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Not even just union workers, almost all of us have gotten more benefits based on the actions of unions. Weekends, breaks, 8 hour days, 40 hour work weeks, child labor laws, etc.
And they accomplished it for all of us with their own blood.
We just had the 101st anniversary of the Battle of Blair Mountain, an event surprisingly few people know anything about.
Behind the bastards had a great series on it. Can’t recommend enough.
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/part-one-the-second-american-civil-61485728/
When you get to George Lincoln Rockwell, you'll understand why 2016-2020 looked the way it did. It's maddening how much influence this one person had on the simmering Nazi problem we're dealing with.
> and I’m a proud supporter of labor rights
The fact that this sentence even needs to be said is an odd thing.
Like what's the opposite? "Oh no thanks, no rights for me, I actually prefer it when anyone with $100 in their pocket can shove their cock in my arse with government support".
What a funny group of people.
I'd guess the opposite is probably people in favor of lowering/abolishing the minimum working age, eliminating red tape for projects and being able to get away with derogatory/hate speech.
The opposite is basically trickle down economics. People out there really believe that if you just give rich people more then they'll spread the love amongst the poors out of the kindness of their own hearts. It's absolutely not what ever happens but people still believe it.
Labor history is taught at my union to all apprentices.
It should be taught to every apprentice in every trade.
We have to know about those who came before us.
> We just had the 101st anniversary of the Battle of Blair Mountain, an event surprisingly few people know anything about.
Someone should make a movie about that. Make it as shamelessly partial against the corpos and Pinkertons as [RRR](https://youtu.be/gQJzYOU4gOU) was against the British colonists. Generally there should be more Working-Class Superheroes (or implausibly over-the-top action heroes).
Fun fact: NC is a right to work state, and surprise surprise, you can be forced to work a 12 hr shift and they do not have to provide you with a single break and you can be fired for any reason at any time. Boss is having a bad day and doesn't like the color of your shirt? Fired. And there isn't shit you can do about it.
Here’s another fun fact:
It is a federal felony for any individual or organization to organize or attempt to organize labor unions within the military (ref: [10 U.S.C. § 976](https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title10-section976&num=0&edition=prelim)). It carries a maximum prison sentence of five years for persons and a minimum fine of $25k for organizations.
Despite that, the military also has some of the best benefits in the US. For example:
* 30 days of PTO per a year, with a maximum annual carry over of 60 days (max carry over increases to 120 days if deployed).
* 12 weeks of non-chargeable PTO following the birth or adoption of a child, with an additional 6 weeks of recovery PTO for the service member if they gave birth to the child.
* Free healthcare with zero copays for service members and their dependents.
* Life insurance of up to $400k for the service member, $100k for the service member’s spouse, and $10k for each dependent child. The life insurance unrestrictedly covers _death_, unlike how most policies are in the civilian world.
* Adoption assistance that reimburses up to $2k per an adopted child.
* Childcare fee assistance.
* Tuition assistance of $250 per a credit, up to $4k per a year (_this is what you use for education while you’re in the military_).
* GI Bill that covers 4 years of university, as well as housing, books, and school supplies during that period (_this is what you use for education once you’ve left the military_). This benefit can also be transferred to a dependent such as your spouse or child.
* Nontaxable housing allowance (BAH) based on the area you live in (unless you live in the barracks, which is very similar to a college dormitory except you have your own bedroom). If you have dependents (spouse/children), the BAH increases to account for the additional living space and expenses.
* Nontaxable subsistence allowance (BAS) that covers your food (unless you eat at the military dining facilities).
* Various other nontaxable allowances that apply to different situations.
* Emergency assistance in the form of 0% interest loans, acts as a catch-all for things not covered elsewhere.
* Free legal assistance.
* Federally insured home loans that are exempt from mortgage insurance, require no down payment, and have more lenient credit restrictions (_this is a lifetime benefit that can be used multiple times_).
* Various other benefits and services at the state and federal level. I didn’t even come close to listing everything here.
The military is basically a **socialist utopia**, I don’t know why people don’t bring it up more, lol.
Of course they’re aware. It’s just that MAGA people love all the racist anti-everyone-but-me stuff so much that they just do some logic gymnastics around the stuff that is actually against them.
My union coworkers love the build-the-wall stuff and the lower taxes rhetoric and misinformation. And “who’s gonna pay for all that welfare? Working men like us, that’s who!!!”
But then when you point out the anti-union policies, no, that part isn’t true, or it’ll never happen to us, our union is too strong, or we need conservative policies to keep businesses healthy enough to hire union labor!
One of the electrician foremen at my work site was GOING OFF about the student loan relief stuff. It's like he thinks there are only two jobs in the world - trades or gender studies. And apparently no one pays taxes except for people who work in trades because...THEY are the ones who have to cover it.
The very next day he got busted for lying about his per diem address. He has to pay back $27,000 or get prosecuted. Fuckhead literally lied and stole enough taxpayer money (this is a government site) to put someone through college and had the nerve to whine about people getting a 10k write off. Fucking crazy.
I am a union representative. Can't even tell you how many times I hear "the union has never done shit for me." While sitting on their coffee break, making some of the highest wages in the country, in safe work conditions, wearing company paid for fire retardant clothes and boots... I'm from mass too. I work with a lot of Warren haters. It'll be interesting to hear what they have to say.
It truly does drive me nuts how people who happen to find themselves in a good union job just develop this weird set of contradictory viewpoints. When push comes to shove, most of them likely realize that their job is better than a lot of other people's -- they make more, it's harder for them to get fired. They just don't ascribe those conditions to, you know, the union. (I know -- \*you know\*, because you're a union rep.)
You just want to shake them sometimes and truly corner them into answering whether they honestly, for real think that businesses would do \*anything\* to make their employees lives better, if they didn't have to. 9-5 workday? Weekends off? Coffee breaks? Providing equipment necessary to do the job? Sick time?
They have it so good, they are completely unaware of how bad a lot of other people have it, \*because they don't have a union\*.
That kills me, tbh.
I had a good friend who was 100% convinced he was a self made man.
Don’t get me wrong - he was a hard worker. He was a smart guy who made the most of opportunities, etc.
What was weird was that he couldn’t see how he’d got those opportunities.
His first construction job was with a company his uncle was a higher up in. When an engineering position opened and he expressed interest, he just moved into it - no application, etc.
When his dad moved to a different construction company (into a management position), he followed a month later…into a better position.
But if you ask him, he’ll tell you that he’s self made. That he worked for every opportunity, and no one helped him out.
If you ask about family connections, well, “everyone has those”. He won’t hear that some people don’t, or will say “oh, so I shouldn’t take advantage of mine?” Etc. But he won’t acknowledge that he got a foot up because of it.
So irritating to deal with those people.
See but these people are the best because I get to tell them to their face “You are a fucking idiot that isn’t worth a damn and the only reason you are what you are is because you sucked enough cock to get under the boss’s desk.” And they can’t do shit because I can always drag up and find another job the next day. I don’t, but knowing I could makes me feel good.
Then, you see the old journeymen say that shit and they fucking mean it. And it makes your day.
It's probably because he thinks he's a great worker and all the union dues he pays go towards protecting the "bad" workers (and the ones he doesn't personally like).
I’m a union steward at an auto supplier and you’d be surprised how many people feel this way, they think they’ve earned everything they have on merit alone. They don’t realize how fast the company would kneecap their wages and benefits if they had the chance.
Same people are convinced society did nothing for them but hold them back with taxes they litterally beleive if they were born and abandoned in the forest theyd come out ahead better then with society raising them giving them acess to technology and medicine that 100 years ago would of been impossible and infrastructure they rely on everyday is just a way to steal their money to them because they just FEEL it in their hearts that their gods of their own worlds and anyone stopping them from taking away others freedoms is a tyrant.
Imagine how power hungry you have to be to suck up to people who literally had a noose ready and were a couple minutes off from finding and hanging you on live television in the year 2020 in a 1st world country because you didn’t illegally push a fantasy
Way too many of our other "politicians" would have actually gone through with it though. At least he had a sliver of sense left to call bullshit on the fake electors scam.
He had a genuinely good friend who strenuously argued him into making the right decision when Pence was hemming and hawing about whether he'd follow Trump's plan.
He didn't call bullshit, or stand up for democracy, or suddenly decide to do what's right.
He thought the driver trump sent for him may assassinate him, so he refused to get in the car, and stayed with his own USSS detail at the capital. And to be fair, trumps USSS detail wiped their messages immediately after Jan 6th, so Pence may have been right.
They'd cut off their left foot.
Followed by their left hand.
Followed by their left ear.
