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January 02, 2011 06:03 PM UTC

The need for Labor Unions

  • 42 Comments
  • by: Ellie

Reading the New York Times this morning I was reminded of a conversation, heated one at times, I was in over the holidays.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01…

The four involved had the following political makeup: 1 Dem., 1 Repub., 2 Indy’s.  

The Dem. is a die hard union guy (who admitted never having joined a union) who sees the end of unions as the end of the American way of life.  Plain and simple.

One Indy had been a union member and found it to be corrupt and argued for change such as the United Food Workers voting out Ernie Duran and family if unions are to survive.    

The other two saw teacher tenure as the critical issue that needed to be addressed with the Indy #2 citing Washington, D.C. and the NEA’s successful effort to get rid of a progressive school superintendent Michele Rhee. http://www.time.com/time/magaz…  

I’ll digress here by saying the two (R & I) argued that teachers were underpaid and administrators by and large overpaid.

California’s labor laws and current budget problems came up with a whole other range of arguments but I won’t try to go into those.  Suffice it to say the 3 didn’t sway the lone Dem. union guy and he didn’t sway us.

My position is if unions are going to be part of the future they have to be part of the economic & education solution.  We can no longer afford labor bosses who have a strangle hold over their unions.  

Bill Ritter said his biggest mistake was thinking he could bring labor and business together before he became Governor.

In the end that’s going to be a problem for all of us and our children unless things change.

 

Comments

42 thoughts on “The need for Labor Unions

  1. jpsandscl & I had a long discussion about this here which I concluded with:

    I think most people have the capability to do a stand-out job at something. I also think the job market is evolving so that more and more companies are looking for people who can excel.

    Does this mean everyone will be a millionaire? No. But I think as jobs evolve like this, specific employees become more valuable and are then paid better. This is where I think unions are blowing it – there’s a major opportunity if they work with this change.

    Yes people should do their best to get fair wages and a decent standard of living. I just don’t think old-school unions and collective bargaining are the way to do it.

    I think (correct me if I’m wrong) you want what the white middle class had in the 50s & 60s – jobs were clearly defined, wages were decent, and if you met the job criteria you had a clear predictable road of advancement ahead. And most people could meet the expectations.

    But that job world is disappearing, for a bunch of reasons. Whether that’s a good or bad thing is irrelevant, it’s going away. So the trick is to figure out how to structure things in this new world.

    And I would say one big step is it’s no longer about protecting workers, it’s about setting workers up to get a fair share for engaging in the system.

    1. on the subject, the battle between workers and the owners of the “means of production” will be in conflict. The trouble is the spectre of the one evil of “corporate thought”. Profit.

      Profit only allows as much humanity as the humans involved can impose upon its’ mandate.

      1. where is the profit in allowing poorly trained or inept teachers stay in the system because of tenure?  The question isn’t meant to be argumentative Duke. I am sincerely worried about our education system and what’s not benefiting our children and grandchildren.

        1. am concerned about our educational system. I am a product of the public school systems in various southern locales during the late 50s and 60s.

          I can remember that some of my teachers were outstanding, and I count them as mentors. They were the exception. The majority were competent, but not extraordinary, and there were, indeed, a couple of slugs along the way. I find the same to be true of carpenters, barbers, store clerks…practically in any endeavor.

          I am not an education expert, and my tenure as a teacher in dist. RE1J was brief and long ago. But I just don’t think that the teachers unions sticking up for a few bad teachers is the problem.

          I spent a year as a director of the Grand Junction Boys Club, back in the day (and before the advent of female membership). My experience with those boys tells me that the roots of our problem with our educational system has to do more with parental involvement and socio-economic inequity than anything else.

          The push for privatization of schools is another way to delineate our society between the haves and the have nots…the Christians and heathens…the whites and people of color. I know your concern is genuine, Ellie, I just respectfully suggest that you are looking under the wrong leaf.  

          1. Yes the home environment is the #1 influence on how a child does in school. But the teacher is a very close second. Anything we can do to improve that home environment is gigantic. But so is anything we can do to improve the teacher.

