Comments on: The herd immunity theory of unions

By: Ymarsakar

Ymarsakar — Sat, 15 Dec 2012 02:40:15 +0000

Most of the union officials would be on the execution chopping block since they would qualify as “corrupt bureaucrats” to me.

By: lee

lee — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 21:12:42 +0000

Let me start off by saying, I am not a fan of unions. They have gotten greedy, and stifled development. They are more about lining the pockets of their officials than about helping their members. They have no problem killing the goose that lays the golden egg. They protect people who should be FIRED. That being said…
My husband works in a non-union plant and it is AWFUL. The stifling government regulations do no good if they never inspect. (I once heard a compliance manager say you are better off to kill or maim an employee than you are to spill something toxic. OSHA doesn’t care but the EPA will swoop down like harpies and suck your blood dry.) There are unmarked gas lines (a fork lift ran into one, and a man was seriously injured in the resulting explosion), pot holes where fork lifts drive, no one inspects or replenishes first aid kits. Someone who shall remain nameless tried to call OSHA, and OSHA was not real interested. Now my husband USED to work in a union shop, and grew weary of unions, to put ot mildly. He got tired of the pre-breaks, the breaks, and the post-breaks. He got tired of them sucking money out of his paycheck. He despised the way retirement benefits works. (You quit the union, you lose big time!)
But right now, it’s so bad at his plant that he is thinking, “UNION.”
In a perfect world, everyone plays nice. Employers provide safe work environments. Employees provide a working effort. People who are really on board with QUALITY MANAGEMENT and the principles of quality management tend to play nice… But that is NOT at a LOT of places. (Alas!)

By: Bookworm

Bookworm — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 21:10:14 +0000

Oldflyer, stop trying to confuse people with your intelligence and logic. Without their slogans, they are nothing!

Unions should be voluntary associations -- and there should be competing unions. Many people might be interested in a union that focuses solely on fair wages and that doesn't buy politicians and advance ultra Progressive political views. In today's mobile, information saturated, fairly educated world, unions should be a marketplace, the same as anything else.

By: Oldflyer

Oldflyer — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 19:56:58 +0000

I heard a pro-union commentary yesterday that essentially stated the old canard, “we must have unions to control the abusive companies.”

My reaction was that if we must have unions for that purpose, then we don’t need the stifling governmental regulations that supposedly serve the same purpose.

Foolish me.

By: JKB

JKB — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 17:54:06 +0000

I went to the website below and entered for a comparison between Knoxville, TN (a right to work state) and Detroit, MI – you have to make 1/3 more in Detroit to live the same as Knoxville.

Your Current Salary:

100,000.00

State of Origin:
Destination State:

Tennessee
Michigan

City of Origin:
Destination City:

Knoxville
Detroit

If you make: $100,000.00
You will have to make: $132,581.92

http://www.cityrating.com/costofliving.asp

By: lee

lee — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 17:47:41 +0000

I used to work, many, many years ago, as a stage hand in the Bay Area. The stage hands union, IATSE, is weak (or at least it was then) in the Bay Area, so there was a lot of non-union houses. More importantly, a non-union stage hand could get a job at a union house. Of course, s/he had to pay union dues, but s/he could accumulate hours towards joining the union. In NYC or LA, IATSE is VERY STRONG, and there is virutally no way a non-union person can get into the union, unless they are related to a union member.
Now, back to the Bay Area–a lot of non-union houses were crappy places to work. They could frequently be dangerous, flaunting OSHA and fire regulations. Not to mention labor laws. Union houses were always going to be safe. However, because the stagehand’s union was weak, people could start new theaters. The whole union thing work in the Bay Area because the union was weak. It doesn’t work in NYC and LA, because it has a stanglehold on the entertainment industry. It’s crazy.
Unions CAN do good. They frequently don’t. And many times, they are a barrier to getting a job.

By: JKB

JKB — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 17:45:30 +0000

Oops, I neglected my point on wages. We really need to do a proper comparison using something like the Economist’s “Big Mac” index to see a true economic comparison.

By: JKB

JKB — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 17:42:44 +0000

When I speak of unions to my elderly aunt she points out unions did good. But she also likes to relate that when she was working the production line at a coffee packing company, she got the union voted in and when they didn’t do right, she got them voted out. She was odd for the union being the go to person the manager put on new machines to work out the most efficient process.

In regards to the higher wages, you must consider the impact of union wage demands on the cost of living.

Sumner Slichter, an economist in the 1940s said
The greatest danger to an adequate old-age security plan is rising prices. A rise of 2% a year in prices would cut the purchasing power of pensions about 45% in 30 years. The greatest danger of rising prices is from wages rising faster than output per man-hour…. Whether the nation succeeds in providing adequate security for retired workers depends in large measure upon the wage policies of trade unions.

Of course, when he made that observation after WWII, the economy was tightly controlled by the government and unions. Those of us a bit younger remember the consequences of that control or as it is commonly known as, the 1970s.

By: rick9911

rick9911 — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 17:20:56 +0000

I’m not sure that the opposite of right to work is mandatory unionization. Right to work does not outlaw unions, it gives the choice to the individual.