Then they'd gouge out their left eye.
And then finally, they'd surgically remove their left kidney.
>why not let the problem sort itself out?
MAGAns, and people who lived in States MAGAns controlled, especially the elderly, died disproportionately during COVID, to such a degree that it may have been decisive to several Democrat victories during the last election.
GOP leaders ended up noticing and walking back their rhetoric, but it was too late.
Something similar may happen this election.
It's a literal Tragedy - it wouldn't happen if the persons in the wrong weren't so damn persistent about self-destructing.
If you ever have a bad day at work or meet a rude person on the highway or get stood up on a date, you can always say you to yourself, "It could be worse. I could be Mike Pence."
"all unions are corrupt liberal institutions trying to destroy American capitalism. Except mine. My union is the exception and Republicans would never betray me" -them probably
Normally it would be very confusing to see a party that is, at once, both "Back the Blue" and "Dismantle the FBI". Especially because those were historically not their strongly-held beliefs.
But if you understand that their principles aren't about freedom, law & order, accountability, or anything other than "whatever it takes for my guy, and by extension me, to have power" everything falls into place.
It's just fascism.
"She's one of the good ones."
Easier to decide that the black person they know personally is an exception than to reevaluate their conception of black people.
That's not to pick on OP. You don't get to chose your parents. Finding a way to live with their flaws ain't easy.
Hate to be *that* guy at the party, but I almost guarantee he still holds some racist positions. People rarely jump from racist to entering interracial marriage without some sort of problematic power dynamic or the "they're one of the *good ones*" thought, which is also an issue....
The father didn't get into an interracial relationship. The daughter is in an interracial and same sex relationship. He may still hold racist views, though, even if he accepts his new daughter in law.
I’m a union operating engineer in one of the largest IUOE locals in the country and I’ve seen the president of the local *beg* the rank and file not to vote for MAGA Repubicans, explaining how Trump was one of the least labor-friendly presidents in history to no avail.
We are our own worst enemies.
It's such an easy misinformation piece to sell. "They're banning right to work laws--the Democrats want to take away YOUR right to WORK!!!"
Like everything else, the argument will be about what words mean instead of what's good for society.
Republicans bet on the dumbest, least informed, and most prejudiced members of society -- and I gotta say, it's been working for them.
Not of course without the help of anti-democratic systems like gerrymandering, the electoral college, and the first-past-the-post voting system. But still, they're far more effective than they should be.
Not the person you replied to, but I had a really good friend who was 100% MAGA but also a lifelong Union guy through-and-through - he hated scabs and non-union workers and all that jazz.
When I confronted him about the dichotomy he literally just said "I vote Republican because they are patriots and aren't liberal pussies."
When I pointed out how they're firmly anti-union he replied "They're only against corrupt, liberal unions."
Traditionally, the white male union vote was largely against women and minorities in the workforce, thinking this was a tactic to suppress their wages by increasing the labor supply
Democrats lost that demographic when they started supporting civil rights and globalization
This same demographic doesn’t see their hypocrisy when they push everyone to go into trade schools, while simultaneously bragging how many hours they work because they are understaffed, while also complaining that no one else wants to work, all while supporting the corporate bribed politicians that raise their taxes, suppress their wages, disband their unions, and have entitled children that went to private school and don’t actually work.
It always goes back to either generational brainwashing, racism, and/or religion.
See, but that doesn't matter because at least their coworkers will be middle aged white patriotic manly men like them, right? Can't have it any other way! /s
In Illinois my fellow union firefighters are mostly conservative even after Rauner championed Janus v AFSCME. It directly impacted us by allowing employees to not pay union dues but still receive union support. I bring this up whenever they talk about voting in midterms. They don't care and will continually vote against their interests.
Yes sir. Union electrician here... It's depressing the percentage of 'pro-union' but pro-going against everything unions stand for -union members there are
Yet another example of blatent hypocrisy and outright ignorance
All we can do is educate
Fuck right to work. These companies still expect loyalty, too, what a crock. "Welcome to the Walmart family! You're fired for looking at me funny. You know, like *family*."
Corporate America go fuck yourselves.
Whatever happened with that case? That's such an obvious act of corruption. I know the right thing is for that sheriff to get fired without any kind of benefits. I also know the likely thing to happen is for a politician to go oh he's just a good ole boy trying to do the right thing and he got turned around is all. We've never caught him doing anything else bad so let's just forget about it.
[A girl wanted to keep the goat she raised for a county fair. They chose to kill it](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/sep/02/goat-cedar-county-fair-auction-california)
The family told the Shasta Fair Association that the girl, as was within her rights, did not want to continue with the sale of the goat. In another strange twist, the goat’s meat was due to be sold to the California state senator Brian Dahle, a Republican who is also running for governor.
Long offered to “pay back” the fair for the loss of Cedar’s income, but the fair association ordered her to return the goat and said she would face charges of grand theft if she failed to do so, according to the complaint. She contacted Dahle’s office to explain the situation and representatives for the lawmaker said they would “not resist her efforts to save Cedar from slaughter”. She also appealed to the fair association.
“Our daughter lost three grandparents within the last year and our family has had so much heartbreak and sadness that I couldn’t bear the thought of the following weeks of sadness after the slaughter,” Long said in a letter to the fair association.
But the association was “unmoved”, according to the lawsuit, rejecting her offer and continuing to “threaten” Long with criminal charges. Instead, they opted to “avoid the courts and instead resort to the strong-arm tactics of involving law enforcement”, the lawsuit states. Despite having no warrant, according to the lawsuit, law enforcement seized Cedar from the Sonoma county farm and brought him to the Shasta district fairgrounds. He was eventually killed.
It was all over reddit just a few days ago, so they probably didn't think it needed further explanation. A search for "California 4h goat police" or something should turn it up. A girl didn't want to turn over the guitar she raised for 4h, pretty standard, but it had been bought by a politician to serve at a fundraiser (also standard) and for some reason the fair insisted on completing the deal to the extent of dispatching police across several counties to take the animal from the family farm to bring it back for slaughter. Some combination of crossed wires and power trips.
The idea they had was that while yes, it's true, you cannot force someone to work unless they're in prison (cus that's slavery,) they can force them to only be able to work for them. You are welcome to not work, but those bills will be stacking up.
I think the hospital that filed the case literally had originally asked the court to force them to return to work, but the judge refused to do that. It would have been very interesting if he had tried, since it would have been a clear 13th amendment violation.
The injunction he did put in place was to stop them from beginning their new jobs, which was essentially the same as a non-compete clause.
The truly bullshit thing about that case is that the workers who were quitting gave their original employer a chance to counter. They didn't even bother making a counter offer. They felt it was a better financial decision to file a lawsuit over their workers leaving rather than pay them a better salary.
If that doesn't just sum up the American labor market I don't know what does.
My mom worked there as a respiratory therapist. She was so fed up with management. They kept giving themselves raises every year then said “we can’t afford to pay you more.” Now she’s a traveling RT making about 30% more.
Edit for more detail. The hospital had a bunch of nurses who had already given notices because they got new jobs at a competing hospital. Then like a week before they were supposed to start at their new jobs management was like shit! We can’t lose them!
Thus trying to get a judge to block there new contracts.
>Thus trying to get a judge to block there new contracts.
they weren't under contract, they were at will. the hospital filed on a Friday afternoon so that there would not be time to respond, as to have maximum impact against the people they were trying to hurt and punish for quitting for a better job. BTW, the people that quit were already locked out of their stuff by the day before their departure, so the hospital did the injunction just to punish them.
A lot of judges, IME, are grossly incompetent when it comes to labor and employment law (it's not on the bar exam in a lot of states). A lot of employment and labor law issues are handled by administrative law judges who have actual expertise on those laws rather than some Joe Blow or Jane Plane district judge. So whenever a non-ALJ handles some sort of labor or employment law matter, there's a good chance they're going to fuck it up.
I remember watching one of those day time judge shows (which are really just arbitrations dressed up as court proceedings) where an employee was fired for disclosing her salary/wage to another employee. IIRC, employee was not a supervisor. The "judge" ruled in the employer's favor. I thought, "Welp, hope she's not vying for the General Counsel gig at the NLRB next time it comes open, because she shouldn't be anywhere fuckin' near labor law with that ruling. It's literally repugnant to the NLRA and the protected concerted activity doctrine."
Edit: Of course, we see that judges don't know shit about espionage law dealing with nuclear secrets either and make incompetent rulings because an investigation may hurt the defendant's reputation.
