Secret Ballot or Card Check?

Ditto! (GA BTW)

as always, GA!

This is supposed to be a democracy. If it's not a secret ballot it's not democratic. It's facist.

On the other hand I blame management for allowing the union contracts to become a millstone around the necks of their companies. If management hadn't been lining their own pockets they wouldn't have succumbed to pressure to feather the nests of the unions. It's not easy to justify a tight budget for the workers when you are playing fast and loose with your own compensation.

Also, it was management who failed to realize that competition was heating up. The union workers are going to make what they are told and their interests are very narrow. Management is supposed to have the global visability and predict that things are going to get tough as competition heats up.

Of course it's better to be fat, dumb and happy when you are getting rich instead of planning for a rainy day. This is a function of management.

Where the unions get whuppped with the ugly stick are things like work rules and nutty work hours that create inefficiencies in the system. Again, management allowed that to go into the contracts. But of course management stacks the board of directors with their cronies. Tough to push back on the unions for work rules when you get to write your own rules.

Are the current union practices a problem? Yeah. But I don't blame the unions. They were just mimicing the actions of the supposedly much smarter managers.

But it's too late now. The current economic situation is going to wipe out the inefficiencies - except where the government gets into the act. That's a different topic.

Where have you been working?

Corporations declared open season on unions after the feds broke the air traffic controllers union...

Companies use nafta to break unions, or just plain close the doors & reopen minus the union.

I watched the food plant I was working in repel the teamsters. The teamsters successfully split the warehouse off from the rest of the plant, and get voted in. for the next 2 years everyone else got a raise, but not the warehouse workers. They decertified the teamsters & got the same raises the rest of us got, but no retro & paid dues for that time, the trucking all got outsourced to penske....

I no fan of unions.

What you say may be true of UAW, but the outsourcing of manufacturing continues, the tax structure favors this, instead of using import tarrifs to level the playing field as we have done since the founding of this country.

A century ago the corporations overplayed their hand. They were allowed to work people (including children) to death with no compensation to the families, they were allowed to hire 'goons' to shoot and kill strikers. Workers had no rights.

In response to these abuses, laws were passed giving the workers rights and imposing limits on the power of business. Then we had WWII which destroyed the industrial base in most of the world. The US was spared this fate and became for a period of time the 'world's factory'. We got fat and happy and eventually stupid. Unions overplayed their hand, and management went along figuring that the wealth and prosperity would never end.

The rest of the industrial world rebuilt, and new members (China and other parts of Asia) joined the club. Now the party is pretty much over. Our wages here in the US are out of proportion to our value as workers when compared to the rest of the world.

I own a small business, but I still support the idea that workers have rights, including the right to organize. The choice between a secret ballot and a card check is left up to the workers, so the argument that they are being denied the secret ballot is BS. In addition, the secret ballot is a right pertaining to public elections of public figures, enactment of ballot initiatives, etc. It is absurd to suggest that this vital constitutional right extends to the workings of private groups such as clubs, unions, or corporations. Using this argument is a cynical attempt to confuse the public. I have sat on committees dealing with teacher's wages and other school related issues. There were no secret ballots - all decisions were made in public by voice vote.

Having said all that, I think that under the current economic situation, the prospects for workers, unions and or non-union are pretty bleak.

The new legislation has many bad points to it that we were made aware of at my company. It removes the Labor Departments overseeing the 'elections' which I see as a bad idea, no oversight. If you give in to the union goon who wants you to sign a card 'requesting information' on the union, you have signed in favor of joining the union. Not what they are telling you at all. If they get enough people to sign the card (don't remember the percentage), you are in the union. No real vote, no monitoring by anyone

I am no fan of unions, they have outlived their usefulness in 90% of the businesses that they are in. Some businesses could use the unions to make the employer fair, WALMART comes to mind there. I have been acquainted with business owners who have had to shut down because of them demanding raises that the product being made could not support. And where does the money go? They have no accountability on the dues that gather.

I have read most of the reports on the "Employee Free Choice Act" and it is like the 300lbs Gorilla in the room. Nobody want to talk about it in fear of it, but it has to be dealt with whether we like it or not. I was a union electrician for thirteen years and seen and heard allot of stories on everything from coercion to money under the table. Plus, I got tired of paying to work so I left the union.

I believe that this issue boils down to two things. What's best for the economy and what's best for the employees. Some would wonder why I didn't say "what's best for the company", well, you can't have a company without employees. Whether it's service or product, you are going to need employees to function.

I agree that unions have lived out their usefulness because no one should have to pay to go to work. Getting up in the morning is hard enough. Plus, I believe if the employees are treated fairly and revenues will be in the black. Look at Honda versus US Automakers. Honda has no union and pays their employees almost half of what their US counterparts receive and the Honda employees have no union.

I could write about this all day, but I'll let someone else respond.