It's a public place. I wouldn't do that.

Everybody I know that has a union job loves it.

You don't post one because? Your only here for? I know the answers but there are many political forums and blogs that are just that and nothing more. To me it seems very odd people choose this dating site just for the political forum. That's the only forum you have posted in. I didn't go all the way back, I could be wrong. Most people I have met on here post on many and not just this one. Sorry man I just find it very odd!! To me you would do more good spreading your word on a political forum site. JMO...Very odd!

I don't post a pic because I don't feel the need to. a friend signed me up unwillingly to this and a bunch of other dating sites a while ago and for some reason (she said she wanted to help after my last breakup), this (for some reason) is the only account i didn't cancel as soon as i found out. I have no desire to meet anyone here or anywhere else on the net. I don't post a pic because I have no need to impress anyone here. I don't often take shots of myself anyhow and I'm rarely in any when I go out because I'm the one with the camera.

Call it weird not posting a pic. i don't care. no worse than madison having 16 political statement pics and one more that may or may not be him. I really can't tell what it's of.

and yes. this is the only forum I post on. I do not believe in god so I stay out of the religion forum - I respect that decision by others and don't toy with them for their beliefs. I don't care who would have sex with the person above them so I stay out of the sex & relationships forum. i could care less about sports (i don't really watch them - playing is more my thing), science, or any of the other forums. I started discussing politics here with the election after I read a really ignorant post and I've kept at it for some reason.


My whole thing is I'm not so sure why what you do for a living should be so secretive. I'm an auto mechanic. If you think you'll be judged by others for what you do, then those are not people you should be wanting to associate with anyway.

I meant no disrespect. You are not the only one. Just odd to me.

Are you not passing judgement on his job because its a union job? You can say what you want but the unions help make this the "Best country". Unions have been making concessions for years. The revamping of the Auto Industry in the late 80s for one. Farming parts out to cheap labor. You should do a little investigating what that cheap labor produced...Warehouses of bad parts, the implementing of SPC save their butts from continuing to receive such parts and eliminating the really "Cheap labor".. My dad always said you get what you pay for. Ever wonder why nothing lasts anymore. Why when you buy something %30 of the time something is wrong with it. Quality control??????

HEALTHCARE is what has pushed the costs of unionized labor. What do you suggest suspending those benefits putting more burden on the overcrowded Er's. High cost treatment for low cost ailments. We will end up paying for their health care as we already do for the uninsured.

So their is plenty of blame and its not just the unions....

Auto mechanic? They charge anywhere between 70 to 100 dollars an hour.

My job classification is utility man being I do every job in my dept.

Working hard every day to keep good paying union jobs here in america!

I know people that are trying to get into the union.

I can understand why. A well trained workforce is far better than a workforce filled with fly by nighters. My union builds the Ships of the US navey. They dont trust that type of work to amatures. We build Nuke plants ,water towers Bridges, anything they expect to last a long time is union made. (mostly) I am but a small cog in the wheel of the Union of boilermakers, , iron ship builders, blacksmiths, forgers and helpers. And I think winx they are based in your town.

I don't know if the headquarters is here. We have so many union halls. I don't know which ones are the headquarters.

yeah but the technician only sees a small amount of that (my rate is on the higher end because of my certifications and I make $20). We are paid off the work we do. if we do 60 hours (as listed in the labor book) in a 40 hour week, we get paid 60 hours. on the other hand, I've only booked 14 hours in a 48 hour week before and only got paid for 14 hours. while getting charged 6 hours labor for a job that I do in 3 (injector pump on a dodge/cummins diesel, for example) may not seem fair, turn it around once. would you like to pay 6 hours for a job that should only take 3 because the tech is slow? I've seen techs take almost two days to do a pump like that.

not to mention the costs of running an automotive shop now is astronomical. our workman's comp insurance is now over $6,000 a person a year. On top of that, we have accident insurance too. Environmental concerns with disposing used oil and coolant and tires are expensive too. We have to have the driver of the disposal truck on our insurance in case there's a spill. Then my employer it kind enough to pay for a PPO plan for us as well (with no union or collective bargaining involved). it's not a cheap industry to be in.

