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It's more aptly described as an army of union workers who contribute boatloads to political parties. It may be more efficient for the feds to cut out the chara

It's more aptly described as an army of union workers who contribute boatloads to political parties. It may be more efficient for the feds to cut out the charade. They should close down all the union shops and give all the union workers full welfare for life. The resulting bill might be cheaper than the economic distortions caused by political policies that favor unions in the marketplace.

DougWebb 17y ago
Full welfare for life? You mean Social Security and Healthcare? Perhaps we just need to make those programs work properly. If we also had some basic legal limits on the way salaried and non-salaried employees work and how much of a corporations tax-deductible costs can go to C-level salaries instead of everyone else's salaries, much of the need for unions would go away.
- jacoblyles 17y ago
  Unions have outlived their usefulness in the American economy. Today, their primary effect is to destroy and bankrupt everything they touch. GM paid many workers full salary to do nothing for years because their union contract wouldn't allow them to fire people. I'm sure those "workers" were happy with what the union did for them. But those of us who don't get a sweet union deal have to live with a bankrupt state of California that can't negotiate their union labor contracts, a broken school system run by the country's most powerful union that resists all reform (except "more money for schools"!), bankrupt unionized automakers, a stale unionized postal system that is going broke, and even union grocery stores with long lines because the union resists putting in automatic checkout machines that they fear would take their jobs. And when the unions inevitably kill their host, they still aren't made to suffer. The federal government steps in and guarantees their pensions and salaries. Imagine what kind of incentives that gives the union leaders in future negotiations. Oh, and union workers will have lower taxes on their health insurance than non-union workers under the Obama health care plan even though union workers make more money on average, just to rub a little salt in the wound. In 1900, unions were a great idea. Now they are poison.
  - roc 17y ago
    > "Unions have outlived their usefulness in the American economy." I used to think this way; even having grown up in and around Detroit. But it only takes a few years of actually paying attention to continued corporate abuse of employees -- numerous cases of flagrant violations of labor law and regulations -- to realize that's completely wrong. All unions are not the UAW or Teamsters any more than all companies are Enron and Merrill Lynch.
    - robryan 17y ago
      So the alternative is unions which empower the opposite form of abuse? It seems that a balance is the problem, one is always stronger than the other.
  - cullenking 17y ago
    I agree, in general, as a former Teamster working for UPS. I moved out of the union and became a supervisor for UPS. It was hell, where I couldn't penalize any worker for showing up late, for not working, for leaving early. Some workers could not be motivated, period, as 'senior' union employees told them the tricks that made it so they didn't have to work hard. Meanwhile, my trucks were late to pull, meaning I got my ass chewed out, because I regularly had 3/10 employees skip work. The only way I could get things going was to literally bribe them with popsicles (hot warehouse in summer) and energy drinks from my own pocket $$$. The worst was having to give skilled positions to the most senior, rather than the most capable. Made for a nightmare operating environment. However, my dad is a union employee - he works on elevators. It's a small union, and it doesn't have a bunch of 'no penalization' bullshit, and no seniority promotion clauses. The benefit it offers are a standardized health care package, so he can keep the same healthcare and retirement regardless of employer (there are only a few elevator companies anyway). The union also guarantees overtime. He can still get canned if he starts skipping work, doesn't perform etc, it just takes legitimate documentation to have happen. There are upsides and downsides, but I believe a well run union is a good thing, but in general unions are not well run and are in actuality, terrible for the private sector.
