The 1936 Sit-Down Strike That Brought a Powerful Automaker to its Knees

Over 136,000 GM workers participated in the strike in Flint, Michigan that became known as 'the strike heard round the world.' interesting read if you look it up, it's long so I didn't post it.

 

Union wages lift Non-Union wages.
Non-Union labor(overall) earns~18% less than their Union member counterparts.
Union labor has been/still is significant in establishing and maintaining standards and protecting workers from many many many things too long to list.
America has a problem with individual and corporate greed, the "bottom line" and stockholders and Wall Street don't function with workers' best interest in mind.
Trickle-down economics isn't running rampant within companies last I checked.
It's not a perfect system, and it needs checks and balances- Unions are a big part of that.

The Working Class built this wonderful country on their backs, everyone else gets to use it.....

Qualifications for posting=
-Raised in a proud Union and Non-Union trades family (living in harmony together.... mostly)
-Former Union member, current Non-Union Sr. Manager of both Union and Non-Union employees.
-Employee of a multibillion dollar corporation that can more than afford to employ and contract Union labor, and happily does.
-Ford truck owner (GAS and 6-speed....)

 

The dictator..


The sound of reason..


The reality check...

 

I have been a non-Union trades worker for over 20 years and never really learned much about the Union way. I'm pretty indifferent to it.
That statement about earnings however did get my attention because of a conversation I had early on with a couple of Union carpenters. I would almost call it a recruitment attempt. He was very upfront in saying that I would likely not get paid as much hourly if I were to go Union, and the hourly he estimated would definitely have been less than I was getting at the time. I don't recall if that was pre Union dues, or after (been a long time). The pro's to going Union had more to do with benifits, retirement, vacation pay....something like that. I also know at that time, starting pay was less Union vs non Union, at least around here.

Besides that, my only other experience with Union was when my boss at the time, hired on a couple of Union carpenters who had been waiting for their names to come up for work. I could be wrong, but I don't think the Union likes when their workers do that. But these guys had been out of work, on some kind work waiting list(?) so he gave them some work. Oh, and I do remember the Union hiring, what seemed to be random people, to hold signs with negative statements about some local construction company haha.

 

well at least two of my trucks are at the dealership, the other two are in transit.

I don't expect to see the 550s this year at all.

So with all the non-union talkers, let me ask you what you think. The fair wages per hour for auto workers?

What is your yearly gross?

What do you think their yearly gross should be?

 

My yearly gross is irrelevant to what an auto worker makes or should make. I'm not an auto worker. I think they should make whatever the industry standard is for that job, in that part of the country.

 

I have a feeling the guy who are making very good money 400- 500,000 a year compared to a auto worker that may be making $70,000. Maybe a little more out of touch. That was the reason of my question.

I make good money, I am not in a union. I did start off my young life as an operating engineer local 150 when I was a teenager to my early 20s. That was young and dumb and messed that up. That's my background. My father was in the same union, He's been retired 20 years now on a pension.

Most of the people I know, don't have a retirement plan, does anybody feel it's right for somebody to put in 30 years in a company and not have anything at the end?

 

Right.
And the "Industry Standard" is and always will be set by union wages, or what is known as prevailing rate". you only go down from there, not up.

 

Yeah, your right again.

Perhaps they should be putting the 10 speeds together, or the mustang motors.

Everybody thinks of the assembly line workers, what about the guys that are putting everything together such as the motors, rear ends, transmissions, transfer cases etc

I will agree with you that that is not a very high skilled job working on the assembly line. I'm sure some of it is technical.

I know I couldn't do the same repetitive job day in day out day in day out day in day out.

 

Prevailing wage for a laborer (a designated unionized trade in civil construction with no skills or specialized training) is between $33 to $36 per hour sent to the employee, but the actual cost to the employer for that same hour of work is between $64 to $67 per hour, due to the requirement placed upon the employer to pay a near equivalent to wages sum into Pension, Health, and other union benefit trust funds on behalf of that employee's hour of work.

So essentially, anytime you see someone in an orange vest with a yellow hardhat pushing a broom to clean up a construction job on a city street in this area, that broom pusher is costing the private employer (who won the public works job by submitting the lowest bid) at least a dollar a minute.

The broom pusher always has their cell phone handy, and checks their Facebook and Instagram accounts about every 10 minutes, or 6 times an hour. If they only spend a minute on their cellphone every time they check, that is 6 minutes per hour, times 8 hours, while they are being paid $1 per minute.

So the employer is paying $48.00 per day for the non skilled prevailing wage worker to keep up with their personal Instagram appetites. This is what I have observed when monitoring employer compliance with prevailing wage requirements. Naturally employers are frustrated. Municipalities, Counties, School Districts, and citizen taxpayers who fund all of those public agencies wonder why it cost so much to replace a broken sidewalk.

It isn't like production of a sewer or a school parking area can be farmed out overseas.

In the three way war between human nature, need, and greed, there are no flesh and blood winners. Only robots.

 

I do. People know as soon as they are hired if they are eligible for a pension. If they want one and employer doesn’t offer it then it’s time to find a different job.
Anyone is free to have a 401k and to work enough to earn social security credits.
Its called taking care of one’s personal responsibility

I knew at 18 I wanted a pension and an early retirement so I joined the Air Force and retired at age 39 with a moderate pension and fantastic health care. Everyone has a chance to follow their dreams.

 

I worked for a non union company. Then a union company bought us...first thing the union agreed to was slashing wages by 15%, and doing away with pensions. Then our service went to crap in part because unions breed lazy workers. There were other issues as well.
I live in a right to work state and opted out of giving corrupt thugs a single dime of my hard earned money. Proud scab you might say.
My experience with unions: they are a cancer. If you start out with a strong work ethic, chances are you'll lose it in my experience. Its the nature of the union culture.
I quit that job not long ago...that union company has gone under. They are no more, to be fair it wasnt all the union's fault. Company was horribly mismanaged as well...they are currently in bankruptcy.

Ups is now on a slippery slope...huge wage increases at a time when Amazon is pulling a huge volume of business from them. Dont be surprised when your ups employed friends are layed off. Just saying

 

I'll ask question again

What should, in your opinion, they be paid hour?

Either put up or shut up. You can't knock without a solution.

 

Union workers are like Socialism, they work at the lowest common denominator.

 

As a tech at a dealership in my early years I always felt it was wrong that an assembly line person made more money than me and I was required to think and repair. Definitely not right