Why are they called Collective Bargaining 'rights'?
Offline Why can't the media explain to the moronic public what exactly are so called Collective Bargaining 'rights'?
Government's role is to have men with guns force people to do or not do something. So all catch phrases and propaganda must be translated into what are the men with the guns going to force on people.
Collective Bargaining rights means that a Government agency can't negotiate for services with a private company or individual. A collective of a select group of people(that pay union dues) is granted a monopoly because men with guns will not allow anyone else to negotiate their own deal. The Union is granted an exemption from anti-trust laws. This is a special privilege, not a right.
This special arrangement is the equivalent of Exxon going into a state and negotiating a deal with politicians to be the sole seller of gasoline. The state would arrest anyone else that tried to sell gas.
When are people going to wake up and see that the political left is just the same as the right, labor unions the same as corporations? They all just want special rights and privileges for themselves.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
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I'll respectfully disagree. To me, unions allow balance. Unions have improved the working conditions, and overall quality of life for employees ( see http://user7628.qwestoffice.net/Unions2.htm ) Without unions, workers have no say regarding work conditions, salary, insurance benefits, etc. If unions were not allowed to form, employers would have unrestricted control over all employees.
I would also disagree with the parallel you drew to Exxon. The difference to me is that all citizens hold the right to join unions. Although a union of teachers may create a stipulation saying that all educators in a given state must be union members, they also allow anyone not in their union to join (as long as they meet certain requirements that are determined by the union AND the state).
Most every corporation, union, or club is going to have some kind of self-interest. But to take that fact and generalize it by saying that corporations and unions are synonymous is incorrect, in my eyes.
Utterly false. The employee always has the option not to work for that employer. What unions do is restrict the freedom of the employer to fire an employee and discriminates against those who are worth a higher or lower salary than the union contract negotiates. Those who are worth more will go find work at a non-union workplace or settle for a lower wage, those that are worth less will be unable to find a job.
The question isn't whether or not a union can form. I am not against the freedom of association. If any group of workers want to join together to negotiate their salary and threaten a massive strike that is fine. The issue at question is whether the employer can fire said workers when they stop working. Current labor law uses the force of government to prevent the employer from firing those workers and hiring workers willing to work under mutually agreed terms.
Collective bargaining is doubly absurd when the workers are bargaining against the government, where the officials are spending money that is not theirs while receiving donations from the union that are extorted from the workers.
And how is it a "right" to force other people to join your union as a condition of employment and pay the union money without any say in how it is spent? When the mob does it that is called a shakedown. And how is that really different from the government saying you can only sell gas in the state if you run an Exxon gas station? Anyone can sell gas, as long as they pay Exxon. Your saying anyone can be a teacher, as long as they pay the teachers union. I fail to see the big difference.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
I believe that without unions, the power rests completely in the hands of the employer. To some, that may be considered a good thing. I think that the idea of negotiating with an employer and determining the minimum wage that can be paid, the amount of hours that can be worked, and the terms of employment is essential in creating a fair working environment. What would your alternative to unions be? How would labor descrepancies be decided? I think it is essential to determine terms of labor by reaching a middle group between employers and employees. Without the ability to have a say in these terms, a person's terms of employment lay at the whim of the employer.
It is not a right to force others to join your union. I agree that being forced to join a union just to get the job desired isn't a fantastic option. However, what other alternative do you see that would allow employees to have a say?
Correct, people do have the right to not work for a particular employer, unions do restrict employers from firing an employee (you said the 'right' to fire an employee... why do employers have the right to fire employees... but employees do not have the right to lay out guidelines for termination. Without guidelines, employers have the right to hire/terminate based on gender, sexual preference, or ethnic background.)
I understand also that those who are worth a lesser wage may not be able to find a job. However, why are they worth a lesser wage? If it is based upon their level of expertise, then I say it is wrong to hire a person with lower expertise just because you would save money. If this was allowed in all circumstances, then what is the point of gaining expertise through schooling? If you are more knowledgeable and efficient than someone else, you should be hired for the job. Is that not the determination of 'worth'? I just any other reason for someone being worth less than someone else?
Unions are not a monopoly, they are a check on power.
If you want to get rid of "special rights" then go after the assholes who at the same time CUT TAXES for their corporate buddies and "sellect" unions.
This is merely robbing the middle class and poor to pay the rich.
