While I have problems with unions, in general I believe people have a right to form a union.
But.
I don't believe local, state or federal government employees who are not in public safety should be allowed to form unions. This is due to a few reasons. First, as a public employee they are covered under civil service laws and they therefore have inherently more rights then private sector employees. Government employees also have greater protection under discrimination laws.
And Second, there are issues when it comes to actual contract negotiations. When a union negotiates with a private sector employer, that employer has a direct responsibility to their company when it comes to wages and benefits. If they give up too much, the company suffers and in a worst case scenario, will have to close its doors (think GM). But this is not true with public sector employees. The agency negotiating with the public sector unions has no responsibility to the taxpayers. To these agencies, the taxpayer is just a source of near unlimited revenue. Additionally, due to state laws, it is in the agencies employees best interest to give pay increases to union members as the non-union members pay is directly tied to the union members. In California several years ago, we gave the prison guards a huge pay increase (40-50% over a couple years). Yet only one person was directly negatively impacted by that pay increase and he was recalled (this was one reaosn Gov Gray Davis was recalled).
As to BART, I have to ride it every day into Oakland from Castro Valley. This was a 20m BART ride. Driving is almost out of the question due downtown parking being impacted. If I end up taking the bus, I'm looking at a minimum of a 75 minute bus ride (probably longer due to traffic).
If the train and station operators strike, I say screw them and break the union. Fire them all and hire new operators. We have plenty of high skilled (and train op doesnt require high skills) unemployed people in the bay area who would take a job paying $40/hour.
But.
I don't believe local, state or federal government employees who are not in public safety should be allowed to form unions. This is due to a few reasons. First, as a public employee they are covered under civil service laws and they therefore have inherently more rights then private sector employees. Government employees also have greater protection under discrimination laws.
And Second, there are issues when it comes to actual contract negotiations. When a union negotiates with a private sector employer, that employer has a direct responsibility to their company when it comes to wages and benefits. If they give up too much, the company suffers and in a worst case scenario, will have to close its doors (think GM). But this is not true with public sector employees. The agency negotiating with the public sector unions has no responsibility to the taxpayers. To these agencies, the taxpayer is just a source of near unlimited revenue. Additionally, due to state laws, it is in the agencies employees best interest to give pay increases to union members as the non-union members pay is directly tied to the union members. In California several years ago, we gave the prison guards a huge pay increase (40-50% over a couple years). Yet only one person was directly negatively impacted by that pay increase and he was recalled (this was one reaosn Gov Gray Davis was recalled).
As to BART, I have to ride it every day into Oakland from Castro Valley. This was a 20m BART ride. Driving is almost out of the question due downtown parking being impacted. If I end up taking the bus, I'm looking at a minimum of a 75 minute bus ride (probably longer due to traffic).
If the train and station operators strike, I say screw them and break the union. Fire them all and hire new operators. We have plenty of high skilled (and train op doesnt require high skills) unemployed people in the bay area who would take a job paying $40/hour.
- Feb 26, 2006
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It actually wasn't that long ago that public employees in Kahleeforneeya were denied the right to unionize.
http://www.lao.ca.gov/1995/010195_calguide/cgsgov2.html
"Collective bargaining of terms and conditions of employment between the state and its employees was authorized by the Legislature in 1977 with enactment of the Ralph C. Dills Act (Sections 3512 through 3524 of the Government Code). The act grants state employees the right to belong to organizations that serve as their exclusive representatives in contractual negotiations over wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment. The act requires the state and employee representatives to "meet and confer in good faith" and to endeavor to reach agreement on these matters. (Higher education employer-employee relations are governed by the Higher Education Employer-Employee Relations Act and are discussed in a following section.) "
I'm curious why you think public safety employees should have collective bargaining rights...but not the rest.
FWIW, various classes of Kahleeforneeya state employees have had to fight for the right to unionize, even after passage of the Dill Act.
