"Because that fact doesn't affect the workers making the minimum wage. It takes a certain number of employees to run a McD's"
It certainly does affect them. The # of employees required is variable. McDonald's adjust things by making customers wait more, or increasing automation.
"If they cut too many of their minimum wage staff, then they will be paying the rest more in overtime."
Are these the ones where taking the picture and sending it requires so much power that you are required to change the battery halfway through the shutter click?
"Cite please? You aren't talking about unions are you? What sort of "force" are you referring to?"
Many Meijer workers are forced to join unions which then extort their money and use it for political causes and candidates. Union membership has nothing to do with whether or not the worker can do the job or how well, so it all comes down to being a political organization. It is about as appropriate as Meijer forcing its workers to tithe to the Dutch Reformed Church.
The "force" part is that the workers will be fired if they do not join the political organization. No one is holding them at gunpoint, granted, but it is about as much "force" as it is with sexual harassment where the secretary must have sex with the boss or be fired.
It is pretty outrageous. Workers' rights must be upheld: the decision to join such organizations should be left for each worker to decide, and not be made a condition of employment.
Entirely incorrect. Most union members are forced to join, due to closed shop. The "Fair Share" situation you mention is where workers are forced to pay union dues, which the union then uses for anything, including political campaigns. Sorry, it is a pretty weak argument to say that they are forced to pay dues but they are not members.
"bargain as a group - so that they can limit the abuse to workers and gain higher wages"
That is great union-thug spin, as union abuse of workers is quite common (look at the assaults strikers commit against working people who cross picket lines), and the wage certainly isn't higher anymore when the union forces the company to move the factory to Mexico.
"The Union protects you in many other ways (Dismiss w/o cause etc. ) that you also pay for without realizing it."
If this were true, the unions would have no problem getting people to pay. Instead, they have to force people.
"Walmart as an employer blows major chow"
Walmart employees tend to disagree. I take their word on it more than yours.
As far as politics go the Dems are much more Labor (and by that I mean anyone who punches a clock) friendly then the Repubs
The facts do not bear you out on this one. During the past two elections, more working people voted for Bush than for the Dem candidate.
"That is the traditional Dem base in part - their was a day when union busting would get you killed. Now-a-days it is business as usual. "
Are you using "union busting" to mean insisting on the right of workers to join or NOT to join? Used to that "union busting" meant Pinkerton thugs busting skulls of organizing. Now there are extreme spinners (well paid with stolen money) in the AFL-CIO that call any effort to protect worker rights, such as paycheck protection "union busting". It is no wonder the unions represent the interests of a record low of about 8% of workers.
"it's not a union, when the AFLCIO get in to meijer then I'll be impressed until then it's the meijer corperate union."
They AFL-CIO which actually stole tens of millions of dollars during the last two presidential elections to give to campaigns? The AFL-CIO which steals money from workers and then uses the money to lobby Congress specifically to prevent workers from being protected from such miss-use of dues?
Either way, no-one should be forced to join any union (Meijer or AFL-CIO). It is a matter of basic union rights.
"I understand that on the one hand it's their right to work for $3/hour, but now the other 30 guys are out of jobs and the total income of society has just gone down"
It has gone down much less than it would have under the other scenario. The $20 hour overpaid workers would have resulted in a short period of a McDonalds selling $12 Big Macs before it closed, and NO ONE was employed at the place for any wage. You can look at Flint, Michigan for an example of this. UAW greed pushed auto worker wages higher and higher. The money had to come from somewhere, so there's only a fraction of the total number of auto workers that were there before.
It don't see the problem. The best workers get the jobs.
"There's a difference between a PAC (or what have you) and collective bargaining though"
There is no difference when it comes to people being forced into the organizations for reasons that have nothing to do with doing the job. Whether or not I end up joining the Catholic Church, or some "collective bargaining unit" has nothing at all to do with how well I can do the job, and should not be a criterion of employment.
"Do you disagree with any of the 100 reasons in this article? 100 Facts and 1 Opinion -- The Non-Arguable Case Against the Bush Administration [thenation.com]."
I will grant that it is a pretty good editorial. Factual? Much of the wording is so loaded it is hard to tell. However, this is what I expect. "The Nation" magazine is an opinion journal, and is not noted for being level-headed and factual. It is, however, known for making forceful ideological arguments. This is hardly an ideological observation on my part.
The same situation is true of "The Limbaugh Letter" or "National Review" on the Right. These are ideological arguments aimed at those who have the ideology of the writer. They won't convert anyone.
