The collective bargaining presumption that workers are fungible
is not always best for the lesser workers either. My wee wifey
was simply less productive than other union cabinetmakers (other
than the time she was able to climb inside the custom desk order
they forgot to build with drawer stops) which meant that when
things slowed down she simply wasn't worth what the union insisted
she had to be payed. End result was that she couldn't find work
in the field she'd spent years training for.

We were writing almost the same post at the same time.

Maybe we were seperated at birth?

Try a spell check, if you want readers.
Very difficult to interpret nearly every sentence you wrote.

Im not sure what world you were watching on TV, but in Wisconsin... McMansions?
only 64% own their home here, and in like Brown County, a fairly well off county for the sate, it's only 58%

And this with you use iPods plasma TV as some comback to a lower standard of living?
Do you have any idea what a TV cost in 1958? Compared to annual income?
DO you know what a house cost in say 1948? Compared to annual income.

Do you think that cell phones, iPods and the obvious material trappings of your age group, are relevant to anything other than your age group? These things are not different than the things of 1948, or 1958.
They have the same function, and they cost far far less than you could imagine.
This line of yours, " It ends up being a race to the bottom that brings in the worst quality people." really displays your mettle.
Based on this one paragraph, on my first visit to this blog, I, with let's say several to many decades of experience can honestly with some level of accuracy, make a claim about you.
The race to the bottom for the worst. Brilliant!
You surely don't have a grasp on your own language,
and live by assumptions you garner from obviously electronic media only.
Your writing skills leads me to believe you dont read well , either.
You never made any viable statement pertaining to your headline.
An opinion blog is great, but to have an opinion, it has to be understood, well comminucated,
with tangiible and linked ideas.
That are comipled into a reasonable and somewhat coherent flow of a language.
Which you did not come close to achieving.
Reading this like a Fox News chyron ticker, with snide question after question only shows, this reader, that you are one of the people that should really be scared.
You might be one of the worst yourself, even with your iPod.

PS: A TV in 1958 cost about $1,600, this was nearly 30% of the annual average income.
Compared to today, would you pay almost $16,000 for a similar TV when you make $42,000?
A house in 1948 cost about $4,500, and thats a three bedroom on 2 acres.
I am trying, my best to lower my writing skills to relate, but forget it.
You are a stupid kid.
Maybe reality will show, some day, and give you one upside your head.

Wow. That individual leaving that comment needs a hobby. Or to get laid.

Quality of life is a subjective term, but I heard an interview with Warren Buffett recently, where he commented on how everyone alive today lives "better" than Rockefeller did in his heyday. Homes are heated, you can travel the country in less than a day - even travel across town in less than a day. The comfort level is what he was referring to, but it raises the interesting point of what each generation EXPECTS out of the standard of living.

Oh, btw, TVs cost about $150-$250 in the 1958. http://www.gti.net/mocolib1/prices/1958.html

Your above author might want to do his homework next time. And two acres for a property? Maybe so, but the link that I just referenced has a house at 15-19000 bucks. He referenced 1948 for home prices, but that would indicate a housing market increase of three fold in just a decade. Talk about a housing boom.

Average income in 1950 was just under $3000. http://www.saintvincentferrer.com/hayn/average_income.htm
A $250 TV was 8% of the yearly income. I have a big TV, and it was about 6% of my income for that year. A TV back then was a luxury, as is having a 'big' TV now. So it's about the same ratio. A home at $15000 was 5 times the annual salary back then. My house is over 8 times my annual salary. Not that much of a difference.

I do have a hobby, and it took me about 25 seconds to find that information.

That was almost painful. I just read a completely inarticulate, almost indecipherable rant, complaining (I think...I'm still not entirely sure) about the clarity of a very simple, well laid out opinion. Both Michael and Nick wrote well on the same topic, with an obvious difference in opinion. I sincerely hope Goofticket was clowning around, and that wasn't an actual attempt at a coherent thought. I can see both sides of the argument. I certainly value the contributions made by the early unions, many of which are now codified in both our law and our evolving moral standards. However, I also grew up the son of a proud City of Milwaukee union man, who quite often outperformed all of the rest of his department combined. And I've worked in a union shop myself, while going to college, where I was the top performer in my department by week two...(until they hired my sister...darn her) I think it is a shame that we have come to the point, where one has to be embarassed to admit they are a part of a union. I believe that unions were created to take advantage of the leverage a group of dedicated workers can bring to bear. But in too many cases, they have become defenders of the less than dedicated and even the downright corrupt. There is a reason they are dying in every realm, other than government.

