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UAW: Prepare to strike Delphi

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meltdown75

Lifer
Nov 17, 2004
37,548
7
81
Originally posted by: rudder
Originally posted by: meltdown75
i'd probably make $5 less per hour if my union hadn't bargained so well for my latest contract... there's another round of bargaining coming up... mind you, i'm not an automotive worker at the moment but i have been in the past, under the CAW.

i don't understand why unions get flamed. i don't think many people here have ever dealt with them directly or been a member... they just like to flame them. it's definitely among OT's strangest phenomena imho.

Why do people flame unions? Mainly because if I was laid off I would go actively find another job, even get more training if need be. How much money does GM and Delphi pay for laid off union workers to sit at home?
if you had 25 years in somewhere (or whatever amount of time you deem to be an investment), you might not be so quick to ditch your seniority and / or chances of being called back.
 

LED

Diamond Member
Oct 12, 1999
6,127
0
0
Honda of America...5 miles down the road from my Farm has never allowed the Union in and they and the workers are happy...
 

Kenazo

Lifer
Sep 15, 2000
10,429
1
81
Originally posted by: LED
Honda of America...5 miles down the road from my Farm has never allowed the Union in and they and the workers are happy...

And I'm sure they treat their employees fairly and well. They can afford to pay more to the individual employees b/c they aren't shoveling money into the union.
 

Red Dawn

Elite Member
Jun 4, 2001
57,529
3
0
Originally posted by: LED
Honda of America...5 miles down the road from my Farm has never allowed the Union in and they and the workers are happy...
That's because they pay and treat them well so the Workers won't unionize. Without the threat of those Employees organizing if they are treated like sh!t you can bet that Honda wouldn't pay them well or treat them well.

I believe some Unions have to be more realistic. If a worker doesn't do his job well he should be fired. Also if they have to lay off a worker he should get unemployment just like anybody else, not full wages for a year or two. That's the way it is in the Unionized Building Trades or at least the Carpenters Union.
 

Perknose

Forum Director & Omnipotent Overlord
Forum Director
Oct 9, 1999
46,873
10,668
147
Originally posted by: Red Dawn
Originally posted by: LED
Honda of America...5 miles down the road from my Farm has never allowed the Union in and they and the workers are happy...
That's because they pay and treat them well so the Workers won't unionize. Without the threat of those Employees organizing if they are treated like sh!t you can bet that Honda wouldn't pay them well or treat them well.

I believe some Unions have to be more realistic. If a worker doesn't do his job well he should be fired. Also if they have to lay off a worker he should get unemployment just like anybody else, not full wages for a year or two. That's the way it is in the Unionized Building Trades or at least the Carpenters Union.
Bingo!

 

LED

Diamond Member
Oct 12, 1999
6,127
0
0
Honda and Japan will never let Unions in no matter what type of idle threats there are just as Lawyers and lawsuits are few and far between in Japan...the exit door exist for all who do not like to work as a team...
 

RU482

Lifer
Apr 9, 2000
12,689
3
81
anyone else wonder what all of these high dollar blue collar union contract cancellations (and resulting slashing of wages) is going to do to wages in every other industry??

This is going to have a major economic impact for all of us
 

dartworth

Lifer
Jul 29, 2001
15,200
10
81
Originally posted by: LED
Honda of America...5 miles down the road from my Farm has never allowed the Union in and they and the workers are happy...




yet that plant was built with union labor...:)
 

shilala

Lifer
Oct 5, 2004
11,437
1
76
Originally posted by: Injury
Originally posted by: Triumph
I don't really like the UAW, or hell unions in general, but a 60% paycutt seems pretty drastic. I mean, assuming this isn't the same as the other recent article about GM employees going bankrupt because their overtime was cut, asking anyone to take a 60% paycut (in base pay) is pretty drastic. Even if they made $60k a year turning wrenches, asking them to drop down to a $24,000 salary is pretty ridiculous. No one on this forum could adjust to that kind of paycut instantly, nor would you even agree to it. You would quit. And if at the same time upper management is giving themselves 250% bonuses while declaring bankruptcy, I think I'd be pretty upset as well.

