Posted on 08/23/2014 10:24:21 AM PDT by Oldpuppymax
I’ve always been a great fan of Pope St. Leo XIII’s whose moves to protect the working man during the Industrial Revolution resulted in the rise of labor unions. It saddens me to see how unionism has fallen under totalitarian rule with the leaders thriving on power rather than the welfare of the workers – or the survival of the companies that employ them.
More than one union has committed economic suicide by demanding pay and benefits beyond what an industry can support. They forgot it wasn’t only solidarity, it was also subsidiarity – well-stated in Pope Benedict XVI’s “Caritas in veritate” 57 and 58. A company has a better chance of prospering with a happy and motivated work force. Companies will move offshore or die if they can no longer compete. The wreckage of heavily unionized industries dots the American landscape. All ignored the “formula” our Founders left us in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
I’m for labor unions, but have a real problem with public employee unions. There’s a “Catch-22” here, because public employees need some form of collective bargaining at times, but the power they exercise in the body politic has become a possibly terminal cancer in our society. Public employee unions have an evil advantage over the taxpayer who suddenly finds himself paying salaries and perks to public “servants” ranging all the way to near full time pay in retirement at a rate 3 times what the hardest worker in the private sector can hope to amass. It’s a far cry from freely choosing to buy a union shop’s product at any price.
Cities and states under control of federal government funds...
(Excerpt) Read more at coachisright.com ...
Thank you for referencing that article Oldpuppymax. Please bear in mind that the following critique is directed at the article and not at you.
What are man’s viewpoints worth? Jesus’ teaching of Matthew 20:6-16, particularly verse 15, resolves this issue for me.
Well, the Church does have a tendency to move at a glacial pace, Vatican II being the notable aberration.
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