there are a lot of anti-union folks out there that see a line worker making $57k and tend to get a little jealous. what usually follows is a diatribe on why american automakers are losing out to foreign automakers. some truth there, but a pretty narrow read on the situation.
Jfid - as a fellow rust belt inhabitant you can put the blame squarely on the unions. They've killed the goose. They've killed big steel. They killed Detroit and Philly and Akron and Gary to. But I wont turn this into an anti union thread - I'll save it for later. See ya,
no, that's fine, evilp. i just want to hear why people feel that way, not just unions suck. i don't doubt that the unions should shoulder some blame for the problems of the rustbelt.
cause my sister works for the postal services and sits on her ass and makes 28bones an hour....wtf..... she dumps mail into a machine and it does all the work....
and factory work is really an unskilled trade......whats so damn hard in tightening a few bolts/etc..... really....no real brains involved....
Unions are great in concept. The reality is much more grim. Sure there was a time when people ended up in hot dogs and getting mamed at work was expected, and labor had a legitimit social role. However by the outbreak of WW2 their control was solidified futher by threatening the nations wartime production. So strong was their grip on industry in the 50's and 60's that the power to strike brought unrealistic benefit inflation that we are dealing with today. The cnn article on the strike says there are 340,000 retired autoworkers expected to cost $51 billion. GM wants to jetison the package to the union. Now the dilema is this - the unions built Vegas, a lot of San Fernando Valley, they have huge stakes in wall street funds, now control of $51 billion in health care. They can become too dangerous if left unchecked. Its an unatural concentration of capitol (ironic) built on the power to strike in order to raise more funds, and in the long term is destroying our ability to produce industrially. Mak'n Boyz I hear the pipe fitter say at the bar when he should be at work.
a friend of mine worked at one of the big 3..... and he was in the engineering dept...well in order to go through the factory, he had to be escorted on a golf cart by a paid union worker....well, he waited for an hour for a guy to pick him up and no one showed up after numerous calls on the p.a. so he found a golf cart and drove it to the machine he had to get some info from.....well, my friend was almost fired from that incident since the "union" guy wasnt involved and that's taking away from union workers...wtf.......
we used to joke at work stating that we were on a union break ...haha.... lazy asses.....
my whole thing is that you know you are going into a situation in a factory....so you are taking that risk for that pay check.....
I know two really nice people who work hard for unions. I have seen a lot of individuals who expect the union to work hard instead of them. I have heard unions proclaiming their retrograde missions at the expense of environmental, social and economic progress: Defending slackass layabouts from their own excreta.
Unions suck ass.
Let the free market rule! except in cases of human rights abuses.
i still believe unions have a legitimate role, despite the obvious problems associated with the corruption of power.
the current political climate here is one where the government is vehemently anti-union, to the point of dismantling laws protecting legal strikes and the right to collectively negotiate contracts. in the middle of this the head of the construction workers union was arrested at a building site for apparent unlawful entry, the developer alleged intimidation, the union alleged breaches in safety regulations and the media/government went predicably on the 'standover thuggery' line.
2 weeks later a tilt-up concrete slab fell from the apartment building, luckily causing no injuries, and an investigation found that the developers had been ignoring safety procedures and had also threatened the subbies with the sack and legal action if they informed their union.
the union official is undoubtable a thug, but that doesn't mean that the protections provided by the union should be taken lightly.
It is a competitive world! Make some choices, get over it, but don't assume that because you have the TV, car and home that signified middle-class in the '50s, that you are in '00s middle-class, or that because single income families worked in the '70s that they do or don't work now.
Just a thought, but isn't median family more like the lumpen proletariat, and middle-class the merchant (of old). Weren't "decent" and "hardworking" attributes of the working class in years gone by?
I like people to be decent and hardworking. They are desirable attributes.
What she is really saying is that gender equality made it socially acceptable for middle-class married women with children to go to work, this has lead to stiffer competition for jobs, and stiffer competition for the products that dual-income couples with kids like to spend their money on (houses, child care, school). She elaborates by saying that some of these couples are poorly informed re financial management and that the family pays the price.
It is tragic.
