Tag: Labor Movement

Labor For Life

In my younger more impetuous days I was a labor organizer and since then I am always reading about the movement and trying to decide where it is going in this country…….

In modern politics the word labor and unions are dirty words in conservative circles……..this institution has been blamed for all sorts of woes…it has been blamed for a wide array of situations from the high cost of cars to poor educational performance to the unwanted outcome of elections…..in short…..unions are the anti-Christ in some corners.

The perfectly executed character assassination of unions has, in my opinion, has lead to a weakening of labor’s position in the workplace which in turn has slowly fueled the demise of the middle class….

Fast forward to this week……the ‘big story’ has been the union vote in a VW plant in Tennessee on whether to unionize or not….BTW the union lost out in that vote…..they voted to NOT unionize…….

The obvious loser in last week’s failed bid to unionize the Volkswagen auto plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., was the United Auto Workers. The union was counting on a victory at the German-owned plant, which stayed officially neutral in the unionizing effort but hinted it welcomed a platform for organizing other plants in the South.

But the vote — and the forces that had arrayed themselves against the UAW — could also represent a setback for the economy and blue- and white-collar employees, a number of auto-industry and economic experts suggested.

U.S. management and labor organizations have battled each other —with both sides wasting resources in the process — ever since Frederick Winslow Taylor used his “scientific” methods a century ago to de-skill and control production workers, explained James P. Womack, founder of the Lean Enterprise Institute in Cambridge, Mass., and a co-author of “The Machine That Changed The World.” For Womack, the acrimonious fight and vote in Chattanooga was part of a historical continuum that has often hobbled U.S. industry, especially in the face of international competitors who embraced much more collaborative approaches to management.

My personal opinion was that it would not succeed in unionizing the plant….after all it is in the South and Right To Work is strong in the region…….so was the vote a big win for VW?  I thought so until I read another article shortly after the vote…….

The head of Volkswagen’s General Works Councils in Germany is threatening to block any further investment in the southern United States, Reuters reports, after workers at VW’s Chattanooga plant voted against union representation. “I can imagine fairly well that another VW factory in the United States, provided that one more should still be set up there, does not necessarily have to be assigned to the South again,’ Bernd Osterloh said. “We as workers will hardly be able to vote in favor” of one. Osterloh blames US conservatives for stirring up “massive anti-union sentiments.” He serves on a 20-member supervisory board split evenly between workers and management that could block future investments unless Chattanooga gets a German-style workers’ council. VW would still like to create a council without the United Auto Workers union, the New York Times reports, but legal experts say that might violate federal laws against company-controlled worker groups. Some anti-UAW workers have offered to set up an alternative union to get around the problem.

An interesting turn of the screw, right?  With all that info in hgand, who would you say was the big winner in this situation?

Please throwing your hat into this conversation.  I would like to have as many thoughts as possible……

Blame It On The Unions

With the revolution, so to speak, that has been festering in Wisconsin and now moved onto other states, the unions are being blamed for everything from the election of a president to e coli…..of course this is NOTHING new….conservs have been doing this for a very long time….almost since the beginning back in the early 20th century…..

Any one that has read Info Ink for any length of time knows that I am a labor supporter but not necessarily a supporter of unions, as we know them today.  Yes, I think that labor should be lead by a separate party, if you will……but NOT an AFL-CIO type of organization……why?  It is too bureaucratic and too top-centric (if that is a word)….this was not the fault of the members but rather a labor leader back in the day, named Gompers who believed economic power was more to his liking than political power…..