Nick, Nick, Nick--

As you write:

"The quality workers don't want to be paid like everyone else. They want to be paid for the quality of their work, and be recognized for it. When collective bargaining takes over, the bad teachers get paid extra just like the good. So why should any teacher work harder and go the extra mile for their kids? Of course there are some who simply do it because they care about their kids. But there are only so many of those rare apples, and they often times give up when they see their extra effort isn't recognized."

Hey, a lot of us "quality workers" have been waiting for years to be "recognized for it," but have yet to see such recognition from employers in the only way that really counts--in pay, benefits, and working conditions. Being told how much one is valued and appreciated without compensation and advancement to match won't help one pay the rent or mortgage, buy groceries, or enjoy life's better things. Ultimately, employers that don't truly reward good workers often make such workers ask what doing good work really brings them--and also makes a lot of them remember that unions generally do help make sure that good, hard work really *is* rewarded with a fair share of the wealth workers themselves mainly create.

Why is it somehow all right for the rich and powerful to organize themselves into corporations, trade associations, and the like (including organizations that lobby for and otherwise seek policies that better their own positions at the expense of working people–including the Republican Party and its ilk?), but somehow “greedy,” “selfish,” or even “un-American” when working people do the very same thing to protect and advance their own rights and interests?

Unions and the right to form and collectively bargain through them for better pay and working conditions are not only all-American–they’re among the main reasons why America’s now-endangered middle class took root and grew. The time of the greatest growth in prosperity for the greatest number of Americans “just happens” to be the time that working people and their unions were strongest in America. Just as that king of hypocrites, Ronald Reagan, asked in 1980, are *you* better off than you were four (or, more accurately, six or 25) years ago?

Most of us aren’t. Might that just have something to do with the most organized assault on America’s workers and American living standards–and on unions–we’ve seen since the 1920s?

I, for one, proudly salute Michael King and his courageous column in the February 26, 2007, _Milwaukee Journal Sentinel_.

As any basic economics textbook will tell you, a truly free market can exist only when the parties involved have relatively equal bargaining power. Does anyone *really* think that a lone, unrepresented wage-earner has any fair chance to strike a fair bargain with a multimillion-dollar corporation, especially in our deliberately pay-stagnant, job-scarce, “Bushed” economy?

For far too many committed, high-quality American workers, this one included, doing a good job has done a lot for employers’ and executives’ bottom lines, but not much for most of those who really make employers profitable–us workers!

American workers, and America’s middle class, have been under siege for most of the last 30 years or so, especially under the likes of Reagan and George W. Bush. Unions and their members and supporters are among the most vital bulwarks in stopping our nation’s headlong rush under such “leaders” back to the days of Herbert Hoover, if not William McKinley.

For “free enterprise” to be truly free, it must be fair enterprise. Like pro-worker legislation, labor unions are a vital part of keeping our economy and our nation, to use a famous phrase from elsewhere, “fair and balanced.” In our modern, industrialized world, one where most of us must work for others for our livelihoods, unions are integral to any real democracy.

As King in essence asks, as I’ve asked so many of my fellow workers over most of this time, look at history. Left to many employers, most of us would still be working six or seven days a week, for 25 cents an hour, with few benefits and even fewer rights. What will it take before America’s endangered middle class stops swallowing the Jack Bauer and Horatio Alger myths?

To those who think that their being good workers will somehow help them maintain their living standards in modern America, I say: Guess again. Wait until your bosses decide to lay you off when your pay suddenly becomes too high for their greedy tastes, or perhaps simply when you reach a certain age. (Yes, this has happened to many of us, this worker included–thus are many working people “rewarded” for their hard work, commitment, and loyalty. Don’t laugh. It can happen to you or to someone about whom you care.)

As King justly notes, what will your misplaced faith in the myths do for you (and your family) then?

It is long past time to start encouraging union building, not union busting, in America. The right to form and collectively bargain through labor unions is not only a right (ostensibly)protected under United States law, but one recognized as a fundamental human right by many international organizations. But many employers in our “free” country now brazenly ignore this right and the law.

This is wrong.

This must stop–*now*.