However, those that were the middle class of old, give or take, aren't in that position.
The free market is what allows those of any "class" to slide up and down the greasy pole in a capitalist democracy. You choose.
My commentary of course lacks the hard data which she (in this free market) would have us pay to see. For example the percentage of dual income families in 1970 and now, and the undercutting of the male (unionised?) monopoly on jobs by (free market?) women.
Geeze. Coming from a working-class family, I can only hope to attain your version of today's middle class.
Then again, I probably don't need as much as the next person, so it all works out. Right now, I feel fairly compensated for my work, and I hope that the future holds the same.
i was in the uaw for about a week. i got a job at the allis chalmers tractor factory. they would hire lots of people, build up their inventory, then lay you off just when the initial membership dues came up. i don't know if this was planned, but it seemed planned.
GM has no one but themselves to blame for the generous labor packages that the UAW was able to negotiate in the 70s. The UAW would never have become as powerful as it did had GM and Ford not used the 30s through the 50s to bully and beat auto workers into a unified body.
And unions, like corporations and architects, come in all descriptions and degrees. The union carpenters I've had to work with in NY have been barely competent at best, criminal at worst. And I can verify that the stories about couches being required on the jobsite are true.
In LA, union carpenters have been universally great. I don't bother trying to reconcile how they are both members of the same organizations.
And although it is not the only point of contention, it is worth pointing out that the UAW is partially striking to preserve the health and retirement benefits that they've been promised over their entire careers. People on this board have complained about having to work between Christmas and New Years - imagine how pissed you'd be if you were 64 and told that you might not have any retirement benefits or savings.
unions still have a place...or they could have a place if they go global. their new markets need to be the factory workers in places like china & india where, undoubtably, working conditions are worse than they are in america. but can an overweight 60 year old in flint, michigan ever consider a non-english speaking china man his union brother, let alone his union heir?
upper management has run gm (and potentially all of the big three) into the ground. how can you even begin to appear like you give a shit about your company and workers when you pay your execs millions and millions of dollars to make bad decisions while continuing to pay the little guys peanuts and threaten to take away their benefits.
they have continued to use the same business and marketing model since the '70's and refused to budge. it's said that if this strike lasts 3 weeks, it will utterly destroy GM... i'm halfway tempted to wish them sunk, but i know better... people here are nervous and have been for quite some time. i'll be glad when a resolution is agreed upon and everyone can go back to work.
at least the people that run gm haven't also run the local football team into the ground like the fords have done with the lions for the past 70 years. ouch. michigan really has some severe problems...no wonder the government is on the verge of shutting down too...
it will be interesting though if the ren cen joins the ranks of abandoned detroit skyscrapers
Seriously, after reading that article I agree with the author but that goes right back to the heart of benefit inflation. Also if you look at what people concidered middle class in 1956, an 1800 s.f. cape cod w/ 2 bd rm. or a bungalow, its still attainable. The "safe neighborhood" and "for the children" bullshit thats getting us $90 million dollar schools in places where the existing school was just fine. I happen to think theres a lot of hype and bullshit people have bought into and are just blindly following and the right answers may not seem like it at the time. Like saying know to education - its got such a negative conotation but cut deeper and and its say no to degree deflation.
I agree with many of the points above particularly regarding the blanketing of all unions as bull shit. As is typically the case with generalizations, its a stupid statement. Clearly unions have a place in a country were the vast amount of new wealth is being concentrated in the accounts of the wealthiest Americans. The truth is that unions still hold much value because they equal the only economic competition to their bosses who are earning hundreds of times more.
Im sure everyone has heard the ridiculous statistics about how concentrated wealth has become in this nation. Here is the most telling in my mind.
