At a unionized company I worked with, a guy didn’t show up to work for 10 yrs for a kidney stone while collecting benefits and doing another job. Since the company never official asked where he was (he milked it), nothing could be done to him. In fact he had seniority and kicked someone who had been working for a few years out of his position and came back to work the next day. The union while looking after both workers basically sided with the kidney stone guy he couldn’t be fired (after 10 years)!
I’m not sure what the answer is, but if you look at income trends in the US and most other major economies over the last 40 years, you’ll see that income inequality has grown and that a lot of people have not seen their real wages rise at all: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_inequality_in_the_United_States Unions as they exist now are not perfect, but household income as a percentage of GDP have been falling for a long time whereas corporate profits as a percentage of GDP reached an all time high in the US during the most recent up-cycle. This sort of elitism is not good for society or the majority of people in it. Perhaps it is more and better unionisation that is needed to reverse those trends. As I said initially, I don’t have any concrete answers myself.
The problem as we see it today is very much like BChadwick put it. At a time, workers had no rights whatsoever. Unions came in as a way to force managment to release these ‘rights’ and created the workweek we know today. The problem is that when it comes to unions, they fight for rights that cannot be taken away and thus why we, ie. taxpayers, are attempting to force the unions into concessions. The union mentality is that once a right is attained for the workers, it is impossible to take away and this can be applied to all facets of how unions work, like with PTNY’s comment above involving a worker who has been given rights and the system is structured for him to keep them, often defying law and common sense itself. Unions are a one-sided, all gain, no loss system. Unions are a natual response in a world where it is management’s job to maximize shareholder value. In doing so, they MUST give as little to their employee’s without it effecting their productivity. Unions are not efficient in any way as the true efficent point on the ‘Matrix of Corporate Life’ would occur at a point where management pays employees enough that they have no need to ‘acquire’ more capital. Anyone who works for a union should be ashamed of their job as they do not provide any productivity to our society, though they still get paid hefty sums. Unions will not go away period, as they have created rights that cannot be taken away unless they concede them themselves. One way system. Even if we changed the law to make management truly pay respect to all stakeholders equally, unions would still be around to take more than the other stakeholders, including shareholders, which we are seeing in autos now. So long as there are unions in North America, those businesses will be slowly failing, UNLESS, of course, your products are unique and unimitatable, ie. copper, oil, etc etc. Just as countries and states are created in unison, so shall they be destroyed. In this day and age we need a complete revamp of our corporate laws and their union law counterparts. Lets establish real fairness, give managment discretion in distribution of captial, but create a national, government arm to regulate each stakeholders’ rights and enforce changes should there be any inequalities over time. This is the only way to bring fairness in all sectors and allow North America to truly compete with other countries in all areas. At least if stakeholders’ rights are in the hands of government, we can fight the initiatives we don’t like as a nation, take part in who we want to lead, monitor and create these initiatives and take power out of current union hands who do not deserve such power and who are hired and appointed by a mob of people who have had way too many years of feelings of entitlement passed down from generations.
A guy starts a shop with a purpose - to make something. Like custom wrought ironwork and hires some welders to help make the ironwork. Then the welders form a union with the purpose of stopping the making of something, the ironwork in this case, unless they get everything they want. It is like an anti-purpose! Like the other fella my view comes from seeing dad’s business deal with this stuff.
Well if my taxpayer money goes into making detroit like this… well then please go right ahead and take my money 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYPqA4slnbQ
Hah! That’s going to take a heck of a lot of taxpayer money. Especially after seeing what it’s like in its current state: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aktLRiWXfqg
Carson Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I’m not sure what the answer is, but if you look > at income trends in the US and most other major > economies over the last 40 years, you’ll see that > income inequality has grown and that a lot of > people have not seen their real wages rise at > all: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_inequality_in_ > the_United_States > > Unions as they exist now are not perfect, but > household income as a percentage of GDP have been > falling for a long time whereas corporate profits > as a percentage of GDP reached an all time high in > the US during the most recent up-cycle. This sort > of elitism is not good for society or the majority > of people in it. Perhaps it is more and better > unionisation that is needed to reverse those > trends. As I said initially, I don’t have any > concrete answers myself. It’s also important to realize that this also coincides with a dramatic decease in the percentage of employees that are covered by collective bargaining agreements, particularly in the United States. This is the primary reason I am sympathetic to unions because it’s clear that alot of people will never be able to get into university or dont have the capability to develop marketible skills. Which is important because these are the most significant factors in predicting life time income. Its not healthy for society as a whole for this inequality to exist, low skilled workers do need some sort of protection because not everyone has the same intrinsic capabilities.
