GM forced to close 4 truck plants

[gemini5362]

Perceived wealth and money in the bank can be two very different things.

Nice little double talk going on there. Standards of living may be out of kilter also. Twenty years ago, how many 16-17 yr. old kids had their very own car with a gas credit card and a cellphone? Now, we're bidding a job to expand one of the high school parking lots because they lack 250 spaces of adequate parking. 1500-2000 sq.ft. of housing used to be more than acceptable. Now, most homes in this area start at 2750 sq.ft., then a full basement plus at least a 20x24 garage. Then add a perceived housing shortage to help inflate prices and you get "starter homes" for 300+. The real estate developers and sales agents did little to help offset that. Now, we have an excess of housing which is driving some prices down and the real estate agents are squealing about poverty and well below "record" sales. So, the "skilled trades" that moved into the area for the housing boom are now packing up and heading for the next boom market. Meanwhile, the "skilled union mechanic" has been layed off and is now looking for work because he doesn't want to move the wife and kiddies again. How much money is the union giving that person to help them stay on their feet so they won't need government assistance?

I am sorry if percieved wealth and money in the bank are two different things. When I see a doctor on food stamps I will rethink my value of their income. I agree with you 100 per cent about the parking lot at school. When I was in high school you were not allowed to drive your car to school unless you were a senior. We had a chunk of dirt parking lot that they put some gravel on and that was it. Blame your local school board on the parking lot.

You are doing a great job. In addition to being a union official, I also have a real estate license. If you start making comments about electronic geeks you will have me totally covered since my main job is as an electronic technician.

 

[gemini5362]

70K per year with benefits is more than my wife makes teaching kids with 2 masters degrees an 14 years experience on the job.

So who should make more?

A union janitor at a manufacturing plant sweeping floors & straightening the magazine pile, or a union teacher of our children with the highest education level possible except for a PhD ?

I am so tired of hearing this arguement. I can tell you from my experience with teachers when my children were in high school that I would rather have had the union janitor teaching them. The bottom line here is that your wife went to school and graduated. She took her job knowing what it pays. She continued to work in that field knowing how big her pay check is. If she is unhappy about that she should change fields. I had a really good job as a Field Engineer. I made a really nice salary. I did not like the travel so I did something about it I changed fields. If teachers are that unhappy with their salary they are free to do the same thing.

By the way I am not going to believe that a janitor is making 70k a year. I will explain why. We are not allowed to go on strike, if the union and management cannot agree on something we go to interest arbitration. A few years ago my employer was taking a blood bath losing electronic technicians to other companies. ( some of which I believe were non union) We got two pay level increases in one contract period. The custodians were having a fit. I attended a meeting where it was brought up that our custodians are the highest paid in the United States. During arbitration the way we get pay raises is to compare like job descriptions to other companies and then try to get compatibility. I believe that the exact quote told the custodians was that other companies use them to get raises for their custodians. Our top level topped out custodians do not even make half of that amount. While I am on that subject. I am the top level and topped out scale for my employer Basically as high as you can go as a hourly employee for one of the bigger unions in the US. I dont make 70 K a year. Builder, my wife has actually more education than your wife does. She has a higher level degree was number one in her class in college. Had the highest score in the state on her certification test. She makes quite a bit less than 70k she also works a lot more than 8 hours a day and does it for 12 months a year. She does not go around talking about how horrible it is that she does not get paid more. She likes her job and is making what she makes.

 

[gemini5362]

Never going to happen. A Union takes no social responsibility. They may have been idealistic at some point in the past. Now they are just a business - keep those dues flowing and the union bosses making big $$$. CAW policy is "no concessions." They'd rather close a plant than agree to a wage cut.

It is kind of hard to make concessions when you hear about management getting huge pay increases or bonuses. I believe you will find that a lot of unions have had to take concessions to have a job in todays market and you will find that most of the times when unions make concessions managers get increases or bonuses.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Gemini, if my history is correct weren't unions brought about because of a combination of poor working conditions and low pay? If so have working conditions improved? Have wages improved? If so then why do the unions constantly want more and more every time their contracts are up. I do not recall recently any of the major unions saying they were happy with their current deal. It is always about a possible strike if a "new" deal isn't reached.

I personally see no use for unions in this day and age. You said it yourself, if the employee doesn't like what the employer is paying they can leave for another job. If the employer can't keep workers he will have to raise his rates. Why have unions anymore? Safety? OHSA covers workplace saftey now.

 

[gemini5362]

Reading with interest, and funny, I think I sit on a different side of the table then folks I often do on this one.

My union experiences. My uncle, ran some kind of paper plate machine (about 83 or 84) and had for many years before that. The company (the dreaded "they" decided to take that machine out of the equation, left my uncle without a machine to watch (his words) for his 8 hour shift. So they sent him too the machine shop, still at full time in service, full pay etc. so in 84 he was making well over $20 an hour sweeping the machine shop floor, and yes, that was his job, he swept the floor.