            And while we only have indirect influence on the home environment, we can have direct control over the quality of the teacher. Because of this, the larger ROI is in improving the teachers.

            1. improving teacher quality is a “biggie”. But bashing unions for protecting their own is kinda silly.

              I don’t really have a problem with adjusting the tenure system, but without it, what will keep Rose Pugliese(use das google, ja?)from getting teachers fired because they don’t agree with her ideology?

              She was the local school board member that wanted to fire teachers if they tell their students they believe in “global warming”.

              How do you keep teachers from becoming political collateral damage?  

                  1. “One can dream.”  I should admit I was raised in a staunch union family.  I can remember Pop (my grandfather who lived with us) telling me how he helped start (1 of 7) the fireman’s union on the L & N railroad (shoveling coal).  How they negotiated with the railroad.  Mother had stories of joining a union of telephone operators after she had to drop out of school.  Both talked about the difficult negotiations with Bell and L & N to earn a livable wage. (I don’t recall benefits being discussed.)

                    It won’t be easy but the debate in my mind is how to have better teachers who are paid what they are worth.  Not poor teachers paid because they have tenure.

          2. but I can’t dictate the student’s home environment or the families socio-economic status. What I can be is an advocate for better teachers and a pay scale to attract better educated teachers.  The NEA on down to our local MVEA would have a willing ally if they would work to implement an evaluation system to weed out the least effective ones.  

            I also believe there is a disparity between administration salaries vs. teachers salaries that needs to be addressed by local school boards.

            1. I can’t dictate the student’s home environment or the families socio-economic status.

              You cannot dictate such things, but you can support realistic policies, within the public school system, that motivate and enable people to better themselves and to become productive citizens and families. I have no problem with a performance-based system, but I do not believe that a system based solely on student performance is appropriate. There are just too many variables that are not within the teachers’ control.

              I do not know what sort of rating system would be fair, but to rely on student perfomance as the measure of teacher quality is problematic. Perhaps if it were evaluated over a period of years, it might be more relevant.

              But…as I said, I am not an expert and I might be wrong. There are many out there, far more astute and educated than I, grappling with the problem.

               

          3. which impact kids’ behavior and performance in school, not the least of which is parents’ struggles (usually both parents in two-parent families) having to work long hours to maintain their lifestyle).  

            Do people really believe there is a long line of superb teachers waiting for jobs to open up when the not-so-good teachers are forced out of the system?  I really don’t believe it – but if someone’s got some data on this, I’d love to see it.

            I believe that the profession struggles to attract superb teachers not only because the pay isn’t that good, but also because the working conditions are deteriorating – more difficult kids, increasing pressure to produce success with limited resources, increasing pressure to teach to a test, increasing job pressure, for example, with Colorado’s new SB10-191.  

            The reason we too easily conclude we cannot impact the growing social problems including the non-involved parent, is that it will take lots more money and resources to tackle these problems.  We love having the teaching profession to blame – it’s much easier than addressing societal issues.  

            And would someone in the know please write a diary on how SB10-191 is going to help!  It was pushed by some legislators last spring because it was supposed to bring big federal education dollars to the state – but it didn’t.  Instead what we have is a law with a newfangled teacher evaluation requirement that has a $237,869 state price tag (according to the final legislative fiscal note in July), and drives the need for 3.0 FTE in the Colorado Dept of Education.  Is this the reason no one is talking about this law any more?

             

            1. In the fall of 2010 I read a story w/charts to show how higher education has dropped further behind in teaching our future teachers.  Maybe someone (David?) can help me remember where to find it and post it here for discussion.

      2. Most of our advances were not done out of altruism, they were done is pursuit of profit. Profit has caused major problems too, but I haven’t seen any other system that moves us forward at close to the same rate.

        1. Companies should be able to be organized to maximize profits; certainly individual should be free to set up the Dollar as their personal God and pursue the acquisition of more things, out of choice, need, or in an attempt to clutter their empty lives with distractions.  