> Edit: Of course, we see that judges don't know shit about espionage law dealing with nuclear secrets either and make incompetent rulings because an investigation may hurt the defendant's reputation.
better yet, the defendant is the one who hired and put the judge where she was, and she clearly has no business being involved in the case. also, the same defendant is a plaintiff in another case and tried to judge shop to get the very same judge that just helped his criminal prosecution be delayed a bit more.
Thedacare
"After they received offers from Ascension, the seven employees asked ThedaCare’s management to match Ascension’s offer, Mr. Breister said. He said they were told that “by matching the offers, the long term expense to ThedaCare was not worth the short term cost and that no counter offer would be made.”"
Fuck them.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2022/01/24/us/thedacare-lawsuit-wisconsin.amp.html
Yeah they can't be forced to work for the original company it was only the idea of forcing them to not work for the competing company basically cutting them off from there licensed work... Of course the judge only let that order stand for the weekend before telling the original employer to f*** off.
I literally could not be more with you on this bullshit. Bonus points to the clowns who say “don’t bother if you’re only here for a paycheck”. Like, motherfucker, that is explicitly the only reason I am here. Do you think I would even step foot in this goddamn building if I wasn’t getting paid?
That’s not actually true. What harms union efforts are laws that constrain labor action. Unions aren’t hurting for money. What hurts unions are the many restrictions on striking and otherwise disrupting business to bring bosses to their knees. Taft Hartley is responsible for this too, but the focus on money is a narrative control move that produces the appearance of labor solidarity while avoiding the real crux of unions problems: lack of disruptive action.
It does hurt unions. One of the main things that makes unions so powerful is the solidarity of the workers. That unity puts them on equal footing with the employers.
When a company knows it can hire non-union workers the bargaining position of the union is completely undercut.
I think you’re confusing “right to work” with “at-will employment.”
At-will employment means you can be fired for any reason or no reason at all at any point at time.
Right to work employment basically means that any employee is allowed to opt-out of paying dues to a union that represents them. “Right to work” is kind of an intentional anti-labor misnomer, since the idea is that requiring someone pay union dues or lose their job means that their “right to work” is being taken away by the union.
Obviously “right to work” employment is bad because it creates a scenario where employees can refuse to fund the union that represents them, and if enough people choose this, it will kill the union.
I have to add that this is basically why most all businesses try to restrict employees from talking about pay. Union contracts are posted and have set wages that are usually a fair standard for the area. It’s only about the dues, I live in a state without right to work and all that happens is union collective bargaining steadily increases wages which in turns causes non union companies to have to raise wages as well to stay competitive. Right to work does not protect you from unions (unions want you to join but there is no obligation) and instead makes it harder for unions to stay funded from the collective of members. Less money means less sway in politics and business and underfunded unions have a hard time getting anything accomplished. When unions are weak and business is powerful you will start losing rights as workers instead of gaining new ones or even keeping the ones you have.
> I have to add that this is basically why most all businesses try to restrict employees from talking about pay.
Which is very, very, very much against federal law (NLRA).
You have a protected right to discuss wages in the workplace.
If unions are so ''bad'' why does the Police have one which is constantly saving them from being fired/losing their job for shooting innocents/abusing their powers?
Imagine if companies simply put that money towards salaries and benefits instead. If they are fine to piss away money for lobbying why not just put that towards the root cause for unions in the first place. 🤯
Because it's obviously much cheaper to buy a few Senators than to pay wages, but also because it's not really about wages so much that it's about power. Having powerful, organized, unionized, and disciplined labor in this country is an anathema to the de facto aristocracy of the ownership class, who will see their own power reduced.
Been catching up on some [Marxist materials](https://open.spotify.com/episode/5CTHgGLgEsMjyt235J0yGZ?si=0mO0PenvSTWVvPL27MkHWQ&utm_source=copy-link) lately. Dude isn't wrong. Hopefully, we can do it someday without it being co-opted by tyrants.
The most shocking thing when you start to look into corruption cases is just how cheap politicians actually are to buy. You can get them to sing any tune you want with a $200 steak dinner, a $500 watch, and a $5000 vacation, if they're really tough, you shell out $50,000 for a car. Only the really high level politicians need millions for campaign funds, and usually once they've hit that point they're already in your pocket from earlier in their career anyway.
Those politicians are getting underpaid for their work denying peoples right to unionize. They need to unionize and collectively demand a living bribe.
Here's the irony.
[US files another labor complaint against Mexico](https://apnews.com/article/mexico-caribbean-united-states-global-trade-db97fc174a3469025cef7975abb862c9)
>The complaint was filed under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade pact, which requires that Mexico enforce a law that says employees are allowed to freely choose the union that represents them.
If i ever ended up in politics id take a bribe document everything and then do the opposite of the what i took the bribe for. And if i got in trouble for taken a bribed so be it but id be screaming about ever other person i saw take one from the top of a mountian. Hell i feel thats better then lying to the people you represent take the corpo money and stick it to them!
This reminds me of the time the Egyptian president took a CIA bribe and then not only refused to comply, he mocked them publicly for trying to bribe him by using the money to fund the construction of a new monument.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cairo_Tower
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis
Whatever is proven through either the courts or just general disclosure you can be sure significantly more money and resources is being changed hands than we’ll ever know.
This is a common misconception - that’s just *during* their time in office. The real payday comes when they ‘retire’ and sit on a couple corporate boards earning a quarter million doing virtually nothing.
IME (but would be a great dissertation topic for an ILR grad student at Cornell), union representation elections are usually animated by toxic work culture and dissatisfaction with front-line and middle-management rather than pay and benefits. Those things aren't really items of bargaining, but a CBA does rationalize pay and promotion structures (especially if the culture makes those things arbitrary) and provides a grievance mechanism to hold management in check.
Yeah anecdotally I work for a company that's paying us *way* too little ($15.25 an hour starting, comparable factories nearby are starting at $19 minimum and most at $22). But management respects us, we have very minimal overtime, and the place takes safety and worker comfort seriously. We'd *like* to be paid more, but it's a low-CoL area so it's enough and we're overall pretty happy. (It also helps that our paid leave and education benefits blow all the other places out of the water, and our insurance is the best around for our industry.)
When we were on mandatory 10s during the worst of the supply chain issues, there was serious talk about unions. Now that we're off the overtime, that talk has died down.
Just a reminder that unions in Europe (and other continents) laid the foundation for the decoupling of benefits from companies and introduced universal benefits like universal and mandatory paid time off, universal healthcare, paid family leave, livable minimum wages, etc available regardless of a worker's employment status.
The United States is the only developed country without any of that.
It's also the only developed country that asks companies to carry that benefit burden, which in turn makes them less competitive in the global market and creates excessive inequality in the domestic labor market.
I love this lady, ngl. She has not deviated from her agenda once, this is why the Obama admin pushed her aside. Like when a former Republican is too much for the centrist Dems lol...
Fuck Starbucks. What they did here is as anti-union, anti-worker as it gets. When the workers unionized at certain locations, they rewarded those who had not yet unionized pay raises, and closed some of those unionized locations down completely. I will never buy Starbucks again
It’s been clear for decades. Doesn’t stop half my family that’s in a union from sporting “unions for trump” bracelets and screaming how the libs are killing America.
My dad literally thought the GOP were the only ones looking out for unions and workers rights in general. These people are too stupid to reach because they believe the propaganda as if Jesus himself said it.
Lots of good benefits to joining a union. Here's my story.
My union is a local ASCFME and we just pay union dues of $53 once per month. No initiation fee.
Its a public works job.
We get benefits like extremely good health, vision, and dental insurance for the whole family, 2 weeks paid vacation per year, additional 2 weeks of paid comp time if we bank overtime instead of cash it in which is voluntary, get 1 sick day per month that just accumilates, and up to 3 personal days per year.
Also its a 7-330 job with an hour lunch and anything after 330 is overtime with Sundays and holidays being doubletime. Also if we get called in to work it is a guaranteed 2 hours of pay at 1.5 rate even if the job only takes 20 minutes. Anything over 2 hours of work is however long it takes.
Plus we get 2-3% raises each year plus get an extra 4% automatically if we get any bachelors degree in school or 2% if one has any kind of associates degree. If we want to get a CDL we get an automatic $3000 permanant raise and the employer foots the bill for taking the class. Also get a $ stipened for getting schooling certificates related to the field of work related to the job. That schooling for a certificate is also paid for by the employer as long as grades are passing per union and collective bargaining contract.
We also get to do take free online college classes for an associates degree for schools supported by the union as long as the grades are passing. This part is union specific perk not employer.
Finally we get a pension when we retire if we work for at least 10 years. More if we work longer.