For a quarter of a century, from 1980 to 2004, while U.S. gross domestic product per person rose by almost two-thirds, the wages of the average worker fell after adjusting for inflation. Over the three decades from 1972 to 2001, the wages and salaries of even those Americans at the 90th percentile (those doing better than 90 percent of their fellow citizens) experienced income gains of only 1 percent a year on average. Those at the 99.9th percentile saw their income rise by 181 percent over these years (to an income averaging almost $1.7 million). Those at the 99.99th percentile had income growth of 497 percent.
there is a middle school right down the street that is slated for the wrecking ball. Community groups have been trying to save it for a couple of years now. i don't know the circumstances why it is being torn down but i can speculate it's because it's old and potentially too expensive to update. it's really a nice building, typical circa 1950's brick school house. it's also conveniently located right smack in the middle of a large residential neighborhood.
just a couple of days ago my wife was on a walk with the pups and came across a rather large pile of rubble where the middle school once stood.
it makes me so angry to see this shit happen. it's just like all of the tear downs they are doing in the neighborhood.. if only people had the foresight to see they are jacking up and ruining their neighborhoods in small succinct steps.
i don't know what this has to do with GM but i thought it was appropriate for what ep said above.
"unions still hold much value because they equal the only economic competition to their bosses who are earning hundreds of times more"
lLETDOWN - the workers are not in competition with the management. They work for the management. Capitalism 101. The worker isnt risking his home, his credit, or staying up at night in cold sweats wondering how he is going to meet payroll. Thats why management gets what they get.
I watched an amazing Industrial Gothic school get torn down at the end of my block back in 1984. It wasnt needed anymore. Then they tore down 3 more. Then by 1997 there was another kiddy boom and the town needed more schools - the town has floated over $130 million in new bonds. Some has to pay for the kids. Amazingly when I look at my generation and increasingly the newly minted grads of this new era of increased child attention, I can only think we screwed up. Look at picture of baby boomer classrooms from the 50's, a generation arguably who pushed science and tech to the limits and was greatly educated, and you'll see 40-50 person classrooms
Well, I agree that management gets paid much more because of the liability and responsibility they hold, but at the same time there are many cases where it is unreasonable. I read recently how some can make in one day what the average employee makes in their lifetime. And that is even when their company loses money.
ceo's and executives are concerned with investor returns. a stock can rise dramatically with layoffs, sell offs etc that are not beneficial to the worker or even the customer.
My opinions of unions aside, GM's (Ford & Chrysler too) biggest problem is they haven't been making cars that people want to buy. My guess is that of all the cars archinecters drive, the domestics are a minority.
Detroit can whine all they want to, but they are only excuses for their own failings to deliver a viable product. And I'm not talking about quality. VW is not at all known for reliability, but their marketing is good and their drivers are loyal (which often astounds me). Even the Toyota image of quality has been tarnished lately, but they continue to sell while GM continues to offer rebates and 0% financing.
the big three used to sell all the cars. now their markets are smaller but not insignificant. my own personal motto is "never get behind a buick or you will be late."
how many of you have ever worked a blue collar job for any serious length of time in your life? how many of you know uaw workers or anything about their day to day lives? does anyone here have any idea what they really make, what benefit package they are asking for, and why they are not working? is this just an ideological conversation being had by elite, educated, white collar individuals based on generalizations about unions, corporations, and what you think people deserve and don't deserve in a world that most of you have virtually no interaction with at all?
But their markets increasingly rely on fleet sales. Not insignificant, but not as profitable. Their loyal "buy american" customer base is getting old. Buick should probably go the way of Oldsmobile. Remember the "not your father's oldsmobile" marketing. Now they pay Tiger Woods millions to make Buick look young and hip. Instead they sit on dealer lots while Civic's and Camry's are going for top dollar.
striking at $57,000 a year plus benifits
that is what the blue collar guys and gals at GM are making...
if this turns into an anti-union thread, i may go ballistic.
so...i'd probably strike to if i was only making $57k a year
jafidler
I am all for the unions. I think that architects should unionize...
there are a lot of anti-union folks out there that see a line worker making $57k and tend to get a little jealous. what usually follows is a diatribe on why american automakers are losing out to foreign automakers. some truth there, but a pretty narrow read on the situation.
mdler, do you have a link?
it's big news around the d today.
sorry if i'm a little touchy about it.
i aint got no pension plan
maybe because GM makes really shitty cars is one reason they are loosing $$$...
