions may be a problem and simply blame the unions for causing a problem).

i agree, tariffs would have helped, and import tariffs on chinese goods are being talked about (still don't know how likely they are though), but the age of manufacturing in the us has passed. the government did a good job with car manufacturing though, a good deal of foreign cars are now made in the united states because of import quotas that were imposed. however, the united states is mainly a services market now. the problem with the public sector and big government, is that it aims to eliminate waste and minimize marginal cost by streamlining the process (whatever it may be), but is prone to being caught up in inefficiency, partly because the security allows people who shouldn't hold positions, hold positions.

btw your arguments aren't falling on deaf ears here haha