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To: Mr. K

In answer to your query about why people join and follow unions. In 1967 and 68 when I was in college I worked summers as a laborer in NYC for Local 731 Int’l Laborers and Hod carriers. I was paid $4.75/hr. A good wage and better than most college kids got back then. If you go to inflation calculator you will find that $4.75 then is $33.22 today, but members of 731 make $41.29 plus $26 in benefits/hr. Given that construction has weather related down times the laborer still can make $75K-$85K per year plus benefits. And the laborer is at the bottom of the construction wage scale in NYC. Carpenters, electricians, wire lathers, ironworkers make more. The non union guys are making $25-$30/hr with very minimal bennies in the area. That’s why people join and stay in unions. Oh and back in 67 I worked my tail off for those 9 weeks and the guys I know who are 731 laborers today still do. One final thought. In May 1970 I and 100K other hardhats marched in support of President Nixon and the troops in Viet Nam in the hardhat parade. No one complained about us being union members then.


23 posted on 09/14/2013 8:03:42 AM PDT by xkaydet65 (.You have never tasted freedom, else you would know it is purchased not with gold but with steel)
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To: xkaydet65

One can’t wisely divorce one’s activity from an overall consciousness of the Lord. Money is a powerful motivator but it shouldn’t be one’s Lord and Savior. Unlike God who never perishes, it is possible to push the golden goose that lives on this sinful earth onto the endangered list. Atlas shrugged and looked abroad, the place where the unions hadn’t managed to go. Some kind of mutual reward system would have worked better for the overall term even if it didn’t yield quite as much money up front. IMHO.


26 posted on 09/14/2013 8:10:08 AM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (The Lion of Judah will roar again if you give him a big hug and a cheer and mean it. See my page.)
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To: xkaydet65

I have no problem with people assembling together and negotiating. They’re just using numbers to increase their strength against owners who sometimes seem to hold all the cards.

My problem with unions is the same as with anything: power corrupts. Once they got some influence, they then decided to: (1) use it to legislate perks to themselves, and (2) use it to force irrational rules on their workplaces. It is irrational to tell a business that person A can change a lightbulb and person B can’t. It’s crazy to say person A can pack a box but he can’t stack it. Using Hostess bakeries as an example, it’s crazy to say that Twinkies need to be carried one truck and bread has to be carried in another. They killed their companies with that kind of stupidity.


34 posted on 09/14/2013 8:14:52 AM PDT by xzins ( Retired Army Chaplain and Proud of It! Those who truly support our troops pray for victory!)
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To: xkaydet65

In answer to your query about why people join and follow unions. In 1967 and 68 when I was in college I worked summers as a laborer in NYC for Local 731 Int’l Laborers and Hod carriers. I was paid $4.75/hr. A good wage and better than most college kids got back then. If you go to inflation calculator you will find that $4.75 then is $33.22 today, but members of 731 make $41.29 plus $26 in benefits/hr. Given that construction has weather related down times the laborer still can make $75K-$85K per year plus benefits. And the laborer is at the bottom of the construction wage scale in NYC. Carpenters, electricians, wire lathers, ironworkers make more. The non union guys are making $25-$30/hr with very minimal bennies in the area. That’s why people join and stay in unions. Oh and back in 67 I worked my tail off for those 9 weeks and the guys I know who are 731 laborers today still do. One final thought. In May 1970 I and 100K other hardhats marched in support of President Nixon and the troops in Viet Nam in the hardhat parade. No one complained about us being union members then.


You make a strong argument for the existence of private sector unions, probably a necessary evil of the free market system.

Alternatively, wage and benefit levels that outpace the market can eventually destroy entire industries such as what occurred in Detroit, where the UAW savaged the American auto industry. American Big Steel also fell to the wrath of the unions and other forces like govt regulation and price controls.

One day you’re making a tidy $40 per hour and the next day your job is long gone, being done abroad for pennies on the dollar.


57 posted on 09/14/2013 8:56:07 AM PDT by PaleoBob
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To: xkaydet65

I understand that, and see why they would want to JOIN the union, what I don’t understand is how they let their leadership drag them down into the democrat slime


70 posted on 09/14/2013 9:18:14 AM PDT by Mr. K (Lies, Damned Lies, Statistics, and then Democrat Talking Points.)
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