I started performing that very mundane task at this place and my goodness, the proverbial fecal material hit the ventilation device! "Stop! You can't do that! That's a union function!"
As a result, I waited all day until someone came and did in five minutes what I could have done in five minutes. They wasted their money paying me to do nothing while waiting, and doubtless the union wasted much of their money. I saw in that experience a first-hand microcosm of the problem with our government and its waste.
I’ll do you one better. Here in Chicago, we have some large convention centers. You must be union in order to be on the staff in these centers.
My company does environmental work, boilers, heating, cooling, cooling towers, etc. We are licensed plumbers and electricians.
Now, we cannot be on the staff of these convention centers, but we are regularly called out to repair, service and maintain the systems because those on “staff” are unable. They are all A card electricians and licensed plumbers, but those are Chicago cards, most couldn’t install a water heater, but they get political appointed jobs at these centers, some I know make over $200k a year with overtime.
Mostly, these guys just sit in golf carts.
So anyways, to the story, I’m working in the ceiling one day, and all the sudden the power to my light goes out. So, its dark, and I have to crawl back out and down the ladder. I get down there, and a “union electrician” has unplugged my extension cord.
He explains that I need a “union member” to plug it in. I can’t do it myself. Now, I’m in THEIR building, fixing the system THEY can’t fix, and he wants to play this game. I said “fine, plug it in”. He says he can’t he needs a work order. I take it work order means a twenty or $50 in this case.
I told him, sorry, I’ll wait. He wants to know who sent me? I explained who, and I told him since our company is billing out at $450 an hour, I’d be more than happy to sit down and wait for a “union electrician” to come by and plug it in. Oh, and by the way, whats your name and position here? He starts getting flustered and darts off on his cart, he wont’ give me his credentials.
I sat in the building for the remainder of my 6 hours, then called our dispatcher, told her what was going on, and told her to start clocking overtime for us at double time, and have one of the guys come down and sit here, cuz I need to go eat dinner.
The other guy gets there, she gets a response after about 4 more hours, and we are issued a permit to “plug in an electrical cord”.
We billed the city on that, for I think 3 hours of our normal time, and 4 hours of our double time. It probably cost them $5,000 because some union thug wanted a hand out to plug in an electrical cord.
This is the sort of dumb-assery that goes on in Chicago.