Surely there is some happy middle ground. The unions need to take a pay cut, and management should never get huge bonuses when they haven't done their jobs either!

The 60% paycut is a bluff to ruin the Union. Once it's gone, they can go fine quality workers and pay them the reasonable amounts that the union would consider way too low because they are greedy.

What kind of car is in your driveway???

 

shilala

Lifer
Oct 5, 2004
11,437
1
76
Originally posted by: Feldenak
Originally posted by: meltdown75
i think they are most guilty for improving the quality of life for the workers.

damn them!

corporations should be allowed to treat workers like crap.

fsck yeah!

I don't think anyone disputes the fact that unions were a useful tool before OSHA and various other agencies and wage laws. They have definately outlived their usefulness now and are an albatross hanging around the neck of business.


Who the fvck do you think was instrumental is developing OSHA, Wage laws, and various other agencies?
Your Fairy Godmother???
Who the fvck do you think is going to continuously and tirelessly defend these laws that everyone here takes for granted???

How much of your paycheck went to lobby that the Davis-Bacon Act is not repealed???
How much of your paycheck went to see that minimum wage laws are constantly reviewed?
Do you think that big business and government gives a royal flying dick about OSHA??

The ignorance on this topic never ceases to amaze me.
 

shilala

Lifer
Oct 5, 2004
11,437
1
76
Originally posted by: FrankyJunior
Originally posted by: Kenazo
Originally posted by: FrankyJunior
Why do Unions even exist? All they do is waste money, cause companies to go bankrupt, drive up prices of items because their members are overpaid...

Unions should just go away.

That's an equally naive point of view. A corporation's primary goal is to maximize profits, thus if it's more profitable to mistreate employees they will. Unions minimize the amount of maltreatment that the labour needs to suffer through, and ensures fair wages for the employees.

That's if the union is being realistic. The UAW and most current unions are out to lunch.

But that's just it. They don't enture "Fair Wages". They insure the wages that they want. Wages are just like Supply and Demand. But Unions demand very high wages for their employees just because they can. There are plenty of people who would do the same job for far less than the Unions demand but they can't because those plants can only hire union people. They basically have a monopoly have the workforce and monopolies are illegal.

There are stories all the time where a company is working along fine. Employees might not be happy but obviously they aren't too unhappy or they'd find a new job. THen the employees make a union and demand higher wages. Then the company goes out of business because now they would have to jack prices way up in order to stay in business.

The only people Unions help are the employees in the union. They screw over the companies which in turns screws over the rest of the public because now we have to pay a lot more for prducts than we should.

Unions were only needed back before there were labor laws about employee mistreatments. But once OSHA came around, Minium wage went in, Health insurance is standard, etc.. the union sjust never went away and continue to get worse and worse.

I know people that are in a union because they are forced to or they couldn't work where they do. And most of them hate the union. It makes them go through lots of extra hoops, runs their lives, forces them when to work or not work even if the employee has no problem with something...

Unions just plain suck. They outlived their usefulness decades ago and they shoudl have all power taken away from them for the good of the rest of the country.

It's called a collective bargaining agreement.
Look it up, and go lay down somewhere before more stupid comes spilling out.

 

KLin

Lifer
Feb 29, 2000
30,433
748
126
This is definitely going to suck for GM in their service portion of the company.
 

3chordcharlie

Diamond Member
Mar 30, 2004
9,859
1
81
Originally posted by: Injury
I don't know your situation, but I do know that when the average unionized worker is making something equivlent to a college graduate in the workforce for 5 years, with better benefits and the job of a simp, there is something wrong.

Factory jobs shouldn't have to take the bullcrap from unionized employess like they do. Most parts of automotive manufacturing is UNSKILLED LABOR. The ONLY reason that a factory job is more important than the burger flippers and janitors in the country is that they are more dangerous.... but there's no way in hell that some of the guys that work there should be making the $25-30/hr they do. That's just stupid. Even if you've been there 40 years, it shouldn't matter.