I don't think there's any legal mechanism that would allow the BART to "break the union," without completely shutting it down.
Even if there was, (much like Ronnie Raygun's PATCO act,) BART would be out of service for at least a couple of months while they retrained new people to run the trains, perform the necessary maintenance, etc. Maybe YOU think it'd be OK to turn someone loose with a BART train with a few hours training...but fortunately, the ones who make such decisions are smarter.
http://www.lao.ca.gov/1995/010195_calguide/cgsgov2.html
"Collective bargaining of terms and conditions of employment between the state and its employees was authorized by the Legislature in 1977 with enactment of the Ralph C. Dills Act (Sections 3512 through 3524 of the Government Code). The act grants state employees the right to belong to organizations that serve as their exclusive representatives in contractual negotiations over wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment. The act requires the state and employee representatives to "meet and confer in good faith" and to endeavor to reach agreement on these matters. (Higher education employer-employee relations are governed by the Higher Education Employer-Employee Relations Act and are discussed in a following section.) "
I'm curious why you think public safety employees should have collective bargaining rights...but not the rest.
FWIW, various classes of Kahleeforneeya state employees have had to fight for the right to unionize, even after passage of the Dill Act.
I don't think there's any legal mechanism that would allow the BART to "break the union," without completely shutting it down.
Even if there was, (much like Ronnie Raygun's PATCO act,) BART would be out of service for at least a couple of months while they retrained new people to run the trains, perform the necessary maintenance, etc. Maybe YOU think it'd be OK to turn someone loose with a BART train with a few hours training...but fortunately, the ones who make such decisions are smarter.
glenn1
Lifer
- Sep 6, 2000
- 25,383
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It's completely irrelevant about how skilled the folks in these jobs are, or how their pay compares vs. office workers. I'm sure that the striking workers are to a man good citizens who just want to do a hard day's work and put food on the family table. That being said however, just because these guys belong to a union that doesnt' mean that they are owed something because of that. It is a legitimate argument that you could find other potential new hires who could do just as skillful a job as the current workers, and because of the economy would probably be willing to accept a lower salary. Heck, if you're worried about union busting, you could probably even find a bunch of unemployed union guys from other cities/states willing to relocate to the Bay Area to accept these positions.
Go look at the record concentration in wealth in the US, the plummeting wages of workers relative to the economy, the fact that all the wealth added to the economy after inflation since Reagan has gone to the top most wealthy, the plummeting levels of union membership, and you can start to see a few reasons for Unions in this day and age.
The basic principles of labor why unions exist don't really change much over time, and they continue to be essential in providing workers leverage.
That doesn't mean there aren't some legitimate criticisms - but you don't get rid of all police over problems, you don't get rid of all doctors over problems.
You try to fix the problems. Without unions, the middle class would be destroyed even more than is now being destroyed.
Oh, and I live near BART.
rudder
Lifer
- Nov 9, 2000
- 19,441
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They do not have a right to organize when the BART is taxpayer funded. Now if BART was a corporation that paid its own way.. sure. Sorry but everyone else is making concessions and when your budget has a $300 million shortfall... well something has to give and it is not taxpayer money.
Follow the comment flow, rudder. dammitgibs posted an attack on *all* unions existing today. Red Dawn posted a general defense of unions existing.
Since you say you agree that you agree to unions for private workers, you are more disagreeing with dammmitgibs than with Red Dawn.
Your point distinguishing public and private is fine, and more related to the BART topic than the broadside against all unions, but you say it as if Red Dawn had only discussed public unions, which is not the case. IMO, Red Dawn made the important point well that the basic idea of labor organizing, so that individual workers are not greatly outgunned by big organizations, is somewhat timeless, in contrast to dammitgibbs' stated view.
As to your point about public unions, I don't really have a clear position at this time, I'm open to how to best balance the needs of workers and the public.
