[Loaded]

What should become of unions?

[cordex]

There are a couple different kinds of unions.
Unions with optional membership I have no problem with.
Mandatory membership is wrong.

Gov't shouldn't interfere unless their activites are illegal, however. (violence, intimidation, destruction of property, etc)

As they stand today, many unions are outdated, bloated bureaucracies that do more harm than good. Others are little more than organized crime syndicates. Still others are helpful both to employees and employers.

[seeker_two]

I'm with cordex on this. While most unions are nothing but perpetuating bureaucracies, there are a few that are useful.

Also, things are getting worse for the average employee. Companies are pushing "mandatory overtime", reductions in benefits, and other efforts that are turning back the clock on the progress that workers have made. Unions were once there to help workers collectively bargain for better conditions, but now the union leadership hobnobs w/ the corporate leaders rather than represent the workers. That needs to change.

How? I have no idea... :(

[Don Gwinn]

One of the worst things about my new job is that I will again be represented by the NEA. However, I'd rather have a crooked union than no union.
I'd really like an honest union that negotiated contracts and kept its nose out of things it didn't understand, but that's asking a lot.

[Loaded]

Pssst...... hey guys. Ever notice how many union companies close shop here in America and head over seas? Plenty! Why you ask? Too costly for the owner / board of directors to pay the wages the unions strong arm (read strike) their owners with. Hence, shut the plant and move to a location where unions don't exist. Which equals more profit, lower prices for consumers, and more than likely more production. Union worlers tend to fall into the trap of "hey, I only need produce x amount today because I say so."

[Duncan Idaho]

What Cordex said. If somebody is stupid enough to belong to a union, then God bless them I say.

My hope is that people eventually become smarter than that.

[telomerase]

>Unions with optional membership I have no problem with.
Mandatory membership is wrong.

Yeah, as long as there's no government forcing you into "your" union why would it be anyone's business? Same as any other guild, like the medical guild; if it's private it's fine, if it's an excuse for squashing competition it's BS. Back in prehistory the AMA actually did fairly impartial drug safety testing; a couple of competing private organizations that couldn't forcibly ban competing products would be a great thing for safety.

[Chris Rhines]

I dislike unions and would not join one.
I also dislike the idea of anyone using force to prevent me from organizing my fellow workers.
I further dislike anyone using force to make me join with my fellow workers.

Clear as mud? :D

- Chris

[Joe Demko]

The NEA at the national level is definitely a leftist organization. My union local, however, has always done a good job of negotiating contracts and representing members in grievance situations. If you want the NEA to be less leftist, get involved in union politics and start moving it that way.

A look at history, the coal/steel/railroad companies in the US are good places to start, will show why unions were needed in the first place. Businessmen, like everybody else, are no better than they have to be. Given the chance, corporations would return to exploiting their workers as little more than slaves. Despite their many faults, I vote to keep the unions around.

[Malone LaVeigh]

I finally belong to a union, and it is working hard to stop the Bush admin's insane attempts to outsource my job to some fly-by-night contractor.

You can have my union card when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers.

Edited to add: I have also worked in industries where corrupt unions made a mockery of their original purpose. But that doesn't mean I'd want to live in a country in which workers aren't allowed to organize.

Also: How come the numbers didn't change when I voted?

[Dannyboy]

As a reluctant member of the Teamsters, I'd have to say that unions are a necessary evil. They should all be reformed, for the most part. There are way too many unscrupulous people in management and the little guy needs all the help he can get. That said, I absolutely despise the "Strike First" mentality, as well as the opposition to personal accountability. There's nothing worse than seeing some dirtbag do something that should get him fired filing a grievance and coming back to work the next week. Fortunately, I'll be taking a management position in the next few weeks...finally.

[Hkmp5sd]

I know little about unions and have never been a member of one. From what I have seen in dealings with unions where I work, they serve no useful purpose and I have no desire to join one.

[Keith]

Most unions are horrible, but I see no provision in the Constitution granting the US government the power to abolish them.

What country do you live in?