$5 more in your pocket is great for you, but now some factory has to pay it's employees $5 more every hour... guess who pays for that in the end? THE REST OF THE FREAKING COUNTRY. They just pass the cost straight on to the customer.

Unions were created to prevent dangerous and risky working situations, as well as prevent employers from screwing over workers who NEED the job.

There were NOT created to strong arm their way into getting more money left and right, and to piss whine and moan everytime the slightest hint of inflation comes along.

Funny enough, when union workers negotiate for big bucks and the money is passed on to the customer... in turn the customer needs to start making more money... thus the company they work for has to charge more to get them more money... yadda yadda yadda. Yeah, it can be said for any job, not just unionized ones, but the unions are negotiating for CRAZY HIGH amounts. Remember two years ago, the grocery store strike, where they were complaining that giving a paycut to cashiers making upwards of $17/hr? Yeah, unions suck ass.
wow... for someone who apparently believes in free markets, you're showing some severe ignorance of how free markets work.
 

qaa541

Senior member
Jun 25, 2004
397
0
0
The unions have negotiated an ungodly amount of money for their members which has crippled the businesses ability to operate efficiently. The unions pay unskilled laborers more than most entry level skilled laborers and cause the businesses to raise prices to compensate. I think the market should determine fair wages and that unions monopolize the employee pool by locking in a factory to only accept unionized workers. In the end, its the rest of the US which pays for all the products with their highly inflated prices.

I stopped believing in unions after the government put an end to safety issues and horrid working conditions. Everything since then has been negotiating higher and higher pay and benefits without regard to see what the market is willing or able to tolerate.
 

shilala

Lifer
Oct 5, 2004
11,437
1
76
Originally posted by: 3chordcharlie
Originally posted by: Injury
I don't know your situation, but I do know that when the average unionized worker is making something equivlent to a college graduate in the workforce for 5 years, with better benefits and the job of a simp, there is something wrong.

Factory jobs shouldn't have to take the bullcrap from unionized employess like they do. Most parts of automotive manufacturing is UNSKILLED LABOR. The ONLY reason that a factory job is more important than the burger flippers and janitors in the country is that they are more dangerous.... but there's no way in hell that some of the guys that work there should be making the $25-30/hr they do. That's just stupid. Even if you've been there 40 years, it shouldn't matter.

$5 more in your pocket is great for you, but now some factory has to pay it's employees $5 more every hour... guess who pays for that in the end? THE REST OF THE FREAKING COUNTRY. They just pass the cost straight on to the customer.

Unions were created to prevent dangerous and risky working situations, as well as prevent employers from screwing over workers who NEED the job.

There were NOT created to strong arm their way into getting more money left and right, and to piss whine and moan everytime the slightest hint of inflation comes along.

Funny enough, when union workers negotiate for big bucks and the money is passed on to the customer... in turn the customer needs to start making more money... thus the company they work for has to charge more to get them more money... yadda yadda yadda. Yeah, it can be said for any job, not just unionized ones, but the unions are negotiating for CRAZY HIGH amounts. Remember two years ago, the grocery store strike, where they were complaining that giving a paycut to cashiers making upwards of $17/hr? Yeah, unions suck ass.
wow... for someone who apparently believes in free markets, you're showing some severe ignorance of how free markets work.

That is the stupidest post I have read in a YAUT yet.
 

dartworth

Lifer
Jul 29, 2001
15,200
10
81
Originally posted by: DaWhim
blue collar jobs gone = good news.

:roll:...you truely are an idiot...


If GM does get rid of the UAW, will we see a drop in price on cars then?
 

My friends who work at the Lockport plant are sh!tting their pants. They know the unemployment line is calling their names.
I kind of feel sorry for them, but at the same time I don't.

We here in WNY get a lot of local stories about this delphi ordeal. It employs about 3,800 people and is one of the largest employers here in the area.
If I actually had the time and effort, I would post the articles. Some of them appear in buffalonews.com and do give a lot of local insight into this UAW/Delphi mess.