But unlike most union opponents, I view workers' well-being as one of the priorities in the equation, whether by union or another system not yet suggested.
Primarly because public safety employees are in life and death situations. In their specific case, I believe they need some representation. I consider police, prison guards, and firefighters PS employees but not paramedics or metermaids. But they still shouldnt be able to strike.
I used to do HR about 10-12 years ago for AMR ambulance which was represented by SEIU. It was then when I learned just how militant SEIU was. There was a paramedic in the Sacramento area who on a call gave 10x the recommended dosage of morphine to a 8 year old boy. He lied on the PCR (Patient Care Report), he lied to the ER, and he lied to his supervisors. Each lie was different. The company fired this paramedic. The union filed a grievance over the firing and took the case to arbitration. The idiot arbitrator put this paramedic back on the job. It was less then 6 weeks before he screwed up again. The only reason the company managed to keep him fired was the state finally got around to pulling this paramedics certs. SEIU choose to put the general public at risk in order to keep a incompetent paramedic on the job.
If the facts are as yo describe, I'm appalled and would support reform to fix that problem so that someone who behaves so criminally can be removed.
It's not just the mistake - mistakes happen and that's a debatable topic how to handle it - but the lying IMO makes it unacceptable.
Holy shit. Look how much a computer operator makes...$58K plus extras. Running jobs and carrying stacks of reports around. Crazy.
I'm a chemist. An even split between testing products for lead and identifying unknown materials for people/companies.
We're not unionized and we really don't get paid as much as we probably should but I feel the work of protecting kids from lead is worth the minor inconvenience of less money.
We're a small enough company to not fall under the umbrella of big business. I have no problem with small businesses.
Agreed. My last job was with a small 50 person Sales/Marketing firm. The CEO fired the CFO because she wouldn't sign off on his expenses (to the Gold Club in SF) and then decided to fire me when the AP manager threw a fit on some planned IT changes.
I've been working for a f500 company w/ 50k employees since and its been a lot better.
I work in IT at a company in San Francisco, and while I don't ride the BART, about half my department does. If the strike does go through on Monday, those that live in the East Bay will be allowed to work from home.
As for the strike, they've got some horrible timing! There's very little sympathy for their cause right now. There may even be some anti strike protests.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/...detail?&entry_id=45565
As for pay, I disagree with everyone that says a person should get a certain salary because of a job's danger, mad skill requirements, education requirements, etc. Pay is not determined by what someone deserves.
When you buy a computer you look at performance, build quality, and whatever other criteria are important to you. How many of you would buy an inferior product for more money because you thought a certain group of people deserved more?
An employer paying someone for a service is the same as you paying for a product. I don't care how demanding a job is - if a new guy comes along that can do the same or better job for less, that determines pay (competition). Unions deny employment to the new guy to the benefit of existing employees, and to the detriment of those consuming the product.
As for the strike, they've got some horrible timing! There's very little sympathy for their cause right now. There may even be some anti strike protests.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/...detail?&entry_id=45565
As for pay, I disagree with everyone that says a person should get a certain salary because of a job's danger, mad skill requirements, education requirements, etc. Pay is not determined by what someone deserves.
When you buy a computer you look at performance, build quality, and whatever other criteria are important to you. How many of you would buy an inferior product for more money because you thought a certain group of people deserved more?
An employer paying someone for a service is the same as you paying for a product. I don't care how demanding a job is - if a new guy comes along that can do the same or better job for less, that determines pay (competition). Unions deny employment to the new guy to the benefit of existing employees, and to the detriment of those consuming the product.
Red Dawn
Elite Member
- Jun 4, 2001
- 57,529
- 3
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Who says, you? Where does it say the workers don't have the right to organize if they work for the government?
Well I do believe it's in their best interest to give concessions in this time of economic upheaval and that going on strike isn't in the public's best interest. However I'm not privy to the bargaining, what the Union offered for concessions and what Bart demanded.
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