The dreaded "company" then tried to "force" him to do something he just did not want to do, darn them nasty folks, they would send him to the local machinest school to become a certified / qualified machinest for two years, pay his regular salary etc, pay all class fee's, books etc, pay additional travel and food money to drive back and forth (I think it was about 20min drive) and give him a job as a machinest (making substantially more money, still with all his union seniority etc.) but he had too agree to stay with them one or two years after that............ Those darn corporate scoundrels were not going to force that junk on him.. They needed to bring back that machine so he could watch it.........

Then the next year when I visited they were on strike against this dastardly company who were trying to "get over" on them and were treating them so horrible (they still had not brought his machine back and he was still making over $20 an hour yes, still sweeping the machine shop floor)

They finally fired him last year, well, check that, they never were able to fire him, he got belligerant with them and told them "he quit" (then my bet he sobered up that night) and when he went back the union could not help him because he had done it fully too himself in front of too many folks.

Oh, and yes, I was with this uncle at this point, but don't get the assumption that it was "him". Running around with many workers from that plant, he was far from being unusual.

Ok, here is another of my great union experiences. They tried to bring the union in here were I worked. Lets see, 20 Pro union guys come into my shop (I am outspoken anti union) and tell me I better "straighten up" or "something may happen to me at work" lets see, then they called my wife and told her I was sleeping with a female co-worker, and on and on.

Yeah, my 2 cents, unions, EPA and OSHA are going to drive business right out of the US. And I would say they would all sit around and sing kumbayaa at the campfire, but they would have to use an imported chainsaw, and hire a TCN to run it, the OSHA guy would require us all to be 100' from that dangerous open flame and then again the EPA will be trying to ban us from polluting with that burning wood.......................

Never mind,

Nomex undies on

If I was king, send those striking union workers home.

Hire in replacements. (see how the Union folks act then) I would venture to say there are plenty of folks ready to work at what that company is offering on the table right now, and that is how that should be settled.

Alan we usually dont disagree on things but on this one we can just agree that we disagree. I personally dont agree with the make someone join the union. I have told a lot of people when they complained that I wished they would get out of the union altogether. I will give you one of my experience with the last company I worked for before I got this job. I worked at a steel mill as an electrician. The steel workers union got enough signatures to call for a vote. There were several weeks where the company had us stay mandatory overtime for two hours a day so that they could have talks with the employees. I believe if I remember it was twice a week. This was mandatory overtime if you didnt stay you were fired. I attended every one of these meetings for my shift and talked to others from other shifts. Every meeting I went to people got up and talked. Management wanted to know what was wrong that we thought we needed a union. All the meetings that I went to everyone said that it was not about money. The people I talked to from other shifts said the same thing. ( everyone rotated shifts and maintenance was in a different rotation so we worked with every production shift over a three week period. The company had some managers with serious problems. Employee after employee got up and talked about the problems with these managers and interestingly enough it was the same two managers. The shipping department head and the Maintenance department head. Meeting after meeting employees recounted horror stories about these two individuals. ( usually the shipping department head he was a real uh jerk i guess is the strongest word that wont get me in trouble) I am very serious they had hours and hours of employees talking about things that he had done to employees. The plant manager whom everyone really liked said he would do something about the problems. When the time to vote came the vote was against the union ( by the way I voted against it) I left shortly after this. There was absolutely nothing done about the bad managers they kept their jobs they did not change anything in the way they did things. They continued to treat people poorly. Two years later there was another vote and the union was voted in. The vote neither time had anything to do about money. Most of the people that worked there had new cars, new bass boats, nice houses. They just got tired of being abused.

 

[gemini5362]

Gemini, if my history is correct weren't unions brought about because of a combination of poor working conditions and low pay? If so have working conditions improved? Have wages improved? If so then why do the unions constantly want more and more every time their contracts are up. I do not recall recently any of the major unions saying they were happy with their current deal. It is always about a possible strike if a "new" deal isn't reached.

I personally see no use for unions in this day and age. You said it yourself, if the employee doesn't like what the employer is paying they can leave for another job. If the employer can't keep workers he will have to raise his rates. Why have unions anymore? Safety? OHSA covers workplace saftey now.

I believe there are a lot of employees who have no faith in OSHA. I don't. My father worked for a major appliance manaufacturer. The employees were spraying a foam with a known carcinogen in the doors as insulation. They were only provided rubber gloves for protection. OSHA found out about it and made them go to isolation suits with external air supplies and then fined the company a great big 600.00 fine. My father died a couple of years after that with lung cancer. I am not that impressed by OSHA


I agree that is why Unions started and actually I believe for most of them it was working conditions and treatment more than salary. I do know that is what led to my union being formed. There is still a lot of management that mistreats their employees. We have employees that are temporary employees they are not hired from a temporary agency we hire them but they are considered temporary. Because they are not regular employees they are not afforded protection under the contract. They are paid 10.00 per hour, no health benefits, no holiday pay, no sick leave, exactly what others on here are advocating companies should be able to hire. We had one young man the other day. He drove 20 miles from his home to work that day. He worked for 17 minutes. The boss came up to him and told him that he needed to cut back that night because he was over his budget on workhours so he had to go home. This kid drove 40 miles round trip for 17 minutes work. I was mad as heck but could do nothing about it.