The UAW workers get paid an astounding salary to do what they do (very little). As a former dealer technician, I would have to do repairs on probably 10% of all new vehicles that I did pre-inspections on for stupid mistakes. careless mistakes like interior panels installed wrong, body panels misaligned, bolts not tightened so the suspension rattles, etc. I fully agree that parts are higher quality when made here (Napa USA made/rebuilt is a million times better than the lesser parts houses from personal experience). as for labor, there is no reason to pay a man $27 an hour plus medical for their family, plus retirement to install panels or torque a bolt. cut that and keep the medical. Having everything (all benefits added in) means the average cost per hour is over $78 for each and every UAW worker. That is asinine.

I agree we should dump used oil in the rivers, work for next to nothing and if we get hurt on the job well we are on our own after all its your fault you got hurt

First this statement....

Unions are their own worst enemy as is being seen by the fact that their membership decreases year by year.

Union memberships decrease year after year because of two things.
First the legislation, starting with Reagan and since, is designed against unions. Globalization can not work with American workers galvanized and speaking as a group against it.
Second, America has moved from a highly skilled manufacturing economy with one of the highest standards of living in the world to a service society with an ever increasing gap between the haves and have nots.

This has resulted in American jobs outsourced to countries with none or little environmental responsibility and a constant shrinking dollar value.

Its called Globalization. Its not a failure in the quality of American products or the Union workers fault for wanting to provide a decent life for their families.

It's a planned coordination of big business and American political leaders payed off by lobbyist so they can reap larger profits and its been successful so far due to a continuous and hard pressed propaganda campaign aimed at the public for years.

Oh yeah!
The UAW workers only make on average $3 an hr more than their foreign Auto worker counter parts.

As with any job especially yours you get what you pay for. That's why nothing lasts. The auto repair business is one of the worst. To many backyard mechanics that are under trained trying to do the job!!!!! They not only charge you $70 to $100 hr labor but "Mark up" the cost of materials by %25....Parts that half the time are after market created by cheap labor that are inferior or defective from the start...

You will get no sympathy from me and I find it ironic you would bash anyone's job whether its union or not!!!! Your field is full of half azz worker and crooks!!!!

That my friend is also asinine!!!!!!!

YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR!!!!!!!!!!!!

My mom is a RN and worth every penny she makes...I read your posts and know what you do.

Would I want a underpaid RN giving care to my child...NO!!! I want the best trained and most skilled one working on her..I'm sure you are and well deserve the pay you make.

Would I want an under paid less skilled person building the car she will be driving on highways that are posted at 70mph? No way man!!!! Would I want some backyard mechanic servicing the auto? NO!!! If I need heart surgery would I want the least trained less paid surgeon? NO!

YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR!!!

One would have to be a dyed-in-the-wool Pollyanna or plain fool not to recognize that labor unions in this country, despite all the good they’ve done and continue to do, are fighting for their collective lives. Indeed, it requires every resource at labor’s disposal just to keep their heads above water. Things are grim.

On one side, unions face a deadly, triple-threat combination—Corporate America looking to outsource everything that can be manufactured or digitalized; Joe Citizen buying into all the anti-labor propaganda he’s being bombarded with; and Republican lawmakers seeking to further marginalize unions through the courts and government agencies.

Alternatively, on the other side, unions face their traditional allies and benefactors, the Democrats, who continue to embarrass themselves and disappoint the Movement by pretending to be organized labor’s staunch supporter, yet rarely go out on a limb to help. Meanwhile, the once proud and healthy middle-class continues to be chipped away.

This is not to say the battle is over, or that, despite their woeful current predicament, unions aren’t capable of making a dramatic comeback. In fact, given the climate of the country and the fundamental dichotomy and tension that has always existed between labor and management (in spite of those slick “We’re all on the same team” slogans), it can be argued that labor’s eventual resurgence, in one form or another, is almost guaranteed.

Still, just when it seemed that organized labor had been battered, slandered and beaten down about as much as it could be, we find that there’s no end to it. New plots continue to be hatched, new enemies continue to be recruited.

For those wondering whatever happened to Steve Forbes, the one-time Republican presidential candidate and radical flat tax disciple, he has recently resurfaced as a shill for a virulently anti-union organization called the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (NRTWLDF).