"Welllll, the only way a union can be truly effective is if everybody joins"
Come to think of it, the John Birch Society can only be truly effective if everyone is forced to join, right? So let's force everyone to join it. Then it will be REALLY effective, right?
"The minimum wage is most helpful in things like folks working at McD's and other low-skill jobs though"
How is it helpful that the minimum wage encourages (and result in) McDonald's cutting back on employees?
"Welllll, the only way a union can be truly effective is if everybody joins"
Is that a version of "you are with us, or you are against us"? Tough. Pressure groups like the NRA, Sierra Club, ACLU, etc are quite effective, and no-one is forced to join them. Making the union membership voluntary keeps the union accountable to its members.
"If only a handful of workers are in the union, how do they go on strike?"
I guess there is no reason to go on strike, then, if hardly anyone wants to do it?
"Collective bargaining only helps if everyone is bargaining"
But it certainly does not "help" the person who is forced into it even when they do not want to be involved.
"Don't get me wrong. I believe the unions are corrupt by an large, and serve mostly to benefit themselves. But they have their uses"
I agree, but only when they are legitimate organizations (no-one forced to join).
"Most, if not all, Meijer stores are unionized, which is more you can say for Wal-mart."
That is the problem. Meijer workers are forced to join unions, which really are nothing more than political organizations. They force members to contribute money to political causes that go against their interests, and really have nothing to do with whether or not you can do the job or how well you can do it. Like such an organization? Fine, your choice. But Meijer employees have no choice in membership. Wal-Mart employees, in contrast, are not forced to belong or give $$$$ to such organizations.
"a better selection of words to use intead of "political organizations" are unions. Unions help keep your ass from being fired without a reason.. Although unions suck imo, atleast they do that for ya"
The opposite is true. Unions can get you fired just because you refuse to give money to political campaigns. And yes, Meijer forces you to join. This should be a choice left to workers.
"if you work at walmart you can be fired for no reason at all"
However, this is very very rare. It is in Wal-Mart's interest to retain good employees, and fire only the bad ones. Wal-Mart is rather cut-throat when it comes to efficiency. Firing people without reason is rather sloppy.
"The minimum wage in the US is so tiny that I find it hard to believe that it has much real effect on employment"
Thankfully, it is low, and getting lower due to inflation. This way, it has less negative impact on employment. On a macro level, it has little effect. On a micro level, you have people who are denied work, or who get thrown out of their job because the minimum wage goes up a dime. To these people, the effect is very real.
"....arguement has become 'in vogue' with the neo conservatives"
You use credibility by bringing up the bogus "neo-con" bogieman. The one good thing about inflation is that it makes the government "minimum wage" meaningless over time. Eventually, more and more low-wage jobs will have the real value of the work be at a level above that of the arbitrary government-set amount.
"One of those social problems is a tendancy to undervalue the work of the people at the 'bottom' of the labor market."
Translation: you think some low-worth job should be worth a lot more. The problem with this is that it isn't. It ignores the real value. No, it is not a problem: no undervaluing occurs.
"Apparently you don't think so. BTW, how much do you pay for making your tin foil hats."
I was not referring to a government conspiracy. I was referring to the real effects of the government-mandated "minimum wage", which is to discourage companies from hiring people to work jobs of low-worth. If I were a tin-foil-hat nutjob, I'd think that the government was intending this as the effect. However, I don't. It is just that the misguided legislators who push for "minimum wage" are misguided and callous. They do not care when people get fired as a result.
As long as you can shoot Ewoks like in "Star Wars: Battlefront", I'm in for this one! Wonder if they will have those shrapnel-shooting Corellian elite blasters that easily turn Gungan ears to tatters.
"I wholeheartedly agree. A job should be evaluated on two accounts: its importance for the society and the 'difficulty' of the job."
The best way to evaluate this, by far, is to look at the free market value of the job. The factors you mention become secondary to the actual value (determined by how much/little the employer will pay and how little/much the employee will take). That is all that matters in the end. The actual value.
"To test this theorem, which group do you think gets paid more...."
I think they should be paid for the value of the work. It is really not my business, however, how much they are paid unless I sm paying them. None of my business at all when it comes to the private sector. Many government employees, in fact, are overpaid. They will still stay at the job even if paid less, and by wasting money on overpay, you have to cut services to make up for it.
If a CEO's wages are "obscene" to you, ignore them. Just like if Playboy is "obscene" to you, leave it on the shelf.
