Stephen, J. Cabot blog

February 19, 2010

PLAY BALL!

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 5:50 pm

 

With the start of the  baseball season just around the corner, players and owners have much to consider. To wit: stadium attendance has dropped by more than 6%, and the collective bargaining agreement of the baseball franchises expires just after the 2011 season. Thus far, there has been scant news about disputes between management and players; however, that is not necessarily an indication that numerous dissatisfactions aren’t brewing.

According to an article in New York Newsday, Bud Selig stated: “I’ve been thinking about it [the collective bargaining agreement] a lot. (Major League Baseball executive vice president of labor relations and human resources) Rob Manfred and I have a lot of conversations about it. Rarely do I have it off my mind. We’ve had 14 straight seasons of uninterrupted action, though, featuring two CBAs negotiated peacefully. The first one, in 2002, went down to the final minutes. The more recent one, in 2006, reached agreement months before the deadline. That history must count for something, to both sides, as do the relatively positive relationships that have been constructed.”

While the Obama administration is attempting to push forward its pro-union agenda, baseball fans, disturbed by past labor conflicts, are generally hopeful that there will be no strike to disrupt the call of “Play Ball.” And not only the fans, but also the owners and players are hopeful that labor peace can be maintained.

In fact, professional baseball may offer an example of how labor and management can cooperate for the overall good of the economy. Corporate America and organized labor both have a vital stake in increased productivity, profitability, and cooperation. And that can be achieved by putting aside petty differences and working together to bring about shared goals. The adversarial culture, which often permeates all aspects of labor relations, is an obstacle that both sides should work to eliminate, regardless of who in Washington is pushing a pro-union agenda.

February 12, 2010

WILL DOC BURNSTEIN’S ICE CREAM MELT?

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 4:40 pm

In the town of Santa Maria in California, there is a popular ice cream shop: Doc Burnstein’s  Ice Cream Lab. Doc’s is not General Motors nor is it Ford. It is not Pepsi nor is it Coca Cola. It is a small establishment run by its founder, Greg Steinberger.

It seems that the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America Local 150 is not pleased with Doc’s. On the other hand, the carpenters’ union is not popular with the local Tri-Counties Building and Construction Trades Council, nor is it popular with the AFL-CIO. It has disassociated itself from both groups.

Member of the carpenters’ union have been protesting outside Doc’s Ice Cream Lab since October 2009, because they believe that the ice cream shop used non-union workers to expand the size of the store.

According to the Santa Maria Times:  “People hired by the United Brotherhood of Carpenters Local 150 of Camarillo have been holding a banner outside Doc Burnstein’s Ice Cream Lab on the belief the Arroyo Grande business hired a nonunion contractor to build out its space in the Santa Maria Town Center, a job the union wanted. However, Doc Burnstein’s is not paying for the drywall work; it is paid for by the mall. Steinberger said the National Labor Relations Board, which oversees union activities, believes the protest in Arroyo Grande violates the National Labor Relations Act by being [sic] actions against a third party. He filed charges against the union with the NLRB, but those charges are awaiting final review by the board.”

This is just another example of a union victimizing a small business. It is no wonder why the vast majority of Americans believe that unions are an obstacle to the success of the country and its entrepreneurs who create small businesses and provide employment to millions of workers.

January 29, 2010

STICKS & STONES CAN BREAK YOUR BONES, BUT CARELESS EPITHETS ARE SELF-DEFEATING

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen Cabot @ 2:00 pm

 

In politics, there is a great deal of name calling, disparagement of one’s opponents, and assorted calumnies spread through rumor mills. There is also a maxim that “it is easier to attract flies with honey than with vinegar.”

 

Attempting to defame one’s political enemies is a sure sign of desperation that will have a contrary effect to one’s intentions. Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is his latest broadside has accused Senators Joe Leiberman and Ben Nelson of being “terrorists” for their opposition to the bill that would create “card checks” under the union-endorsed Employee Free Choice Act.

 

From Osama bin Laden to the Christmas Day bomber, America has been targeted by one terrorist after another. To place Senators Lieberman and Nelson in that same criminal category as those who are motivated to kill Americans is not merely absurd, but it is a form of defamation that will generate considerable skepticism about Andy Stern’s values and methods of cogitation.

