Are unions whacked? First we saw the Hostess union go on strike when everyone warned them Hostess was on the verge of collapse. Then came the union stand on the Chattanooga Volkswagon plant where they promised to honor the workers wishes and then promptly broke their word when the workers voted against it and are now trying to force them to go union. A friend of mine pointed out that Kellogg locked out their workers in Memphis where again we have a company losing money looking for an excuse to shut down a few production plants but the union is fighting their efforts to justify keeping this facility open so they just shut the doors. Now, unions in Las Vegas are planning to go on strike even as profits in the casinos are dropping like a stone. Now, heres the funny thing. The same people supporting this stupidity are the same ones who supported the UAW selling its workers down the river which was one of the major concerns workers in Tennessee had about joining the UAW it now turns out and it had almost nothing to do with their political leaders. The truth is that corporate leaders are indeed exploiting the bad economy to try getting ahead. We all know this as one only needs look at the fuel companies and their record profits at a time we are driving less and a barrel of oil costs more than ever to see their dirty tricks. One of their biggest dirty tricks, and this was with government compliance, was shifting costs onto truck drivers because America has to have its products delivered. Diesel fuel is basically junk fuel. Its the stuff that really cannot be processed any further so that a new engine had to be designed to use it. If diesel engines didnt exist, this junk grade fuel would be burned off or cast off. Until President Bush, the fuel companies couldnt raise prices on diesel fuel because it was waste fuel and diesel truck manufacturers would simply go with standard engines. In fact, the auto industry was moving towards diesel engines as a standard to save drivers money on fuel to sell more vehicles... that went out the window when the fuel industry raised prices for diesel fuel beyond the cost of non diesel so the trucking industry took a big hit and you didnt get the benefits of cheaper diesel fuel engines. What this reveals is how government has been doing things to deal with inflation when they have no clue what they are doing... smoke and mirrors. In 1970, most Americans lived in families and could survive on one income and that was with them earning less than $2.00 an hour. During the 1970s, this changed and where we thought the government was supporting womens rights, what they were actually supporting was creating a second income for the family to disguise the fact rising inflation could not be controlled because our leaders simply know nothing about economics and arent elected for their knowledge on economics. This is also why so little was done to address poor wages for women when they did enter the workforce as that was never the governments intent. By the 1990s, it was clear we had reached a point where this was no longer the case but our leaders had already begin a new policy in the 80s of making it easier for us to get into greater and greater debt. By the end of the 90s, we were facing the reality that growing debt was becoming a problem and it was necessary to help women earn more. But, in the 21rst century, the shift had made a dramatic turn to government aid. The so called Middle Class began to emerge after WWII. By the 70s, that second income helped to create an ever growing middle class. By the 21rst century, the Middle Class finally reached its limit because to continue, we now need a third income. Thus, thus on the lower end of the Middle Class fell back into the Working Poor, those who were still developing income to sustain their Middle Class lifestyle are the ones who survive representing the Middle Class... and then you have the upper end Middle Class who would continue to make gains which put them into a new class of lower end Rich Class. Thats the truth about whats happening to the Middle Class. Now, what does this have to do with unions? The purpose of a union is to organize labor as a force to protect Americas work force. The principle is simple enough as without a union, employers could basically pay what they want and do what they want. The problem here is that by 1970, the unions had accomplished most of what they were going to accomplish and shifted almost entirely into political organizations. The reality is that they had made themselves largely unnecessary because political leaders were now responding directly to the voting workforce so that if they wished to survive, they basically had to abandon the issues of the workers and support those political leaders who were responding to the workers. Basically, the unions became a means for influencing political leaders but this didnt work to the employees advantage. Unions are inherently corrupt so a large percentage of the union dues being paid in goes into their pockets. The political leaders they support are also receiving money from corporations so that it changed the very nature of politics to where whomever has the most money can buy off the politicians. Because unions shifted to the political left, it led to the Neocons shifting from the Democrat Party to the Republican Party and turned these former union supporters into union opposition because they were rightwing not leftwing. At every step of the way since the 1970s, the unions have been making endless mistakes and if not for political leaders responding directly to the voters who represent labor, labor would essentially have little to no representation at all. Because the labor unions went political and then shifted to the left thinking they were the way of the future, the unions set themselves up for failure. Rightwing workers are not inherently anti union in regard to economics as they understand the need to have representation against their employers to be treated fairly. However, you are not going to get rightwing voters to support leftwing labor unions... THATS where the labor unions went wrong because America did not remain on the leftwing path much later than the mid 70s when the extreme left began pushing Americans back to the political right. In other words, unions shifting into politics and to the political left created a situation where all they essentially represent today is a lobbying group buying off political leaders no different than any other group. They spend more time and more resources infighting and trying to take over one anothers territories to claim union dues than they do actually representing the interests of the workers paying them to be represented. In essence, you would be better off to support a labor lobbying group that represents the political right than the political left simply because there are more potential members on the political right than on the political left. There is still need for unions today, but a new type of union. The new union needs to be non political. It needs to be controlled by the workers and not autonomously as is currently the case. Instead of wasting their money buying off political leaders, they need to be investing it into grassroots efforts to ensure that the workers are working in safe working conditions, to make their presence felt in the business doing inspections and talking with the employees anonymously doing surveys and becoming involved where the workers personal interests are involved as workers cannot afford financial advisers like their employees can. They need to focus on fighting inflation and political games which are only delaying the inevitable and creating a situation where more and more employees are in need of the next trick to forestall the inevitable collapse when all this debt and need for additional income come crashing down and cannot be repaired... the rich do get richer but what are the unions doing about this? Nothing but whine and complain trying to turn it to a political and financial advantage. Unions have become dinosaurs and are on their way to extinction because they themselves have brought about their own extinction and American workers are paying the price for their stupidity. No matter what, you do not go on strike during a bad economy. In the case with Hostess, they won a previous battle to reduce labor costs and then gave their execs a huge bonus. In a way, we can say Hostess brought this on themselves. However, a strong union with intelligent leaders would have foreseen this and negotiated cuts not only on behalf of labor... but on behalf of management as well where management takes pay cuts and gives up benefits with bonuses being done away with completely. A strong union would have seen that coming and realized the company is heading down the wrong direction meaning our members in the union are going to suffer if this doesnt get turned around. This is why unions prior to the 1970s made management make the same sacrifices their employees were expected to make. Management wants bonuses and higher pay... they get bonuses and higher pay for the workers sharing the gains and the losses rather than one but not the other. Lets face the reality, by 1980 the unions had rendered themselves irrelevant in the US and all union members have been doing is paying a damn lobbying group... and you do not need a labor union for this as a lobbying group representing dead goldfish can do just as well if you paid them the dues youre paying your union.
Posted on: Sat, 29 Mar 2014 19:24:42 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015