If you are a worker, either union or non, there is a lot you can blame on the unions…..a whole litany of issues that conservs have seldom been in favor of in the past and most notably in the present……

  1. Weekends
  2. All Breaks at Work, including your Lunch Breaks
  3. Paid Vacation
  4. FMLA
  5. Sick Leave
  6. Social Security
  7. Minimum Wage
  8. Civil Rights Act/Title VII (Prohibits Employer Discrimination)
  9. 8-Hour Work Day
  10. Overtime Pay
  11. Child Labor Laws
  12. Occupational Safety & Health Act (OSHA)
  13. 40 Hour Work Week
  14. Worker’s Compensation (Worker’s Comp)
  15. Unemployment Insurance
  16. Pensions
  17. Workplace Safety Standards and Regulations
  18. Employer Health Care Insurance
  19. Collective Bargaining Rights for Employees
  20. Wrongful Termination Laws
  21. Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967
  22. Whistleblower Protection Laws
  23. Employee Polygraph Protect Act (Prohibits Employer from using a lie detector test on an employee)
  24. Veteran’s Employment and Training Services (VETS)
  25. Compensation increases and Evaluations (Raises)
  26. Sexual Harassment Laws
  27. Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA)
  28. Holiday Pay
  29. Employer Dental, Life, and Vision Insurance
  30. Privacy Rights
  31. Pregnancy and Parental Leave
  32. Military Leave
  33. The Right to Strike
  34. Public Education for Children
  35. Equal Pay Acts of 1963 & 2011 (Requires employers pay men and women equally for the same amount of work)
  36. Laws Ending Sweatshops in the United States

(Thanx to bigcorporationusa.blogspot for the list)

The next time you hear one of your potential reps telling you all about the evils of unions ask them about some of the things on the list and ask why they are so hated……so on Labor Day if you want to remember those in the Labor movement and thank them for the rights and benefits you have today….for without their work your life would be considerably more miserable than you think you have it.

Enjoy your day of fun, food and family…..see you tomorrow…….

Wait For It—-It’s Coming

No I am not talking about some blue eyed, blond dude from the Middle East…..I will be giving my observations on the whole situation in Wisconsin and its after math…..

By now everyone that has an interest in this country should be aware of the situation in Wisconsin, as well as other states that are industrialized (though not much industry remains)……workers rights are involved, whether you are a member of a union or not, it will impact on your working life, somewhere do the road….

I see the possibility of four scenarios that could play out in the US and effect all of us in the long run….

Scenario #1–If Wisconsin’s governor (who looks like a weasel)  is successful in his attack on the unions and collective bargaining, then it will steam roll through the rust belt through states that have GOP govs and legislatures…yes, some of the other states have backed off their stances on this, but it is a prudent political decision, not that think it is a bad idea…they will see that unions have been weaken and they will go for the jugular….

Scenario #2–Let us say that all challenges to the unions  bills are successful….then the American worker will see wages start in a downward spiral and with that the Middle Class will get smaller and smaller and eventually there will be two classes in our society…you will be either rich or in poverty….

Scenario #3–With the unions gone…the GOP will be in the drivers seat almost everywhere….we will have a one party control of the government…..with union support we have remained basically a two party system….without union support the Dem Party will become a minor party kinda like the Green Party in the US….all decisions will be made in favor of corporations and their interests….e poor will suffer immensely…..

Scenario #4–If all the predictions come into being then I see a return of the situation we had a century ago……there will be a new labor movement…and this time it will be organized around industries and not trades…..it could be as bloody and violent as the original, a hundred years ago …….

OK, hear that?  What is that chomping and snapping sound?  That is your loss of rights snapping at your butt….Americans need to recover their huevos or grow a pair and take on these self-serving highly manipulated and paid for fools that we have put our trust in for so many decades….they are liars and cheats and thieves…and yet we allow them to continue preying on the middle class and we reward them with even more chances to continue……one day we will wake up and find that most of America is in the poor house, with NO one caring…….

To be honest (yes, I am capable of that) as an aging radical, deep in my soul I yearn for the days of protests and radicalism…the good old days of the 60’s and 70’s….you know…those years when the American people actually had principles and ideals….we did not hide behind the rantings of morons, we took to the streets and the lot…….a return to my days of working on a plan that was larger than myself….so much larger…the days, right or wrong, when it felt good to be an American politico….those days are gone and I want them back!