Reality is that Delphi is bleeding money, always has been, and no one is willing to do anything about it. Here in WNY the delphi plant in Lockport gets free electricity allotted. Their tax assessment was dropped 20 million dollars. They get a huge discount on natural gas. They also get quite a few other benefits from Niagara county that no other company in the entire WNY area sees. Still, they can't turn a profit. Unions do have a lot to do with that

At the Lockport plant union employees are guaranteed a minimum of $25/hour with full benefits. In WNY $25/hour MINIMUM is a lot of money. The cost of living here is dirt cheap, average cost of housing just went over 100K for the first time ever. You can live on $12 an hour in this area. But they need more and more and more and more.
Sure no one wants to take a pay cut, but it's take a pay cut, or take a employment cut in an area where jobs are nearly non-existant.

The guys at the plant put in a lot of overtime and end up making a killing. My best friends father is a foreman at a GM plant in Tonawanda, NY. He made well over 100K by putting in guaranteed weekly overtime. You make that much in this area you are sitting pretty. If you make that much in this area, and can't save for retirement, you're a fvcking retard.

Either way, this will be generally bad for the economy, but possibly good for GM in the long run. Delphi is guaranteed to lose money every year.
 

Kalbi

Banned
Jul 7, 2005
1,725
0
0
Originally posted by: dartworth
Originally posted by: shilala
Flamefest in 3...2...1...

Let me be the first to say...
"Unions suck teh balls" and "we should all drive foreign cars because they are WAY better and that will solve everything".

Wow, only six minutes and I still can't be the first asswipe in.


LOL...;) Time to go to work...


Anyways, it's funny how so many people on this board want to see all these UAW workers lose their jobs. Well?it?s not funny, and it?s not going to be good for the economy either?

Of course it's better for the economy, not for the short term, but long term.

As Greenspan says, Flexible Economy > *
 

Triumph

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
15,031
14
81
What do you say to this, Shilala? Do you agree with $25/hour minimum starting salaries for unskilled labor? If so, please justify.

Originally posted by: SampSon
My friends who work at the Lockport plant are sh!tting their pants. They know the unemployment line is calling their names.
I kind of feel sorry for them, but at the same time I don't.

We here in WNY get a lot of local stories about this delphi ordeal. It employs about 3,800 people and is one of the largest employers here in the area.
If I actually had the time and effort, I would post the articles. Some of them appear in buffalonews.com and do give a lot of local insight into this UAW/Delphi mess.

Reality is that Delphi is bleeding money, always has been, and no one is willing to do anything about it. Here in WNY the delphi plant in Lockport gets free electricity allotted. Their tax assessment was dropped 20 million dollars. They get a huge discount on natural gas. They also get quite a few other benefits from Niagara county that no other company in the entire WNY area sees. Still, they can't turn a profit. Unions do have a lot to do with that

At the Lockport plant union employees are guaranteed a minimum of $25/hour with full benefits. In WNY $25/hour MINIMUM is a lot of money. The cost of living here is dirt cheap, average cost of housing just went over 100K for the first time ever. You can live on $12 an hour in this area. But they need more and more and more and more.
Sure no one wants to take a pay cut, but it's take a pay cut, or take a employment cut in an area where jobs are nearly non-existant.

The guys at the plant put in a lot of overtime and end up making a killing. My best friends father is a foreman at a GM plant in Tonawanda, NY. He made well over 100K by putting in guaranteed weekly overtime. You make that much in this area you are sitting pretty. If you make that much in this area, and can't save for retirement, you're a fvcking retard.

Either way, this will be generally bad for the economy, but possibly good for GM in the long run. Delphi is guaranteed to lose money every year.

 

Engineer

Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
39,230
701
126
Originally posted by: dartworth
Originally posted by: shilala
Flamefest in 3...2...1...

Let me be the first to say...
"Unions suck teh balls" and "we should all drive foreign cars because they are WAY better and that will solve everything".

Wow, only six minutes and I still can't be the first asswipe in.


LOL...;) Time to go to work...


Anyways, it's funny how so many people on this board want to see all these UAW workers lose their jobs. Well?it?s not funny, and it?s not going to be good for the economy either?