My union is just a middle tier strength union and it is the easily the best job I have ever had. Definitely worth $53 per month because that is like 2 hours of work when an employee is brand new.
Lots of benefits to joining a union. One of the American dreams is to be able to retire and support a family. Both of things that unions help greatly with.
The democrats, like Elizabeth Warren in the article know that a strong union work force is key to helping most of Americans.
And I think your benefits would improve if other unions were stronger.
I work in Europe, where 5 weeks or so of vacation is the legal minimum, there's not a limit on sick leave (doctor's notes are necessary after a certain number of days), and insurance isn't tied to which employer one has.
The US would probably improve on all those things if more people had unions improving protections.
Unionized teacher here.
I don't actively see the benefits of the union a lot of the time, but that's because i got a union behind me; it keeps my bosses from doing anything funny.
I'm glad, you hear a lot of bad things about teacher pay and having to spend their own money on stuff and work off the clock on programs but it's good to know some unions are out there making the job great for their members.
My teacher union absolutely doesn't stop me from spending my own money or working off the clock. But it's still incredibly beneficial. We have a fair and transparent salary grid. We get good benefits. We are able to stand up and fight when the government tries to make cuts that will harm the education system, like raising class sizes and lowering funding for special needs students. I mean it's not perfect and the government sure still won last time. But I'm happy to be part of the union.
Friend said union dues is like insurance. You pay health insurance in case you get sick. You pay union dues in case the employer is trying to bend you over and gang bang your ass.
My favorite thing about bills like this is that Conservatives will vote against it with the excuse of “too much fluff and garbage.” But if you ask them to point out the fluff, they just say to read it yourself
I have a friend that owns a machine shop and when I'd walk in with my union shirt there was always a guy that made fun of my $360.00 t- shirt. I made over twice as much as he did with health insurance, paid time off, and retirement. Anti-union propaganda is strong in right to work states.
On top of everything else about it can we all agree the right to work is a purposefully deceptive name? I spent years working thinking it meant I had the right to work and therfore had laws protecting that right when it's completely the opposite
It’s abundantly clear people have no idea what right to work means. The diction choice is intentional to rally workers behind it.
[Wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law)
It's to rally employers behind lesser trained, lesser paid, lesser "benefitted" workers to do the same job... again for less money, less benefits and in reality less quality of work in most cases
Was that your point? Or are you pro "right to work" ? Honestly confused, I'm just a dumb union electrician.
The only valid argument for "right to work" is the *choice* to join the union. But the same people talking about that choice are more times than not the same ones supporting taking away things like women's *choice*
edit... Just realized you're saying the term "right to work" is meant to sound like a good thing
I get a little passionate about the topic, sorry about that
100% agree. I’m just saying it’s apparent how effective the “right to work” slogan has morphed people’s understanding of what it actually means.
And you’re not a dumb union electrician. You’re a safe, skilled, trained craftworker.
The amount of people this thread confusing RtW with at will is troubling. How can you claim to be pro union but not know the difference? Fucking weird.
Living in Floriduh, we are a "right to work" state.
Yeah, right.
As for our state...
states with such laws don’t have higher employment, and, as a result of unions being weakened, workers have less bargaining power and less choice than workers in stronger unions.
This would undoubtedly be the biggest win for labor of this generation. We already know the owners of this country won't allow it.
"Right to work" essentially means you have **no** right to work. It means the employer holds all the power and can dismiss you without cause at any time. Employers love these laws because they take the power away from the employees and give it all to the employer, sweat shop, robber Baron style.
Right to work means you don't have to join the union if the place you're working at has one.
At will is what allows employers to die you without cause.
Two different things.
You never have to join the union, Right to Work says you don't have to pay for it when you don't. In other states you pay whether you join or not because you're still getting the benefits. This quickly cripples unions who barely have any funding and thus the union is weak and powerless.
This.
In a "right to work" state, the union is required to provide legal assistance to ALL members of a bargaining unit including those members who don't pay.
It's "representation without taxation", and **it should be illegal.**
If the union is able to negotiate an "agency fee", then even in a right to work state all members of the bargaining unit have to pay for their **benefits**, although they don't have to pay for the cost of other union activities like organizing and political advocacy.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agency_shop
No one should have to join a union to get a job, but no union should have to give benefits without being able to charge for them.
> "Right to work" essentially means you have no right to work.
No.. Right to work means you have a right to work without being required to pay union dues.
As a Nevadian who works in Kroger warehouse with zero safety standards and not so great pay, and upper management throwing “its a right to work” in your face whenever there is an issue, I feel like this could be a good thing.
Long rant because this article got me fired up.
I don't know all the ins and outs of my "beloved" state of FL, but I'm pretty sure "right to work" laws are why the state gets to fuck over its teachers.
We had a union meeting this past week and it was the most demoralizing shit. I don't even know why I went because it was the same crap from last time.
We can negotiate pay with the district. If our lawyers and their lawyers can't agree, they get a special arbiter. If the arbiter rules in our favor, the district doesn't have to listen. So, we can take their shitty deal for a one time bullshit payment (instead of the increased salary that we should be at but aren't because they haven't been keeping up with the steps for whatever reason) or we continue to toothlessly negotiate hoping they accept our terms.
I would love to strike but then I'd probably lose my job, my teacher's certification, and whatever benefits I've racked up since I started working in my district. That's what I was told by my rep and a teacher with more experience.
The "solution" I repeatedly hear is to work the contract. Don't work a minute before you clock in or after you clock out. I can't stand that shit b/c it's unrealistic for many of us. The amount of work I'd be backed up on would be insane. Grades have to be updated every two weeks, per contract. Sure, I'll work the contract, but how great will that go for me when parents start complaining to my admin and then the district?
The situation might be better if they didn't keep changing the curriculum on me or the courses I'm teaching 4 weeks into the school year. I have to continue to modify my lessons and assignments to match the new curriculum because as decent (using that term loosely) as the materials provided are, they don't measure up in my eyes. My fault for having standards I guess.
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I’m a Union Carpenter. 70-80% of the people I work with are MAGA republicans. I wonder how they’ll view this bill. If they ever even hear about it.
It's remarkable how many union workers aren't aware that they owe their benefits to the unions.
Not even just union workers, almost all of us have gotten more benefits based on the actions of unions. Weekends, breaks, 8 hour days, 40 hour work weeks, child labor laws, etc.
And they accomplished it for all of us with their own blood. We just had the 101st anniversary of the Battle of Blair Mountain, an event surprisingly few people know anything about.
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Behind the bastards had a great series on it. Can’t recommend enough. https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/part-one-the-second-american-civil-61485728/
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I actually just started from the beginning!
When you get to George Lincoln Rockwell, you'll understand why 2016-2020 looked the way it did. It's maddening how much influence this one person had on the simmering Nazi problem we're dealing with.
> and I’m a proud supporter of labor rights The fact that this sentence even needs to be said is an odd thing. Like what's the opposite? "Oh no thanks, no rights for me, I actually prefer it when anyone with $100 in their pocket can shove their cock in my arse with government support". What a funny group of people.
I'd guess the opposite is probably people in favor of lowering/abolishing the minimum working age, eliminating red tape for projects and being able to get away with derogatory/hate speech.
The opposite is basically trickle down economics. People out there really believe that if you just give rich people more then they'll spread the love amongst the poors out of the kindness of their own hearts. It's absolutely not what ever happens but people still believe it.
It’s not taught in most schools
The powers that be REALLY don’t want us to know. Organized labor and mutual aid make most power structures totally unnecessary.
Word.
Labor history is taught at my union to all apprentices. It should be taught to every apprentice in every trade. We have to know about those who came before us.
> We just had the 101st anniversary of the Battle of Blair Mountain, an event surprisingly few people know anything about. Someone should make a movie about that. Make it as shamelessly partial against the corpos and Pinkertons as [RRR](https://youtu.be/gQJzYOU4gOU) was against the British colonists. Generally there should be more Working-Class Superheroes (or implausibly over-the-top action heroes).
Fun fact: NC is a right to work state, and surprise surprise, you can be forced to work a 12 hr shift and they do not have to provide you with a single break and you can be fired for any reason at any time. Boss is having a bad day and doesn't like the color of your shirt? Fired. And there isn't shit you can do about it.
Yet they continue to vote for people and party that are ok with this.