          But to imagine that the best way for a society to organize itself–that the primary motivating forces behind just politics (and the equitable opportunity for shared power) is to allow those who profit most to profit more, and to put forth greed and gain as some type of imagined holy pursuit of humanity’s overall betterment, is preposterous in my opinion.

          Companies and capitalists are good at making profits (the successful ones, that is).  The government’s role should be to build up and develop good and strong members, i.e. the citizens, and to give them the tools to compete in a changing, increasingly global and multi-polar, world.  

          Instead we elect people who think teaching any language other than ‘American’ is treasonous; that teaching science means fitting ‘evidence’ into pre-formed and popularly-selected, beliefs; and that making sure kids are properly fed at school is a Stalinist plot.  

          Those ‘beliefs’ (or cynically manufactured positions) benefit many powerful interests, and their profits, thus ensuring that global warming, for instance, won’t be addressed until the cost is so great that it must be borne by citizens, taxpayers, and the world at large (rather than specific–ultra-powerful and possessing the wealth of many nations–industries) and at some many times the current cost; that the financial system will continue to be rigged to benefit the wealthy and powerful and not  hard-working middle-class American; and schools will continue to decline–their mission to create compliant consumers, scared of any disruption to business-as-usual, unable of critical thinking or really questioning authority.  

          As long as we embrace the corporatist myth that profit is ‘good’ (as opposed to being a normal desire of individuals and–at best somewhat neutral, or ambivalent, being capable of both good and bad, and generally with mixed, effects), we will continue our slide to greater irrelevance: an impotent giant, holding onto 19th century corporate models, locked in a bilateral world of Cold War super powers (or ‘for us’ and ‘against us’ with no appreciation of a middle ground), and ignorant of our own peril, fiddling while the earth heats up…    

          1. I think it’s that we’ve allowed money to control the political process. Now you can fairly argue that profit causes the rich to invest in the political process for their advantage.

            But you always have people trying to game the political process for their advantage. I think that’s politics, not profit specifically.

            And keep in mind there are a lot of very rich people who are on the side of liberalism and moving the country forward to a better future.

            1. I am glad when my profits are up.  And I never suggested that rich people are evil, or that there are not rich people who care about improving the world, apart from how it may or may not affect their personal bottom line.  But I don’t think that the pursuit of profit is the best motivator for a government–for individuals perhaps, for companies, sure–but for the government–no.  

          2. It was not my intention, either, to vilify profit as an “evil” thing in its’ entirety and I probably should have used a different phrase. I was merely pointing out its’ inherent weakness as an “organizing principle”, as CT says.

            I, too, am a business owner whose business depends upon turning a profit. If I were only concerned about my next quarterly report and the bottom line found there, it would be counter-productive for me to do anything that would put a restraint on my profitability.

            In the short term, doing the right thing…the altruistic thing… is anathema to profit. In the long run, it can define a company as better and more “human” than others. The unions are there to stand up for the workers, whose personal well-being is of no concern to “Profit”. I offered an explanation in another thread, a few days ago:  

            We were sitting around a table…about twenty of us…and I presented two scenarios. First…imagine we are twenty members of the Board of Directors of “Megabucks Corp.”. We have 75,000 employees, worldwide, in 145 locations. We are from several countries and see each other two or three times a year. A line on a report brings us the news that we must fire 5 workers. What are the odds that a single one of us will give it a second thought?

            Now picture yourself sitting around a table with 19 other people who comprise the owner, management, and staff of a small business. You will know them all…their families…their dreams. When the reluctant owner says, “I have to let five of you go”…will you think of anything beyond the bottom line or the dividend owed to each shareholder at quarters end?

            Of course, you will.

            Certainly there are exceptions, but anyone who does not believe that profit, and profit alone, drives the corporate world is a sadly naive fool.

            In the first scenario, profit is the only consideration. Without personal knowledge of the affected, it is unlikely that any member of the BOD will object or intervene.

            In the second scenario, humanity has entered the picture and changed the entire dynamic. Just ask ChuckieD, right, ardy?

            Or did we all miss the reruns of “A Christmas Carol” this season?  

            1. The board of directors is told they have to let 25% of the employees go. Then they will be very focused on the human element. Because 5 out of 19 is 25%.

