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17,000 AT&T Workers Go On Strike In California and Nevada (fortune.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Fortune: Approximately 17,000 workers in AT&T's traditional wired telephone business in California and Nevada walked out on strike on Wednesday, marking the most serious labor action against the carrier in years. The walkout -- formally known as a grievance strike -- occurred after AT&T changed the work assignments of some of the technicians and call center employees in the group, the Communications Workers of America union said. The union would not say how long the strike might last. A contract covering the group expired last year and there has been little progress in negotiations over sticking points like the outsourcing of call center jobs overseas, stagnant pay, and rising health care costs. The union said it planned to file an unfair labor charge with the National Labor Relations Board over the work assignment changes. "A walkout is not in anybody's best interest and it's unfortunate that the union chose to do that," an AT&T spokesman told Fortune. "We're engaged in discussion with the union to get these employees back to work as soon as possible."
Worst case scenario for the unions: what if nobody really notices?
Many years ago I belonged to a Union.
In its rules was the cause that we could NOT go on strike. The employer could not do a lock out.
What took it's place was that any negotiations over pay and conditions that could not be resolved in 12 weeks would be taken to an independent Arbiter. That arbiter was a member of the judiciary, their job was not influenced by elections, employer payments, etc etc etc
Both sides put their final offer to the arbiter and defended it, justifying why their position was the most fair and reasonable. There arbiter required proof of any claims, and that could include looking at the employers books.
The arbiter could then take a further 2 weeks and choose EITHER the union OR the employer offer. No chasing bits from one and bits from another, they had toe make a choice which offer was the most reasonable. And that decision was binding on both parties
This forced both sides to start from a position of reason right from the start and most negotiations took less then 3 weeks to negotiate and ratify.
Sadly that union was consumed by a larger union and all that went away.
If any of what you are selling had any merit China would have been worse off today than it was 40 years ago, the people there would have still been poorer than dirt. What you are selling is garbage though, collectivist garbage, which is why China brought hundreds of millions out of complete poverty by drastically reducing collectivism, not by growing it. USA is on a completely wrong path, has been on it for over a 100 year stretch now, it is a path of diseased collectivism and it is murdering, slaughtering USA economy.
You can't handle the truth.
Murder rate
UK 0.9/100,000
Canada 1.5/100,000
Germany 0.9/100,000
France 1.2/100,000
New Zealand 0.9/100,000
Australia 1.0/100,000
Spain 0.7/100,000
China 0.8/100,000
Japan 0.3/100,000
Italy 0.8/100,000
Sweden 0.9/100,000
Iceland 0.3/100,000
And the site I am looking at says the USA is 3.9/100,000 which puts it 108th out of 218 countries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Almost half the countries in the world are safer than the USA.
And the US imprisonment rate is nearly 700/100,000
Canada 114/100,000
Germany 78/100,000
France 103/100,000
New Zealand 202/100,000
Australia 152/100,000
Spain 131/100,000
China 118/100,000
Japan 47/100,000
Italy 89/100,000
Sweden 53/100,000
Iceland 45/100,000
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
So yeah, most countries could indeed be safer if they kept americans out, they seem to have a high rate of crime and murder compared to other 1st world civilised countries. That wall is looking better and better, not to keep Mexicans out, but to keep Americans in, Canada should take a close look at this, who knows maybe they can get the US to pay.
I remember when President Reagan fired the Air Traffic Controllers. That didn't work out well for more than a year.
I have also been a union member twice. Unfortunately, one union was run by the company, so it was a pretty shitty union for the most part. The other union was run by ex-union members and were not beholden to the company. That worked pretty well in that "silly" stuff didn't happen. If a shitty boss wanted to fire people for not kowtowing, too bad. But if someone screwed up, the shop steward and the boss delivered the pink slip together. Nobody wanted to do extra work because someone else slacked their assignment. I eventually went management in that job, and I never had a problem in 6 years with union workers. I generally had to hold back the shop steward when I knew things about the employee that he didn't (terminally ill wife, child, substance problems they were being helped with, that sort of thing.) The times I did have to terminate someone, the union guys were in agreement with me and we'd already tried multiple times to get the person back into the fold.
That said, what strikes me are the many people that say "Unions suck" that have never been in one and how frequently the throw out "get another job".
Hm. You must live in the land of good jobs, where the trees of excellent education are right there behind the bushes of golden opportunity and the river of endless paycheck. That's a sweet place to live, but one whose address I've not found.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
Im a non union electrician for a reason, i may make a lot less but the unions out here promote laziness and shitty work. if you get thrown off of one job, they send you to another, tossed off that one, on to another. as long as you pay union dues they dont really give a fuck. thats not my style. as i said i do electrical work. peoples lives are at stake. i will not be responsible for stupidity.
Not in New Zealand.
Our Judges are not elected, nor government appointed. They either put their name forward themselves or the firms they work for nominates them. However the MUST have a law degree, must have at least 7 years experience as a practicing lawyer, and they get chosen based on their work experience, character , social awareness, fairness etc etc etc by the Attorney-General's Judicial Appointments Unit.
Our civil service is also non partisan, senior appointments are not political appointments and dont change when there is a change in government.
Equally our news media is less partisan then US media, and it has been rated as far more free (as in free speech) than US media too.
New Zealand is also one of the least corrupt countries in the world, the lack of political interference in the courts, police, civil service may also account for this.