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Right to work laws

DO you support right to work laws?

  • yes

    Votes: 32 55.2%

  • no

    Votes: 24 41.4%

  • not sure

    Votes: 2 3.4%
  • Total voters
    58
jet57 said:
What right to work laws do is weaken a union's ability to negotiate better contracts. That is to say, less than 100% upsets the balance of power.
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I agree with your stated conclusion, but not a conclusion that RTW laws are bad. I sense that you favor them, so correct me if I'm wrong..

For example, living wages are much lower in the state of Alabama where many auto manufacturers have set up shop and more are coming. If those plants were to unionize, the wages would climb for sure, but the cost of living as well as the cost of the vehicles produced would rise as well. Most auto workers in Alabama have a wage that compares favorably with those in other states when adjusted for COL. However, their workforce is not quite as educated, which I think justifies a lower wage. FWIW, the area around the Huyndai plant in Montgomery has abysmal education outcomes not entirely the fault of the schools (large numbers of single/no parent homes, drug usage, etc).

It's a win-win for Alabama to have RTW laws that allow those to work that might not be employable at the wages negotiated based on nationwide averages. (edited) It may not be so in other states where wages can be justifiably negotiated upward.

Not a complete argument, but the best I can make in 5 min.
 
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jwzg said:
I agree with your stated conclusion, but not a conclusion that RTW laws are bad. I sense that you favor them, so correct me if I'm wrong..

For example, living wages are much lower in the state of Alabama where many auto manufacturers have set up shop and more are coming. If those plants were to unionize, the wages would climb for sure, but the cost of living as well as the cost of the vehicles produced would rise as well. Most auto workers in Alabama have a wage that compares favorably with those in other states when adjusted for COL. However, their workforce is not quite as educated, which I think justifies a lower wage. FWIW, the area around the Huyndai plant in Montgomery has abysmal education outcomes not entirely the fault of the schools (large numbers of single/no parent homes, drug usage, etc).

It's a win-win for Alabama to have RTW laws. It may not be so in other states where wages can be justifiably negotiated upward.

Not a complete argument, but the best I can make in 5 min.
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The evidence for the claim that increasing wages for auto workers would result in increased COL is weak, at best. Even worse, it is an argument that workers should desire lower wages, a claim that is obviously ridiculous
 
Lovebug said:
They should be able to work, but not enjoy union contract work conditions or pay, should they choose not to pay their dues.
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I agree with you 150%. Right to work laws were invented to weaken unions.
 
danielpalos said:
I support, Right to Work laws that outlaw homelessness due to a right to work.
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How do you accomplish that? Have the gestapo round them up and hold them at gunpoint while they put in 8-12 hrs?
 
Masterhawk said:
For those who don't know, a right to work law is a law in a US state which prohibits unionized workplaces from forcing workers to join a union. Opponents of such laws say that they make unions harder to form and lower wages while supporters say that they keep unions accountable.
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Right to work laws have nothing to do with holding unions accountable, that's 100% bull****.

Right to work laws makes about as much sense as giving people the right to decide whether or not they want to pay taxes, and claiming that it will hold government accountable because people will only pay taxes if they're happy with what the government is doing. That's a load of bull****. If you let people voluntarily choose whether they want to pay taxes nobody will pay taxes. The government would collapse, and nothing will get paid for. Either that or you end up with a relatively small handful of nice people paying to solve a problem that realistically benefits the entire country. The whole concept behind a union(and the United States of America is a Union) is that there are somethings you simply cannot do well on your own. You have more leverage, more bargaining power, and things are overall cheaper and easier to do if you consolidate your power under one centralized authority that handles it for you.

If you work for a company with a union you benefit from the union whether you're technically a member or not. If the union negotiates an extra holiday around Christmas time the whole plant shuts down. You can't have one or two non-union people showing up to run a production line when everyone else is gone.

Unions are democratic organizations. If you don't like the Union, don't like the leadership, don't think you're getting as much as you'd like out of that union then you have a right to speak up about it. You can vote for new leadership. If you really want you can even run for office and become a union leader. That is how you hold a union accountable just like that is how you hold your government accountable.
 
Mixed.


I live in a right-to-work state. We joke that it really means "right to be fired for no reason".

OTOH I know people from states where it is nearly impossible to get a decent job without a union card; furthermore many places have union problems with corruption, kickbacks and so forth.

It seems to be a mixed bag with both versions having their own set of problems.
 
Goshin said:
Mixed.


I live in a right-to-work state. We joke that it really means "right to be fired for no reason".

OTOH I know people from states where it is nearly impossible to get a decent job without a union card; furthermore many places have union problems with corruption, kickbacks and so forth.