TAXES exist, and if you are going to say it is OK for the rich to pool their money to make political change then there has to be something to counter that possible monopoly as well.
Just because this is not a private union doesn't mean private wealthy people buy politicians to harm these people.
I'll make you a deal, I'll go with your union busting buddies if they in turn allow the corporate tax rate to go back to what it was. OTHERWISE don't bitch about people pooling their collective power if the rich are allowed to do it too.
FYI all of us pay taxes for things we don't like, get over it. The only monopoly I see are the corporate class buying off our congress so they can get away with raping the other two classes. Or have you been asleep the past 5 years?
All because THEY spent tons of money to deregulate so they could do what they wanted. AND we bailed out banks and car companies ON OUR DIME, because of their "no rules" attitude.
OTHERWISE people have the right to form groups as a collective form of protection from abuse of power.
Stalin and Hitler had one union, their political party, THAT was a monopoly of power with no check on it. Right now the "union" with the most power is one class, and I don't see it giving a shit about us. If it did we would still have a strong manufacturing sector.
What we have now is an unsustainable consumption market based on profit padding and a Wal Street that is being treated like a Vegas casino.
What we have in America today is ONE class waging a war on the other two, and they will not stop until we make 30 cents an hour 16 hour days like China and India.
If you want to bash unions then you need to bash the con artists who hide their money in post office boxes overseas.
I agree BOTH can be abusive, but as far as I see it right now, between unions vs corporations, corporations are winning AT the cost of the rest of us. If it takes a union to stop the abuse and keep jobs here, and keep our living standards from sliding like they are, I will take a union right now, over some corporate goon.
SO again, if you are going to say "BOTH" can be bad, I agree, but right now, I don't trust the corporate class anymore than I can throw them, and someone has to stand up to them.'
THE FIRST AMENDMENT is an anti-trust law. It is there to proctect ALL citizens of all classes. It was not there to protect the rich so they can say, "anything goes and anything less than anything goes is oppression"
I don't want to hear shit about unions when NJ tax payers are still paying for an NFL stadium that is now a parking lot.
We are the richest country in the world so there should be no fucking reason we should buy into this bullshit blackmail "If you raise my taxes I'll shut down and move overseas".
Wisconsin is the reason we have 40 hour work weeks and overtime pay, and those federal laws are because some collection of people, a long time ago did not put up with abuse of power.
OSHA, is a governmental regulatory system that EXISTS so that your boss cannot lock the exits or keep you from peeing. We do not have a financial Osha, and the regulatory systems in place to keep check on financial business is a joke and has been bought off by the republican party.
If the top 2% insist on making it "us vs them", then that is going to be the way it is until they realize we are all in this together. Right now the only attitude I see from them is "let them eat cake".
If the rich class wants the middle and poor to not turn to government for help, then they need to stop asking for welfare themselves in the form of tax cuts, and spend that money on their workers. But for anyone to ask me to give sympathy to an oil executive making 500million a year, while the store clerk risking his life for $7.25 an no health care, has got to be out of their fucking mind. If it takes a union to stop shit like this, then that is what it takes.
Public unions and public workers deserve the same protection from abuse of power as those in the private sector. And these Wisconsin unions have already bent backwards giving in to the cuts republicans asked for. All they want in return is for them not to take away their right to pool as a check and balance on power.
"Absolute power corrupts", and right now, the pendulum is swinging lopsidedly towards the top 2%, which will make the poor more poor, and erode the middle class. We are in a race to the bottom lead by those at the top.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
I just read your link. Let me go through some of the things it says we can thank unions for, exactly what on that list is not available from companies that are not unionized? Probably the only two are "good pensions" like the ones that made GM go bankrupt and "job security" which is precisely the problem with unions. By making it difficult to fire unproductive workers unions decrease efficiency and make it more difficult for a company to compete in the market. All the others are routinely offered by most of the companies I have been involved with.
But you can keep your 8 hour work day and 5 day work week, I don't know why the hell anyone wants to work 40 hours a week. Life is too short for that.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
The terms are at the whim of the employer and the employee. The employer offers terms, if the employee doesn't like them they can counter offer or simply leave. Obviously, those employees with special skills to offer will be able to force the employer to give up more in wages and benefits. Employees with little to no skill will have less leverage because they are more easily replaced. What do you mean "what is the alternative", most employees in this country are NOT unionized. The vast majority bargain on an individual basis, solely within the confines of minimum wage laws and such.