These idiots will keep blaming unions while all the tax payer monies are being looted by the elites right under our noses. They remind of the people blaming gays for 9/11. With so many ignorant masses running amok I see no future for this country.
louisvillegrad Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > These idiots will keep blaming unions while all > the tax payer monies are being looted by the > elites right under our noses. They remind of the > people blaming gays for 9/11. With so many > ignorant masses running amok I see no future for > this country. Unions are not going to get people up to the proper level… In the long run, usually the business goes under. Also, why go to college when you can earn 60k? Assuming that unions are going to make things all better… is just poor logical thinking. I agree that the income gap is not good. I also would like stronger development in our most basic infrastructure in the USA. Aside from our universities, our schools are terrible. But unions are not going to do this. Proper time and investment in the right areas will.
louisvillegrad Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > These idiots will keep blaming unions while all > the tax payer monies are being looted by the > elites right under our noses. They remind of the > people blaming gays for 9/11. With so many > ignorant masses running amok I see no future for > this country. I don’t believe they are ‘robbing’ anything. I think they are allowed to sustain. More capital = more capital appreciation + no desperate liquidity needs relative to the ‘common man’ = rich get richer The other side of the coin is that we take the capital from the elite and form our own society… its called socialism that will never work and we’ll be back to despotism/capitalism when someone can convince a lot of people that they should hold power and thereby capital. The reality of life is that WE ARE the masses. We are in it and its very very difficult to become an elite, but compared to all societies before ours, at least we have a shot 
Louisvillegrad may be a little over the top in his analysis, but I have to agree with him on this one. Yes, unions do lead to some inequalities in the systems. And, yes, they do take advantage of the system when they can – they protested for months outside of my building after non-union workers were hired to fix the lobby. But the fact remains that they are a necessary counterpoint to the inevitable and eventually exploitation of workers by business. Do I agree with 90% final year payouts for all retirees for the remainder of their lives? No. But then again, I don’t think business should be able to basically monopolize the work pool and hold-out and only offer work to the lowest bidder. Definitely, no. Also, back to what I think was louisville’s original point: why is everyone so steamed at the unions and not the bankers? The front-office boys in every IB basically have their own union and they keep the club very exclusive with – what I believe – the sole purpose of keeping their salaries nice and high. It’s the guys in suspenders and cufflinks that drove this economy into a ditch, not the unions. – My pinko commie, raving lunatic, pissed off at this year’s returns, 2 cents.
TJR Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Louisvillegrad may be a little over the top in his > analysis, but I have to agree with him on this > one. Yes, unions do lead to some inequalities in > the systems. And, yes, they do take advantage of > the system when they can – they protested for > months outside of my building after non-union > workers were hired to fix the lobby. But the fact > remains that they are a necessary counterpoint to > the inevitable and eventually exploitation of > workers by business. Do I agree with 90% final > year payouts for all retirees for the remainder of > their lives? No. But then again, I don’t think > business should be able to basically monopolize > the work pool and hold-out and only offer work to > the lowest bidder. Definitely, no. > > Also, back to what I think was louisville’s > original point: why is everyone so steamed at the > unions and not the bankers? The front-office boys > in every IB basically have their own union and > they keep the club very exclusive with – what I > believe – the sole purpose of keeping their > salaries nice and high. > > It’s the guys in suspenders and cufflinks that > drove this economy into a ditch, not the unions. > > > – My pinko commie, raving lunatic, pissed off at > this year’s returns, 2 cents. B/c this topic is on unions.