              The thing with 5 out even even 500 is you can find 5 people who are not doing a good job. So it becomes more a question of identifying the right people.

              1. But with it, you are making my case. Identifying the right people is simple mechanics of efficiency. a business principle…not a human one. Not doing a good job as a basis for termination is a profit based motive.

                The directors of “Megabucks Corp.” don’t know the people who are being terminated. And if a 25% reduction in personnel is a profit enhancing move (as it all too often is), I, as a covenant holder with the shareholders of the Corp., will vote for that every time. If you say to the board, “Well, if you don’t make this move your shareholders will not see a dividend for three years.”, do you really think that will be the option they select?

                A small business by contrast, has a much more personal relationship with its’ employees…I make considerably less money than I could, because I am generous and caring with my workers. Just ask them. If I had to let any of my people go, it would affect me personally, because I know them and care about them.

                So please understand, David that I am not an enemy of profit. I am just not willing to overlook its’ undesirable effects.

                1. Part 1

                  Companies that cut back merely to make the next quarter look good tend to do poorly over multiple years compared to those that don’t cut. For example SouthWest Airlines is the one airline that didn’t respond to 9/11 with layoffs.

                  So item one is what is the focus of the people at the top. And what you find is family owned tends to take a longer view than non-family owned. That’s why Ford, BMW, Toyota, and Honda have performed better than average.

                  So yes, a company managed by people in there for their own short-term persona gain will focus totally on the next couple of quarters. But that can occur even with small companies. And at the same time there are large companies, like General Electric (not family owned) which take the long view.

                  Part 2

                  Now lets go to a small company owned by a caring individual where they view all employees as family. In that case, you also generally do not have a lot of profit margin. Because any excess profit you are putting back in to the company to hire more people.

                  Now let’s say you have to let 5 people go, or the company will go under. It’s rough, it sucks, and you’ll feel terrible about it – but laying off 5 beats closing the company and all 19 are out of work.

                  Or maybe it’s not that bad and you can make it through – but it will be tight with no raises and no expansion. But you have 5 people who under-perform and if you replace them, then the company will do better (more profit) and with that additional profit you can provide raises and hire additional people.

                  In that case letting those 5 go means good jobs for say 8 other people and raises for the 15 still there. Do those 5 have such a strong call that you fore-go the raises for the other 15 and reducing unemployment by a net of 3 people?

                2. To make something, your value added, and gain from it is a basic human drive, I think, and thus a flaw in a purely communist system.  

                  Thinking of a trip to Central Europe this year (been there before) and reading up on some histories.  An expression from (then) Czechoslovakia:  “They pretended to pay us and we pretended to work” sums up this problem.

                  On my previous trip I stayed in a Slovakian pension up in the Tatras and the gentleman running it told the story of his grandmother who–along with her husband–opened the business and then had it seized by the communists in the 40’s.  She was a veterinarian, but the Party thought that too bourgeois and made her go to work for two years in a factory until she got sufficient prole cred to get her business back.  The family’s new job was to continue running the hotel they once (and now again) owned.  Terrible way to motivate people, to encourage individual expression, innovation and ingenuity.  

                  But the thing is: lots of things are basic human drives that we don’t enshrine as the organizing principle of our society–the need to eat for instance, or to be healthy. Other things are needs in our increasingly advanced, global and multipolar world.  I mean if the nation really wants to compete in a changing world rather than retreat into a bunker.  

                  However, providing for and facilitating  needs like health care and sustenance is called ‘socialism.’  Facilitating the drive for ‘profit’ is enshrined as the (or one of the) ‘greatest force’ for the betterment of humankind.  I rank the need to care for each other, take care of the planet, and a recognition of our shared plight/path as all greater forces–overall–for our advancement and betterment than the drive for profit.  

                  I think a focus on providing for those other human drives, and the need for us–collectively–to get along and do well, as a whole, prepared for a changing future;  while not depriving individuals of the drive to ‘profit’ (i.e. better themselves through their own labor or ingenuity, or deployment of personal capital) would be a better, more human, and more holistic approach.  