It seems to be a mixed bag with both versions having their own set of problems.
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A fifteen dollar an hour minimum wage will put upward pressure on wages and remove some pressure and opportunities for corruption from unions.
 
jwzg said:
I agree with your stated conclusion, but not a conclusion that RTW laws are bad. I sense that you favor them, so correct me if I'm wrong..

For example, living wages are much lower in the state of Alabama where many auto manufacturers have set up shop and more are coming. If those plants were to unionize, the wages would climb for sure, but the cost of living as well as the cost of the vehicles produced would rise as well. Most auto workers in Alabama have a wage that compares favorably with those in other states when adjusted for COL. However, their workforce is not quite as educated, which I think justifies a lower wage. FWIW, the area around the Huyndai plant in Montgomery has abysmal education outcomes not entirely the fault of the schools (large numbers of single/no parent homes, drug usage, etc).

It's a win-win for Alabama to have RTW laws that allow those to work that might not be employable at the wages negotiated based on nationwide averages. (edited) It may not be so in other states where wages can be justifiably negotiated upward.

Not a complete argument, but the best I can make in 5 min.
Click to expand...

I am against right to work laws; I see them as intentionally destructive to cohesion in the work place. As for who works in the south, the south has been the favorite of auto manufacturers because of anti union sentiment that dates before the Civil war; it's purely political and has everything to do with 'northern aggression'. Lower wages and benefits are another reason, that you have pointed out, but more education on the part of line force will never raise wags and benefits down there: the fact is fear is the motivator against any concerns for upward scale living. Unions have zero to do with who's employable and who;s not. Union people are sent away and fired all the time for unemployable reasons. My own union had guys with "lived at the hiring hall" as we'd say; they did lousy work, they went out for the day's wages only and none of us wanted them on our docks. They were the first to get "do not send letters" from the employers to the hall.

Right to work laws have nefarious ends in mind. If you want the proof, just look at the sate of labor and the income gap and temporary work world that exists today.
 
danielpalos said:
A fifteen dollar an hour minimum wage will put upward pressure on wages and remove some pressure and opportunities for corruption from unions.
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Nationwide, a 15/hr min wage is unsupportable. There are some places where cost of living is so high you need 15/hr just to survive; many other places, 15/hr is too high for most entry-level or low-end jobs and it would cause major unemployment.
 
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
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The South must also help out, at every opportunity!
 
faithful_servant said:
That's why we need a "trade guild" model for unions and not the current model. The unions should be responsible for setting and maintaining skills and practices and not be bullying employers for wages and benefits. While unions once were doing some really good things, that time has long passed. Safety is now very well handled by OSHA and employment practices are now covered by BOLI. Pay and benefits should be handled by the employee/employer, not by a 3rd party using strong-arm tactics.
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Our local is much more "European". Cooperative. We give when we need to and fight when we need to. But we kill at this work. Even when we work for people who don't want to use us but are required by the property they are impressed with our efficiency and professionalism. We change minds.

But to your point that the government is all that is necessary, this line always comes from Conservatives who also believe the government can't do anything right. So I have to take that with a grain of salt.
 
sangha said:
No one is forced to join a union. The misnamed right-to-work laws are really businesses-have-no-right-to-decide-who-is-not-qualified-to-work-for-them laws.
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When I was hired at very large Aerospace company in 1966 I was required to join the IAM union...Later that was rule was overturned but if you didn't join the union you still had to pay a 'Agency Fee', which was the same as the required union dues. So yes when I went work at that company you did have to join the union.
 
Goshin said:
Nationwide, a 15/hr min wage is unsupportable. There are some places where cost of living is so high you need 15/hr just to survive; many other places, 15/hr is too high for most entry-level or low-end jobs and it would cause major unemployment.
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Agree....$15 dollar an hour in New York City is hardly a living wage. But in some rural areas $15 is a living wage. 'One size fits all' doesn't apply in the $15 debate.
 
What if...? said:
Our local is much more "European". Cooperative. We give when we need to and fight when we need to. But we kill at this work. Even when we work for people who don't want to use us but are required by the property they are impressed with our efficiency and professionalism. We change minds.

But to your point that the government is all that is necessary, this line always comes from Conservatives who also believe the government can't do anything right. So I have to take that with a grain of salt.
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Most conservatives I know simply understand that there are places where the gov't is needed and places where it isn't needed, there are places where the gov't is very competent at what it does and places where it's really crappy at what it does. BOLI and OSHA are two of the better ran parts of the gov't. I'll even go so far as to say that unions have a lot to do with their existence, but their existence also negates a lot of the claimed needs that unions fill.

Unions, IMO should not have anything to do with wages/benefits, they should not be allowed to participate in political action that the people they represent haven't approved of by way of a secret vote and they should not be protected from firing if they go on strike or carry out a slowdown. Make those three changes and make the unions core function to maintain standards and practices and you've got a great thing. But as long as there is money /power to be had, unions are not a good thing for this country. Have you ever wondered why it was so easy for organized crime to embed itself in the unions almost from the start?? Here's a hint: Money and power.
 