We must thus not only enact the proposed Employee Free Choice Act, but end such grossly unfair practices as the inequitable and pernicious legal doctrine of “employment at will,” replacing it with a “just cause” standard.

Indeed, we should go much further than the Employee Free Choice Act would in penalizing employers that violate workers’ sovereign right to form and bargain collectively through unions by providing for mandatory prison terms and confiscation of corporate *and* personal assets for scofflaw employers, executives, and managers, with such assets redistributed to wronged workers. Only when we make the cost of violating workers’ rights clearly more costly than any perceived benefit to employers of doing so will we once again start to see workers and their rights again respected in our “free” country.

We must also explicitly protect Americans’ rights to engage in lawful political (and other) activities as they choose without fear of employment discrimination.

Let’s take back our country, our economy, our rights, our futures, and the American dream. If that means that we must make the coming years an era that will make the 1960s look tranquil, so be it!

Scott Enk

senk8105@sbcglobal.net

For some good reading on the issues that affect us all–yes, you included–take a look at such fine books at David Sirota’s _Hostile Takeover_ and Thom Hartmann’s _Screwed_, as well as the Web sites of such organizations as the National Workrights Institute, Workplace Fairness, Working America, and American Rights at Work!

I think the most ridiculous part of Mr. King’s column is where he poses supposedly difficult questions regarding the ability of individuals to make it on their own.

Mr. King: “How will lower taxes and a deregulated business climate help you when your company sends your job overseas to boost their profits?”

When companies go overseas for labor, the trade off is often in quality or skill. In order to keep your job, you need to upgrade your skills and increase your quality and productivity. Or, you could accept less money. Lower taxes and fewer regulations would also make it less costly to employ workers in the United States.

Mr. King: “How is giving up a defined-benefit retirement plan for a 401(k) going to help you when the stock market crashes and takes your life savings with it?”

It will help you because you have been responsible enough to diversify your portfolio, so when your company has to declare bankruptcy because of the insurmountable unfunded liability within the pension plan, you actually still have enough money to retire.

Mr. King: “How is your high-deductible health savings account going to help you when you, your spouse or one of your kids develops a chronic, debilitating condition?”

It will help because I will still have SOME health insurance as opposed to NO health insurance. It will also help because it will allow me to be able to fund those costs, which are my responsibility, with MORE money because my taxes have been reduced, as opposed to having to pay these costs with after tax funds.

The last one is the best however (for a laugh, that is),

Mr. King: “How will you earn those bonuses and pay incentives when you’re old, ill or out-worked by the next generation of younger, better-educated co-workers?”

Mr. King’s answer is “you won’t.” My answer is that since you are a sensible person, you have taken the time and effort to upgrade your own skills and abilities so that the new generation isn’t any better educated than yourself. You also rely on your own experiences to guide you to find more efficient and effective ways to perform your job. Having also planned for contingencies, the long-term disability insurance that you carry will help to support you in case you fall prey to illness.

I just can’t fathom thinking so little of my own capabilities to subscribe to Mr. King’s philosophy.

Mr. Arndorfer--

As the experience of many proven workers who have long and continuously upgraded their skills and knowledge has shown in recent years, doing so and doing an ever-improving good job is no guarantee of advancement, or even security, in many workplaces in modern America. Many employers now want only the young, the gullible, the malleable, and, above all, the *cheap*. Indeed, many highly talented workers have found themselves among the first, not the last, to be laid off because greedy, untrammeled employers, in their lunatic drive for profit at *an*y cost, now target such high-quality employees as "too expensive." I know--it was at least once done to me, rated highest in performance by the very employer that made me among the first it laid off. What sort of motivation, what sort of incentive, is that to succeed, much less excel? (Ever notice, however, how employer concern about costs vanishes when it comes to *executives' and managers'* salaries, benefits, and perks?) Can *you* say "overqualified"?

That term, like "fit," when used by employers, is usually not a reason for not treating workers fairly, but an excuse. "Overqualified" makes no sense--if you need a doctor, a lawyer, a police officer, or a firefighter, do you ever worry if that person is "overqualified"? Employers must pay people what they are truly worth. (Yes, that would mean raising a lot of "ordinary" workers' pay--and cutting that of a lot of executives and managers.) Like other forms of discrimination, age discrimination is now rampant in our "Bushed," deliberately job-scarce economy.

If there is to be any further downsizing, let it be of excessive executive and managerial salaries, perks, powers, and egos. Now that, to use an infamous corporate euphemism, would truly be "rightsizing."