Jfid - as a fellow rust belt inhabitant you can put the blame squarely on the unions. They've killed the goose. They've killed big steel. They killed Detroit and Philly and Akron and Gary to. But I wont turn this into an anti union thread - I'll save it for later. See ya,
no, that's fine, evilp. i just want to hear why people feel that way, not just unions suck. i don't doubt that the unions should shoulder some blame for the problems of the rustbelt.
gm does not make shitty cars.
fuck dodge
go chevrolet
i'm against unions
you know why...
cause my sister works for the postal services and sits on her ass and makes 28bones an hour....wtf..... she dumps mail into a machine and it does all the work....
and factory work is really an unskilled trade......whats so damn hard in tightening a few bolts/etc..... really....no real brains involved....
my 2pennies
Unions are great in concept. The reality is much more grim. Sure there was a time when people ended up in hot dogs and getting mamed at work was expected, and labor had a legitimit social role. However by the outbreak of WW2 their control was solidified futher by threatening the nations wartime production. So strong was their grip on industry in the 50's and 60's that the power to strike brought unrealistic benefit inflation that we are dealing with today. The cnn article on the strike says there are 340,000 retired autoworkers expected to cost $51 billion. GM wants to jetison the package to the union. Now the dilema is this - the unions built Vegas, a lot of San Fernando Valley, they have huge stakes in wall street funds, now control of $51 billion in health care. They can become too dangerous if left unchecked. Its an unatural concentration of capitol (ironic) built on the power to strike in order to raise more funds, and in the long term is destroying our ability to produce industrially. Mak'n Boyz I hear the pipe fitter say at the bar when he should be at work.
^ MAK'N BACON BOYZ- TYPO
a friend of mine worked at one of the big 3..... and he was in the engineering dept...well in order to go through the factory, he had to be escorted on a golf cart by a paid union worker....well, he waited for an hour for a guy to pick him up and no one showed up after numerous calls on the p.a. so he found a golf cart and drove it to the machine he had to get some info from.....well, my friend was almost fired from that incident since the "union" guy wasnt involved and that's taking away from union workers...wtf.......
we used to joke at work stating that we were on a union break ...haha.... lazy asses.....
my whole thing is that you know you are going into a situation in a factory....so you are taking that risk for that pay check.....
b
Unions, generally suck ass.
I know two really nice people who work hard for unions. I have seen a lot of individuals who expect the union to work hard instead of them. I have heard unions proclaiming their retrograde missions at the expense of environmental, social and economic progress: Defending slackass layabouts from their own excreta.
Unions suck ass.
Let the free market rule! except in cases of human rights abuses.
i still believe unions have a legitimate role, despite the obvious problems associated with the corruption of power.
the current political climate here is one where the government is vehemently anti-union, to the point of dismantling laws protecting legal strikes and the right to collectively negotiate contracts. in the middle of this the head of the construction workers union was arrested at a building site for apparent unlawful entry, the developer alleged intimidation, the union alleged breaches in safety regulations and the media/government went predicably on the 'standover thuggery' line.
2 weeks later a tilt-up concrete slab fell from the apartment building, luckily causing no injuries, and an investigation found that the developers had been ignoring safety procedures and had also threatened the subbies with the sack and legal action if they informed their union.
the union official is undoubtable a thug, but that doesn't mean that the protections provided by the union should be taken lightly.
what has the free market done for the middle class, psyarch? answer, not much.
do dentists and lawyers have unions....?.... i think they have set rates that they all go by so undercutting isnt possible
b
sobering article, jafidler...
she was featured in a very good documentary on the credit industry: maxed out. (be sure to skip the annoying intro when opening the link.)
It is a competitive world! Make some choices, get over it, but don't assume that because you have the TV, car and home that signified middle-class in the '50s, that you are in '00s middle-class, or that because single income families worked in the '70s that they do or don't work now.
Just a thought, but isn't median family more like the lumpen proletariat, and middle-class the merchant (of old). Weren't "decent" and "hardworking" attributes of the working class in years gone by?
I like people to be decent and hardworking. They are desirable attributes.