What if...? said:
As a union stagehands I see one side of this that isn't always covered.

My local is VERY good at convention A/V. We took it as a project years ago. Companies take our guys all over the country to oversee local labor, union and otherwise.

Some of the properties we work at want us there. They like the way we do things. They often require our presence one for one with various vendors.

Because they like the way we do things and they want everybody to do it that way.

That's one of the reasons some operations only want union workers. A certain set of standards and best practises.
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Welcome IATSE brother!

2495760_orig.jpg
 
jet57 said:
I am against right to work laws; I see them as intentionally destructive to cohesion in the work place. As for who works in the south, the south has been the favorite of auto manufacturers because of anti union sentiment that dates before the Civil war; it's purely political and has everything to do with 'northern aggression'. Lower wages and benefits are another reason, that you have pointed out, but more education on the part of line force will never raise wags and benefits down there: the fact is fear is the motivator against any concerns for upward scale living. Unions have zero to do with who's employable and who;s not. Union people are sent away and fired all the time for unemployable reasons. My own union had guys with "lived at the hiring hall" as we'd say; they did lousy work, they went out for the day's wages only and none of us wanted them on our docks. They were the first to get "do not send letters" from the employers to the hall.

Right to work laws have nefarious ends in mind. If you want the proof, just look at the sate of labor and the income gap and temporary work world that exists today.
Click to expand...

Well, the laws are certainly destructive to cohesion.

I get the anti-union sentiment, but to say that it is the result of Civil War era resentments is really a stretch. Most unions were very short lived before 1881. The presence of slave labor certainly precluded the need for most unions anyway and the population of the south was much more rural and less organized by nature, so I don't see the connection.

Lower wages are probably more related to a lower cost of living as anything else. Imagine if you could build a car in a location for $10000 and the workers have the same purchasing power as a another location in which a car is built for $15000. The foreign car manufacturers realized this and moved in once domestic manufacturers' labor prices shot through the roof as a result of unsustainable wage and benefit growth in the 1980's and 90's. Pay market value for wages in the south which are lower than those in the north and price your cars to sell.

Unsustainable healthcare, pensions and wages basically drove the US auto manufacturers to the brink in the 2000's as the dollar lost value and foreign companies moved their manufacturing here, along with their vastly better R&D, quality design and assembly.

Please tell me, do you wish for:

a) open borders which further drives down wages?
b) increased wages which increases prices of manufactured goods?
c) union-negotiated wages and benefits which create unsustainable costs for manufacturers.
d) tariffs which artificially increase the cost of foreign manufactured goods thereby increasing costs for everyone
e) goods manufactured at a lower cost in RTW states and sold for a reasonable cost.

I realize you have a tie to the unions, and no-one says they have not been a huge benefit to the working class. However, the first rule of bureaucracy is "Thou shalt grow and gain influence..." At some point that growth and influence causes the system to collapse upon itself and then it is ripe to return. Until then, the south keeps gaining manufacturing jobs and the wealth gap keeps climbing in the blue areas.
 
faithful_servant said:
Most conservatives I know simply understand that there are places where the gov't is needed and places where it isn't needed, there are places where the gov't is very competent at what it does and places where it's really crappy at what it does. BOLI and OSHA are two of the better ran parts of the gov't. I'll even go so far as to say that unions have a lot to do with their existence, but their existence also negates a lot of the claimed needs that unions fill.

Unions, IMO should not have anything to do with wages/benefits, they should not be allowed to participate in political action that the people they represent haven't approved of by way of a secret vote and they should not be protected from firing if they go on strike or carry out a slowdown. Make those three changes and make the unions core function to maintain standards and practices and you've got a great thing. But as long as there is money /power to be had, unions are not a good thing for this country. Have you ever wondered why it was so easy for organized crime to embed itself in the unions almost from the start?? Here's a hint: Money and power.
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Why expend all the effort to effectively train with no additional compensation?

Its a power balance thing.

In my industry non-union wages are a joke. They start at $12/hr, but full-time highly skilled workers only make $17/hr. And the contracts they sign suck. They get ****ed over on the regular.

This industry depends on "boots on the ground". If your labor can't properly build and run the show, deal with issues that inevitably arise, then you have nothing. Doesn't matter how nice your gear is. Doesn't matter how good your salespeople are. Your "product" will suffer. You will lose clients.

Use us and your show will go great, your gear will be respected and your road crews will have some time to have dinner or a drink before they have to get on the next plane.

We cost more because we are worth it. And they wouldn't pay us what our work is worth if we didn't make them.