The alternative is to not allow unions to use force. Let the employee choose whether or not to join the union, and whether or not to accept the CBA or make their own. You pretend to want to give the employee a say but then deny them the choice of whether or not to be part of the union.
The employer has the right because it is his/her money on the line. When the business fails it is the employer who loses everything. The guidelines for termination are generally "at will" for low level employment, which means that if the employer thinks you look funny they can fire you. Generally it is not profitable to fire people. Hiring and training is an expensive process, so a smart employer is not going to fire anyone without a really good reason. If the employer is going to discriminate by race or gender they would discriminate during the hiring process and unions do nothing to stop that.
Basically, an employer is going to attempt to get the best employee they can get for their money. Suppose the union requires hires make $10/hr and two employees apply. One has experience and is willing to work for $10/hr, the other has none but is willing to work for $7/hr. Which one would you hire? Since you have to pay $10 anyway, you might as well take the one with experience. Without the union, you might hire the $7/hr worker to save some money, thus allowing that worker to gain experience. Once the union intervenes, the bias is clearly toward the more skilled worker and the worker who is willing to work for $7 is unemployed.
Why is it wrong to hire someone without experience to save money?
Walter E. Williams wrote a great article on this
http://www.capitalismmagazine.com/economics/minimum-wages/3307-why-racists-and-unions-support-minimum-wages.html
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
Unions are responsible for the other rights that you enjoy. They made sure that companies that are not unionized are still regulated by certain stipulations. Federal laws were passed based on union's demands. The laws became applicable to ALL workers, not just ones in unions. Without unions, a lot of companies wouldn't be held to the standards they are held to today.
As I say many times on this board, I do not have a way with words that many other people on this board possess. Brian eloquently said many of the things that I believe, but couldn't articulate properly. I see unions as a check on the previously unmitigated powers of corporations.
Yet it is ok for a billionaire to bilk the tax payers for a stadium that is now a parking lot? You want to talk about "shakedown"?
I would agree with your utopia "free market" if it were a regulated market. There are bullies in all this and they are not in the middle and poor class. If you want to bash unions then bash corporate welfare as well.
Unions should not exist in a utopia world, but as long as humans have different values and some want more then others, then there has to be a check on those powers who have more money.
ANY type of unchecked power, be it a class, political party or religion, is dangerous.
There cannot be a pure "free market", just like there are speed limits on highways. Financially speaking in this country, we have on class going 100mph in a 55mph zone and if this keeps going, it will be 200mph in a 25. And we just had 8 years of "no rules" which has caused our economy to crash.
ON TOP of 30 years of union busting that has not kept manufacturing here and has produced airline bubbles, and dot.com bubbles and now the bank, housing and car bubbles. And who bailed them out every time?
I would say, that if you don't want unions there is an easy way to do that. SELF INTROSPECTION.
Don't bash unions unless you are willing to bash corporate welfare.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Have I ever shirked from bashing corporate welfare? As soon as you have a regulated market you have put power into the hands of the billionaires you attack so often. The answer is to stop using government force to force our fellow citizens to do what we want them to do, even if it is a good idea. Until you massively shrink the power of government, abuses will continue to happen on both sides. The more power you grant to the federal government the more abuses you will see at the hands of unions, billionaires, corporations and anyone else who can get their hands in the money pit that is Washington D.C.
Your argument basically boils down to "well they do it too". That isn't going to help our country. We need to get past that and stop ALL parties from using government power to enforce their desires. The only way to ensure that no entity can use government power, is to remove power from the government. Have I ever argued otherwise?
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
A CBA is a good faith agreement that is entered into by two parties. In Wisconsin, the government no longer wants to negotiate in good faith.
Are you OK with this? If so, why?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Yes they do have a say. They can say give me this or I quit. Last time I checked, slavery was illegal.
You don't get what we're saying. No one is against bargaining as a group. But what right does a union have to tell me I can't negotiate with a government or business to sell my labor as an individual without them? It's not the union per se I'm against, it's their privilege to be a monopoly.
Sure, employers can often dictate crappy condition when there is an oversupply of labor. So your argument is essentially to fix this problem with price controls, to not let supply and demand dictate salaries and benefits. Unions are not helping the guy that gets shut out of a job, they are not fixing the education system so people can get the skills they need, they are making the businesses and governments less competitive in an international market place, they are encouraging people to stay in profession where the labor rates are artificially kept high.
