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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."
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.
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.
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.