  - Anechoic 17y ago
- lionhearted 17y ago
  > ... and how much of a corporations tax-deductible costs can go to C-level salaries instead of everyone else's salaries, much of the need for unions would go away. Something like that was already instituted under Bill Clinton - corporations can't deduct more than $1 million of an executive's salary. That was actually a big part of why compensation shifted to stock options - I don't think that was a good shift, myself. CEO's and high level executives now make a lot more short term decisions than they used to when they got, say, $6 million in salary and a dramatically smaller option pool. Back then their main concern was keeping the business running smoothly to ensure their jobs. Now it's all about getting the stock price up as much as possible in the short term, often with disastrous results. Also, executive compensation actually went up as a result of the shift to stock options... it's ironic that the government trying to limit executive compensation helped stimulate an increase in executive compensation. Unforseen secondary effects can be funny like that. > ...much of the need for unions would go away. Much of the need for unions has gone away, but unions do not voluntarily close shop. Do you think they would do so? It hasn't happened yet...
roc 17y ago
Except that the non-failed auto companies have no problems operating in union states or nations. Many of GM's own in-the-black business units are in Europe. "The unions" didn't cause the failure, nor the bailout.
- philwelch 17y ago
  2/3 unionized auto makers in the US failed and had to be nationalized in order to survive. (Ford survived largely on the principle that you don't have to outrun the bear, just your hunting companions.) The foreign, non-unionized auto makers have no problem keeping plants open in the US and turning profits. It may be more affordable to support a unionized workforce in Europe just because European countries have more generous welfare systems, or because European unions own stock in the company and have a financial incentive not to completely destroy the host. Of course, UAW resisted that level of responsibility in the GM and Chrysler bailouts.
DrSprout 17y ago
American industry is failing primarily because safety standards are higher than abroad. GM failed because they designed shoddy cars. The Unions had nothing to do with that (especially given that most of the union workers were rank-and-file factory workers who built exactly the shitty cars they were told to.)
- fizx 17y ago
  > GM failed because they designed shoddy cars. The Unions had nothing to do with that If the overhead of dealing with unions adds some amount to your marginal costs, and you have to sell your vehicle for a competitive price, then you have to find a way to make a cheaper car than your competitors. A cheaper car can happen through lower material costs, less R&D, etc, all of which lead to "shoddy cars."
  - The_Fox 17y ago
    I read somewhere that GM's union commitments added about $2,000 to the price of a car. Meaning that if you buy a GM automobile, $2,000 is going to union-related stuff, rather than buying extra features, better quality, a longer warranty, etc.
- spamizbad 17y ago
  I agree. It's not the union's fault the American auto industry failed to adopt using more universal/standard parts across their range of vehicles, as opposed to favoring proprietary parts for each specific model (with the exception of engines). Only now, post-gov take-over, are they implementing these practices that should have been in place 20 years ago. Their board also structured union benefits that favored short-term cuts over long-term costs. And when times were good, GM placed its engineering efforts on Trucks and SUVs, and when gas was cheap. Unfortunately, they let everything from compacts to their luxury sedan lines decay. GM's failure, to me, is more of a case of rotten corporate culture than a lesson against unions.
- jdminhbg 17y ago
  "American industry is failing primarily because safety standards are higher than abroad." Then why can Toyota and Honda successfully build cars in the US?