In a letter dated April 28, 2008, Forbes implored the readers on his mailing list to heed the dangers posed by America’s labor unions, and urged them to fill out the enclosed questionnaire and mail it back immediately. His 4-page letter is filled with anti-union diatribe. Here’s a sample:

“Fueled by massive forced-dues dollars seized from employees as a condition of employment, union bosses are now on a legislative rampage to help the new far-left majority. Big Labor is pulling out all the stops to:

block the appointment of qualified judges on the nations’ Federal courts;

further reduce parental control over their children’s education and hand it to unaccountable teacher unions and government bureaucrats;

stop lawsuit and medical malpractice reform needed to restrain greedy trial lawyers

retain the unfair federal “Death Tax” and cancel the Bush tax cuts; and

seize new powers to collect hundreds of millions of dollars in forced union dues.”

The questionnaire (titled “Voter Opinion Survey on Big Labor”) consists of nine questions, most of them emotionally loaded, categorical and wildly misleading.

Some examples:

Question #1: “Do you think American workers should be fired for refusing to pay dues to a union?”

Question #6: “Do you think union violence should continue to enjoy legal immunity under federal law and the laws of more than 15 states?”

Question #8: “Do you believe that public employees such as police and firefighters should be forced to join labor unions?”

Very weird stuff.

Instead of focusing their outrage and fury on the federal government—for wantonly violating the civil liberties of American citizens, spending billions of dollars a month on an unpopular war, propping up maggoty oligarchies all over the globe, and bailing out greedy Wall Street investors (not to mention engaging in perjury and every other manner of deception)—this NRTWLDF group feels compelled to go after working men and women.

Of course, these are the same folks who opposed the establishment of a mandatory federal minimum wage and the creation of OSHA (Occupational Health and Safety Administration), and who favor privatizing social security. By and large, they’re the same closet-plutocrats who claim to “respect” working people but try to conceal the fact that the average American worker hasn’t received an actual (allowing for cost of living) wage increase since 1973.

Because these anti-union zealots can’t come out and honestly say what they really feel—i.e., that the notion of common working people getting a substantially larger slice of the pie makes them ill—they attack the organizations representing these workers. They use lurid, smear tactics in their attack, depicting labor unions as corrupt, dictatorial and greedy. The following paragraph is taken from the second page of Forbes’ letter:

“For America’s workers, it’s not much of a choice. Either pay tribute to labor chieftains or lose their jobs. But for union bosses, it’s like cashing in a giant lottery jackpot every day of the year. And their lust for money is nearly endless.”

If the ideology being peddled here weren’t so scary and potentially dangerous, that paragraph would actually be funny . . . funny in the same way the movie “Reefer Madness” was funny. Unfortunately, the stakes are too high to appreciate the humor.

It’s hard to understand why class distinctions remain so powerful in America. People don’t flinch when they hear of a hedge fund manager, like John Paulus, who made $2.5 billion in 2007 via the quasi-legal manipulation of money, yet they get downright resentful when they hear of a group of janitors asking to be paid $14/hour ($29,000 annually). It’s hard to understand. And it ain’t fair.

David Macaray, a Los Angeles playwright and writer, was a former labor union rep. He can be reached at dmacaray@earthlink.net


http://www.counterpunch.org/macaray07262008.html

And of course, what is ( and is ALWAYS ) ignored in that load of crap is that the vast majority of that amount comes about because of Health Care costs.

And we all KNOW that the rising cost of health Care is because of the unions and the automakers, right?

It couldn't POSSIBLY have anything to do with the government putting restrictions on where we can buy our medications or anything like that.

That HAS to be the auto workers fault.

Cheaper drugs from Canada ( which by the way, no matter WHAT our fabulous government says, are just as safe as the ones made here. WHOOPS...they aren't MADE here. They are made overseas and SHIPPED IN by the pharm companies )which could help alleviate some of the very high cost of health coverage??/ NO WAY!!! We can't do that.

Bringing up the absurd 78 dollar an hour line...THAT is asinine.

I would like to add that people that aren't in Unions also have their health benefits included in their salary.

Unions do no guarentee that you are getting a quality employee and does not guarentee that they do quality work..I have had both union and non-union people work for me and the most important aspect to me is who I pick and hire. I included health care when I hired someone to work for me, but it would be alot easier if small and medium business could join together to get better rates for health benifits, then more people could be hired and provided with health care. Right now the shop I run is union, they start out at 17.50 an hour with full benifits and work up to 32.20 per hour. The average wage is about $59,000 a year and with benifits and compinsation cost me about another$40 to 50,000 more on top of that. Cut down my benifit costs and I could hire more people..