UA Local 123 here, my brother
23 yrs

 

01, excellent post (I didn't want to quote all that). That is exactly the type of stuff I just studdied in my cost accounting class last semester. A huge chunk of it was accountants finding ways to help the "working side" do their job smarter & cheaper. The 2 things you mentioned were the main things to assist in this. Feel proud that the company you work for is making a good effort to help out everyone (employees & customers) in todays questionable economy.

 

That is a great post and I am sure the Union you belong too is great. However not all unions are as you may think, nor are they “Pro-America, buy everything American made” We “had” a union, now there gone “thank God, they were worthless and had cost too much money”.

They were a very weak union, very selfish union only looking out for themselves and no one else. They are one of the reasons you see some unions going away and never coming back.

This union we had, which there are many like it only protected those that were “in the click” which were basically the ones who would have been fired from McDonalds in a day or two. Someone continually comes in late, everyone else can make it, but this one just cannot seem to get it through his non-existing brain that he must be here on time EVERY day. So he gets written up and hopefully after 3 times of being written up we can FIRE him. First time he gets written up he challenges it, states the company is picking on him. Union jumps in and next thing you know you have lawyers involved. Anyway that was typical of this union we had, fighting all the WRONG fights, for the wrong people.

Here is what a union should be like, and what they were like in the beginning of which I completely agree. They were there to protect the employee’s rights, to insure there was a safe environment, good lighting and ventilation, guards on machines to protect people from loosing limbs. They were there to insure the company didn’t use them as forced labor, making them work 15 – 20 hours a day, insure they had adequate breaks and time for a meal. When someone within the union was not up to par the union, not the company, but the union took care of it. If someone came in late it was the union reps giving the person a hard time and letting them know the union would throw them out if it did not stop immediately.

You know why the union took care of the lazy or stupid themselves rather then letting the company deal with it? Because it gave them MORE power especially come negotiation time. Rather then waste time, money and resources coming up with rules to help protect the ******** of the bunch they were able to cut past that and go right to the good stuff, medical benefits, longer breaks, more holidays, better pay all the things that make sense to the vast majority, not the few who do not belong working because they don’t want to.

Anymore, a good amount of unions, not all, but a lot are there to insure the weak and lazy get by, make the same amount of money for sitting on their *** while the other guy bust his because that is just his character. Spend the money they take in from the members and throwing it at the lawyers to help get Joe off the hook from the 5th warning about coming in late.

The worst thing is a big chunk of those union dues go into the pockets of the big union bosses to do with as they please. Another big chunk goes towards electing politicians that many union members would rather have nothing to do with. Sure union members in most make very good money, and the vast majority are worth every penny, the pipe fitters for instance are worth very good money, however some guy pushing a broom for a living is not worth more then about $10 an hour. Some guy plugging in something into a power socket is not worth more then about $10 an hour so if these guys are making $30 - $60 an hour well that just means more people that will not have a job due to budgets, it also means more people will buy foreign because when your paying someone $40 an hour to clean a sh*tter, or plug something in that cost is going to get passed on to the consumer and consumers are just not going to foot the bill for an overpaid janitor.

I believe unions are great if they are operating properly, but know this that union employees are not more pro-American then the majority of Americans because we have many EX-union members driving nothing but foreign autos with their union stickers on the back windshield “Buy American”

 

It's crazy that you brought that up because that is exactly how my dad got the position that he is in. He is now the business manager of Local 440 in Indianapolis. The guy in there before him was pocketing a lot of money from the members dues which nobody knew about for somewhere around 15 years. Once my dad started catching onto this, he ran against him in the next election. Since the members didn't want a crook stealing their money, my dad became business manager.

Fast Gator:

Right on man, Local 440, Indy right here. Check out our website that I got to make www.ualocal440.org

 

eposey:

Congrats on your dad that is awesome...

I hope you don't get the wrong idea on my position on unions. I think when ran correctly and for the right purpose they serve a very useful purpose...

 

I know you mean. I admit there are some *****ty unions out there, but there are also some great ones. Some of the crappier unions give a bad name to the rest of us. The thing is, they arent all run the same like you said.

 

That is true, and I do not believe many conservatives believe in unions, however even though I consider myself conservative I do believe that when unions are opearated correctly they serve a very good purpose of “checks and balances”.