Having gone through a very ugly negotiation and strike a few years ago I remember an observation I made to the State President of the union that sent him into a chair throwing, swearing rage, (must have struck a nerve:). Anyhow I observed that negotiations with unions are very tough because you have 3 groups trying to agree on something.
1. Workers wanting to get better wages, benefits and whatever.
2. Employers that would like to make a profit and remain viable through good and bad times.
3. The Union who must absorb as much of the coming raises as it can to increase it's revenue flow so that it can increase it's bloated hierarchy and pensions and shit.
Number 3 is the biggest problem I found. They have to protect ALL jobs while increasing the amount of money per hour paid to the union per man so that they can achieve their goals which have absolutely nothing to do with either the employers nor the workers.
Our area a journeyman earns 37.85 per hour now, 18.74 of which goes to the union for vacation fund, local pension, national pension, health and welfare, local training, national training, SASMI and of course the business agent. As a side note a journeyman working a normal year is going to earn about 40K with overtime and such for his check share and almost the same for the union. A journeyman that is wise enough to become a business agent on the other hand will earn 96K per year plus a car and other benefits like the annual agent meeting in such awful locations such as Tahiti.
I want to sell my business and become a union rep. No stress, no risk, no investment, way the hell more time to play golf and best of all make more money. |
