Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Being on strike sucks,butthis is worse!

Indy and rick, now guys this is just what I didn't want to start. I know passions run high on the subject but I am honestly seeking information which I thank you both for. By way of explanation: Sanderson Farms has a big chicken processing plant in Bryan, Tx about fifty miles from me. Some of my friends and kin grow chickens for them. Some of my friends work for them in other ways. I hear them talk. The truck drivers are union, Teamsters, I guess. The line workers are non-union though they have had two elections trying to get the union in, which I don't know, and both failed. As stated passions run high on both sides and I am just trying to understand the deal. Thanks


BCR

BCR, I'm not trying to start any pissin match, just gets me how some people go spouting off a bunch of claims that are bs. I've found lazy people everywhere I've worked, union or non-union. Unions may not be perfect, but at least we get time and one half for anything over 8 hours a day.

Many a day I don't get a chance to eat lunch or drink my coffee because the shi* hit the fan and I've been too busy along with the rest of the crew. The family knows when I've had a busy day at work when I walk in the house with a full thermos of coffee.

Not trying to start any p*** match either, but I hope you realize that time and a half has nothing to do with your union. It's a federal law.

True you will find lazy people everywhere. But in a union free operation, it is a lot easier to get rid of them, and the enterprise prospers with all hands as a result.

Also, I infer from your bio that you work in a paper mill in a fairly rural part of northern Wisconsin. People there have a much higher and better work ethic than do people in general in, say, steel mills in big cities. I have spent time in every paper mill in your state. In most cases, if you came from a unionized steel or auto plant, you would not even know that the paper mill was unionized.

The unions have taken over the former to the extent that is is almost immoral. For instance, there are rings of people who sell dope and punch each other in when they don't come to work. Management finds out and starts discipline. The union automatically files a grievance. Later, when management wishes to buy a computer or something, the union "gives" them the right to buy it (instead of the union workers making it) in exchange for dropping the disciplinary proceedings. This occurs with the USW and the UAW but not, to my knowledge, with paper mills in Wisconsin. Of course, part of the problem is management too chicken to take a strike and hire replacements when this started in the 1950s.

I have only been involved in one campaign against the Teamsters and that was decades ago in a big northern city, and very short, as the pro-union malcontents switched to a different union. Your mileage in 2004 probably varies.

The best way to predict what would happen would be to find another similar chicken processing plant which the Teamsters organized a few years ago and check into what happened.

In our case, the Teamsters bribed a fork lift driver at a nearby plant to give them the names of all the workers. Then they went to the workers' homes over a weekend, informed them (falsely) that the plant had been unionized, and that they would be fired if they didn't sign a union card. On Monday they walked into the owner's office, presented him the cards, and demanded he recognize the union without any NLRB election. Very stupidly, he did that.

The first contract gave the workers just enough raise to pay the Teamster dues, which of course was mandatory for them. Later contracts got more onerous as the owner was an incompetent patsy. Later his sons took over the business and moved it away.

Then the Teamsters tried to organize our plant which was bigger. They of course tried to get cards signed in secret, but we found out about it, called a meeting of the employees, and explained why we were against unions. Only about 4 or 5 cards were ever signed, and after a brief flirtation with another union (which went away when they figured out they could not make the sale), everything settled down. The four or five malcontents left the company on their own.

An NLRB election tends to polarize the work place, irrespective of who wins, because each side declares itself during the campaign, and tempers flare. Afterwards, the union is not allowed to try for another election until a year later.

The union can ask for an NLRB election if 30% sign cards, but generally tries to get over 50%. It tries to do this in secret so management does not start campaigning against it. Incredible as it may seem, many workers do not realize that management would oppose a union--until they say so. Once the campaign becomes public, the union knows it will lose some support, which is why it tries to start over 50%.

Everything I say refers to fairly well managed industrial facilities. It is almost impossible to unionize such a facility. The union has nothing to offer such workers but elevaton of the incompetent and risk of layoffs. But chicken workers--I don't know. there may be some desperation factor.

The Teamsters have motives a little different than some other unions. They take in more money. For instance, the union, not each company, has a pension fund, and the head goombahs have used this as a slush fund to invest in various things. As a result, they are now under federal supervision, which makes stealing the pension fund harder, although every national president except the present incumbent, for the last 30 years or so, has been sent to prison. Incidentally, they provide medical care for retirees but last year raised the copay from $100 per month to something like $1200 per month. If Enron had tried that, you would have heard more about it.

my honey had 9 1/2 hours overtime last week but doesn't get paid for it cuz he's salary. How's that for a crock of BS??



mrsfisher

He does get Comp time off though. At least that is how it works here.