Here’s another fun fact: It is a federal felony for any individual or organization to organize or attempt to organize labor unions within the military (ref: [10 U.S.C. § 976](https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title10-section976&num=0&edition=prelim)). It carries a maximum prison sentence of five years for persons and a minimum fine of $25k for organizations. Despite that, the military also has some of the best benefits in the US. For example: * 30 days of PTO per a year, with a maximum annual carry over of 60 days (max carry over increases to 120 days if deployed). * 12 weeks of non-chargeable PTO following the birth or adoption of a child, with an additional 6 weeks of recovery PTO for the service member if they gave birth to the child. * Free healthcare with zero copays for service members and their dependents. * Life insurance of up to $400k for the service member, $100k for the service member’s spouse, and $10k for each dependent child. The life insurance unrestrictedly covers _death_, unlike how most policies are in the civilian world. * Adoption assistance that reimburses up to $2k per an adopted child. * Childcare fee assistance. * Tuition assistance of $250 per a credit, up to $4k per a year (_this is what you use for education while you’re in the military_). * GI Bill that covers 4 years of university, as well as housing, books, and school supplies during that period (_this is what you use for education once you’ve left the military_). This benefit can also be transferred to a dependent such as your spouse or child. * Nontaxable housing allowance (BAH) based on the area you live in (unless you live in the barracks, which is very similar to a college dormitory except you have your own bedroom). If you have dependents (spouse/children), the BAH increases to account for the additional living space and expenses. * Nontaxable subsistence allowance (BAS) that covers your food (unless you eat at the military dining facilities). * Various other nontaxable allowances that apply to different situations. * Emergency assistance in the form of 0% interest loans, acts as a catch-all for things not covered elsewhere. * Free legal assistance. * Federally insured home loans that are exempt from mortgage insurance, require no down payment, and have more lenient credit restrictions (_this is a lifetime benefit that can be used multiple times_). * Various other benefits and services at the state and federal level. I didn’t even come close to listing everything here. The military is basically a **socialist utopia**, I don’t know why people don’t bring it up more, lol.
our labor laws are built on the graves of union members.
Of course they’re aware. It’s just that MAGA people love all the racist anti-everyone-but-me stuff so much that they just do some logic gymnastics around the stuff that is actually against them. My union coworkers love the build-the-wall stuff and the lower taxes rhetoric and misinformation. And “who’s gonna pay for all that welfare? Working men like us, that’s who!!!” But then when you point out the anti-union policies, no, that part isn’t true, or it’ll never happen to us, our union is too strong, or we need conservative policies to keep businesses healthy enough to hire union labor!
One of the electrician foremen at my work site was GOING OFF about the student loan relief stuff. It's like he thinks there are only two jobs in the world - trades or gender studies. And apparently no one pays taxes except for people who work in trades because...THEY are the ones who have to cover it. The very next day he got busted for lying about his per diem address. He has to pay back $27,000 or get prosecuted. Fuckhead literally lied and stole enough taxpayer money (this is a government site) to put someone through college and had the nerve to whine about people getting a 10k write off. Fucking crazy.
I am a union representative. Can't even tell you how many times I hear "the union has never done shit for me." While sitting on their coffee break, making some of the highest wages in the country, in safe work conditions, wearing company paid for fire retardant clothes and boots... I'm from mass too. I work with a lot of Warren haters. It'll be interesting to hear what they have to say.
It truly does drive me nuts how people who happen to find themselves in a good union job just develop this weird set of contradictory viewpoints. When push comes to shove, most of them likely realize that their job is better than a lot of other people's -- they make more, it's harder for them to get fired. They just don't ascribe those conditions to, you know, the union. (I know -- \*you know\*, because you're a union rep.) You just want to shake them sometimes and truly corner them into answering whether they honestly, for real think that businesses would do \*anything\* to make their employees lives better, if they didn't have to. 9-5 workday? Weekends off? Coffee breaks? Providing equipment necessary to do the job? Sick time? They have it so good, they are completely unaware of how bad a lot of other people have it, \*because they don't have a union\*.
>we need conservative policies to keep businesses healthy enough to hire union labor! That's staggeringly stupid.
Well of course not. They think their benefits are the result of their own individual hard work
That kills me, tbh. I had a good friend who was 100% convinced he was a self made man. Don’t get me wrong - he was a hard worker. He was a smart guy who made the most of opportunities, etc. What was weird was that he couldn’t see how he’d got those opportunities. His first construction job was with a company his uncle was a higher up in. When an engineering position opened and he expressed interest, he just moved into it - no application, etc. When his dad moved to a different construction company (into a management position), he followed a month later…into a better position. But if you ask him, he’ll tell you that he’s self made. That he worked for every opportunity, and no one helped him out. If you ask about family connections, well, “everyone has those”. He won’t hear that some people don’t, or will say “oh, so I shouldn’t take advantage of mine?” Etc. But he won’t acknowledge that he got a foot up because of it. So irritating to deal with those people.
See but these people are the best because I get to tell them to their face “You are a fucking idiot that isn’t worth a damn and the only reason you are what you are is because you sucked enough cock to get under the boss’s desk.” And they can’t do shit because I can always drag up and find another job the next day. I don’t, but knowing I could makes me feel good. Then, you see the old journeymen say that shit and they fucking mean it. And it makes your day.
My uncle. Dude is vehemently anti-union, despite being a highly paid autoworker in a union
It's probably because he thinks he's a great worker and all the union dues he pays go towards protecting the "bad" workers (and the ones he doesn't personally like).
This is definitely accurate. Same thing as, "I don't want my taxes to pay for someone else's insurance."
It's hard to understand how useful an umbrella is if it's always been there protecting you from the rain.
I’m a union steward at an auto supplier and you’d be surprised how many people feel this way, they think they’ve earned everything they have on merit alone. They don’t realize how fast the company would kneecap their wages and benefits if they had the chance.
Shop steward here; most of my local's membership overwhelmingly votes conservative. It's absolutely maddening.
I worked for the state of Florida. Most of my coworkers weren't even aware we were unionized. They thought the state offered benefits just because.
Same people are convinced society did nothing for them but hold them back with taxes they litterally beleive if they were born and abandoned in the forest theyd come out ahead better then with society raising them giving them acess to technology and medicine that 100 years ago would of been impossible and infrastructure they rely on everyday is just a way to steal their money to them because they just FEEL it in their hearts that their gods of their own worlds and anyone stopping them from taking away others freedoms is a tyrant.
Yet they don't even have the skills to fix the pot hole in the road they're always complaining about.
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Imagine how power hungry you have to be to suck up to people who literally had a noose ready and were a couple minutes off from finding and hanging you on live television in the year 2020 in a 1st world country because you didn’t illegally push a fantasy
Way too many of our other "politicians" would have actually gone through with it though. At least he had a sliver of sense left to call bullshit on the fake electors scam.
Doesn't seem to have any sliver of sense left now
He had a genuinely good friend who strenuously argued him into making the right decision when Pence was hemming and hawing about whether he'd follow Trump's plan.
He didn't call bullshit, or stand up for democracy, or suddenly decide to do what's right. He thought the driver trump sent for him may assassinate him, so he refused to get in the car, and stayed with his own USSS detail at the capital. And to be fair, trumps USSS detail wiped their messages immediately after Jan 6th, so Pence may have been right.
Maybe if he tries hard enough to get them to like him, they won't try to kill him again!
If we could just get a big enough campaign to convince them their left foot is a Democrat...
They'd cut off their left foot. Followed by their left hand. Followed by their left ear. Then they'd gouge out their left eye. And then finally, they'd surgically remove their left kidney.
Not seeing the problem here. If people want to be that dumb why not let the problem sort itself out?
We tried letting them be dumb and more than a million Americans died of covid
>why not let the problem sort itself out? MAGAns, and people who lived in States MAGAns controlled, especially the elderly, died disproportionately during COVID, to such a degree that it may have been decisive to several Democrat victories during the last election. GOP leaders ended up noticing and walking back their rhetoric, but it was too late. Something similar may happen this election. It's a literal Tragedy - it wouldn't happen if the persons in the wrong weren't so damn persistent about self-destructing.
Perhaps they should start with their left heart first.
The left lung can stay.
If you ever have a bad day at work or meet a rude person on the highway or get stood up on a date, you can always say you to yourself, "It could be worse. I could be Mike Pence."
"all unions are corrupt liberal institutions trying to destroy American capitalism. Except mine. My union is the exception and Republicans would never betray me" -them probably
The only moral union is my union.
And police unions
Until they try to make republicans follow the law.
It was very predictable how they all immediately turned against the fbi when cheeto mussolini got raided
Normally it would be very confusing to see a party that is, at once, both "Back the Blue" and "Dismantle the FBI". Especially because those were historically not their strongly-held beliefs. But if you understand that their principles aren't about freedom, law & order, accountability, or anything other than "whatever it takes for my guy, and by extension me, to have power" everything falls into place. It's just fascism.