 

If one’ mission as head of a union is to convince as many Americans as possible that  union membership is desirable outcome for all, Andy Stern has a peculiar tactic for convincing them of his project. How many pro-union entomological subjects has he attracted by spritzing vinegar on the reputations of others? No wonder why most Americans perceive unions as creating obstacles to national prosperity.

 

 

January 15, 2010

RESPECT FOR WHOM?

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 4:56 pm

In the current political climate, Corporate America (to borrow a phrase from Rodney Dangerfield) “gets no respect.” Unions are rallying again for what they cleverly call RESPECT for supervisory personnel. At issue is the Re-Empowerment of Skilled and Professional Employees and Construction Tradeworkers (RESPECT), which had originally been introduced in 2007 by Senator Dodd, but which may be taken up by a new congress.

 

The National Labor Relations Act defines a supervisor as an employee with the authority to “hire, transfer, suspend, lay off, recall, promote, discharge, assign, reward, or discipline other employees, or to responsibly direct them, or to adjust their grievances, or effectively to recommend such action.” In other words, supervisors are part of a company’s management, and management cannot be organized by unions. To do so would create divided loyalties.

 

The Respect Act would eliminate the responsibility of supervisors from assigning and responsibly directing non-supervisory personnel. The effect would be that all supervisors would become like all other employees and be eligible to join unions. The ensuing value to union coffers is estimated to be in the many millions of dollars. In this Alice in Wonderland world proposed by unions to the NLRB, there would be no line separating supervisors from workers. Where would the allegiance of supervisors be if they are on the picket lines, cheek by jowl, with those they had once supervised? And should card checks become law, one can easily imagine supervisors pressuring employees to sign those cards! In such a situation, it would be impossible for supervisors to carry out the goals of management.

 

This proposed Act is obviously no respecter of logic or common sense. It is, instead, part of our brave new world where union leaders not only frequently visit the White House whose occupant’s political campaign enjoyed the benefits of tens of millions of dollars raised by unions, but where unions are visiting upon the country an ongoing assault on economic well being and growth. Corporate America does – indeed – get no respect.

 

 

 

December 18, 2009

UNION MEMBERS REVOLT

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 4:19 pm

 

Municipal employees in Portland Maine have decided to show their unhappiness with the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). Many local union members (Local 1373) feel that they pay expensive dues and are not receiving sufficient job protections. More than ninety of their members were laid off from their city jobs.

 

Now 450 members of the union have received ballots, giving them the opportunity to decertify the union.  The local AFSCME sends the national office $130,000 a year, and feels that it’s not getting its money’s worth.

 

Local leaders had filed a petition in October with 200 signatures that asked for decertification ballots. As a result, those leaders were suspended from their leadership positions, and the Local’s assets were seized. In addition, the National office has been running local ads critical of the Local.

 

As we reported last week in our report about SEIU, a union that is in a war with a break-away union, this is another example of intense dissension within the ranks of organized labor. As unions become increasingly more superfluous, their internecine battles increase in ferocity. Organized labor, unable to connect with workers, are fighting with each other for the ever diminishing number of workers who still find what is chimerical value in being union members.

December 11, 2009

ORGANIZED LABOR’S CIVIL WAR

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 5:50 pm

One of the most aggressive unions in the country, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) will now face a challenge to its dominant role representing healthcare workers in California. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has called for an election to determine if SEIU or the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW) will represent 2,300 Kaiser healthcare workers in California.

 

The decision of the NLRB came as a blow to SEIU in its ongoing battle with the breakaway healthcare union, NUHW. SEIU had hoped to stop NUHW’s ongoing march to win the allegiance of thousands of healthcare workers in a wide array of states. As part of its PR war, the two sides have exchanged charges of various acts of wrong doing, including financial mismanagement. Perhaps the most hilarious charge leveled by the unions is union-busting. It’s usually the paladins of Corporate America who are accused of being union busters. If the labor movement has ever evidenced its true agenda, the bitter battle between these two unions indicates that power and money are as important to unions as they are to other institutions.

Determined to preserve its power, the SEIU says it will appeal the NLRB decision. If, however, the SEIU appeal fails, balloting is expected to take place in January.

The fight between SEIU and NUHW amounts to a civil war within the labor movement. The unintended victor will be Corporate America, and the millions of workers who will regard unionization with a richly deserved sense of skepticism, if not disgust.  



November 20, 2009

THE UNION AS CULT

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 5:44 pm

 

While the New York Times is generally thought of as being union friendly in its reporting, it recently reported on a union situation so egregious that the Times could not avoid it.