What she is really saying is that gender equality made it socially acceptable for middle-class married women with children to go to work, this has lead to stiffer competition for jobs, and stiffer competition for the products that dual-income couples with kids like to spend their money on (houses, child care, school). She elaborates by saying that some of these couples are poorly informed re financial management and that the family pays the price.
It is tragic.
However, those that were the middle class of old, give or take, aren't in that position.
The free market is what allows those of any "class" to slide up and down the greasy pole in a capitalist democracy. You choose.
My commentary of course lacks the hard data which she (in this free market) would have us pay to see. For example the percentage of dual income families in 1970 and now, and the undercutting of the male (unionised?) monopoly on jobs by (free market?) women.
I am actually becoming increasingly convinced interns should form a union...
that $57k after 40 years and I'd strike too if that was all I made. Most of us here will be making more then that once we pass the AREs.
I've never liked driving GM cars...
my dad's 1 year from retirement.
hope this doesn't last too long.
Geeze. Coming from a working-class family, I can only hope to attain your version of today's middle class.
Then again, I probably don't need as much as the next person, so it all works out. Right now, I feel fairly compensated for my work, and I hope that the future holds the same.
i was in the uaw for about a week. i got a job at the allis chalmers tractor factory. they would hire lots of people, build up their inventory, then lay you off just when the initial membership dues came up. i don't know if this was planned, but it seemed planned.
sporty:
domestic sedan:
GM has no one but themselves to blame for the generous labor packages that the UAW was able to negotiate in the 70s. The UAW would never have become as powerful as it did had GM and Ford not used the 30s through the 50s to bully and beat auto workers into a unified body.
And unions, like corporations and architects, come in all descriptions and degrees. The union carpenters I've had to work with in NY have been barely competent at best, criminal at worst. And I can verify that the stories about couches being required on the jobsite are true.
In LA, union carpenters have been universally great. I don't bother trying to reconcile how they are both members of the same organizations.
And although it is not the only point of contention, it is worth pointing out that the UAW is partially striking to preserve the health and retirement benefits that they've been promised over their entire careers. People on this board have complained about having to work between Christmas and New Years - imagine how pissed you'd be if you were 64 and told that you might not have any retirement benefits or savings.
unions still have a place...or they could have a place if they go global. their new markets need to be the factory workers in places like china & india where, undoubtably, working conditions are worse than they are in america. but can an overweight 60 year old in flint, michigan ever consider a non-english speaking china man his union brother, let alone his union heir?
upper management has run gm (and potentially all of the big three) into the ground. how can you even begin to appear like you give a shit about your company and workers when you pay your execs millions and millions of dollars to make bad decisions while continuing to pay the little guys peanuts and threaten to take away their benefits.
they have continued to use the same business and marketing model since the '70's and refused to budge. it's said that if this strike lasts 3 weeks, it will utterly destroy GM... i'm halfway tempted to wish them sunk, but i know better... people here are nervous and have been for quite some time. i'll be glad when a resolution is agreed upon and everyone can go back to work.
gm owns saturn
at least the people that run gm haven't also run the local football team into the ground like the fords have done with the lions for the past 70 years. ouch. michigan really has some severe problems...no wonder the government is on the verge of shutting down too...
it will be interesting though if the ren cen joins the ranks of abandoned detroit skyscrapers
Blame it on good schools, safe neighborhoods
Seriously, after reading that article I agree with the author but that goes right back to the heart of benefit inflation. Also if you look at what people concidered middle class in 1956, an 1800 s.f. cape cod w/ 2 bd rm. or a bungalow, its still attainable. The "safe neighborhood" and "for the children" bullshit thats getting us $90 million dollar schools in places where the existing school was just fine. I happen to think theres a lot of hype and bullshit people have bought into and are just blindly following and the right answers may not seem like it at the time. Like saying know to education - its got such a negative conotation but cut deeper and and its say no to degree deflation.
I agree with many of the points above particularly regarding the blanketing of all unions as bull shit. As is typically the case with generalizations, its a stupid statement. Clearly unions have a place in a country were the vast amount of new wealth is being concentrated in the accounts of the wealthiest Americans. The truth is that unions still hold much value because they equal the only economic competition to their bosses who are earning hundreds of times more.