Neither will watching GM/Ford/Chrysler pack bags and head to Mexico as many parts suppliers (both union and non union) are already doing.
 

shilala

Lifer
Oct 5, 2004
11,437
1
76
Originally posted by: Triumph
What do you say to this, Shilala? Do you agree with $25/hour minimum starting salaries for unskilled labor? If so, please justify.

Originally posted by: SampSon
My friends who work at the Lockport plant are sh!tting their pants. They know the unemployment line is calling their names.
I kind of feel sorry for them, but at the same time I don't.

We here in WNY get a lot of local stories about this delphi ordeal. It employs about 3,800 people and is one of the largest employers here in the area.
If I actually had the time and effort, I would post the articles. Some of them appear in buffalonews.com and do give a lot of local insight into this UAW/Delphi mess.

Reality is that Delphi is bleeding money, always has been, and no one is willing to do anything about it. Here in WNY the delphi plant in Lockport gets free electricity allotted. Their tax assessment was dropped 20 million dollars. They get a huge discount on natural gas. They also get quite a few other benefits from Niagara county that no other company in the entire WNY area sees. Still, they can't turn a profit. Unions do have a lot to do with that

At the Lockport plant union employees are guaranteed a minimum of $25/hour with full benefits. In WNY $25/hour MINIMUM is a lot of money. The cost of living here is dirt cheap, average cost of housing just went over 100K for the first time ever. You can live on $12 an hour in this area. But they need more and more and more and more.
Sure no one wants to take a pay cut, but it's take a pay cut, or take a employment cut in an area where jobs are nearly non-existant.

The guys at the plant put in a lot of overtime and end up making a killing. My best friends father is a foreman at a GM plant in Tonawanda, NY. He made well over 100K by putting in guaranteed weekly overtime. You make that much in this area you are sitting pretty. If you make that much in this area, and can't save for retirement, you're a fvcking retard.

Either way, this will be generally bad for the economy, but possibly good for GM in the long run. Delphi is guaranteed to lose money every year.

Yes, I do support it 100%.
I support it across the board.

I think it's very fair for a man (or woman) to make $50,000 a year with health benefits so the other parent can stay home and raise children that turn into decent human beings because they can actually interact with the people who spawned them rather than interacting with a video game in which they respawn.
 

3chordcharlie

Diamond Member
Mar 30, 2004
9,859
1
81
Originally posted by: shilala
Originally posted by: 3chordcharlie
Originally posted by: Injury
I don't know your situation, but I do know that when the average unionized worker is making something equivlent to a college graduate in the workforce for 5 years, with better benefits and the job of a simp, there is something wrong.

Factory jobs shouldn't have to take the bullcrap from unionized employess like they do. Most parts of automotive manufacturing is UNSKILLED LABOR. The ONLY reason that a factory job is more important than the burger flippers and janitors in the country is that they are more dangerous.... but there's no way in hell that some of the guys that work there should be making the $25-30/hr they do. That's just stupid. Even if you've been there 40 years, it shouldn't matter.

$5 more in your pocket is great for you, but now some factory has to pay it's employees $5 more every hour... guess who pays for that in the end? THE REST OF THE FREAKING COUNTRY. They just pass the cost straight on to the customer.

Unions were created to prevent dangerous and risky working situations, as well as prevent employers from screwing over workers who NEED the job.

There were NOT created to strong arm their way into getting more money left and right, and to piss whine and moan everytime the slightest hint of inflation comes along.

Funny enough, when union workers negotiate for big bucks and the money is passed on to the customer... in turn the customer needs to start making more money... thus the company they work for has to charge more to get them more money... yadda yadda yadda. Yeah, it can be said for any job, not just unionized ones, but the unions are negotiating for CRAZY HIGH amounts. Remember two years ago, the grocery store strike, where they were complaining that giving a paycut to cashiers making upwards of $17/hr? Yeah, unions suck ass.
wow... for someone who apparently believes in free markets, you're showing some severe ignorance of how free markets work.

That is the stupidest post I have read in a YAUT yet.

I agree - the notion that a competitive firm can simply 'pass costs along to consumers' is utterly ridiculous.

If you learn one thing from basic economics it should be this: under competition, firms are price-takers.

Now we can argue all day about the degree of competition in a given industry, but the fact remains that costs cannot simply be 'passed along' in anything the remotely approximates a market. Asking prices can be increased, with any associated reductions in demand, but they simply do not work their way through the system in the manner that Injury describes.

In fact, the standard (but still highly flawed) argument is that unions lead to artificially low employment levels in unionized companies. By this I mean high capital:worker ratios, which allow higher marginal products of labour, which allow companies to pay workers high wages without going broke. What is glossed over here is that maintaining such high ratios should be impossible in a world which supposedly also has a free market for investment funds, as this one does, since high capital:worker ratios are typical of industries with low returns to capital. But I digress.

Allowing this capital ratio inequality means lower capital:worker ratios for the rest of the non-unionized economy, meaning each worker in the rest of teh economy has less 'technology' helping them do their job, and as a result lower productivity, and lower pay than they would have in a world without unions.

Short version - unionization of some industries leads to lower employment and higher pay in those industries, and higher employment with lower pay in 'the rest' of the industries.

I think that's mostly BS myself, but it's the standard textbook answer that neo-classical economists would give.

I tend to think you can gain more from analysing the gap between 'living wage' (in the long run, the smallest wage you can pay a worker without them dying) and 'workers marginal productivity' (in free market theory, what a worker actually gets paid). The funny thing is that in the textbook world, living wages are irrelevant, but in the real world, they are very much more important in people's day-to-day lives than often abstract calculations of productivity.

Think about this: What is the productivity of a manager? what about a janitor in a factory? How do you calculate the productivity of anyone who doesn't singlehandedly create a good or service that is directly sold in the marketplace?

 

Triumph

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
15,031
14
81
Originally posted by: shilala
Originally posted by: Triumph
What do you say to this, Shilala? Do you agree with $25/hour minimum starting salaries for unskilled labor? If so, please justify.

Originally posted by: SampSon
My friends who work at the Lockport plant are sh!tting their pants. They know the unemployment line is calling their names.
I kind of feel sorry for them, but at the same time I don't.

We here in WNY get a lot of local stories about this delphi ordeal. It employs about 3,800 people and is one of the largest employers here in the area.
If I actually had the time and effort, I would post the articles. Some of them appear in buffalonews.com and do give a lot of local insight into this UAW/Delphi mess.

Reality is that Delphi is bleeding money, always has been, and no one is willing to do anything about it. Here in WNY the delphi plant in Lockport gets free electricity allotted. Their tax assessment was dropped 20 million dollars. They get a huge discount on natural gas. They also get quite a few other benefits from Niagara county that no other company in the entire WNY area sees. Still, they can't turn a profit. Unions do have a lot to do with that

At the Lockport plant union employees are guaranteed a minimum of $25/hour with full benefits. In WNY $25/hour MINIMUM is a lot of money. The cost of living here is dirt cheap, average cost of housing just went over 100K for the first time ever. You can live on $12 an hour in this area. But they need more and more and more and more.
Sure no one wants to take a pay cut, but it's take a pay cut, or take a employment cut in an area where jobs are nearly non-existant.

The guys at the plant put in a lot of overtime and end up making a killing. My best friends father is a foreman at a GM plant in Tonawanda, NY. He made well over 100K by putting in guaranteed weekly overtime. You make that much in this area you are sitting pretty. If you make that much in this area, and can't save for retirement, you're a fvcking retard.

Either way, this will be generally bad for the economy, but possibly good for GM in the long run. Delphi is guaranteed to lose money every year.

Yes, I do support it 100%.
I support it across the board.

I think it's very fair for a man (or woman) to make $50,000 a year with health benefits so the other parent can stay home and raise children that turn into decent human beings because they can actually interact with the people who spawned them rather than interacting with a video game in which they respawn.

Well then there's no room for misguided people like you in a free market economy. Move to a socialist country, you'll be much happier.