Unions are on their way out because they don't work in the long run. All they do is provide a short term benefit for a limited number of people at the expense of everyone else. If GM was forced to only buy their steel from one supplier that dictates the price or shuts them down, they'd be at an extreme disadvantage. But this is exactly what happened with buying their labor. And taxpayers had to bail them out.
It fine to want to help the working man with low wages, but allowing monopolies is irrational. Fix the problem with a combination of education, welfare and population controls.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
OK then. Why can't private companies negotiate with the states to offer teaching, fire and police services at lower costs for equal or better service?
Taxes exist for one reason, to transfer wealth from producers to the politically connected(both left and right) to subsidize their non-productive lives. The rational solution is to make everything a user fee. Take the money out of politics.
The car companies went under in large part due to overly generous union contracts. The banks went under because it was 'unfair' that poor people couldn't afford a home, so we had to guarantee their loans as government policy. These were both misguided and short-sighted policies of the left.
This is a perfect example of how the democrats with their rights and the republicans and their special rights end up fucking over everyone. Why the fuck should anyone get special rights and privileges in our society? Pay for what you use, don't expect others to subsidize your lifestyle and life choices. Why can't we be that kind of society?
If government got it's money by charging for the services it provides, we wouldn't have this problem.
I'm all for it too, who exactly is against them being able to bargain as a pool? The governor isn't against it.The media spin is ridiculous. It's the collective MONOPOLY we're against.
He justs want the right to be able to tell them no, we don't like you're offer, we found something better. Why can't the governor negotiate with private companies and individuals to provide teaching services?
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
In USSR, powerful unions were just another executive branch of the Communist Party. It seems, the unions here in the US are at a similar status in many places.
This is a rare occasion when I mainly agree with Beyond Saving.
Generally, unions are not bad, but they tend to get fattier with time and suck as much gold as they can. I think that labor department regulations can be quite enough to regulate the employer-employee relationships. And this, in my opinion, where the government and unions could shine - in discussing the rules general to all businesses. Socialism would be nice, but I am afraid B.S. will disagree.
EXC,
You're rationale makes sense, and I'd agree with you on many of the things you just pointed out. Your original post is what I disagreed with. I think that unions are essential in the here and now. They may not be a perfect model, but they at least provide a check on corporations. Sure, in your hypothetical model, we can fix the problem with a massive overhall. Realistically, corporations have massive powers within our society. In the present, the only way to balance some of these powers is through unions. Whether the union solution is only a temporary band-aid of sorts is irrelevant; the unions are not the root of the problem.
To give an alternative method in which we change x, y, and z is also a little naive. In a perfect world, in which we could 'take the money out of politics' and live in the type of society you outlined in your post to Brian, I'd agree that unions would be unnecessary. However, that is unfortunately not the world we live in. The stranglehold that large corporations maintain on our financial and legislative systems is not something that is just going to go away. Their pockets are essentially bottomless, and much of their money is fed into the political system. The odds of some sort of reform is relatively slim, secondary to lawmakers being hesitant to bite the hand that feeds them. Therefore, there needs to be some sort of regulation on corporate power... and to be honest, unions seem like the only feasible option at this point. They definitely have their flaws, but I think that they should not be the source of anger from the middle class. I think the anger should be re-directed towards corporate America, which has proven on many occasions that it will act in absolute self-interest in an environment that provides little opposition.
Are you aware that the vast majority of workers are not unionized? http://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm
Only 6.9% of private sector workers are unionized. That is because all of the unionized companies have been ran out of business by unions but I digress. 36.2% of public sector workers are unionized. Does anyone here seriously believe that public sector workers are in abusive conditions and require unions? When you hear "government job" is your first thought, "wow, that is a really tough working environment"? As someone who attempts to work with government workers on a regular basis, let me assure you they are far from abused. They get better benefits, way more days off, and some pretty generous pensions. What great "corporate power" are these public unions protecting everyone from?
Corporations do not have bottomless pockets...unless they are given money by the government. GM was going bankrupt because it ran out of money. Corporations go bankrupt every day. The only entity that has bottomless funds is the government, which can always print or tax more.
Show me where all of these corporate abuses are that only forced unions can help us with. With only 6.9% of the private sector unionized, they must be all over the place. Working in the US must be exactly like working in China.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
No one is saying corporations have bottomless pockets, but if they can afford to pay one executive hundred of millions of dollars they can afford to pay them less and pay the people at the bottom more or put that into health care.