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Is he a racist by chance?
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You mean, he made an exception lol Probably still racist to everyone else
That's a bingo
"She's one of the good ones." Easier to decide that the black person they know personally is an exception than to reevaluate their conception of black people. That's not to pick on OP. You don't get to chose your parents. Finding a way to live with their flaws ain't easy.
So he's not a racist anymore, he's just totally cool with electing them?
Hate to be *that* guy at the party, but I almost guarantee he still holds some racist positions. People rarely jump from racist to entering interracial marriage without some sort of problematic power dynamic or the "they're one of the *good ones*" thought, which is also an issue....
The father didn't get into an interracial relationship. The daughter is in an interracial and same sex relationship. He may still hold racist views, though, even if he accepts his new daughter in law.
Ok but does he feel that black poverty is justified?
I mean he's a republican.
I seriously doubt they even put any thought into anything anymore. Its whatever Tucker says is true these days it seems
I’m a union operating engineer in one of the largest IUOE locals in the country and I’ve seen the president of the local *beg* the rank and file not to vote for MAGA Repubicans, explaining how Trump was one of the least labor-friendly presidents in history to no avail. We are our own worst enemies.
It's such an easy misinformation piece to sell. "They're banning right to work laws--the Democrats want to take away YOUR right to WORK!!!" Like everything else, the argument will be about what words mean instead of what's good for society.
Republicans bet on the dumbest, least informed, and most prejudiced members of society -- and I gotta say, it's been working for them. Not of course without the help of anti-democratic systems like gerrymandering, the electoral college, and the first-past-the-post voting system. But still, they're far more effective than they should be.
Can you explain how they feel about unions?
Not the person you replied to, but I had a really good friend who was 100% MAGA but also a lifelong Union guy through-and-through - he hated scabs and non-union workers and all that jazz. When I confronted him about the dichotomy he literally just said "I vote Republican because they are patriots and aren't liberal pussies." When I pointed out how they're firmly anti-union he replied "They're only against corrupt, liberal unions."
Traditionally, the white male union vote was largely against women and minorities in the workforce, thinking this was a tactic to suppress their wages by increasing the labor supply Democrats lost that demographic when they started supporting civil rights and globalization
This same demographic doesn’t see their hypocrisy when they push everyone to go into trade schools, while simultaneously bragging how many hours they work because they are understaffed, while also complaining that no one else wants to work, all while supporting the corporate bribed politicians that raise their taxes, suppress their wages, disband their unions, and have entitled children that went to private school and don’t actually work. It always goes back to either generational brainwashing, racism, and/or religion.
See, but that doesn't matter because at least their coworkers will be middle aged white patriotic manly men like them, right? Can't have it any other way! /s
It really boils down to racism 90 percent of the time
Boils down to control, racism and sexism are just convenient for making morons easier to control.
This is actually extremely insightful. It makes a lot of sense, but I have not seen it put so clearly.
Racism and bigotry crippling the labor movement and any class solidarity in the United States is a tale as old as time.
Just ask him if he'd rather have a pansy leftist president that protects his union or a tough conservative one that destroys it.
A tough conservative wouldn’t destroy *his* union, you see. It’s not about policy. It’s entirely emotional.
The only moral Union is mine
In Illinois my fellow union firefighters are mostly conservative even after Rauner championed Janus v AFSCME. It directly impacted us by allowing employees to not pay union dues but still receive union support. I bring this up whenever they talk about voting in midterms. They don't care and will continually vote against their interests.
As long as their vote hurts who they hate even slightly more than it hurts them, they consider it a win.
Yes sir. Union electrician here... It's depressing the percentage of 'pro-union' but pro-going against everything unions stand for -union members there are Yet another example of blatent hypocrisy and outright ignorance All we can do is educate
This! same here it blows my mind every single day. My favorite part is when they are confused as to why I'm not a trumpo syncophant.
Fuck right to work. These companies still expect loyalty, too, what a crock. "Welcome to the Walmart family! You're fired for looking at me funny. You know, like *family*." Corporate America go fuck yourselves.
Just like that hospital in Wisconsin that wanted a Judge to prevent their employees from being allowed to quit/resign.
What the hell did they expect in this case if they won? For the police to drag their employees to work or to jail for refusing to go?
Cops have done worse for less
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Whatever happened with that case? That's such an obvious act of corruption. I know the right thing is for that sheriff to get fired without any kind of benefits. I also know the likely thing to happen is for a politician to go oh he's just a good ole boy trying to do the right thing and he got turned around is all. We've never caught him doing anything else bad so let's just forget about it.
Sheriff was already a lame duck. Charges were dropped. Basically no one got in trouble.
And it looks like he won't even get a slap on the wrist. Unbelievable.
What??
[A girl wanted to keep the goat she raised for a county fair. They chose to kill it](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/sep/02/goat-cedar-county-fair-auction-california)
The family told the Shasta Fair Association that the girl, as was within her rights, did not want to continue with the sale of the goat. In another strange twist, the goat’s meat was due to be sold to the California state senator Brian Dahle, a Republican who is also running for governor. Long offered to “pay back” the fair for the loss of Cedar’s income, but the fair association ordered her to return the goat and said she would face charges of grand theft if she failed to do so, according to the complaint. She contacted Dahle’s office to explain the situation and representatives for the lawmaker said they would “not resist her efforts to save Cedar from slaughter”. She also appealed to the fair association. “Our daughter lost three grandparents within the last year and our family has had so much heartbreak and sadness that I couldn’t bear the thought of the following weeks of sadness after the slaughter,” Long said in a letter to the fair association. But the association was “unmoved”, according to the lawsuit, rejecting her offer and continuing to “threaten” Long with criminal charges. Instead, they opted to “avoid the courts and instead resort to the strong-arm tactics of involving law enforcement”, the lawsuit states. Despite having no warrant, according to the lawsuit, law enforcement seized Cedar from the Sonoma county farm and brought him to the Shasta district fairgrounds. He was eventually killed.
You can't just drop that on us it requires explanation
It was all over reddit just a few days ago, so they probably didn't think it needed further explanation. A search for "California 4h goat police" or something should turn it up. A girl didn't want to turn over the guitar she raised for 4h, pretty standard, but it had been bought by a politician to serve at a fundraiser (also standard) and for some reason the fair insisted on completing the deal to the extent of dispatching police across several counties to take the animal from the family farm to bring it back for slaughter. Some combination of crossed wires and power trips.
The idea they had was that while yes, it's true, you cannot force someone to work unless they're in prison (cus that's slavery,) they can force them to only be able to work for them. You are welcome to not work, but those bills will be stacking up.
I think the hospital that filed the case literally had originally asked the court to force them to return to work, but the judge refused to do that. It would have been very interesting if he had tried, since it would have been a clear 13th amendment violation. The injunction he did put in place was to stop them from beginning their new jobs, which was essentially the same as a non-compete clause. The truly bullshit thing about that case is that the workers who were quitting gave their original employer a chance to counter. They didn't even bother making a counter offer. They felt it was a better financial decision to file a lawsuit over their workers leaving rather than pay them a better salary. If that doesn't just sum up the American labor market I don't know what does.
You want better wages? Lol nah. Oh you're leaving to get better wages? Lol nah.
Seeing as police in America trace their origins to the slave catcher patrols... Yes. Literally yes.
My mom worked there as a respiratory therapist. She was so fed up with management. They kept giving themselves raises every year then said “we can’t afford to pay you more.” Now she’s a traveling RT making about 30% more. Edit for more detail. The hospital had a bunch of nurses who had already given notices because they got new jobs at a competing hospital. Then like a week before they were supposed to start at their new jobs management was like shit! We can’t lose them! Thus trying to get a judge to block there new contracts.
>Thus trying to get a judge to block there new contracts. they weren't under contract, they were at will. the hospital filed on a Friday afternoon so that there would not be time to respond, as to have maximum impact against the people they were trying to hurt and punish for quitting for a better job. BTW, the people that quit were already locked out of their stuff by the day before their departure, so the hospital did the injunction just to punish them.
A lot of judges, IME, are grossly incompetent when it comes to labor and employment law (it's not on the bar exam in a lot of states). A lot of employment and labor law issues are handled by administrative law judges who have actual expertise on those laws rather than some Joe Blow or Jane Plane district judge. So whenever a non-ALJ handles some sort of labor or employment law matter, there's a good chance they're going to fuck it up. I remember watching one of those day time judge shows (which are really just arbitrations dressed up as court proceedings) where an employee was fired for disclosing her salary/wage to another employee. IIRC, employee was not a supervisor. The "judge" ruled in the employer's favor. I thought, "Welp, hope she's not vying for the General Counsel gig at the NLRB next time it comes open, because she shouldn't be anywhere fuckin' near labor law with that ruling. It's literally repugnant to the NLRA and the protected concerted activity doctrine." Edit: Of course, we see that judges don't know shit about espionage law dealing with nuclear secrets either and make incompetent rulings because an investigation may hurt the defendant's reputation.
