Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/17/84; site mhuxt.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!js2j From: js2j@mhuxt.UUCP (sonntag) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: Are Unions made in Heaven? Message-ID: <608@mhuxt.UUCP> Date: Mon, 18-Feb-85 14:09:11 EST Article-I.D.: mhuxt.608 Posted: Mon Feb 18 14:09:11 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 19-Feb-85 08:31:56 EST References: <509@decwrl.UUCP> <602@mhuxt.UUCP> <601@tty3b.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill Lines: 58 >= Mike Kelly > >From: js2j@mhuxt.UUCP (sonntag) > > Yeah, UAW workers have compromised with management. Instead of the > >unlimited amount they really want, they've settled for only 20/hr and enough > >benefits to cost management $50/hr. Of course, many UAW workers are now out >>of work since American automobiles cannot compete with imports at these rates. > >And they wonder why it's economical to replace them with expensive robots. > > It's just that I think that unions currently have too much >>power. I guess that comes from having watched them 'work' while I was working > >for Chevy's Tonawanda forge. > >This last comment is simply inane. There are several million unionized workers > in the U.S. Do you mean to imply that none of them work? These kind of > comments add nothing to the dialog. The last comment was included to let people know that I really *have* worked in a union plant and actually observed the way one union worked in action. Nowhere did I imply that none of them work. Actually, most of the UAW workers in this particular plant worked at least 4-5 hrs/day. I'm not exagerrating with that number either. How did they get away with it? They had a system called a 'peg', which was a given number of pieces which had to be turned out in one day. The peg for any given machine was set so that it could be met in 4-5 hrs of work. The worker could then sit around in the employee lounge, or go to the cafeteria to have coffee with people on their twice-daily 15 minute breaks (which typically lasted much longer. Nobody minded as long as each man produced his peg.) Why was the peg so low? I asked that question too, when I first got there, and found out that if the peg for a given type of machine is raised high enough to consume 6 or more hours of a workers day, all of the workers mysteriously become *less* productive, and unable to even meet the *origional* peg. > > Regarding the vaunted international competition argument, why don't you just > look at the wage havens U.S. corporations flee to when they shut down U.S. >plants. Surprise, surprise, they often turn out to be U.S.-backed dictatorships > like South Korea or the Phillipines, where the power of the state is used to > do exactly what you would apparently like the U.S. government to do at > home -- prevent workers from forming unions. I guess you're really not as good at reading minds as you thought, Mike. (You certainly never got that idea from my article, but you must have gotten it somewhere.) I recognize the right of workers to form unions, and perceive that it is good for workers to be able to collectively bargain, and to join together to prevent unsafe working conditions, unfair practices, etc. However, I *do* think that unions currently have too much power in our country. Why should they be able to block plant entrances while striking? Why should companies be prevented from firing strikers? Why should companies be prevented from paying high-quality workers more than low-quality workers? Why should companies be forced to 'call back' people from layoffs in order of seniority rather than order of employee quality? Why should unions be able to prevent the hiring of non-union personell (even to do jobs which none of the union people have been trained for)? Now if you want to continue this disagreement, Mike, fine. But please disagree with what I've *said*. Don't make up things and say that that's what I want any more, o.k.? -- Jeff Sonntag ihnp4!mhuxt!js2j "Once more, into the breech!" -the human cannonball