Not everyone wants a union

[thundley4]

The Northerner (1000+ posts)             Tue Mar-29-11 01:47 AM
Original message
Who wants a union? Not Southern autoworkers, it seems
   
Foreign automakers are placing their U.S. factories in the region because of generous incentives and a workforce famously resistant to unions. That's presenting a huge challenge to the once-formidable United Auto Workers.

Deric Golden has what he calls his dream job, fixing small flaws on the sedans being churned out at the Hyundai factory here.

So when two organizers from the United Auto Workers knocked on his apartment door one day, hoping to get him to sign a union card, he quickly sent them packing.

"I told them I didn't work at the plant," said Golden, 29. "I just wasn't interested."

It's the same story in town after town along the southern tier of Auto Alley, a corridor that runs north-south along interstates 75 and 65 from Lexington, Ky., to Montgomery.

Foreign automakers — including Honda, Kia, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Toyota and Volkswagen — are placing their U.S. factories in this region because of generous state and local incentives and a workforce famously resistant to unions.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x764105

FLAprogressive   (1000+ posts)           Tue Mar-29-11 01:48 AM
Response to Original message
1. they've been permanently brainwashed, the UAW shouldn't bother. you can't fix ignorance.

melm00se (1000+ posts)           Tue Mar-29-11 09:59 AM
Response to Reply #1
32. a union can only form
   
if there is unhappiness about something amongst the workforce.

if they are happy with their:

Pay
Treatment
Work environment

there is no way a union will form.

Exactly, but the unions aren't getting their share.

Armstead   (1000+ posts)             Tue Mar-29-11 04:15 PM
Response to Reply #62
64. That's part of it...But there are decent people who hire other people too
   
Edited on Tue Mar-29-11 04:18 PM by Armstead
Yes there are also a lot of employers who will get away with as much they can (and sometimes more), but one should be careful about painting with too broad a brush.

Just because someone has a business does not automatically make them evil.

All business owners are evil.

Dogtown   (1000+ posts)           Tue Mar-29-11 05:39 PM
Response to Reply #59
68. It is incredibly naive
   
to believe in the continued good-will of an employer.

A decent employer will recognize the need and benefits of collective organization.

To paraphrase the GOP, "If he's not doing anything wrong, he has nothing to fear (from the workers)."

Wait, what?  Unions are good for the employer?  Dude, put down the bong.

Armstead   (1000+ posts)             Tue Mar-29-11 07:24 PM
Response to Reply #68
70. When there is no more goodwill, then it becomes time to organize
   
I think if you honestly look around at your friends and family, you will find a good number who are happy in their jobs and with their employer.

Yes there are also many abusive situations too, but it is simple minded to assume that every employers is bad simply because they are an employer.

All employers are evil and owe their success to the workers.

FLPanhandle   (1000+ posts)           Tue Mar-29-11 02:07 PM
Response to Reply #1
56. The aren't ignorant
   
For these folks this is a "dream job" with better pay, better working conditions, and much better chance for moving up than anything else they can get.

They are smart enough to know that and smart enough to not want to put it all at risk.

They know the risk is high they could lose it all and have to pay money each paycheck to a union and for what benefit?

Far from ignorant, I think they've made a careful assessment of their work options & cost/benefit of union membership.

That's right, the worker would get a pay cut from paying dues to the DemonRats unions.

[Ballygrl]

FLAprogressive   (1000+ posts)           Tue Mar-29-11 01:48 AM
Response to Original message
1. they've been permanently brainwashed, the UAW shouldn't bother. you can't fix ignorance.

Brainwashed? it couldn't be that they saw what happened to Detroit?

[Chris_]

The auto workers here see what is happening in Michigan and want no part of it.  Leave them alone, you leeches.

[true_blood]

FLAprogressive   (1000+ posts)           Tue Mar-29-11 01:48 AM
Response to Original message
1. they've been permanently brainwashed, the UAW shouldn't bother. you can't fix ignorance.

If I only had a brain,.......

[BEG]

My husband has never worked for a union, he always has negotiated his salary and bonuses himself. When we were forced to move to the shit hole known as california he alone negotiated his package. He alone got himself more of a bonus for moving here and also more of a raise than they originally offered.

He has worked for the same company (that was bought a few years ago by a large toy company) for 17 years.  Every year he gets more vacation time and sick days than the year before. The company automatically gives 6% of his salary to his 401k, matches dollar for dollar what my husband puts in up to 5% then gives 50% on the dollar over 5%.  He gets dividends, stock and bonuses (it is based on merit, goals reached and profit).  Unions had NOTHING to do with it. Companies want to keep good employees, it cost a lot more than you think to hire a new employee. Even a fairly low skilled employee.

I love how they say, "Have a 40 hour work week? Thank a Union".  Unions are nothing like what they originally were supposed to be about.  Unions are nothing more than leeches today. I don't care what unions have done for "workers" in the past, I care what they are doing to companies and tax payers TODAY.  There use to be a need for them. They have long since outgrown their usefulness. 

I have some anecdotal evidence about what BS Unions are.  When my husband was arranging his office when we moved to CA he started to hang a few pictures on the wall. Someone saw him do it and told him he can't do it himself. He had to call the "janitorial coordinator". So he did. He waited...and waited. The guy never came. Several days later he was tired of waiting so he started hanging the pictures again. Someone must have seen him do it because the maintenance guy came in and yelled at him, " What are you doing?  Are you trying to take food out of my kids mouths?"  The guy was serious. It took this guy HOURS to hang three picture (with a lunch break in between).  The maintenance department is the only part of this company that is union. They don't even hire union writers (they use writers for story lines, etc for toys, movies).   