 

According to a report by Steven Greenhouse, the hotel and restaurant workers’ union, Unite Here, pressures it organizers to reveal the most embarrassing and distressing personal information to their superiors. Such information may include stories of childhood or spousal abuse, family members who were alcoholic or drug addicted, sexual abuse, phobias, etc.

 

Once that information is obtained by the union, it is then used as leverage against the organizers who had revealed that information.

 

According the Times article, “…several Unite Here organizers described high-pressure meetings where they were brought to tears as supervisors pushed them, sometimes in front of a dozen colleagues, to divulge personal information in what several organizers said was an effort to beak their will and ensure obedience.”

 

Such tactics smack of those used by cults to control members. And those tactics are nothing short of being highly manipulative and cynical.

 

If this is what organized labor has devolved to, then Corporate America must be on heightened alert to the efforts of organizers who have been turned into aggressive automatons whose sole purpose is to capture the hearts and minds of workers who will follow orders and pay their dues, no questions asked.

November 13, 2009

TAX PAYERS BEWARE

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 6:30 pm

According to the Bureau of National Affairs, most unionized employees now work for the government.  While the overall number of unionized workers is just above 12% of the workforce, only 7.3% of those union members work in the private sector.

 

What is amazing is that more than 37% of all government employees belong to unions! That amounts to 8-million unionized government workers! The government has become the largest employer of unionized workers, and those unionized workers make sure that their voices ring loud and clear in the halls of congress as well as in the White House. After all, unions contributed more than $56-million to Democratic political campaigns in 2008.

 

While those government workers cannot go on strike for higher wages, increased benefits, or more paid vacation days; they can  and do have their officers lobby congress to achieve those results.

 

An example of union strategy has become apparent on the west coast where unions have been running television ads and supporting ballot initiatives  to raise taxes so that their members can receive higher wages. One need only stand on line at a local post office or motor vehicles office to experience union-protected inefficiencies and lack of initiative.

 

As a result of union demands, taxpayers will be footing the bill for increased taxes. And those taxes will  go to pay for unionized government workers increased salaries and benefit. As the government pays ever high wages, it will have no alternative but  to impose ever higher taxes to meet the demand. It is a classic vicious circle.

November 6, 2009

UNIONS LOSE!

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 5:06 pm

One thing that Tuesday’s elections proved is that union money is not going to win elections this year. In 2008, the Service Employees International Union spent $60-million to help elect President Obama and Democratic candidates to both houses of congress. Altogether, organized labor gave Democratic candidates $400-million in 2008. That money may have been well spent then, but look at the outcome in 2009!

 

Governor John Corzine’s various and well-publicized relationships with unions hurt both him and the unions in New Jersey. In Virginia, Governor-elect Bob McDonnell won by large margin after vigorously campaigning against the Employee Free Choice Act. In both states, conservative Republicans triumphed over union supported candidates.

 

And now many Democrats, having analyzed the election results, are against the so-called “card check” provision of the Employee Free Choice Act. Unions have invested their members’ money with, what some would consider, Quixotic abandon. And what has been the return on that investment? The defeat of two pro-union candidates and the likely demise of “card checks.” Union members should demand refunds!

October 30, 2009

ON THE WINGS OF COMMON SENSE

Filed under: Employee Free Choice Act — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , — Stephen J. Cabot @ 4:10 pm

 

The safety of airline passengers is of paramount importance not just to passengers, but also to airlines. No one wants to fly on the planes of an airline whose pilots may be negligent when it comes to passenger safety.

 

When FAA regulators revoked the licenses of the two pilots who flew Northwest Flight 188 more than 100 miles beyond its destination and who had not responded to air traffic controllers, the flying public breathed a sigh of relief.

 

Yet, officials of the Airline Pilots Association, which represents more than 50,000 pilots, complained that the FAA acted too quickly and disregarded voluntary safety reporting programs.

 

Blatant acts of negligence that could possibly endanger the lives of airline passengers cannot be tolerated, even if those acts are voluntarily reported.

 

Had that plane collided with another aircraft or experienced some other deadly catastrophe, the airline would have been held financially responsible and there would have been millions of dollars in law suits.

 

The FAA did the right thing, and the pilots’ union should understand that. Unfortunately, unions too often raise picayune issues that are of concern to their members, but fail to address more important issues that affect millions of people. 

« Newer Posts — Older Posts »