When you dodge taxes by influence peddling and call it leagle and hide your money in a overseas PO box, I don't want to hear you bitch about some corporate crybaby when his store clerk cant afford 4 bucks gallon or their rent.
I am not saying we have it as bad as Chinese workers, but we ARE headed in that direction. You leave ANYTHING unchecked and it will lead to abuse. To say corporate America is not abusing our economy is absurd.
How anyone can defend corporate America after all the bullshit WE bailed them out of is absurd.
You want to stop welfare, start at the top before you go bitching about what the middle class and poor ask from government.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
A CBA that is negotiated with a government has a series of problems that are unique to the public sector. First, the people negotiating on behalf of the government have no incentive to keep costs down. In the private sector, management has a financial incentive to ensure that labor costs stay manageable, even though we have seen that even with that incentive, CBA's often prove to be too costly for a company to continue operating. The government negotiator has no incentive as they are negotiating with other peoples money and may have significant personal incentive to give the unions what they want at the cost of the taxpayer.
Second, there is a clear conflict of interest when public sector unions donate massive amounts of money to politicians.
Third, when public union membership is mandatory you are preventing individuals from coming to a good faith agreement with the government. If a group of workers wants to create a union and come to a CBA, I am cool with that. When the union demands that everyone must be part of the CBA even against their will I am strongly against it. But like everything else the left pushes they have to use coercion to make it work because if they made union membership voluntary, many people would leave the unions.
Finally, in Wisconsin the government is only taking away the CBA in regards to benefits. Wages will still be negotiated through a CBA. Here in Ohio, we are taking care of both.
Oh yeah, and speaking of benefits, why do union workers get special exemptions from Bamacare? http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/01/unions-make-40-percent-employees-exempted-obamacare What makes them so special? They donate money.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
The only solution is to stop it all. I don't really care which gets stopped first. But our national argument MUST shift from everyone trying to get their piece of the pie to discussing whether or not the government should have any role in doling out the pie at all. Unless we have that argument, our government is destined to become an image of Europe.
And I guarantee that I did not vote for a single politician who supported the bailouts, stimulus, subsidies or any other corporate or non-corporate welfare. Of course, no one I voted for won election because everyone else if the country votes for the two major parties to get their piece of the government pie. I don't know the solution to that problem. If you have any ideas let me know.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
I'll admit to generalizations by saying corporations have a bottomless pockets. By the same token, you have to admit that you are also generalizing. I would assume that corporate America would fit nicely into a bell curve; there are some with deep pockets, some penny pinchers (that will probably cease to exist in the near future), and others that have money to remain self sufficient. However, to point to GM and other companies going bankrupt is taking that spectrum of businesses and zooming in on the failing ones. It's just as easy to go the other way.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/us/22koch.html
This is just one article on the infamous Koch brothers, the billionaire businessmen who feed obscene amounts of money into the political system with the intention of getting individuals elected that will serve their interests. They are throwing a ton of their resources at the problem going on in Wisconsin, and they feel that if they can crush the unions there, that the rest will 'fall like dominoes'. You may have heard about the prank call that a blogger from the buffalo beast pulled off Gov Walker of Wisconson. He Skyped in claiming to be one of the Koch brothers, taped the call, and then posted it to his blog.
http://www.buffalobeast.com/?p=5045
The problem I have is that, although some corporations do not have the capital or man-power to affect political strategy and law making, some do. I fear that this conversation may be drifting from the original topic, but I thought it was important to I clarify what I meant.
And, like I already said, even though only a small number of people are in unions, that doesn't take away from what they have accomplished. The improvements that they have worked towards for all workers, whether union or not, have drastically changed our rights as employees for the good. That first list that I posted is an indication of laws that unions helped pass on the federal level.
Things are not going to change until a majority of people dump the irrational concept of 'rights'. So-called rights have just become an obligation on everyone else. The corporations get rich by taking advantage of this political system.
It would be nice to have a political movement that says you have no rights. But that would be like starting a religion that says there is no heaven. Nobody wants to hear that, everyone wants a free lunch and there are pleanty of politics willing to promise this to get power.
It would be nice if students could be taught in a culture of entrepreneurship, self reliance and no entitlements. But the teachers unions are the complete opposite of what we need. That is why most teachers salaries even at less than $50K is still a rip off. I don't believe we should have teachers unless they've been successful in the business world.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen