Union Ownership

[Fletch]

The idea is to work it like a cooperative.
Since unions are always asking for a "fair" wage, they apparently know what "fair" is. That fair wage is what each person gets as salary. Everyone gets paid a salary and any excess is distributed to all employees.

And this is the fundamental problem with the labor-centric view: profits are not "excess". Profits exist for a reason, and they perform many more functions than simply padding the bottom line.

 

[Stschil]

Three words - Conflict Of Interest

You can't be paid by the union members to protect them and negotiate wages and at the same time negotiate against them as owner of the company.

That really doesn't matter in the O'bummer administration. When GM was bailed out,,,and then bailed out again the "Oversight" of the company was given over to, in some cases, ACTIVE Union leadership.


Now that's what I call putting the fox in charge of the hen house.

 

[BloodEclipse]

That really doesn't matter in the O'bummer administration. When GM was bailed out,,,and then bailed out again the "Oversight" of the company was given over to, in some cases, ACTIVE Union leadership.


Now that's what I call putting the fox in charge of the hen house.

Actually GM workers now work for 3 entities.
The Government
The UAW
GM

Hard to tell them apart anymore.

 

[dross]

And this is the fundamental problem with the labor-centric view: profits are not "excess". Profits exist for a reason, and they perform many more functions than simply padding the bottom line.

Actually, if you really want to get down to it and make people's heads spin 'round, profits are a COST.

 

[djl02]

I disagree with your assertion. A business owner needs absolute power. Power to act. Power to react. Power to expand. Power to contract. Without this power business will fail. Need an example? I'll give you two; Government Motors and its sibling government motors, Chrysler.

The worker needs the right to leave if the job isn't working out for them. The threat of walking should make the business owner's mind right. If it doesn't it's not a person I would ever work for.

Unfortunately today too many people are willing to sacrifice their principles in order to have a paycheck. Or worse, fail to compromise and live off the rest of us.

If you give a business absolute power,thats a dictatorship. Spells out minimum wage.

 

[dross]

If you give a business absolute power,thats a dictatorship. Spells out minimum wage.

What power? Who is giving it to them?

There's no power. If I open a business, and advertise jobs for minimum wage, who will work for me?

Actually, that's a great idea. I'm trying to get a training development company off the ground right now. I'm only going to pay my instructional designers and Flash developers minimum wage. What a huge price advantage I'll have over other training development companies! They'll be paying the same people 50K to 100K per year, I'll only be paying my employees minimum wage! That's only about 10K a year! I'll be able to undercut my competitors' prices, while at the same time making huge profits!

Why didn't I think of that before! I just didn't know until now that I have the power to MAKE qualified people work for me at any compensation I choose.

Gosh, I don't see any flaw in this plan at all. Anyone have a five year old handy to analyze my plan for me?

 

[ATOMonkey]

But but but... I can't QUIT my job if I don't like it there!! My children will be out on the street!! It's the economy and outsourcing and ummm...let's see, oh yeah George Bush!!! That's why I don't make as much money as I want. Not because I failed to educate myself, work hard, sacrifice, and persevere. No, it has GOT to be someone else's fault. Why should I have to be flexible in my employement? The job market should remain the same forever and ever.

Now, I've got to go to my job at the buggy whip factory. See ya later.

 

[Doug]

And this is the fundamental problem with the labor-centric view: profits are not "excess". Profits exist for a reason, and they perform many more functions than simply padding the bottom line.

If the labor unions cannot make a go of this type of arrangement, it seems to me that it proves that Management is NOT the evil, money-grubbing exploiter the Unions have claimed it to be.
Or,at least, that the Union is no better than management and is just as much an evil, money-grubbing exploiter as the employer of the employer.

 

[SemperFiUSMC]

Most of you guys are taking to the fringes without real knowledge of the whole matter. What eatsnopaste said is absolutely correct. Business DID do all of those things, some of them well into the 20th century. And it WAS unions that forced the changes in the law necessary to eliminate those abuses.
That said, large unions of today sometimes DO seriously impact a business' ability to profit, largely by their own inflexibility.
Here's a thought. Why don't you geniuses who refuse to see both sides of the issue run a business or two for a while, then join a labor union, or four, then get back to me.

I've run a multi-million dollar a year business for years without any need for a union for myself or my employees. In fact I have two businesses that I own. Why would I travel back to the Dark Ages where my profits are cut, my employees hate me and I them, where no one gets along, where there is no teamness?

No thank you. You can live in Unionland. I like it where I am.

 

[Zimm1001]

I disagree with your assertion. A business owner needs absolute power. Power to act. Power to react. Power to expand. Power to contract. Without this power business will fail. Need an example? I'll give you two; Government Motors and its sibling government motors, Chrysler.

The worker needs the right to leave if the job isn't working out for them. The threat of walking should make the business owner's mind right. If it doesn't it's not a person I would ever work for.

Unfortunately today too many people are willing to sacrifice their principles in order to have a paycheck. Or worse, fail to compromise and live off the rest of us.

Not disagreeing with you.

 

[Blackhawk2001]

Most of you guys are taking to the fringes without real knowledge of the whole matter. What eatsnopaste said is absolutely correct. Business DID do all of those things, some of them well into the 20th century. And it WAS unions that forced the changes in the law necessary to eliminate those abuses.
That said, large unions of today sometimes DO seriously impact a business' ability to profit, largely by their own inflexibility.
Here's a thought. Why don't you geniuses who refuse to see both sides of the issue run a business or two for a while, then join a labor union, or four, then get back to me.

Is this the equivalent of the old: "if you weren't in combat (or 'Nam or etc.), you don't know what you're talking about and don't get to have an opinion" argument? Sorry, won't play. I've worked in a union, alongside union workers, and I've watched labor unions and their tactics. It doesn't take a degree in business to see a mutually antagonistic relationship and to understand why it doesn't work well. Try another argument.

 

[Fletch]

I worked for a time at the GM Tech Center in Warren Michigan, and learned pretty much all I wanted to know about unions there.

We were doing a massive project where we replaced all of the desktop computers in the place (and it's a big place). Us technical folks could have done it fairly quickly and efficiently, but there was one snag: we had to have a union member with us for one particular operation... to lift the old computer off the desk and put it on the cart, and to lift the new computer off the cart and put it on the desk. Union rules.

Problem was, the union guys were always "busy". So sometimes you'd have half a dozen tech guys standing around a desk and burning significant salary dollars because Johnny Punchclock was "on a break" that lasted pretty much all day.

There was talk of also needing a union-certified electrician to unplug the old computer and plug the new one in, but if I recall correctly, we safely negotiated past that one.

 

[dross]

I worked for a time at the GM Tech Center in Warren Michigan, and learned pretty much all I wanted to know about unions there.

We were doing a massive project where we replaced all of the desktop computers in the place (and it's a big place). Us technical folks could have done it fairly quickly and efficiently, but there was one snag: we had to have a union member with us for one particular operation... to lift the old computer off the desk and put it on the cart, and to lift the new computer off the cart and put it on the desk. Union rules.

Problem was, the union guys were always "busy". So sometimes you'd have half a dozen tech guys standing around a desk and burning significant salary dollars because Johnny Punchclock was "on a break" that lasted pretty much all day.

There was talk of also needing a union-certified electrician to unplug the old computer and plug the new one in, but if I recall correctly, we safely negotiated past that one.

I'd like to read the explanation some pro union people will give to your anecdote. I'll give it shot.

First, you're lying. Second, stuff like that hardly ever happens. Third, working conditions around 1900 were terrible. Fourth, so you're advocating returning to child labor for 12 hours a day seven days a week?

 

[Doug]

I've run a multi-million dollar a year business for years without any need for a union for myself or my employees. In fact I have two businesses that I own. Why would I travel back to the Dark Ages where my profits are cut, my employees hate me and I them, where no one gets along, where there is no teamness?

No thank you. You can live in Unionland. I like it where I am.

Wait, WHAT!?!
Teamwork? Mutual Respect?

The Unions say that can't happen. All the objections to my scenario of Union ownership say that becoming management means you can't get along with the workers and that management and labor can't trust each other.

It sounds like you are doing the impossible.
It sounds like, if the Union could behave the way you do, the Union could be management and there wouldn't be a need for a Union.

 

[ATOMonkey]

I worked for a time at the GM Tech Center in Warren Michigan, and learned pretty much all I wanted to know about unions there.

We were doing a massive project where we replaced all of the desktop computers in the place (and it's a big place). Us technical folks could have done it fairly quickly and efficiently, but there was one snag: we had to have a union member with us for one particular operation... to lift the old computer off the desk and put it on the cart, and to lift the new computer off the cart and put it on the desk. Union rules.

Problem was, the union guys were always "busy". So sometimes you'd have half a dozen tech guys standing around a desk and burning significant salary dollars because Johnny Punchclock was "on a break" that lasted pretty much all day.

There was talk of also needing a union-certified electrician to unplug the old computer and plug the new one in, but if I recall correctly, we safely negotiated past that one.

Well, how can you expect to conduct office business without milwrights?? I mean, who would move the banker boxes and computers without them??? Now you're just being obtuse...

 

[ATOMonkey]

We've paid off union electricians and milwrights (grievance money) just to get them out of the way so we could get work done on time. That's all they want anyway, so everyone was happy...-ish.

 

[Blackhawk2001]

We've paid off union electricians and milwrights (grievance money) just to get them out of the way so we could get work done on time. That's all they want anyway, so everyone was happy...-ish.

Gee, Baksheesh! Sounds like a third world country...

 

[SemperFiUSMC]

I'd like to read the explanation some pro union people will give to your anecdote. I'll give it shot.

First, you're lying. Second, stuff like that hardly ever happens. Third, working conditions around 1900 were terrible. Fourth, so you're advocating returning to child labor for 12 hours a day seven days a week?

Don't forget shipping the job of everyone involved off to some far away land where they only get paid $1 a day.

I used to be involved software development industry (and tangentially still am). I remember the push to outsource all jobs to China, then India, because they could be done for $1 an hour over there. Funny thing. When the Chinese and Indians started reading that they were replacing $45 an hour programmers in the US, they started wanting more money. From what I'm told software development jobs are starting to come back to the US and land in communities in AR, SD, IA because a) it is cheaper than paying someone 8,000 miles away; b) everyone's in the same timezone so no more 36 hour interruptions; c) everyone speaks the same version of English (except in AR, where they speak the heyyall dialect); and d) the company you outsource to doesnt' try to steal your software and sell it themselves.

 

[ATOMonkey]

Gee, Baksheesh! Sounds like a third world country...

It was Chicago. Close enough.

 

[Fletch]

Don't forget shipping the job of everyone involved off to some far away land where they only get paid $1 a day.

I used to be involved software development industry (and tangentially still am). I remember the push to outsource all jobs to China, then India, because they could be done for $1 an hour over there. Funny thing. When the Chinese and Indians started reading that they were replacing $45 an hour programmers in the US, they started wanting more money. From what I'm told software development jobs are starting to come back to the US and land in communities in AR, SD, IA because a) it is cheaper than paying someone 8,000 miles away; b) everyone's in the same timezone so no more 36 hour interruptions; c) everyone speaks the same version of English (except in AR, where they speak the heyyall dialect); and d) the company you outsource to doesnt' try to steal your software and sell it themselves.

There's also the fact that the Chinese, Russians, and Indians are trained to program using the BFMI method (brute force & massive ignorance) rather than trying to actually solve problems and write elegant code. They solve software problems the same way they solve other business problems: massive application of more manpower. More manpower might get more shirts sewn, but it doesn't generally help in software.