I know you hate unions.

What you describe isn't a union. Its free job training for businesses. Nothing more. They get the benefit, the union gets nothing.

We'll pass on that.
 
Helix said:
I work in a right to work for less with reduced job security state. I don't recommend it.
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Why I ask, when given the chance to stay union or leave, such as Wisconsin when they went Right to work, did so many flee the Unions?
 
I really don’t know. It puts two of my values at odds with each other. Personal liberty vs fairness. I despise the idea of forcing somebody to join a union who doesn’t want to in order to get a job. But I also understand it is unfair to reap the benefits of efforts you didn’t contribute to.

This particular political battle is one I will just watch from the sidelines as it doesn’t really affect me anyway. I was in the military and am now self employed so I have never belonged to a union and likely never will. I already own the means of production where I work. ;)
 
What if...? said:
Why expend all the effort to effectively train with no additional compensation?

Its a power balance thing.

In my industry non-union wages are a joke. They start at $12/hr, but full-time highly skilled workers only make $17/hr. And the contracts they sign suck. They get ****ed over on the regular.

This industry depends on "boots on the ground". If your labor can't properly build and run the show, deal with issues that inevitably arise, then you have nothing. Doesn't matter how nice your gear is. Doesn't matter how good your salespeople are. Your "product" will suffer. You will lose clients.

Use us and your show will go great, your gear will be respected and your road crews will have some time to have dinner or a drink before they have to get on the next plane.

We cost more because we are worth it. And they wouldn't pay us what our work is worth if we didn't make them.

I know you hate unions.

What you describe isn't a union. Its free job training for businesses. Nothing more. They get the benefit, the union gets nothing.

We'll pass on that.
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So without the threat of not doing the work, you aren't good enough to get the pay you want?? I have a friend who owns his own business repairing A/C, heating, advanced plumbing and mechanical systems. His crew is 100% non-union and they get paid more than the union boys doing the same work. They get paid more because they are better at their job than the union boys are. They are better than they are because there is someone making sure that they meet the highest standards. He once told me that there is no way he would ever SETTLE for a union worker, since they simply lack the skills, training and work ethic that he demands from his crew. Being part of a union does not mean that you are better than anyone else and in a lot of trades, it means that you are worse than others because you have union providing you with jobs and job protection that negate the need to be excellent at your job in order to get the top pay.
 
jwzg said:
Well, the laws are certainly destructive to cohesion.

I get the anti-union sentiment, but to say that it is the result of Civil War era resentments is really a stretch. Most unions were very short lived before 1881. The presence of slave labor certainly precluded the need for most unions anyway and the population of the south was much more rural and less organized by nature, so I don't see the connection.

Lower wages are probably more related to a lower cost of living as anything else. Imagine if you could build a car in a location for $10000 and the workers have the same purchasing power as a another location in which a car is built for $15000. The foreign car manufacturers realized this and moved in once domestic manufacturers' labor prices shot through the roof as a result of unsustainable wage and benefit growth in the 1980's and 90's. Pay market value for wages in the south which are lower than those in the north and price your cars to sell.

Unsustainable healthcare, pensions and wages basically drove the US auto manufacturers to the brink in the 2000's as the dollar lost value and foreign companies moved their manufacturing here, along with their vastly better R&D, quality design and assembly.

Please tell me, do you wish for:

a) open borders which further drives down wages?
b) increased wages which increases prices of manufactured goods?
c) union-negotiated wages and benefits which create unsustainable costs for manufacturers.
d) tariffs which artificially increase the cost of foreign manufactured goods thereby increasing costs for everyone
e) goods manufactured at a lower cost in RTW states and sold for a reasonable cost.

I realize you have a tie to the unions, and no-one says they have not been a huge benefit to the working class. However, the first rule of bureaucracy is "Thou shalt grow and gain influence..." At some point that growth and influence causes the system to collapse upon itself and then it is ripe to return. Until then, the south keeps gaining manufacturing jobs and the wealth gap keeps climbing in the blue areas.
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None of that is relevant to my position.

Companies exploit workers in my industry. One of the biggest was purchased by Goldman Sachs and is buying every AV company on the planet that isn't nailed down. They could pay a fair wage. They just don't want to.

And they charge the same for one of their twelve dollar workers as they do for us at $25. There are no discounts. They just get less profit. The property gets half of the $100/hr and up they charge for labor. I have no sympathy for them when the worker only gets what, 12% of what the customer is charged for their labor?
 
Lovebug said:
You have a point. Would you agree that employees who are exempt from union dues work for different wages and benefits defined by union contracts? I am all for choice.
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Its none of the union's business what the employer pays his or her employees. If the employer wishes to pay their none union employees the same pay, less pay or more pay than that is only the employer's business and none of the union's.
 
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