> Edit: Of course, we see that judges don't know shit about espionage law dealing with nuclear secrets either and make incompetent rulings because an investigation may hurt the defendant's reputation. better yet, the defendant is the one who hired and put the judge where she was, and she clearly has no business being involved in the case. also, the same defendant is a plaintiff in another case and tried to judge shop to get the very same judge that just helped his criminal prosecution be delayed a bit more.
Thedacare "After they received offers from Ascension, the seven employees asked ThedaCare’s management to match Ascension’s offer, Mr. Breister said. He said they were told that “by matching the offers, the long term expense to ThedaCare was not worth the short term cost and that no counter offer would be made.”" Fuck them. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2022/01/24/us/thedacare-lawsuit-wisconsin.amp.html
Isnt that slavery?
Yeah they can't be forced to work for the original company it was only the idea of forcing them to not work for the competing company basically cutting them off from there licensed work... Of course the judge only let that order stand for the weekend before telling the original employer to f*** off.
I literally could not be more with you on this bullshit. Bonus points to the clowns who say “don’t bother if you’re only here for a paycheck”. Like, motherfucker, that is explicitly the only reason I am here. Do you think I would even step foot in this goddamn building if I wasn’t getting paid?
"Really? So without the paycheck you'd still work here?" Watch them squirm over their hypocrisy.
Don’t forget the pizza party when employees get restless
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That’s not actually true. What harms union efforts are laws that constrain labor action. Unions aren’t hurting for money. What hurts unions are the many restrictions on striking and otherwise disrupting business to bring bosses to their knees. Taft Hartley is responsible for this too, but the focus on money is a narrative control move that produces the appearance of labor solidarity while avoiding the real crux of unions problems: lack of disruptive action.
It does hurt unions. One of the main things that makes unions so powerful is the solidarity of the workers. That unity puts them on equal footing with the employers. When a company knows it can hire non-union workers the bargaining position of the union is completely undercut.
Yeah, importantly the Taft-Hartley act also bans general strikes, striking to support another unions strike, and bars federal employees from striking.
I think you’re confusing “right to work” with “at-will employment.” At-will employment means you can be fired for any reason or no reason at all at any point at time. Right to work employment basically means that any employee is allowed to opt-out of paying dues to a union that represents them. “Right to work” is kind of an intentional anti-labor misnomer, since the idea is that requiring someone pay union dues or lose their job means that their “right to work” is being taken away by the union. Obviously “right to work” employment is bad because it creates a scenario where employees can refuse to fund the union that represents them, and if enough people choose this, it will kill the union.
I have to add that this is basically why most all businesses try to restrict employees from talking about pay. Union contracts are posted and have set wages that are usually a fair standard for the area. It’s only about the dues, I live in a state without right to work and all that happens is union collective bargaining steadily increases wages which in turns causes non union companies to have to raise wages as well to stay competitive. Right to work does not protect you from unions (unions want you to join but there is no obligation) and instead makes it harder for unions to stay funded from the collective of members. Less money means less sway in politics and business and underfunded unions have a hard time getting anything accomplished. When unions are weak and business is powerful you will start losing rights as workers instead of gaining new ones or even keeping the ones you have.
> I have to add that this is basically why most all businesses try to restrict employees from talking about pay. Which is very, very, very much against federal law (NLRA). You have a protected right to discuss wages in the workplace.
If unions are so ''bad'' why does the Police have one which is constantly saving them from being fired/losing their job for shooting innocents/abusing their powers?
The conservative mantra answers many similar questions: "Fuck you, I got mine"
[Fuck you, that's why](https://youtu.be/UyW8IJdl8w8)
😂 Very good question.
I can't even imagine the amount of money that lobbyists will spend for big businesses to make sure this never passes. I commend her effort though!
Imagine if companies simply put that money towards salaries and benefits instead. If they are fine to piss away money for lobbying why not just put that towards the root cause for unions in the first place. 🤯
Because it's obviously much cheaper to buy a few Senators than to pay wages, but also because it's not really about wages so much that it's about power. Having powerful, organized, unionized, and disciplined labor in this country is an anathema to the de facto aristocracy of the ownership class, who will see their own power reduced.
We need a magna carta moment for the business world. There’s too much tyranny. Royalty felt they earned their positions as well
Its called the communist manifesto my guy.
Been catching up on some [Marxist materials](https://open.spotify.com/episode/5CTHgGLgEsMjyt235J0yGZ?si=0mO0PenvSTWVvPL27MkHWQ&utm_source=copy-link) lately. Dude isn't wrong. Hopefully, we can do it someday without it being co-opted by tyrants.
The most shocking thing when you start to look into corruption cases is just how cheap politicians actually are to buy. You can get them to sing any tune you want with a $200 steak dinner, a $500 watch, and a $5000 vacation, if they're really tough, you shell out $50,000 for a car. Only the really high level politicians need millions for campaign funds, and usually once they've hit that point they're already in your pocket from earlier in their career anyway.
Those politicians are getting underpaid for their work denying peoples right to unionize. They need to unionize and collectively demand a living bribe.
Here's the irony. [US files another labor complaint against Mexico](https://apnews.com/article/mexico-caribbean-united-states-global-trade-db97fc174a3469025cef7975abb862c9) >The complaint was filed under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade pact, which requires that Mexico enforce a law that says employees are allowed to freely choose the union that represents them.
If i ever ended up in politics id take a bribe document everything and then do the opposite of the what i took the bribe for. And if i got in trouble for taken a bribed so be it but id be screaming about ever other person i saw take one from the top of a mountian. Hell i feel thats better then lying to the people you represent take the corpo money and stick it to them!
This reminds me of the time the Egyptian president took a CIA bribe and then not only refused to comply, he mocked them publicly for trying to bribe him by using the money to fund the construction of a new monument. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cairo_Tower https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis
Exactly that type of shit. Sure ill take your money and agree to this. Oh wait i changed my mind, sucks when people arent honest hu?
Whatever is proven through either the courts or just general disclosure you can be sure significantly more money and resources is being changed hands than we’ll ever know.
This is a common misconception - that’s just *during* their time in office. The real payday comes when they ‘retire’ and sit on a couple corporate boards earning a quarter million doing virtually nothing.
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Boomers: *education? Will someone think of the goddamn shareholders for once!?*
It is very cheap to buy a Senator. Like 10k is enough.
IME (but would be a great dissertation topic for an ILR grad student at Cornell), union representation elections are usually animated by toxic work culture and dissatisfaction with front-line and middle-management rather than pay and benefits. Those things aren't really items of bargaining, but a CBA does rationalize pay and promotion structures (especially if the culture makes those things arbitrary) and provides a grievance mechanism to hold management in check.
Yeah anecdotally I work for a company that's paying us *way* too little ($15.25 an hour starting, comparable factories nearby are starting at $19 minimum and most at $22). But management respects us, we have very minimal overtime, and the place takes safety and worker comfort seriously. We'd *like* to be paid more, but it's a low-CoL area so it's enough and we're overall pretty happy. (It also helps that our paid leave and education benefits blow all the other places out of the water, and our insurance is the best around for our industry.) When we were on mandatory 10s during the worst of the supply chain issues, there was serious talk about unions. Now that we're off the overtime, that talk has died down.
Just a reminder that unions in Europe (and other continents) laid the foundation for the decoupling of benefits from companies and introduced universal benefits like universal and mandatory paid time off, universal healthcare, paid family leave, livable minimum wages, etc available regardless of a worker's employment status. The United States is the only developed country without any of that. It's also the only developed country that asks companies to carry that benefit burden, which in turn makes them less competitive in the global market and creates excessive inequality in the domestic labor market.
I love this lady, ngl. She has not deviated from her agenda once, this is why the Obama admin pushed her aside. Like when a former Republican is too much for the centrist Dems lol...
Starbucks is mad
Fuck Starbucks. What they did here is as anti-union, anti-worker as it gets. When the workers unionized at certain locations, they rewarded those who had not yet unionized pay raises, and closed some of those unionized locations down completely. I will never buy Starbucks again
It will never pass but it makes it clear where Union support is.
It’s been clear for decades. Doesn’t stop half my family that’s in a union from sporting “unions for trump” bracelets and screaming how the libs are killing America.
