I'm deeply ambivalent about unions and right to work legislation. I think that the ability of closed shops to extract union dues whether you join the union or not is ridiculous. On the other hand, the unions have a point about the free rider problem.
I can certainly commiserate with those who bemoan the dead weight overly powerful unions--and especially those in the public sector--can create. The mostly unionized (and entirely publicly employed) administrative caste at my current employer are merely frustrating to deal with on their best days. On a typical day they actually create work that (non-union, largely externally funded) people like me then have to deal with.
But on the other other hand, I am not sure that I can accept the notion that the labor movement (generally) has achieved all of its worthwhile goals, and can safely cease to be. I'm not sure what the best "third path" here is, but I suspect that it would involve making both sides of the ongoing tension between labor and capital less intimate with wider political struggles.
I have no idea how one does that.
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I haven't been paying much attention to the back and forth on the fiscal cliff. Not because it doesn't matter, or doesn't have tremendous potential to affect me personally--it does--but because 1) there is a not a great deal I can do about any of it, and 2) the 'negotiations' will proceed right up until the last minute. The reason for the latter, simply put, is that no one has any incentive to wrap this thing up early. Since both parties to the negotiations have a number of constituencies at their back, the only reason either would have to end the negotiations before they absolutely have to is if they got everything their constituencies wanted. That simply isn't going to happen, for anyone.
But if you stop too soon, someone can always ask why you didn't hold out any longer. Which is why this won't be "over" until people are already gathering to watch the ball drop.
No point in holding one's breath until then.
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It's because the mis-named "Right to work" "laws" have nothing to do with rights and everything to do with business owners trying to destroy the unions.
The issue has nothing to do with what it is like to work with unions and how inefficient they are. That's not an argument in this case. The legislation is created by anti-union reactionaries who have been trying to kill the unions for decades.
How folks are willing to continually speak out against their own interests so consistently, and be convinced to keep doing so, is beyond me.
But if you stop too soon, someone can always ask why you didn't hold out any longer. Which is why this won't be "over" until people are already gathering to watch the ball drop.
Pretty much.
The fiscal cliff is a red herring. One way takes money directly out of my pocket. The other way devalues the dollars in my pocket. It's merely attention whoring at it's finest. "Look everyone! We're doing SOMETHING!"
The fiscal cliff is a red herring. One way takes money directly out of my pocket. The other way devalues the dollars in my pocket. It's merely attention whoring at it's finest. "Look everyone! We're doing SOMETHING!"
Labor has jumped the shark.
it's still worthy, but not with this current caste of leadership and ideas. they've sold their soul for partisan politics.
case in point: NAFTA.
Clinton/gore pushed it, defended it, own it... after Labor (cap L, yo!) proclaimed it the make or break, do or die issue of the time...
and then Labor fully endorsed the reelection of Clinton, the one who fucked them on the make or break, do or die issue of the time.
(By comparison: can you see the prolifers (i am one)/ Christianists fully endorsing a president who screwed them over royal on the 'defining, make or break' issue of their time?)
Labor is not pro labor, and hasnt been for a generation or more.
How folks are willing to continually speak out against their own interests so consistently, and be convinced to keep doing so, is beyond me.
RW presents a salient point here. in CA, the eco-enviro state that drives manufacturing and jobs away with what amounts to ticky-tack regulations and oversight ( i deal with the 'environmental' guy 3x a week, maybe more in my position. he likes me and grants me personal shit for a reason, because i help him with the bullshit.)
yet, Labor does nothing to twist the arm of those in power to alter the whacked out enviro bullshit (that comes largely from Berkley types) to keep manufacturing in CA.
instead, every election, i get the union voting recommendations that are straight up, total whack job left... tax increases, govt programs, enviro bullshit, all of it....
all these things that drive employers, and jobs, to AZ and TX.
'working people' are leaving CA for reason... because there is no work here.
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