Originally posted by: jbourne77
Originally posted by: boomerang
Originally posted by: jbourne77
Originally posted by: Squisher
From another of my posts in P&N:
I started working as a sweeper janitor in March 1978 at Fisher Body Fort Street in Detroit. I became an apprentice Die Maker in '79.
Things have changed a little since then, in fact I'd say the biggest changes have happened in the last 10-15 years. The line moves a lot faster and the expectations are a lot higher. I remember talking about parts per hundred that were scrap. Now the numbers being batted around were parts per million. Every facet of your work-life has some parameter that tracks it. You get away with nothing.
The place I retired from was a forge making axles. We heated steel to 2150F and squished them into the shape of an axle. The average temperature in the plant in the summer was 115F. My job as a die repairman was to crawl down 10 feet into the upsetter and repair the tooling. I probably averaged 15 minutes in the upsetter, but I might be down there for an hour. The temperature down there usually was 135F and steam was coming up all around me. All the tooling was still at about 250F when I went "in the hole."
See that little area, the size very small closet, between the three things labeled "Multiple Operation Dies"? That's where Squisher made his money.
A difficult job, yes, but not one I'd call "admirable". My grandfather performed similar work for all his life, and I respect him more than any other man I've ever met because of his commitment to his job and quality. He never made apologies for being satisfied by hard labor.
On the other hand, he wasn't making wages that were severely inflated, either, nor did he expect to. I admire him for that more than anything else. He wasn't looking for a handout. He recognized that he had no college degree. He knew his worth and blamed no one else for not being able to artificially surge beyond it. From him I learned that anything worth doing was worth doing right, and he lived that every day at his job.
Jobs like yours are dangerous and uncomfortable, but the labor market does not place you alongside college graduates with degrees in the physical sciences, etc. We can argue the merits and morals of it all day long, but it's irrelevant. The fact is, there are plenty of people who are willing and capable of doing your job, and this drives your wage down. Workers who find this unsettling or unsatisfactory are invited to fill out a FASFA and continue their education.
You don't know what a Die Maker is or does do you? The labor market
does determine the wage for that job. If you knew what the job entailed, if you knew the skill level required to get the job and if you knew the education level necessary to get the job you'd realize that the analogy you're trying to make here has no basis.
You've made a gross rationalization on a group of people working for automakers based upon your bias.
Find out something about Die Making and come on back - please.
You want to hone in on die makers. Sorry, but fail. I'd say it's pretty indisputable that the UAW workers wages are not competitive in the automotive labor market, or we wouldn't be having this discussion. In fact, if they
were competitive, the unions would be obsolete and necessary. But their entire purpose is to inflate wages above the equillibrium. That's (part of) their
job. So like I said earlier, you can debate the utopic ideals of this all you want, but in the end, competitive wages are what matter here, and the UAW workers' wages are far from competitive. This is a huge contributing factor as to why their company's products are not competitive. Result? More fail.
I'm a software architect making just under six figures. I want 50% more. Screw that, how about
allsoftware engineers collude and demand $150k per year. When every software-dependent industry falls on its ass because it can't support such an inflated wage, can we all come knocking on your door for a bailout? Perhaps you'd like to front
my check?
Case in point, US software developers have had to take a pay cut in the last ten years - myself included - to remain competitive with overseas firms. Never once did I demand regulation, unionization, etc. That's nonsense. You know what I did? I made myself the best damn set of skills money could buy in my area. I updated my skill set, retooled, and continued doing business. Soon, my wages bounced back. But even if they didn't, so what. I don't expect these wages to stay where they're at, so I'm currently back in school, yet again, retooling. When I make my career change, I'll actually take a huge pay cut. But you know what? I anticipate being better off financially in the long run because developers have long since been a dime-a-dozen, and it won't be long before our salaries catch up with our quantity. Who do I blame for this? NO ONE.
If your life isn't giving you what you want, do what you can to change your life.
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