Keith

[HBK]

Unions are evil for the most part. I belong to one, the NEA, but I am thinking of dropping out and becoming something called an "agency fee payer" and joining a more conservative organization. Unions are a neccesary evil, but most of them are an abomination.

[SaintofKillers]

Im in a union but am not crazy about it, but after working in union and non union shops I prefer the union. In the auto repair industry no union shops abuse their employees with low wages (less than $12 hour) and expect mandatory overtime, no guarantee of work (most shops pay by the job not the hour), no tool expense allowance (I have over 50k invested in tools over the past 15 years) and no training ( cars change yearly with new technology) On the other hand my union job pays me well (over $24hour) not as good as a plumber or electrician (who by the way has very little overhead and gets paid by the hour not the job) and I have excellent training, so the next time you take your vehicle to be repaired which wouold you rather take it to, a guy getting paid 10 bucks an hour who has virtually no training or expirience or a shop where the gets paid what I do and takes pride in his work and does the job right the first time. Not to say that there arent guys who I work with who screw up all the time and still make what I do but I think that is one of the problems with unions is the protect the guy who is incompetent.

[HBK]

The thing about it is, with no unions, workers will get screwed. With unions having way too much power, the employers will get screwed. There has to be some kind of middle ground with the union issue. (If people were inherently good, unions wouldn't be neccessary, but that's not the case)

[Monkeyleg]

I've never belonged to a union, nor did my dad. My uncles did, though, working for GM and they hated it. One uncle said he would have made a lot more money if the unions hadn't been striking so often.

My wife belongs to a union, and it's a joke. She does twice as much work or more than her fellow employees, and receives the same pay. They come in drunk, they don't work, and they're constantly telling her to "slow down." :rolleyes:

[swifter]

I spent most of my working life involved with unions:barf: I've been a steward, held office, and been an activist in other ways.
Over the years I discovered that unions have become what they were originally organized to fight.:cuss: So: Abolish! They are as crooked and corrupt as politicians and bureaucrats, whether in government or in the private sector. I hate 'em:fire:
Tom

[submin]

A look at history, the coal/steel/railroad companies in the US are good places to start,
They sure are. I’ve had personal experience with the umwa (both rank & file and liberty worker) and can tell you there is not a more corrupt gang of murders, extortionist and political sellouts outside of the kennedy crime family.

Union officials turning their backs on legal contract violations in return for payoffs, or calling for strikes when a union officials’ nephew gets fired for smoking in the mine. Knowingly conspiring with company racists to send “other that white” workers into areas of a mine that no white worker would go, in the hopes that he would quit and then bitch when these people would get workers comp. and disability benefits.

After the long list of murders, the two most intolerable offenses are forced membership and using union funds to support leftist political parties. But these don’t need much discussion because most are already aware of them. Besides, I could go on for hours with this subject.

Doug

In memory of 'Liberty Worker' Robert Hayes; whose bullet riddled body was found beside his equally bullet riddled coal truck. Hardworking Christian husband and father of two young children. You are not forgotten.

[Panache]

Submin -- Very well said!

And let's not forget about the Teamsters Union. Boy, they sure treated Jimmy Hoffa swell didn't they?

Abolish them!

[BamBam]

I was a Teamster.
Never again; it's just WRONG.

No concern at all about the welfare of the company. The union insisted that the company made obscene profits.
HOW can a company make money when the workers don't work and even sabotage production?

[NC Shooter]

The unions I have had to deal with make getting anything done slower and more expensive. With a good non union crew I can get twice the work accomplished with about 3/4 of the money.

Having said that, I believe if your company has a union it is their fault and their problem. Any good company the workers would have the union voted out in about a year. A bad company will have the union forever, or until the shop doors close.

Mark

[444]

I belong to a union, the IAFF.
We have a no strike clause in our contract.
I am a strong believer in collective bargining.
I am a strong believer in having grieves taken seriously by management.
They have lobbied succesfully for many work safety issues.
They provide our health insurance.
Our local does not interfere in any way with productivity, primarily just create a safe work environment.
They provide me with all kinds of positive benefits.



