3718

I have so much I would like to say about that Boeing situation, but the specific angle we are discussing is not something I can share all I’d like as it does directly interact with my employer.

Lets just say there are good contractors, and bad contractors, and I happen to know some on the Boeing side, as well as the players in that field.

3719

Craig, you have crafted the Vaguebook-iest post on QT3 in recent months. Well done!

(I don’t doubt there’s plenty of nuance to that whole situation. I’d be shocked if the broad through-line of “executives don’t understand engineering, cut costs by axing senior/lead types, and got a lesson that nobody will ever learn from about why you pay senior/lead types what you do” isn’t largely true.)

3720

Already starting to happen.

3721

I knew a lot of Deere workers back in the day. I wouldn’t want to be a scab at Deere.

3722

Amazing the lengths companies will go to to avoid paying people.

I’m curious what the insurance company handling John Deere thinks about all this.

3723

I think there’s a difference between supporting a union’s/set of workers’ right to strike and assuming that the union is always right and that the company should acquiesce. I’m admittedly ignorant of the details of this particular strike, but I don’t think company trying to last out a strike (e.g., by bringing in internal or external scabs) is, per se, egregious.

3724

My experiences with unions as a teen were why I voted republican for 20 years.

3725

My experience working 25 years for a fortune 500 company showed me they’re amoral psychopaths.

I of course realize this isn’t exactly a newsflash to anyone.

3726

It certainly was a major factor in me being a Republican. I still believe that generally, companies that have unions deserve them.

3727

My experiences working college-age jobs and seeing the abuse and indoctrination in them introduced me to leftism.

3728

My experience with Unions protecting my father from being fired after false aligations from his job is why I have been a Democrat since I could vote.

Unions are why I only have to work an 8 hour day, instead of the 9 to 10 I was working with the private sector. It’s also probably why my salary automatically increases with inflation.

Honestly, there is a pretty strong correlation between the reduction of Union participation and salaries these last 3 or 4 decades.

But I guess unions stifle the ability of middle management from being tyrants, or the CEOs from taking 160% increase in there own salaries.

3729

A worker lead union is always right. One that only cares about it’s own existance, not so much. Unfortunately, the former is now a rarity.

3730

The only thing more evil than a big union is a big company that doesn’t have to deal with a union.

3731

Every employee at my company has always gotten a cost of living increase to their wage, as the bare minimum before any performance based raises, every year the company has been in existence, and we don’t have a union.

Maybe your Union is great for you, I’m just pointing out that they are not the only way for employees to be treated well.

3732

Yes. Without unions, employees can hope that they have a benevolent overboard boss, or they can hope that government will step in when they don’t, or they can hope there is another, better job they can bounce to. Unions exist, were developed, because, for most of human history, those first two hopes didn’t yield consistent good results. And the third was really a pipe dream for most people.

3733

Unions exist because many jobs could be commoditized, where there was no shortage of labor any basically any functional human being could do the work. In those kinds of situations, where an individual laborer had very little individual differentiation, and this little individual bargaining power.

For instance, part of the reason that my company tries to treat it’s employees well, is because we can’t just pull random people in off the street to perform the job.

3734

I’m genuinely glad you do this, but there are 8 billion people in the world, more or less. Everyone is a potentially a labor commodity.

3735

Unions level the playing field so that company prosperity is shared a little bit more fairly. This is why the people in the John Deere Factory are striking right now.

Something to keep in mind is that the loss of Union positions strongly correlates with the stagnation of wages across the board. So despite how good your one small company might be, it is hardly enough to correct the ongoing hollowing out of the US and the Middle Class.

3736

My union experience is that when we unionized, our wages went up 15%, and we have better job security.

The only downside was it did make it difficult to get rid of one person, but eventually that problem solved itself. Also we get our paychecks on time.

3737

I read that and thought it was a joke. Those are my expenses per year! Actually…my annual expenses are half that…F*ck…

And I would still only+ consider the $14/hr job. Seems easy enough.