Thanks. Apparently, you are one of those who thinks that it is not really "Exploitation!" or "Oppression!" if you have to go out of your way to convince someone they are oppressed or exploited. They even have buzzwords for this: "raising class consciousness".
Slashdot Mirror
It certainly does affect them. The # of employees required is variable. McDonald's adjust things by making customers wait more, or increasing automation.
"If they cut too many of their minimum wage staff, then they will be paying the rest more in overtime."
Or they will be paying them the same.
It is a problem, nonetheless.
"the people organzied the union"
The people who wanted to be in the union organized it.
"...in-order to work in an hourly position you must join the union"
Which is a gross violation of workers' basic political rights.
"if you don't want to join the union don't work there."
That is just like "if you don't want to have sex with the boss, don't be a secretary there".
I think this might have been the case if Gore had been elected in 2000 and he had launched the Iraq war instead of Bush.
"The pitiful fleshy humans can have my gun when they pry it from my cold metal fingers".
Are these the ones where taking the picture and sending it requires so much power that you are required to change the battery halfway through the shutter click?
Many Meijer workers are forced to join unions which then extort their money and use it for political causes and candidates. Union membership has nothing to do with whether or not the worker can do the job or how well, so it all comes down to being a political organization. It is about as appropriate as Meijer forcing its workers to tithe to the Dutch Reformed Church.
The "force" part is that the workers will be fired if they do not join the political organization. No one is holding them at gunpoint, granted, but it is about as much "force" as it is with sexual harassment where the secretary must have sex with the boss or be fired.
It is pretty outrageous. Workers' rights must be upheld: the decision to join such organizations should be left for each worker to decide, and not be made a condition of employment.
Entirely incorrect. Most union members are forced to join, due to closed shop. The "Fair Share" situation you mention is where workers are forced to pay union dues, which the union then uses for anything, including political campaigns. Sorry, it is a pretty weak argument to say that they are forced to pay dues but they are not members.
"bargain as a group - so that they can limit the abuse to workers and gain higher wages"
That is great union-thug spin, as union abuse of workers is quite common (look at the assaults strikers commit against working people who cross picket lines), and the wage certainly isn't higher anymore when the union forces the company to move the factory to Mexico.
"The Union protects you in many other ways (Dismiss w/o cause etc. ) that you also pay for without realizing it."
If this were true, the unions would have no problem getting people to pay. Instead, they have to force people.
"Walmart as an employer blows major chow"
Walmart employees tend to disagree. I take their word on it more than yours.
As far as politics go the Dems are much more Labor (and by that I mean anyone who punches a clock) friendly then the Repubs
The facts do not bear you out on this one. During the past two elections, more working people voted for Bush than for the Dem candidate.
"That is the traditional Dem base in part - their was a day when union busting would get you killed. Now-a-days it is business as usual. "
Are you using "union busting" to mean insisting on the right of workers to join or NOT to join? Used to that "union busting" meant Pinkerton thugs busting skulls of organizing. Now there are extreme spinners (well paid with stolen money) in the AFL-CIO that call any effort to protect worker rights, such as paycheck protection "union busting". It is no wonder the unions represent the interests of a record low of about 8% of workers.
They AFL-CIO which actually stole tens of millions of dollars during the last two presidential elections to give to campaigns? The AFL-CIO which steals money from workers and then uses the money to lobby Congress specifically to prevent workers from being protected from such miss-use of dues?
Either way, no-one should be forced to join any union (Meijer or AFL-CIO). It is a matter of basic union rights.
It has gone down much less than it would have under the other scenario. The $20 hour overpaid workers would have resulted in a short period of a McDonalds selling $12 Big Macs before it closed, and NO ONE was employed at the place for any wage. You can look at Flint, Michigan for an example of this. UAW greed pushed auto worker wages higher and higher. The money had to come from somewhere, so there's only a fraction of the total number of auto workers that were there before.
It don't see the problem. The best workers get the jobs.
"There's a difference between a PAC (or what have you) and collective bargaining though"
There is no difference when it comes to people being forced into the organizations for reasons that have nothing to do with doing the job. Whether or not I end up joining the Catholic Church, or some "collective bargaining unit" has nothing at all to do with how well I can do the job, and should not be a criterion of employment.
I will grant that it is a pretty good editorial. Factual? Much of the wording is so loaded it is hard to tell. However, this is what I expect. "The Nation" magazine is an opinion journal, and is not noted for being level-headed and factual. It is, however, known for making forceful ideological arguments. This is hardly an ideological observation on my part.