                  The drive for profit–like the others–is not a ‘good’ thing of itself.  It may be a necessary feature of the human experience (to greater and lesser degrees varying by society and culture) as are the others, or it may be simply a very basic constitutive principle for most of us–but it is neutral (at best).  

                  There is nothing wrong with valuing it, with setting up systems that reward its good application and provide opportunities (and guidance/regulations) to perpetuate and encourage those drives in a manner that benefits us all, collectively, as that is what we are talking about.  But should not be the primary ‘force’ through which government acts.  Individuals and corporations do quite well there already.  

                  It is not ‘I the People’ or ‘We the Corporation.’  it is ‘We the People.’   Thus the mandate to provide for the COMMON defense and the GENERAL welfare.   Thus the need for government to make caring and providing opportunities for its citizens–broadly defined, not in some trickle-down fantasy where beneficence is heaped upon the rich and powerful–the primary force through which it organizes its objectives.

                  1. The government needs to restrict the actions of business (like no lead in paint for children’s toys). And it needs to address those issues that the market won’t address, or will address partially and/or inefficiently.

                    The trick is to have all parts working appropriately.

  2. at the lack of unionization here in CO. When I was in CT most hospitals were union, most nursing homes were union. I am being paid the same wage here, as a nurse, as I was making as a nurse’s aid in CT. It is disgusted the amount of wage suppression here.  

      1. fired their nurses and brought them back at half of their wages. The other hospitals here did the same. Instead of being kowed by the hospitals, those nurses should have unionized. I really can’t see a hospital administrator running a floor as a nurse.  

    1. Per his comment last week.  Maybe he can help you get paid:

      Gee,

      CEO’s don’t even have to have a union to make exhorbitant amounts of money.  But of course, you’re not interested in that, are you 20th Maine?

      Interested in union nurses?  Well, I have a wife who is a union nurse here in Denver.  She works four days a week and makes over $100K cash, not including a defined benefit pension plan (which is fully funded) and a matched 403(b).  Too much for you 20th Maine?  

      Who decides this?  I thought you would be in favor of the market.

      Finally, the article talks about greed?  Again, really?  Since when is negotiating a contract “greed?”  And anyway, what’s wrong with greed?

      http://www.coloradopols.com/sh

      1. here in CO. In CT there were more than one union representing nurses and nurses aids in CT. The wages were significantly better in CT. With competing unions, the workers got great jobs and benefits.  

  3. Actually a good post from a front pager at DailyKos who I don’t usually agree with: America needs an industrial policy.

    I really like his synopsis of German industrial policy:

    There is a simple reason why Germany manufactures so many high-end goods, from the best watches to the finest grand pianos, all the way up to Porsches and highly complicated precision instruments: it is the policy of the German government.

    Well, it isn’t exactly a policy. It is more of a framework. Germany’s method of creating wealth is straightforward: 1. Produce a highly educated workforce. 2. Have that workforce create and make advanced, precision things for high wages. 3. Export the things at a high price and then re-invest that money back into item 1. This is why Germany is the Number 2 exporter in the world despite having only 27 percent of America’s population and only 6 percent of Number 1 exporter China. The Germans realize they cannot beat either China or India based on cost. Advanced nations can’t compete on cost. America could bust all the unions, get rid of the minimum wage, eliminate all social benefits and taxation and we would still lose jobs to low-wage nations. Germany decided to avoid going down the same path of downward spiral among its middle class that we are in. Instead, they invest in their people and in research.

    Whether or not you agree with his description, I think it’s a smart policy.  Right now, all we offer college grads are jobs that aren’t there and loan payments.  Not the majority, but enough of them to create pessimism.  We don’t have to guarantee a high-paying job for life, but knowing that one will be paid enough to live on, to have health care, and to provide for retirement can create a net positive, as in Germany.  I think we are moving in that direction but it is difficult when one of the parties seems to worship the Gilded Age.

      1. I got a very nice, personal note from your old boss recently.  I was touched.  I don’t know Scott well but we have common friends from my childhood.

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