That being said, the national organization is somewhere to the left of stalin. The monthy newspaper makes me ill.

[MPFreeman]

Unions are dinosaurs of another era.

Whether you like 'em or hate 'em, they are a dying breed in the USA.

I welcome the union decline.

[Erik]

Unions are a wonderful way of diverting otherwise conservative dollars and votes to the left.

[Malone LaVeigh]

What's a "liberty worker?" Is that a euphemism for "scab?"

Unions are a wonderful way of diverting otherwise conservative dollars and votes to the left.That door swings both ways. Corporate profits and rents are two ways Democrat dollars get funneled to Republicans.

[H Romberg]

Unions are like most other socio-politico-economic critters in that they have good and bad traits. Sometimes, even these days, they are absolutely neccessary. OTOH, they can also be a world class PITA. Not surprisingly for a Libertarian, I'd like to see the decision made about unions on a case by case basis with ZERO govt. involvement. In other words, no anti-union laws, no pro union laws, just folks and businesses (which are realy one and the same) making the best deal they can.

Some places would wind up dealing with unions, and they might be union shops, but it'd be because they thought that was the best way to do business.

[hd1.]

Loaded, this is a loaded poll. Your signature line (supervisor) is a good indication as to why it is loaded.

[DadOfThree]

Unions drag superior workers down so they are equal to mediocre workers and lift up sub par to the level of the mediocre ones. You can work very hard every day and do your best or you can do just what you have to do per your job description or you can be a screw up as long as you don't screw up enough to get fired per union rules. It doesn't matter, all three will be paid the same, all will be promoted according to the senority list. There is no incentive to do an outstanding job, no punishment for doing a lousy job.
That said, if that's what the workers want, more power to them. The government should not be able to stop them from forming. Workers should never be forced to join either. I could never belong to one.

[Langenator]

Both my grandfathers were in unions-one was a bulldozer driver and the other a city postmaster. But that was a long time ago for both of them. RIP.

That being said, I do think that a lot of unions today are seriously out of touch with a basic fact of economics: if the company doesn't make a profit, there won't be any jobs for their members. Make it too expensive to employ union members, whether it be through high pay and/or benefits, or through laws like California's idiotic paid family medical leave law, and the company is either going to close up shop or move to somewhere where they can operate at lower cost.

Of all the unions, I find government unions the most revolting and actually dangerous to the public. You need look no further than California, where the Dems control the entire government and the unions have a huge amount of influence of the Dems, to see what havoc they can cause. I remember hearing a discussion on one of the local talk radio shows once, and I actually found myself agreeing with the host, that maybe public employees shouldn't be allowed to vote, since they have too much incentive to vote for whatever or whoever will increase their paycheck the most, at the expense of the public.

[stevelyn]

Unions need to be deep-sixed. They are nothing more than corrupt extortion gangs with roots in socialism. At one time they were a necessary evil. Their time is now passed. In this day and age unions destroy more jobs by sending them overseas.

[Dorrin79]

the problem with unions is their incestuous relationship with the State.

In the absence of State meddling, I would have no problem at all with workers banding together to make demands of employers.

As I would also have no problem with the employer firing them all for banding together and finding new employees.

Questions like this are so easy when you're a libertarian...

:cool:

[10-Ring]

I've never been a fan of unions :cuss:

[.45Ruger]

At work I am represented by the United Food and Commercial Workers, they are AFL-CIO. I dropped my membersip in the Union in 2000, when I got their little fliar saying who to vote for. Some Unions are nothing more thatn wings of the Democratic Party. It is funny when the Union Reps come into the store and try to convince me to rejoin. Usually about the third time I refer to them as Comrade they get the hint and leave me alone.

[cordex]

I've never been a fan of unions
Nor I. Especially when I hear a cousin's friend speak gleefully of the acts of vandalism and intimidation his union has perpetrated during strikes. Everything from sabatoging dozens of company-owned trucks (" ... but they had it coming. We warned 'em not to bring in outside labor") to scattering caltrops all around the entrances to a plant (" ... and we used steel caltrops at first, but when they started using a magnet to pick them up, we mixed in some aluminum ones and they couldn't figure out why their tires were still going flat").