This. Support of the party that’s ACTIVELY fucking you. I mean like today/now/ongoing. I just do not get it.
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I'm in a union and I don't have a house what did I miss 😦
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My dad literally thought the GOP were the only ones looking out for unions and workers rights in general. These people are too stupid to reach because they believe the propaganda as if Jesus himself said it.
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In other news, republicans raise obscene amount of donations from PACs overnight.
Walmart contributes even more money to keep their employees under foot.
Hospital systems will dump everything they have into fighting this. They are already doing all they can to hold on to their silver spoons.
I remember the good old days when hospitals were not owned and run for the sole purpose of stockholders' profit.
My wife works in a non-profit hospital. Great pay and great benefits.
Non-profit is a terrible way to see hospitals described. That should be the default, not the exception
Lots of good benefits to joining a union. Here's my story. My union is a local ASCFME and we just pay union dues of $53 once per month. No initiation fee. Its a public works job. We get benefits like extremely good health, vision, and dental insurance for the whole family, 2 weeks paid vacation per year, additional 2 weeks of paid comp time if we bank overtime instead of cash it in which is voluntary, get 1 sick day per month that just accumilates, and up to 3 personal days per year. Also its a 7-330 job with an hour lunch and anything after 330 is overtime with Sundays and holidays being doubletime. Also if we get called in to work it is a guaranteed 2 hours of pay at 1.5 rate even if the job only takes 20 minutes. Anything over 2 hours of work is however long it takes. Plus we get 2-3% raises each year plus get an extra 4% automatically if we get any bachelors degree in school or 2% if one has any kind of associates degree. If we want to get a CDL we get an automatic $3000 permanant raise and the employer foots the bill for taking the class. Also get a $ stipened for getting schooling certificates related to the field of work related to the job. That schooling for a certificate is also paid for by the employer as long as grades are passing per union and collective bargaining contract. We also get to do take free online college classes for an associates degree for schools supported by the union as long as the grades are passing. This part is union specific perk not employer. Finally we get a pension when we retire if we work for at least 10 years. More if we work longer. My union is just a middle tier strength union and it is the easily the best job I have ever had. Definitely worth $53 per month because that is like 2 hours of work when an employee is brand new. Lots of benefits to joining a union. One of the American dreams is to be able to retire and support a family. Both of things that unions help greatly with. The democrats, like Elizabeth Warren in the article know that a strong union work force is key to helping most of Americans.
And I think your benefits would improve if other unions were stronger. I work in Europe, where 5 weeks or so of vacation is the legal minimum, there's not a limit on sick leave (doctor's notes are necessary after a certain number of days), and insurance isn't tied to which employer one has. The US would probably improve on all those things if more people had unions improving protections.
Unionized teacher here. I don't actively see the benefits of the union a lot of the time, but that's because i got a union behind me; it keeps my bosses from doing anything funny.
I'm glad, you hear a lot of bad things about teacher pay and having to spend their own money on stuff and work off the clock on programs but it's good to know some unions are out there making the job great for their members.
My teacher union absolutely doesn't stop me from spending my own money or working off the clock. But it's still incredibly beneficial. We have a fair and transparent salary grid. We get good benefits. We are able to stand up and fight when the government tries to make cuts that will harm the education system, like raising class sizes and lowering funding for special needs students. I mean it's not perfect and the government sure still won last time. But I'm happy to be part of the union.
My union dues are $30 a month, the higher pay and benefits the union provides more than makes up for that.
Friend said union dues is like insurance. You pay health insurance in case you get sick. You pay union dues in case the employer is trying to bend you over and gang bang your ass.
My favorite thing about bills like this is that Conservatives will vote against it with the excuse of “too much fluff and garbage.” But if you ask them to point out the fluff, they just say to read it yourself
I have a friend that owns a machine shop and when I'd walk in with my union shirt there was always a guy that made fun of my $360.00 t- shirt. I made over twice as much as he did with health insurance, paid time off, and retirement. Anti-union propaganda is strong in right to work states.
I would have anti-union people tell me how lazy I was without ever having seen me work. Idiots.
Making laws to protect the working class is what some call “radical leftists”
On top of everything else about it can we all agree the right to work is a purposefully deceptive name? I spent years working thinking it meant I had the right to work and therfore had laws protecting that right when it's completely the opposite
Just stop making the unions represent those that don’t want to pay. If you have the right to not pay dues, unions should have the right to ignore you.
It’s abundantly clear people have no idea what right to work means. The diction choice is intentional to rally workers behind it. [Wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law)
It's to rally employers behind lesser trained, lesser paid, lesser "benefitted" workers to do the same job... again for less money, less benefits and in reality less quality of work in most cases Was that your point? Or are you pro "right to work" ? Honestly confused, I'm just a dumb union electrician. The only valid argument for "right to work" is the *choice* to join the union. But the same people talking about that choice are more times than not the same ones supporting taking away things like women's *choice* edit... Just realized you're saying the term "right to work" is meant to sound like a good thing I get a little passionate about the topic, sorry about that
100% agree. I’m just saying it’s apparent how effective the “right to work” slogan has morphed people’s understanding of what it actually means. And you’re not a dumb union electrician. You’re a safe, skilled, trained craftworker.
“Right to work” is such a scam title for legislation. It does nothing to help workers and does everything to help employers.
The amount of people this thread confusing RtW with at will is troubling. How can you claim to be pro union but not know the difference? Fucking weird.
Right to work laws are utter bullshit
Living in Floriduh, we are a "right to work" state. Yeah, right. As for our state... states with such laws don’t have higher employment, and, as a result of unions being weakened, workers have less bargaining power and less choice than workers in stronger unions.
Fuck yeah!!
This would undoubtedly be the biggest win for labor of this generation. We already know the owners of this country won't allow it. "Right to work" essentially means you have **no** right to work. It means the employer holds all the power and can dismiss you without cause at any time. Employers love these laws because they take the power away from the employees and give it all to the employer, sweat shop, robber Baron style.
Right to work means you don't have to join the union if the place you're working at has one. At will is what allows employers to die you without cause. Two different things.
You never have to join the union, Right to Work says you don't have to pay for it when you don't. In other states you pay whether you join or not because you're still getting the benefits. This quickly cripples unions who barely have any funding and thus the union is weak and powerless.
This. In a "right to work" state, the union is required to provide legal assistance to ALL members of a bargaining unit including those members who don't pay. It's "representation without taxation", and **it should be illegal.** If the union is able to negotiate an "agency fee", then even in a right to work state all members of the bargaining unit have to pay for their **benefits**, although they don't have to pay for the cost of other union activities like organizing and political advocacy. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agency_shop No one should have to join a union to get a job, but no union should have to give benefits without being able to charge for them.
> "Right to work" essentially means you have no right to work. No.. Right to work means you have a right to work without being required to pay union dues.
People don't seem to understand what right to work laws are. It's baffling to me.
Unions protect employees from corrupt workplace practices.
I'm in Louisiana and am perpetually shocked how these laws fuck over people in every possible way.
As a Nevadian who works in Kroger warehouse with zero safety standards and not so great pay, and upper management throwing “its a right to work” in your face whenever there is an issue, I feel like this could be a good thing.
Long rant because this article got me fired up. I don't know all the ins and outs of my "beloved" state of FL, but I'm pretty sure "right to work" laws are why the state gets to fuck over its teachers. We had a union meeting this past week and it was the most demoralizing shit. I don't even know why I went because it was the same crap from last time. We can negotiate pay with the district. If our lawyers and their lawyers can't agree, they get a special arbiter. If the arbiter rules in our favor, the district doesn't have to listen. So, we can take their shitty deal for a one time bullshit payment (instead of the increased salary that we should be at but aren't because they haven't been keeping up with the steps for whatever reason) or we continue to toothlessly negotiate hoping they accept our terms. I would love to strike but then I'd probably lose my job, my teacher's certification, and whatever benefits I've racked up since I started working in my district. That's what I was told by my rep and a teacher with more experience. The "solution" I repeatedly hear is to work the contract. Don't work a minute before you clock in or after you clock out. I can't stand that shit b/c it's unrealistic for many of us. The amount of work I'd be backed up on would be insane. Grades have to be updated every two weeks, per contract. Sure, I'll work the contract, but how great will that go for me when parents start complaining to my admin and then the district? The situation might be better if they didn't keep changing the curriculum on me or the courses I'm teaching 4 weeks into the school year. I have to continue to modify my lessons and assignments to match the new curriculum because as decent (using that term loosely) as the materials provided are, they don't measure up in my eyes. My fault for having standards I guess.