I don't know about how the plants you have been associated with work, but I do know that at the union shops where I have worked, we, the union members wouldn't tolerate the behavior you have described, as management would not either. One of the problems we had was when hiring new workers, they came in with the impression that they had a union job and didn't have to work. We had some not so subtle ways of making them see the errors in their ways.

The situations you describe seem to stem from problems in management. Blaming it on the union seems to be a cop out. You even said yourself that the management was chickenshi*. On many occasions I have seen management shoot themselves in the foot instead of admitting a mistake. Thank God most of the old time adversarial managers hit the road with the last round of cuts. We now have a management team that tries to promote an attitude of cooperation, and they realize that while they may steer the ship, we are the ones who make it go, and without us they are dead in the water.

Since management at our division has made change from being adversarial to one of cooperation, we have set production records, and are approaching are goal of 13% return on investment, and last year we were the only pulp mill in the US to turn a profit. Too bad they couldn't have figured this out sooner.

No sir, your totally wrong. The same mechanism that brings the union in can be used to remove it. If a majority of workers DO NOT want union representation all the have to do is contact the NLRB. The NLRB will come in and do a decertification vote. If the majority of employees vote to decertify the union, the union no longer represents the employees. It's that simple.



Again your showing your stupidity. Toyota is keeping their employees happy to prevent the union from moving into their plants. Same with other buisnesses, they form committies to settle greivences, use senority for job assignments, vacation schedeling and the likes.



Dam* your three for three. Our plant manager does everything in his power to keep employees, including the use of the "jobs bank". Most figure they (plant managers) DON'T want to loose their trained employees to another plant knowing that their skills will be needed in the future.

Union/management relationships under normal conditions are rarely hostile. Most unions go out of their way to work with management, after all it's our jobs that are affected. Do you sh*t in your own bed?

Al

I don't get comp time! Is this a new law I should know about. It would make me very happy to know about it, can some one help me out with this? There have been many 70 hour + weeks in my life with out even a thank you or time and a half pay. Of course when the dust settles and things slow down they are quick to lay me off. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> But don't worry management would never take advantage of us peeons. They are always looking out for us and taking the best care of us.

Dear AJ,

Stop and think a minute.

1. You've probably never been involved in a decertification. The reason it's almost impossible is that it's illegal for the workers to get outside help from management. They have no chance against the professional goombahs who ARE allowed to get outside help. As soon as a few start to proselitize against the union, they get "disciplined." Many union constitutions allow for fines.

2. Why should Toyota pay such "high" salaries to keep the union out? Answer: The problem with unions isn't high salaries. The problem is the lack of productivity for the reasons I've mentioned.

3. If you're so palsy walsy with GM's management, why has GM laid off 50% or so of its workers in the last 20 years?

While I don't know anybody in authority at GM, I suspect your loving union-management relationship is like a tapeworm. You can't get rid of it so you find a way to live with it. IF GM could snap its fingers and get rid of the UAW, it would be gone in five seconds. Instead they just keep building plants in Mexico and biding their time. Last year they made more money on financing mortgages than on making cars. I hope you get to retire before you get the chop.

There is no such thing as a law mandating comp time. The other poster's employer may do that voluntarily. You are classified as an exempt employee (basically a professional), apparently, and thus do not have to be paid overtime.

The definition of what jobs are exempt goes back to the 1930s. The DOL is right now trying to modernize the definitions but many in Congress are resisting this. In either case, you would probably still remain exempt.

Theoretically, professionals are more highly compensated to begin with and are responsible for working more independently, all of which (in the 1930s) were reasons not to pay them O.T. In some cases, like managers of fast food restaurants, this really isn't the case but such jobs didn't exist under the current rules.

I will admit that comp time is mostly in government jobs, but in \Florida many private firms are adopting it instead of monetary compensation. The food service industry is one of the biggies here.

You seem to be well versed in union/management issues but you omit the fact that management also uses scare tactics to deter union recruitment. I've seen people threattened with being fired for discussing union issues inside a non-union business. At my wifes place of employment management wouldn't allow the union to have a post board to place their issues to inform represented workers, until they won a court challenge with the NLRB.







Easy my friend. One word. Automation. The last 20 years have seen robotics intergrated into many material handeling processes. For example, we have machines assemble core packages that were traditionally done with human labor.



It isn't all gloom and doom for organized labor. In our area theres been a few completely new plants built by GM. The plant I work in has been awarded 80 million dollars to produce the next generation cast aluminum truck engine block. We were in competition with a foundry in Mexico and Brazil for this specific product. If the UAW was such a burden to GM, why are they keeping this work inhouse? You can believe what you want, but the bean counters at the crystal palace have no allegiance to anyone when it comes to awarding new work, the bottom line is cost.

AJ,

No management in its right mind would let a union post stuff on company property during an organizing campaign. Or campaign in any way for the union in work areas during working hours. After all, whose property is it, anyway? That's fair and it's legal.

It is illegal to threaten to fire someone for joining a union or threaten to close down a plant if the union gets in. It is legal, however, to put forth examples where unions have caused plants to close. This may be interpreted as a threat, though it's not.

Any company fighting a union organizing attempt tries to be squeaky clean legally, if they're not total morons, because the NLRB interprets the law to protect powerless workers against big mean companies (think Ford in 1935). In actuality, today's situation is usually a big powerful union against a relatively powerless little company, and in this respect, the union has an advantage.

You are absolutely right about the effect of automation and the bean counters having no loyalty to anything but the bottom line at companies like GM. But here's the point, at least for the country as a whole. When I started my career, about 32% of the work force belonged to unions. Last year it was about 9%. Total production and employment, of course, is much higher. It's the union members that are disproportionately taking the biggest hits from automation, etc., which is not a very good predictor of job security in future decades.

In this case the employees were already being represented by the union. Management steadfastly refused any union information being posted. When they were directed by the courts to allow the bulletin board, the employer picked the most out of the way obscure place to post the board. Any grevience fact finding between employees and their union represenitive was to be done off the clock, off company property. Only when management was brought into the bargining was it done on company time and property. Management created the hostile enviroment.



Al

Boggy,as far as John's post[still can't do the quote deal] about the employer having to agree to an election,did you ever hear of Bum Givens? Back in the fifties ol'Bum had an oil field servicing operation in about every West Texas town and some in East Texas.He must have had hundreds of workover rigs and a thousand employees.
One of the big unions decided to organize Bum's hired hands and got a majority to sign pledge cards and then petitioned the NLRB for an election.When ol' Bum was notified of the election[you can bet he knew about it already],he called the stud toolpusher at every yard and told them that when each rig finished the job it was on to bring 'em to the yard.Anybody that did'nt sign a card could hang around long enough to clean 'em up.
He said;"Boys,we gonna have the biggest auction sale the oil patch has ever seen.Ain't no son of a bitch gonna tell Bum how to run his business!Don't they know I got my sock full years ago?Now I got my belly full!
At least up to the mid eighties when I left it,the oil patch ain't never been targeted again,thanks to ol'Bum.
And-Big Stick,you're gonna love this-was'nt a thing the union or the government could do to stop Bum from doing what he done even though they tried.

hey gene,



i think that it was T LEE that helped me recently with the quote process, and he explained it pretty well... i'm gonna take a stab at it for you...

a) click on reply as usual and put your cursor where you want the quot to appear

b) below the reply box where your message is typed is an area marked instant ubb code... find the quote link there and click on it... this will put something that looks like this in your reply box [Quote] [Quote]

c) scroll to the bottom of the page where the post that you are quoting from appears, and highlight the words that you want to quote

d) in your browser toolbar at the top of your screen you have a tool called "Edit"... click on "Edit", and then on "copy"

e) go back to the reply box andplace your cursor between the two [quotes]

f) click again on "edit", and then click on "paste... your quote will appear as [Quote] blah, blah, blah [Quote]

g) when you submit the reply the quote will look like it's supposed to... i think <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />..... john w

Yeah, Gene, I have heard of Bum. Matter of fact some of his crews were working West Production in Madison Co. when that happened. Wonder if he's still alive?

BCR

Prob'ly;The Devil don't want him and God can't use him!

Yeah he gets off early on slow days to make up the over time. But now that they are mowing and doing the grounds all days are busy, busy, busy. And this company keeps buying more properties and still only have two maintenance guys. When he started in January they had 174 units. They now have 400 some.