This is a nice twist on "Life of Brian," and something we get asked here at TAG from time to time.
The corporate media (and others) have done an excellent job beating the "Unions Suck!" bass drum, and I can tell you the landscape has changed from the quaint era when I started at Walt Disney Productions as a traffic boy, fresh out of high school. Then, double and triple time were paid as a matter of course when employees worked beyond eight hours. Nobody thought it could possibly be any other way. Sadly, nothing remains the same forever.
-- Steve Hulett
Thanks to Jim Parris and Gary Trousdale for the link.
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Sadly, too many unions turn out to be parasites killing the host. Richard Branson, Boeing's number one customer explained it eloquently:
"If people in Seattle build our planes and deliver them on time and, to be frank, don't go on strike, then we'll continue to work with Boeing. If we have our airline completely messed up, with tremendous damage done to our own work force, then we'll go to Embraer or Airbus,"
Unions are important, but in these times, many of them ned to be informed that the customer is more important and that the union and management must work together to get more work than their competitors. Some unions act as if they exist in a vacuum, and end up on the street because of it.
Nice try.
We'll see how well billionaire Branson does when the unionized Airbus employees in France go on strike. Which will be as soon as those austerity measures start spreading into the heart of the Eurozone.
Sadly the corporate world is much more infected with parasitic upper management bleeding their companies dry. They then try blaming the workers, and fools like you buy their BS all to easily.
Branson, yet another corporate communist.
If you are lucky enough in this world to have a unique skill that sets you apart, one you can leverage by yourself or with a small group of others to earn a slightly better life for you and your loved ones, great. Will it change the time honored human traditions of class, wealth, and power, the things that do really make the world go round? No. Human beings are pyramid schemes, and everyone knows how things have to work in order for the train to keep moving, even if the empire goes over a cliff. Labor union hierarchies suffer the same human degradation within ranks as every other institution of man.
Unions are important, but in these times, many of them ned to be informed that the customer is more important and that the union and management must work together to get more work than their competitors. Some unions act as if they exist in a vacuum, and end up on the street because of it.
Ah. You must be the anon. who says things like:
"Social Security is important, but in these times, old people need to understand that they have to understand that the job creators have enough money to hire people and restart the economy. So no new taxes."
And things like "why should I care about you, and that you are struggling, I made it, why can't you?, life can be defined perfectly by those who try and those who not, don't you understand? cancer, poverty, car accidents... those were your choices, you've made your bed, deal with it, what about personal responsibility? "
I remember getting triple time for working late.
That was fantastic!
You worked 8 hours and got paid for three days worth of work.
AND, thanks to the union wages....(back then) that was a nice chunk of money.
"If you are lucky enough in this world to have a unique skill that sets you apart, one you can leverage by yourself or with a small group of others to earn a slightly better life for you and your loved ones, great."
Yeah, that fully EXCLUDES the members of UAW and lots of other factory unions whose members have a grotesque sense of entitlement.
Bag on Richard Branson for calling out the strikes?
Okay, okay... who needs Richard Branson?
BOEING DOES.
He BUYS the planes. Last time I checked, the shiftless labor unions that put them together haven't put any options on the table as far as who is in line to sign massive contracts for planes. Thats not their problem?
Its amazing the willful ignorance in here about the way the world works. Lost of it demonstrated by our representative who types out a post attacking the messenger whenever the message is one he can't dispute.
History has laid waste to the fantasies of the ayn rand kind.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=SPKNqNnXL9Y#at=77
"Human beings are pyramid schemes,..."
Human beings? How Darwinian! No, not human beings, but the market economy certainly is. I suppose we should all work for whatever they feel like paying us, whenever they feel like hiring us and be grateful for the crumbs. The last bit of leverage is taking away all our support systems, (hello 99'ers) so we have no choice.
I'm all for union power... but I'm not going to bat for the shiftless thug unions like the UAW and the California government employee unions who have extorted their way to unsustainable wages and entitlements.
Their strong armed tactics and take-no-prisoners tactics are responsible for the severe drop off of unions in this country. Unions must work WITH management and vice versa.
Many years ago, 'The Simpsons' lampooned this truth in one of their episodes. One of the best episodes in their history and created by writers and artists who are union members.
"No, not human beings, but the market economy certainly is."
Yes, human beings are pyramid schemes. The market thing is, too, but human beings are, by nature, hierarchical and class oriented. Egalitarianism is a fantasy that, as all -isms, creates the oppposite of what it intends. There is always an elite, no matter how you slice the pie.
People suck. Get over it and grow up.
Rahm Emmanuel discovers how lazy and ineffective the powerful government unions have become:
http://tinyurl.com/65azz79
"People suck. Get over it and grow up."
I see; accepting poverty and exploitation in an environment of wealth is a sign of "maturity."
Ah, yes, Christianity. Decidedly not what makes the world go round, but a few good tales in that book. Some whopper lies as well....
I find it amusing that when Unions gain too much power and turn corrupt, it stains all unions. Whereas when a corporation goes corrupt, it's simply a risk a business.
Unions are not magical organizations that are perfect. The trick is to find a balance of power, so that both sides can benefit equally.
Corporations are not considered corrupt because the nexus between government, corporations and financiers on Wall Street is baked into the fabric of your American Dream since the Gilded Age. Corporatism is entirely legal and sanctioned by the United States of America. The labor movement, a short and stale socialist/communist movement of the time, was able to carve out a small slice of legal protection to function, but these laws are always beholden to the overriding power of capitalist elites and large flows of capital that wholly determine the fates and futures of the middle and lower classes.
People only perceive the labor movement as corrupt because they have proven to be collosally ineffective against what is basically the heart of American global power. Public servant collective bargaining agreements are basically bribes to labor. Over time, these bribes have proved to be politically effective in surpressing labor, as they paint state and local governance as corrupt, relative to federal governance, most noteably in times of severe economic distress as we see today.
Police, fire, and prison unions remain politically quitest in the battles over questionable public service payments to pension and health funds, as they are always deemed by the federal government to be essential services for long term political stability. All three overwhelmingly tend to support strong central authority, for obvious reasons. The endless drum beat of 'small government' from the extreme right is diametrically opposite to what the right votes for, which is capitalism and corporate control. And they do it, surpringly so, out of fear of socialism. Still, in 2011, Americans repeatedly vote for corporate governance because we are afraid of changing the status quo. All empires become paralyzed by their own power.
It essentially comes down to what Americans demand in their daily lives. Polical wonks will claim Americans demand freedom, democracy, liberty, and equality. I have never heard that. What I hear Americans demand is gas, coal, electricity, cars and speed, convenience, technology, aircraft carriers, fighter jets, hamburgers, and television. And you get what you pay for. War and heart attacks.
Having said that, I agree that capitalism is the worst system in the world, except for all the rest.
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