Labor Movement–The Early Years

As we celebrate America’s Labor Day, I would like to wish all my readers a very happy holiday and please enjoy all the food, friends and fun.  I will be back at it hard and heavy tomorrow.

Professor’s Classroom

Subject:  Labor/History

This is one of my series I call, Professor’s Classroom, it is from my days of educating people on the politics and economics of the country.

This post is about the early years of the American labor movement.

The War of Independence has been won, the politicos have set about turning the colonies into a viable country, at best a very difficult endeavor.

Labor, as a productive group was very very limited.  Workers were concerned , in those days, as now, with status and their families and livelihood.  In the early days of the republic, workers were not as educated as the wealthy elites.  The typical working class family was larger than their elite counterparts.  In general, the workers were not receiving benefits that we take for granted today, like paid vacations, medical, educational, pensions, and overtime pay.

They were consumers, but had no power over their own destiny.

Even the great Thomas Paine, author of  “Common Sense”, which gave the wealthy merchants and lawyers of the day a voice to convince the average colonist that independence from England was the only choice to be made.   He wanted American legislatures to also levy progressive taxes such as an income tax according to ability to pay. Paine defended labor unions and collective bargaining and denounced maximum wage rates.

By 1820,  workers began to experience the changes in markets.  Carpenters, weavers, printers and tailors began by establishing labor organizations that would would oversee their intersts in the markets emerging in the country.

In 1827 the first major organization appeared in Philadelphia, the Mechanics Union of Trade Association.  And it immediately entered into the political sphere by supporting the candidacy of Andrew Jackson for president.  This was not a campaign of workers veruses capital,  but rather poor against rich.  The union wanted among other things, a 10 hour work day established by law, restriction of child labor, free public schools, abolition of sweatshops and imprisonment for debt.

The political arm became known as the Workingman’s Party and it was the first attempt for workers to acheive their goals through political activity.  Unfortunately, four years later the party was disbanded because of the lack of participation of other labor, because they were not ready to put forth a united front against the interests of capital.

It was not until 1834 and the establishment of the National Trades Union was there another attempt to organize a national federation of labor, but it also failed to survive and was disbanded in 1837.  That was the year of the war between President  Jackson and Nicholas Biddle of the Bank of United States.  Their ugly struggle caused the panic of 1837 and the consequences of their war left a mess for the next president to clear up, Martin van Buren.

But the depression that followed the 1837 struggle of the two men, put any labor organizing on a back burner, unemployment, bank closures, and a slow down in production were the leading causes of the postponing of a workers union.

These were the early attempts of American labor to organize workers into a strong voice of labor.  It would be many years before the strong voices of labor would return.

Plight Of The American Worker–Part 3

What Should The American Worker Do?

I have predicted that this assault on the unions will provide the workers a chance to make a REAL difference in the labor movement.  A difference to their benefit, not that of the corporate handlers.

“There’s going to be fewer factories, fewer salaried and hourly workers, lower compensation, fewer brands, fewer models, fewer dealers,” Dana Johnson, senior economist with Dallas-based Comerica Inc., told the Detroit Free Press. “Everything is going to continue to be rapidly downsized, just not in as chaotic a process if they had not gotten the financing,” Johnson said. He predicted that Michigan would lose another 30,000 auto jobs next year, along with 60,000 non-automotive jobs.

In order to defend their jobs and living standards, autoworkers must organize independently of the UAW and reject the blackmail being carried out by the government, the corporations and the union. A struggle must be waged to oppose wage and benefit cuts and to defend all jobs. This requires a new political strategy—a break with the two parties of big business and the building of a mass party of the working class, fighting for socialist policies including the nationalization of the auto industry under the democratic control of the working class.

I realize that few want to hear this type of language, but unfortunately, the constant attacks on the working class will make this almost inevitable.  The question to ask is “will it help the workers?  The only answer I have is, “could not hurt them anymore than the past has”.