   

[MrsSmith]

Healthcare jobs aren't unionized, at least in this area (maybe there are elsewhere.)  Our wages are compared to those paid by other hospitals in the general area, and our wages scale up if other places pay more.  My department received a 6% raise in addition to the 2% cost of living raise one year.   I'm much better off without having to pay union dues to a group of heavyweights that will come back to my hospital and end up causing them to raise prices even more.   

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

My husband has never worked for a union, he always has negotiated his salary and bonuses himself.

Yeah, well, your husband is not a ***** and as such the liberals will fear and revile him.

[GOBUCKS]

Dogtown   (1000+ posts)           Tue Mar-29-11 05:39 PM
Response to Reply #59
A decent employer will recognize the need and benefits of collective organization.

Even for the DUmp, that's a shockingly stupid statement.

[Karin]

Agreed, GOBUCKS. 

Name removed (0 posts)      Tue Mar-29-11 12:07 PM
Response to Reply #40
44. Deleted message
 Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

 
 cordelia  (728 posts)      Tue Mar-29-11 12:32 PM
Response to Reply #44
46. Alerted

Kindergarten playground.  "I'm tellin!!!!!!"

Initech  (1000+ posts)        Tue Mar-29-11 08:01 PM
Response to Original message
71. Too much RW hate radio, too much Fux News, not enough critical thinking.

  I don't even have to comment.

Thanks for the find, Thundley. 

[Ralph Wiggum]

Healthcare jobs aren't unionized, at least in this area (maybe there are elsewhere.)  Our wages are compared to those paid by other hospitals in the general area, and our wages scale up if other places pay more.  My department received a 6% raise in addition to the 2% cost of living raise one year.   I'm much better off without having to pay union dues to a group of heavyweights that will come back to my hospital and end up causing them to raise prices even more.   

At a hospital that I worked for, there were once rumblings that the local nurses thug union wanted to infiiltrate our group of hospitals.  I used to play golf with a bunch of male nurse anesthesiologists, and they gave me the low-down.  Some of them met with the union organizers, and they were completely unimpressed.  The pay & benefits they were already getting were above market scale, all they would have "received" would have been to pay union dues.  So no union ever ended up surfacing.

[dandi]

My husband has never worked for a union, he always has negotiated his salary and bonuses himself. When we were forced to move to the shit hole known as california he alone negotiated his package. He alone got himself more of a bonus for moving here and also more of a raise than they originally offered.

Absodamnlutely, same here.  My raise was bigger this year and my bonus was bigger because I busted my ass and increased my value to my employer; all by myself and without a damn union. 

40 hour work week?  Fine, if I wanted to do just the minimum but "the minimum" doesn't cut it anymore.  If you want to set yourself apart from the herd, you don't do "the minimum".  I left home when I was 17 with the clothes on my back and $40 in my left pocket and commenced to performing above "the minimum" from there on out.  I didn't get to where I am today by doing "the minimum" and I damn sure didn't achieve what I have with the "help" of a damn union.  It was up to me to get it done and, with the guidance of great leadership and Almighty God, I did it.

Lurking DUmbasses, do you comprehend what I just typed?  I am the one who is solely responsible for my continued good fortune and betterment.  I am the one responsible for the welfare of my family. 

That's it, that's all there is - Me.  Little 'ol self reliant and motivated me.

I've said it before and I'll say it again:  **** a union.

The first idiot that stands up in my company and says "union" gets my right hand run through his head.

Period, the end.

The first pair of union goons that show up at my door with a union card waiting my signature will leave my driveway feet first.  There will be no requests to vacate the premises or any threats of calling 911; I have determined that labor unions are a threat to my family and my way of life and will therefore be treated as such.

[Splashdown]

I love how they say, "Have a 40 hour work week? Thank a Union".  Unions are nothing like what they originally were supposed to be about.  Unions are nothing more than leeches today. I don't care what unions have done for "workers" in the past, I care what they are doing to companies and tax payers TODAY.  There use to be a need for them. They have long since outgrown their usefulness. 

   

Actually, Henry Ford, the most "evil" capitalist of them all, "invented" the 40-hour work week.

So on January 5th, 1914, Mr. Ford announced that he was more than doubling the minimum daily pay for his workers from $2.34 a day to $5 a day.  He also set the work week to five eight hour days.  Please note, no government “wage” legislation, nebby bureaucrat or force from a labor union was required to get Mr. Ford to do this.  And further note that this move was profitable for Mr. Ford as well.

The results were noticeable.  The Ford Motor Company saw reduced turnover and was spending less money finding and hiring new employees.  The company was also able to retain the best people for the jobs it had, thus making the operation more efficient.  And perhaps the least discussed aspect of this policy was that Ford’s own employees were now able to afford the cars they themselves were building.  This plowed money back into the company as Ford’s employees did just this very thing.

Henry Ford saw his company grow and the cars they were making become more and more popular.  And his actions forced other employers to take note.  Other companies, in order to stop their employees from fleeing to Ford at the first opportunity, had to implement similar measures themselves.  Some did.  Others did not.

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