DougWebb 17y ago

Full welfare for life? You mean Social Security and Healthcare? Perhaps we just need to make those programs work properly. If we also had some basic legal limits on the way salaried and non-salaried employees work and how much of a corporations tax-deductible costs can go to C-level salaries instead of everyone else's salaries, much of the need for unions would go away.

jacoblyles 17y ago
Unions have outlived their usefulness in the American economy. Today, their primary effect is to destroy and bankrupt everything they touch. GM paid many workers full salary to do nothing for years because their union contract wouldn't allow them to fire people. I'm sure those "workers" were happy with what the union did for them. But those of us who don't get a sweet union deal have to live with a bankrupt state of California that can't negotiate their union labor contracts, a broken school system run by the country's most powerful union that resists all reform (except "more money for schools"!), bankrupt unionized automakers, a stale unionized postal system that is going broke, and even union grocery stores with long lines because the union resists putting in automatic checkout machines that they fear would take their jobs. And when the unions inevitably kill their host, they still aren't made to suffer. The federal government steps in and guarantees their pensions and salaries. Imagine what kind of incentives that gives the union leaders in future negotiations. Oh, and union workers will have lower taxes on their health insurance than non-union workers under the Obama health care plan even though union workers make more money on average, just to rub a little salt in the wound. In 1900, unions were a great idea. Now they are poison.
- roc 17y ago
  > "Unions have outlived their usefulness in the American economy." I used to think this way; even having grown up in and around Detroit. But it only takes a few years of actually paying attention to continued corporate abuse of employees -- numerous cases of flagrant violations of labor law and regulations -- to realize that's completely wrong. All unions are not the UAW or Teamsters any more than all companies are Enron and Merrill Lynch.
  - robryan 17y ago
    So the alternative is unions which empower the opposite form of abuse? It seems that a balance is the problem, one is always stronger than the other.
- cullenking 17y ago
  I agree, in general, as a former Teamster working for UPS. I moved out of the union and became a supervisor for UPS. It was hell, where I couldn't penalize any worker for showing up late, for not working, for leaving early. Some workers could not be motivated, period, as 'senior' union employees told them the tricks that made it so they didn't have to work hard. Meanwhile, my trucks were late to pull, meaning I got my ass chewed out, because I regularly had 3/10 employees skip work. The only way I could get things going was to literally bribe them with popsicles (hot warehouse in summer) and energy drinks from my own pocket $$$. The worst was having to give skilled positions to the most senior, rather than the most capable. Made for a nightmare operating environment. However, my dad is a union employee - he works on elevators. It's a small union, and it doesn't have a bunch of 'no penalization' bullshit, and no seniority promotion clauses. The benefit it offers are a standardized health care package, so he can keep the same healthcare and retirement regardless of employer (there are only a few elevator companies anyway). The union also guarantees overtime. He can still get canned if he starts skipping work, doesn't perform etc, it just takes legitimate documentation to have happen. There are upsides and downsides, but I believe a well run union is a good thing, but in general unions are not well run and are in actuality, terrible for the private sector.
- Anechoic 17y ago
lionhearted 17y ago
> ... and how much of a corporations tax-deductible costs can go to C-level salaries instead of everyone else's salaries, much of the need for unions would go away. Something like that was already instituted under Bill Clinton - corporations can't deduct more than $1 million of an executive's salary. That was actually a big part of why compensation shifted to stock options - I don't think that was a good shift, myself. CEO's and high level executives now make a lot more short term decisions than they used to when they got, say, $6 million in salary and a dramatically smaller option pool. Back then their main concern was keeping the business running smoothly to ensure their jobs. Now it's all about getting the stock price up as much as possible in the short term, often with disastrous results. Also, executive compensation actually went up as a result of the shift to stock options... it's ironic that the government trying to limit executive compensation helped stimulate an increase in executive compensation. Unforseen secondary effects can be funny like that. > ...much of the need for unions would go away. Much of the need for unions has gone away, but unions do not voluntarily close shop. Do you think they would do so? It hasn't happened yet...

roc 17y ago

Except that the non-failed auto companies have no problems operating in union states or nations. Many of GM's own in-the-black business units are in Europe. "The unions" didn't cause the failure, nor the bailout.

philwelch 17y ago
2/3 unionized auto makers in the US failed and had to be nationalized in order to survive. (Ford survived largely on the principle that you don't have to outrun the bear, just your hunting companions.) The foreign, non-unionized auto makers have no problem keeping plants open in the US and turning profits. It may be more affordable to support a unionized workforce in Europe just because European countries have more generous welfare systems, or because European unions own stock in the company and have a financial incentive not to completely destroy the host. Of course, UAW resisted that level of responsibility in the GM and Chrysler bailouts.

DrSprout 17y ago

American industry is failing primarily because safety standards are higher than abroad. GM failed because they designed shoddy cars. The Unions had nothing to do with that (especially given that most of the union workers were rank-and-file factory workers who built exactly the shitty cars they were told to.)

fizx 17y ago
> GM failed because they designed shoddy cars. The Unions had nothing to do with that If the overhead of dealing with unions adds some amount to your marginal costs, and you have to sell your vehicle for a competitive price, then you have to find a way to make a cheaper car than your competitors. A cheaper car can happen through lower material costs, less R&D, etc, all of which lead to "shoddy cars."
- The_Fox 17y ago
  I read somewhere that GM's union commitments added about $2,000 to the price of a car. Meaning that if you buy a GM automobile, $2,000 is going to union-related stuff, rather than buying extra features, better quality, a longer warranty, etc.
spamizbad 17y ago
I agree. It's not the union's fault the American auto industry failed to adopt using more universal/standard parts across their range of vehicles, as opposed to favoring proprietary parts for each specific model (with the exception of engines). Only now, post-gov take-over, are they implementing these practices that should have been in place 20 years ago. Their board also structured union benefits that favored short-term cuts over long-term costs. And when times were good, GM placed its engineering efforts on Trucks and SUVs, and when gas was cheap. Unfortunately, they let everything from compacts to their luxury sedan lines decay. GM's failure, to me, is more of a case of rotten corporate culture than a lesson against unions.
jdminhbg 17y ago
"American industry is failing primarily because safety standards are higher than abroad." Then why can Toyota and Honda successfully build cars in the US?