The same situation is true of "The Limbaugh Letter" or "National Review" on the Right. These are ideological arguments aimed at those who have the ideology of the writer. They won't convert anyone.
Imagine there's no telco.
It's easy if you try.
No voice mail, no phone lines.
Above us only sky.
Come to think of it, the John Birch Society can only be truly effective if everyone is forced to join, right? So let's force everyone to join it. Then it will be REALLY effective, right?
How is it helpful that the minimum wage encourages (and result in) McDonald's cutting back on employees?
"Welllll, the only way a union can be truly effective is if everybody joins"
Is that a version of "you are with us, or you are against us"? Tough. Pressure groups like the NRA, Sierra Club, ACLU, etc are quite effective, and no-one is forced to join them. Making the union membership voluntary keeps the union accountable to its members.
"If only a handful of workers are in the union, how do they go on strike?"
I guess there is no reason to go on strike, then, if hardly anyone wants to do it?
"Collective bargaining only helps if everyone is bargaining"
But it certainly does not "help" the person who is forced into it even when they do not want to be involved.
"Don't get me wrong. I believe the unions are corrupt by an large, and serve mostly to benefit themselves. But they have their uses"
I agree, but only when they are legitimate organizations (no-one forced to join).
"Killed" them by serving the customers better. How evil!
He was talking about a candy bar named "Halo". He didn't think you needed a computer thingy to use it!
I know I'll be modded down for this, but.....
That is the problem. Meijer workers are forced to join unions, which really are nothing more than political organizations. They force members to contribute money to political causes that go against their interests, and really have nothing to do with whether or not you can do the job or how well you can do it. Like such an organization? Fine, your choice. But Meijer employees have no choice in membership. Wal-Mart employees, in contrast, are not forced to belong or give $$$$ to such organizations.
The opposite is true. Unions can get you fired just because you refuse to give money to political campaigns. And yes, Meijer forces you to join. This should be a choice left to workers.
"if you work at walmart you can be fired for no reason at all"
However, this is very very rare. It is in Wal-Mart's interest to retain good employees, and fire only the bad ones. Wal-Mart is rather cut-throat when it comes to efficiency. Firing people without reason is rather sloppy.
Thankfully, it is low, and getting lower due to inflation. This way, it has less negative impact on employment. On a macro level, it has little effect. On a micro level, you have people who are denied work, or who get thrown out of their job because the minimum wage goes up a dime. To these people, the effect is very real.
You use credibility by bringing up the bogus "neo-con" bogieman. The one good thing about inflation is that it makes the government "minimum wage" meaningless over time. Eventually, more and more low-wage jobs will have the real value of the work be at a level above that of the arbitrary government-set amount.
"One of those social problems is a tendancy to undervalue the work of the people at the 'bottom' of the labor market."
Translation: you think some low-worth job should be worth a lot more. The problem with this is that it isn't. It ignores the real value. No, it is not a problem: no undervaluing occurs.
"Apparently you don't think so. BTW, how much do you pay for making your tin foil hats."
I was not referring to a government conspiracy. I was referring to the real effects of the government-mandated "minimum wage", which is to discourage companies from hiring people to work jobs of low-worth. If I were a tin-foil-hat nutjob, I'd think that the government was intending this as the effect. However, I don't. It is just that the misguided legislators who push for "minimum wage" are misguided and callous. They do not care when people get fired as a result.
Those of us who have used "Windows ME" asked that many times.
As long as you can shoot Ewoks like in "Star Wars: Battlefront", I'm in for this one! Wonder if they will have those shrapnel-shooting Corellian elite blasters that easily turn Gungan ears to tatters.
The rich are included in the working class. The vast majority of the rich got rich through working, and they get rich by working.
The best way to evaluate this, by far, is to look at the free market value of the job. The factors you mention become secondary to the actual value (determined by how much/little the employer will pay and how little/much the employee will take). That is all that matters in the end. The actual value.
"To test this theorem, which group do you think gets paid more...."
I think they should be paid for the value of the work. It is really not my business, however, how much they are paid unless I sm paying them. None of my business at all when it comes to the private sector. Many government employees, in fact, are overpaid. They will still stay at the job even if paid less, and by wasting money on overpay, you have to cut services to make up for it.
If a CEO's wages are "obscene" to you, ignore them. Just like if Playboy is "obscene" to you, leave it on the shelf.
Thanks. Apparently, you are one of those who thinks that it is not really "Exploitation!" or "Oppression!" if you have to go out of your way to convince someone they are oppressed or exploited. They even have buzzwords for this: "raising class consciousness".