Last night, a union leader and a management negotiator were on Kudlow & Kramer. The union leader (last name Ponce de Leon) said that money is not the issue. Technology is the issue.
Can you believe these guys are fighting the replacement of clipboards with bar code scanners, even after they have been assured that there will be no loss of current jobs? In fact, the mgmt rep said that they expect volume at the west coast ports to increase substantially, resulting in more jobs.
I'm sure glad the buggy makers weren't unionized then.
Whatever idiot allowed these morons to get their average salary up to $120k per year ought to be put in jail. There is no way that they are worth that much. None of these guys ought to be making more than $25 an hour. I think we ought to encourage the Mexican government to put up three or four ports down along the west coast of Mexico and divert 80 percent of all US requirement to south of the border. None of their dock workers get more than $6 an hour. For some idiot to claim they deserve $120k a year for unloading a boat....just doesn't pass the judgement test. And then there is the old-boy deal where you get your son or daughter into the same union and they get the same deal. This is what hurts the entire union.