Right to Work laws in America

[henryp]

People who stand up for the poor always seem to get rich doing it. There's something to that that is unsettling.

[Pat Mustard]

It just seems like to me,  forcing someone to be part of a union just to be able to work at certain places,  isn't right and it keeps him from getting a better paying job as a result.

Fact of the matter is, your husband is getting the job with good pay simply because of the trades union, no other reason. Without their activism, their political pressure and their negotiating skills the minimum wage would still be at FDR's $0.25 p/h.

You want the benefits of unionised work and pay conditions, pay the small fees to join the union, and never give it up. Because before you know it, the company will have completely deunionised, made it impossible to reunionise and slashed pay, sick benefit, holiday and employee safety conditions as there is no longer a counterbalance to their power and political influence.

Right to work laws have nothing to do with giving people the right to work (or even expanding employment opportunities), they are simply there to make it easier for employers to treat their workers like shit. By breaking the link between the employee and their only means of collective action it makes it easier for companies to force bad conditions on their employees.

And one last word of warning, if you want to look at the end consequences of deunionisation of industry, look at what happened to the UK's manufacturing sector post Thatcher's union busting in the '80's. Then the country was still the second largest manufacturer in the world, now it's probably lucky to break the top twenty, with large swathes of the nation permanently crippled economically.

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Okay I can see that,  but  a number of years ago,  A)the local Teamsters union (a truckers union) came in and persuaded the employees of the Preston 151 Line to allow them in and B) within 8 weeks, the company went under.  

Part A) has no relation to part B). If the company went under eight weeks after the union getting in, the company was literally on life support for a couple of years by that stage.

Aside from small (i.e. less than five employees) companies, businesses don't go bust quickly, especially if they've got big creditors. There's restructuring, liquidations, sell offs, receiverships and eventually bankruptcies to go through. These are complicated and long processes.

[vorlon13]

I went through a unionization campaign in the 70s from the UAW, and years later was working for a company and not part of the bargaining unit during a bargaining unit strike that went on for 6 weeks.

The unionization campaign was interesting, actually. The company had plants both with and without UAW representation, so there was considerable amounts of information to compare from the various facilities. The strike, on the other hand, was annoying, and IMO, a pyrrhic victory for the union. Their choice was a raise/modest bump in benefits for the current workers, or a larger raise with cutting the bargaining unit. They chose the latter, and in 3 years, took the same option again in lieu of a strike that occasion.

Unappreciated both times was that the company was going to cut the higher paying jobs (tester, inspectors and such) and then with the seniority rules, move everyone down however many notches, and discharge the most recent and lowest ranking union members. I noted a electrical generator test stand operator emptying trash cans in the cafeteria a few months later and was really shocked . . .

And I realize this is just my experience with a couple workplaces and a few experiences with the UAW. YMMV.

I'm in the process, BTW, of cashing out my pension with that company, and I'm pretty pleased with the terms and conditions and the amount I'm getting from my time there, sans representation. I also note, they've been bought out a few times since my experience there and are now backed by a VASTLY larger parent company. I was really impressed with all the options I have on taking early retirement checks and/or payout. LOL, one thing I can't roll it over into is more farm land. And that's the ruling from the guvmint. Bastids.

[Anomalocaris]

People who stand up for the poor always seem to get rich doing it.  There's something to that that is unsettling.

Far less unsettling than the rich being given a cultural right to build any structural gaurantees they fancy for their wealth at the expense of the chances of the poor to become less poor. Better to enrich those who stand up for the poor than those who stand on the poor.

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The union's job is to stop the company from shoving their dicks all the way up the workers' asses.

That's true, but in many cases it is only to leave enough room for union management to stick their pencil dicks in there too.

I do not believe people should be forced to join a union and pay dues as a prerequisite of employment. Once upon a time I worked in a Boeing union shop without paying dues. I opted not to be a dues paying member because the only thing that mattered to the union was seniority. While seniority should certainly be an important part of the equation it should not be the only thing that matters. I did twice the work for half the pay of the super senior union reps with zero chance of ever earning as much as they did despite being better at the position we were all hired to fill.

Give them some guarantee with teeth of what their employer would otherwise take away, and we wouldn’t need the Union.

[Cecelia]

How easy it is to forget what life was like before there were unions. And it's funny people hate public unions so much. Those who think that seem to have a poor grasp of history and the importance of public unions. Unions not only provide better wages, but safer work places as well. Let's not forget the Triangle Waistshirt Factory Fire of 1911 and other similar incidents, caused by employers doing everything they can to screw over their employees. (And keep in mind the owners of that factory were barely fined, and then went and started another business--and had ANOTHER fire)

[Angrboda]

I can understand unions for public servants like teachers, police and fire fighters.

I can't and neither could FDR. It's a viscous circle of patronage in which unions subsidize candidates that favor the unions and who in turn give the unions more money with which to subsidize candidates. At least in the private sector people do not get to elect the bosses with whom they negotiate for wages.

Weren't you just recently satirizing me for suggesting that evangelicals vote where their interests lie?