Our temporary employees have no benefits, no guarantees nothing except a right to work at the bosses whim. There are hundreds of thousands of employees in the United States doing the same. How many of you would like to work under those conditions. Have a wife and children at home and have to come home and tell them that they would only let you work 17 minutes tonight. Before you say he needs another job take a look in the newspaper and see what jobs are out there. I have had kids that were unemployed recently and it is not that easy sometimes to find something. I can say this of my 4 children that are working( one is out of the country going to school but he worked until he left in september) only one of them has health benefits. all of them make less than 11.00 per hour.

 

[gemini5362]

'nuff said.

I wont argue the article I have never seen it. I dont know what they make to be able to say how acurate it is to comment thank you for posting it though.

 

[gemini5362]

Businesses go out of business for a myriad number of reasons --- but it's not the cost of unionized labor that has driven most companies in this country into bankruptcy.

Union workers in the U.S. and Canada were approximately 30.4% and 32.3% of the workforce in 1960. By 1999, those percentages shifted to 13.5% and 32.6% in the U.S. and Canada, respectively. Have you read many headlines about the catastrophic bankruptcy failures of Canadian businesses as a result of their "Union workers"? No....

The percentage of Union workers in the major economies of Europe has not; repeat NOT; declined in the same dramatic fashion as what has occurred in the U.S. during the past 30 years. Anyone know what the Euro is trading today compared to the dollar....?

Please note this reference: Unionization and Wage Inequality: A Comparitive Study of the U.S., the U. K. and Canada. David Card, Thomas Lemieux, and W. Craig Riddell. (National Bureau of Economic Research No. 9473 Jan. 2003)

However, tax policies and the incentives for business (major owners of the companies stock) often provide a financially beneficial avenue for them to "scuttle" a company and sell off it's major assests for incredible profit.

There are a number of "corporate raiders" who have made fortunes buying up blocks of a companies stock and then steering the company into the ditch -- just to enrich themselves and other like-minded "investors".

The name Kirk Kerkovian mean anything to you....?

When tax policies allow this kind of "business activity" to occur; without significant financial drawbacks -- companies and the workers and the retired employees, etc. etc all suffer. And of course, the country as a whole, suffers the repercussions that go along with the human tragedy.

As well, the tax policies that are currently in effect in this country make it a money-making strategy for multinational corporations to shift their "corporate headquarters" to the Virgin Islands or the Bahamas, etc. It has been estimated that this particular tax-loophole costs the American economy $50 Billion dollars a year.

Please note reference: "Multinational Firm Tax Avoidance and U.S. Government Revenue". Kimberly A. Clausing Wellesley COllege, Wellesley, MA. 2007)

There are many things that need a "course correction" or a change in direction in this country -- killing off the Unions is not one of them; IMO.

Watch the pea --- guys --- not the shells.

AKfish

Thank you AKfish. We are the minority in this post. I do notice however that most of the people that are posting anti union comments are Management or buisness owners.

 

[gemini5362]

Up until this post, I took you seriously.

So let me get this straight- you're proposing I cut my $/SF by like 80%?

Would a union construction company do that? Heck no. A union wouldn't even make enough of a concession to let their employer stay in business so they'd wake up to jobs the next day.

It would be kind of amusing to go to one of those union meetings and listen to employees take a stand for another $1/hr only to lose their jobs and employers forever.

This is exactly what i am talking about. You want to talk about workers in china making 30 cents an hour and how overpaid the american union employee is. I wonder what the average cost of a house in China is and if the American Builder is way overpaid. You mention dealings about working with the union. I had a dealing with a builder once. I bought a house and wanted to expand it by 1200 square feet. I talked to some builders and used one I liked. He was not the cheapest by any means but he did do good work. We came to an agreement on price. I paid for all materials as they were delivered. He had me go get some things for the job and told me to go to one particular lumber company for everything. He said to make sure I told them it was for him on my job. I paid for everything as I picked it up or as it was delivered he had none of his own money in the construction. I found out that he got 10 per cent of all the money spend on materials refunded back to him. That was not a bad bonus for doing a job that you had agreed to do for a certain amount for labor. I wished I could negotiate a contract and then have a back door for a huge sum of cash on top of that. I just get paid what the contract says we agree to work for.

Builder do you quote a contract to your clients quoting a certain amount of money for materials knowing you will get a 10 to 15 per cent refund on that amount back ?

 

[gemini5362]

Let me point out something in just a seperate post other than a response.

Many of the people out there are old enough to have children some of us grown children.

Do you want your child trying to live on 10.00 an hour. Do you want your children to not have health benefits if they get sick they have to either not see a doctor and hope it is nothing serioud or decide which bill they wont pay that month so they can see a doctor. I have children in those circumstances and i worry about them a lot. I am very fortunate that I can pay for them to go to a doctor if it comes to that. There are a lot of parents in this country that cannot do that. Jobs with health insurance benefits are becoming more the norm in this country probably as fast as the decline in union membership.