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Politics : Mainstream Politics and Economics -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (384)	9/1/2011 2:49:57 PM
From: longnshort	5 Recommendations Respond to of 85487

"companies would not abandon a profitable business" once they become unionized they won't be profitable anymore, so why go though all the head aches and arrogance from the union. I would also shut it down knowing what the future would be

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (384)	9/1/2011 3:06:11 PM
From: Jorj X Mckie	6 Recommendations Respond to of 85487

Really? You're an unskilled worker on the factory line with unemployment at about 15% and people lined up looking for work and you're going to "demand" a raise? Or, line up with hundreds of thousands of applicants eager to take a paying job, any job, that likely offers no more than the one you just quit? Since you want to question my background as a way to discredit me. I will give you a little background. In the 1980s I was a waiter at the Sahara Tahoe. The food and beverage union came in and started to organize the employees. The base wage wasn't great...if i remember correctly, I was making about $4/hr in salary. However, it would be an unusual night that I didn't bring home $75/$100 in tips. The Sahara provided a 45 min lunch break and a 20 minute break. They provided three free meals a day. They provided health insurance. Why on earth would I want to join a union? But the union was successful in getting enough people to go on strike. I did not join them. I crossed the picket line because the union wasn't going to offer me anything more than what I was getting. Sure, they promised higher wages. But then we would have to pay union dues. And what was once a flexible work environment was now going to become rigid so that union rules weren't broken. Anyway, I had a great car. A Jeep CJ5, candy apple red with a V8 304 engine. I loved that car. And one day I came out to find that my car's tires had been slashed as had my rag top. This was in the driveway of my home. A couple of days later I was driving my jeep into work....tires fixed, but ragtop taken off since it was slashed. When I drove onto the property I was physically attacked by the strikers...my former co-workers. But, the union won. Where I didn't join the union, I had to pay the union dues because I "benefitted" from their negotiations. We got a .50/hr raise. But we had to pay $40/mo in union dues. After taxes, our net pay increase was probably $25/mo. But now we had to pay for our meals at the employee lounge. The insurance was through the union and wasn't as good as what we had before and we did have more rigid enforcement of the rules. I quit after a couple of months and went across the street to Harrah's which was non-union. That's the world view that made me suggest that you must live in a very different world than the world that many working American men and women have to survive in. so let's hear your background now. Even if the business would remain profitable and the only extra burden would be to bargain in good faith on wages, benefits and working conditions along with basic worker protections like protection from arbitrary terminations? I can bargain in good faith on wages and benefits and working conditions just fine without a union twisting my arm. Charged rhetoric aside, I'd think that the majority of companies would not abandon a profitable business based on anti-union animus. Ed Perhaps true. And then, many businesses will move their manufacturing off-shore or will automate their production line or....will implode like the auto industry. But really, let's hear about how you have been mistreated by the evil corporate monsters who are intent on sucking the life out of the poor helpless workers.