But I hate to paint all unions with that brush. Just because some are scum doesn't mean they should all be outlawed.

[glocksman]

Unions drag superior workers down so they are equal to mediocre workers and lift up sub par to the level of the mediocre ones. You can work very hard every day and do your best or you can do just what you have to do per your job description or you can be a screw up as long as you don't screw up enough to get fired per union rules.


And in a non union shop, it's the bootlickers and buttkissers who get the promotions, pay raises, and easy jobs. Office politics are alive and well on the shop floor as well as in an office.

I'd rather deal with the seniority system than have to worry about kissing the boss's rear end. :barf:

While I *strongly* disagree with the political stances of my union, my local does perform good work in protecting people whose only crime was to not kiss the hindquarters of their supervisor.

That being said, of course some unions are corrupt. Just like many corporations are. Yet no one is seriously proposing to abolish the corporation.

Teddy Roosevelt (the good Roosevelt) once said that if capital can organize, labor should be able to as well.

[StandOnGuard]

To quote my entry in the thread "Teachers: Where are the CONSERVATIVE unions":

As much as I despise unions in general and civil servants' unions in particular, I must say that there is nothing inherently collectivist or liberal about unions. What is an outrage, however, is having a government impose mandatory union membership. It is an infringement upon our natural, Charter-protected freedom of association.

[number6]

Look at most unions in the eastern seaboard. Corrupt, and influenced (and I use the word influenced lightly) by organized crime. My advice to union members? Quit your membership and become a real man making your own decisions. Stop relying on stewards (who are puppets for the higher ups) to make your "decisions" for you.

I voted - Abolish 'em!

[vmi93]

In theory, I think that unions would be just fine if the government subjected them to the exact same oversight and rules that coprorations are subject to and if corporations had the absolute right to terminate their contracts with the unions without any government interference (and vice versa).

Unfortunately, the situation now (unions and their members get away with murder, literally) allows unions to be havens for criminals and slackers who seek to drive the achievers out of whatever occupation is unionized and to drive wages so unrealistically high that the management moves jobs offshore.

Finally, I have a hard time mustering much respect for folks who will beat people up, vandalize private property and shout profanities because of some minor change in their working conditions. If you don't like your job, learn a new skill and get another. If you don't like your boss, find another place to work. Children throw tantrums, adults move onward and upward.

[number6]

VMI93 -- That was the most well said and best written reply yet.

[Don Gwinn]

Glocksman is right. So was Roosevelt. It is simply ridiculous to claim that it's A-Okey-Dokey for the owners of the company to organize and pool their resources to make more money, but it's not OK for the workers at that same company to organize and pool their resources.

If you're against unions, are you also against corporations?

And if it bothers you so much that so many unions are essentially owned by the Democrats, does it ever bother you that the NRA is owned by the GOP?


Mr. Idaho, please refrain from calling your fellow members "stupid."

[Futo Inu]

If you can organize and collective bargain, then more power to ya! They do some good things, and the workers would be abused if not for the unions of the past and present.

BUT --

1 thing is just WRONG - The federal law that prohibits firing "only because" the worker goes on strike. I say, if you can strike to get leverage, great. But the employer can fire you the moment you walk out, too, if they have the wherewithal and inclination to replace you and train new workers. It's tilts the playing field to an unfair advantage in the unions' favor, to require employers to negotiate in good faith, and to prohibit firings because of a strike. Otherwise, I'm all for unions - just butt out federal gov't - let the market decide! (so what's new)

As far as closed shops go, I can see both sides of the argument. Those that don't pay the union dues would leech off the ones that do, enjoying the benefits. Ideally, there would be union shops (not closed), but when those in the membership bargained, they ONLY received the benefits of the collective bargaining (higher pay, etc.), and not those who leech and don't pay dues. Since this cannot happen for some reason, then I can see a place for closed shops, *IF* and only if having a closed shop was one of the things actually acquired by previous collective bargaining, through the power of the workers' bargaining, NOT a legal requirement, and for a specific term of years.