Markets are made to serve people, not people for markets. When markets harm people and their rights, the market is what must be reformed and changed. Without unions, laws protecting workers' rights, and the like, you and I and most other American workers would again be working six or seven days a week, for 25 cents an hour with few benefits and even fewer rights. Think about that.

And, yes, support the Employee Free Choice Act, a vital step toward restoring working people's most basic rights in America and toward rebuilding our endangered middle class and the American dream.

The February 27 edition of _The Washington Post_ includes an excellent article about the bill and why it is so important to you and to all of us. Writer Lance Compa justly calls this bill vital to real workplace democracy. You can read the article at this link:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/26/AR2007022601245.html

Right on!

Write on--today. Let's keep taking back our country, our economy, our rights, and our futures.

Scott Enk

senk8105@sbcglobal.net

Nick--

What do you think many employers in modern America now do--even though it's illegal--to some 30,000 workers a year for being pro-union or even being suspected thereof? If being threatened, harassed, or adversely affected at one's job to the point of being fired isn't "retribution," please tell us all--what is?

In our "Bushed," deliberately low-pay, job-scarce economy, the loss of one's job is a frightening prospect. Many employees, *especially* proven, experienced ones, find it difficult at best to find another job quickly, especially one that is at least as good as the previous one. While unlawfully fired employees often descend into poverty, sometimes losing their cherished possessions, homes, and even families, their scofflaw employers laugh all the way to the bank, knowing that at worst they'll be required to provide a wrongly fired worker with back pay minus any income that worker gained since having been fired.

Does that sound fair to you, Nick? What does that say about the rule of law and respect for the law in a democratic society?

Do you *really* think it right, or even tolerable, that a person should have to risk his or her livelihood and future for daring to exercise a right supposedly protected under the law of the land and recognized as a fundamental human right by many international organizations?

Not to me, it isn't. Such employers should be required to pay wronged workers triple, including punitive, damages--and, at least in egregious or repeated cases, even imprisoned, with personal as well as corporate assets confiscated and redistributed to wronged workers.

The proposed Employee Free Choice Act, while it doesn't go that far, does commendably go a long way toward making the right to join and bargain through a union truly meaningful. In addition to its well-known, much-needed "card check" provisions designed to make organizing unions free of employer intimidation or reprisal easier, the EFCA would provide for (1) civil fines of up to $20,000 per violation against employers found to have willfully or repeatedly violated employees’ rights during an organizing campaign or first contract drive; (2) increases the amount an employer is required to pay when an employee is discharged or discriminated against during an organizing campaign or first contract drive to three times back pay; and (3) requiring that, just as the National Labor Relations Board is now required to
seek a federal court injunction against a union whenever there is reasonable cause to believe
the union has violated the secondary-boycott prohibitions in current law, the NLRB must seek a
federal court injunction against an employer whenever there is reasonable cause to believe
the employer has discharged or discriminated against employees, threatened to discharge
or discriminate against employees, or engaged in conduct that significantly interferes with
employee rights during an organizing or first contract drive. The EFCA would authorize courts to grant temporary restraining orders or other appropriate injunctive relief.

If enacted, the EFCA would thus go a long way toward curbing employer abuses of workers' sovereign rights and assuring a fair "playing field" for American workers,

Take a look at the video at this link and tell us all what *you* think:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TEnFYnErLg

And for plenty of good information about the EFCA, take a look at this link:

http://www.aflcio.org/joinaunion/voiceatwork/efca/

I salute the majority of the members of the U.S. House of Representatives for today passing the EFCA, which would once again make the right most American workers (supposedly) enjoy to form and bargain collectively through unions a reality. Now it's on to the Senate.

George W. Bush, renowned as usual for his stupidity and arrogance, has pledged to veto the EFCA if it comes to his desk. Well, he might, but if he and his party think the 2006 elections were bad, just wait until his party loses the White House, as it deserves to anyway, in 2008.

And if businesses that have abused workers and their rights think the New Deal was bad, wait until they have to face the pent-up rage of millions of American workers and their families in a wave of reform and regulation that will move Amerika so far to the left that it will look like--well, America again!

I'm looking forward to seeing us workers continue to take back our country, our economy, our rights, our futures, and the American dream. How about you, Nick?

"Union Yes!"

Scott Enk

senk8105@sbcglobal.net