Im sure everyone has heard the ridiculous statistics about how concentrated wealth has become in this nation. Here is the most telling in my mind.
For a quarter of a century, from 1980 to 2004, while U.S. gross domestic product per person rose by almost two-thirds, the wages of the average worker fell after adjusting for inflation. Over the three decades from 1972 to 2001, the wages and salaries of even those Americans at the 90th percentile (those doing better than 90 percent of their fellow citizens) experienced income gains of only 1 percent a year on average. Those at the 99.9th percentile saw their income rise by 181 percent over these years (to an income averaging almost $1.7 million). Those at the 99.99th percentile had income growth of 497 percent.
there is a middle school right down the street that is slated for the wrecking ball. Community groups have been trying to save it for a couple of years now. i don't know the circumstances why it is being torn down but i can speculate it's because it's old and potentially too expensive to update. it's really a nice building, typical circa 1950's brick school house. it's also conveniently located right smack in the middle of a large residential neighborhood.
just a couple of days ago my wife was on a walk with the pups and came across a rather large pile of rubble where the middle school once stood.
it makes me so angry to see this shit happen. it's just like all of the tear downs they are doing in the neighborhood.. if only people had the foresight to see they are jacking up and ruining their neighborhoods in small succinct steps.
i don't know what this has to do with GM but i thought it was appropriate for what ep said above.
"unions still hold much value because they equal the only economic competition to their bosses who are earning hundreds of times more"
lLETDOWN - the workers are not in competition with the management. They work for the management. Capitalism 101. The worker isnt risking his home, his credit, or staying up at night in cold sweats wondering how he is going to meet payroll. Thats why management gets what they get.
Ether -
I watched an amazing Industrial Gothic school get torn down at the end of my block back in 1984. It wasnt needed anymore. Then they tore down 3 more. Then by 1997 there was another kiddy boom and the town needed more schools - the town has floated over $130 million in new bonds. Some has to pay for the kids. Amazingly when I look at my generation and increasingly the newly minted grads of this new era of increased child attention, I can only think we screwed up. Look at picture of baby boomer classrooms from the 50's, a generation arguably who pushed science and tech to the limits and was greatly educated, and you'll see 40-50 person classrooms
Well, I agree that management gets paid much more because of the liability and responsibility they hold, but at the same time there are many cases where it is unreasonable. I read recently how some can make in one day what the average employee makes in their lifetime. And that is even when their company loses money.
ceo's and executives are concerned with investor returns. a stock can rise dramatically with layoffs, sell offs etc that are not beneficial to the worker or even the customer.
My opinions of unions aside, GM's (Ford & Chrysler too) biggest problem is they haven't been making cars that people want to buy. My guess is that of all the cars archinecters drive, the domestics are a minority.
Detroit can whine all they want to, but they are only excuses for their own failings to deliver a viable product. And I'm not talking about quality. VW is not at all known for reliability, but their marketing is good and their drivers are loyal (which often astounds me). Even the Toyota image of quality has been tarnished lately, but they continue to sell while GM continues to offer rebates and 0% financing.
the big three used to sell all the cars. now their markets are smaller but not insignificant. my own personal motto is "never get behind a buick or you will be late."
i live within walking distance of workers making $6 US/day...i think that's less than $57k/year.
how many of you have ever worked a blue collar job for any serious length of time in your life? how many of you know uaw workers or anything about their day to day lives? does anyone here have any idea what they really make, what benefit package they are asking for, and why they are not working? is this just an ideological conversation being had by elite, educated, white collar individuals based on generalizations about unions, corporations, and what you think people deserve and don't deserve in a world that most of you have virtually no interaction with at all?
pizza, pizza
But their markets increasingly rely on fleet sales. Not insignificant, but not as profitable. Their loyal "buy american" customer base is getting old. Buick should probably go the way of Oldsmobile. Remember the "not your father's oldsmobile" marketing. Now they pay Tiger Woods millions to make Buick look young and hip. Instead they sit on dealer lots while Civic's and Camry's are going for top dollar.
toyota is (or will soon be) the new gm...i pity the fools
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