Archived There’s talk

[pellinore]

My father works in a store and there are unions there.....he can only work in his area.

One time my dad was asked to help in an area because there was high demand for a particular food product that needed some additional workers....just for the day.

The very next day the store manager was told that my dad couldn't be in that area...no matter what the need.

My dad was helping in the food area.....he's not a union member there.....so that is a lot like a swap shift sort of thing. Several unions...different departments....no cross working.
Same thing could easily apply at Target.

 

[pellinore]

Target unions could be sales floor, food, front end, restaurant, backroom......so a cashier couldn't work on the sales floor.......and someone in hardlines couldn't work food.
So, as I said....swap sheets could easily be a thing of the past.

 

[commiecorvus]

It may be a case like what @SFSFun described, he was in an area represented by a different union.
When I worked as a meat cutter the rules were pretty strict, we were represented by the same union but had a different contract.
We could work in other parts of the store but other people couldn't work in the meat department unless they had been cleared.
That mostly meant, since it was the same union, being properly trained and brought up to a level where you wouldn't kill yourself on the equipment.
I suspect in other stores that would mean being a member of the other unions.

 

[commiecorvus]

Target unions could be sales floor, food, front end, restaurant, backroom......so a cashier couldn't work on the sales floor.......and someone in hardlines couldn't work food.
So, as I said....swap sheets could easily be a thing of the past.

It would depend on what union organized the store.
Like I said the meatcutters are big babies so yes, sometimes they have their own union.
In my store, they didn't just their own contract.

Otherwise we all worked other parts of the store no problems.
At Costco they have unionized stores and non-unionized stores sometimes just down the road from each other.
The CEO at Costco has no problem dealing with unions, unlike the assholes that run other companies.

 

[Logo]

Unions are a business to.make money. There are many laws in the books that protect workers.

 

[can't touch this]

I like the idea of unions and labor organization in general but the state of American unions is godawful and in dire need of overhaul.

In Europe unionized firms each have their own company unions that are tailored to the specific needs and conditions of that business. The organization is far more democratic and arranged in such a way that workers can bargain collectively, you know, the way unions are intended to function.

In the US our labor laws have created a pretty fucked up situation where the few unions that can even exist at all are simply an added layer of bureaucracy that gets fat and happy from rent-seeking. Your individual input and bargaining power is extremely limited in practice. The union is typically huge and overextended to "represent" multiple firms in a given industry, meaning they're too big to actually be effective for their original purpose. American unions tend to be overtly partisan to an almost cartoonish degree - the (D) candidate of the given election cycle could announce that they want to fully automate all factories by 2030 and are big fans of Ayn Rand and your union will still endorse them, as if by subconscious reflex. Lots of worshipful slobbering over Obama like he was the second coming of Eugene V. Debs. If you like the idea of divisive partisan politics in every single huddle you attend, you'll get it by the trailerful. Given the direction of labor politics these days, you might go in expecting to have your voice heard, only to find out that you're just stealing a job from a POC who needs it much more than your privileged ass does...oops

short version - good in theory, badly implemented in practice

 

[Fluttervale]

Meat cutting is a skilled trade, unlike every other role in a grocery store.

 

[commiecorvus]

Meat cutting is a skilled trade, unlike every other role in a grocery store.

The idea that any job out there does not take a skill that has value is a lie that has been fed to you by the bosses.

 

[Times Up]

Target unions could be sales floor, food, front end, restaurant, backroom......so a cashier couldn't work on the sales floor.......and someone in hardlines couldn't work food.
So, as I said....swap sheets could easily be a thing of the past.

Most likely only 1 union would attempt to unionize Target. Therefore all TM would be in the same union, and those types of problems would be a non issue.

 

[Tessa120]

@Parker51 your philosophical objections are pretty much the same shit my grandfather had to deal with when he was organizing for the Wobblies.

You see the IWW believed in one big union and also weren't racist or sexist so they were happy to organize POC and woman in industries that everyone said weren't 'acceptable' for organization.
The bosses would talk about how the unions were con men, socialists, just wanted to take their money, how it wasn't going to make things better, two bosses instead of one, the organizers were thugs, and if all else failed the bosses would shoot at him.

He was able to organize a lot of people and was involved in one of the biggest general strikes in US history.

Right now those avocado toast eating millennials are the fastest growing group that is unionizing.
Yep, they have figured out they are getting screwed and need to get some power back.
Millennials Are Keeping Unions Alive - https://www.thenation.com/article/millennials-are-keeping-unions-alive/

This country was at its strongest when unions were at their strongest.
We need to go back to that.

So in the words of Joe Hill "There is Power in a Union". (A song I was rocked to sleep by.)

@Parker51 does have a point though. When I was a kid I lived in a company town for a timber mill. The mill was unionized and while the owners bitched and grumbled about it, there was a really good working relationship between owner and union. A single paycheck supported a family and we had great benefits and while summer vacations were inexpensive, spending a week touring the coast is certainly not done cheaply. Fast forward to my senior year in high school and the owner unexpectedly died from complications of diabetes. The shareholders immediately sold the mill to a non-union chain. By law, them buying it meant they now had to deal with the union and that company hated unions. So also by the law, they completely shut the business down for 30 days. That forced a new vote for unionization when it re-opened, and the company stacked the deck by relocating several of their existing employees and making them over 50% of the hired workforce for the newly opened business. So yeah, workers vote to unionize, all Target would have to do is close the business and then be careful in who they hire back when they reopen to get a future union vote to be no.

But for all those who say unions are useless, when the mill was sold, wages were cut in half and benefits gutted. From what I hear now (it being 25+ years without going home) the chain mill has pretty much run out of physical resources provided by that sale, despite the old owner's family having had a sustainable business plan that had worked for 70 years and expected to last easily twice that long. So the change in business practice was bad for the business too, lots of money at once and then poof it's gone, instead of less at any given moment but staying steady for generations. The symbiotic relationship between business and union kept both thriving.

 

[commiecorvus]

@Parker51 does have a point though. When I was a kid I lived in a company town for a timber mill. The mill was unionized and while the owners bitched and grumbled about it, there was a really good working relationship between owner and union. A single paycheck supported a family and we had great benefits and while summer vacations were inexpensive, spending a week touring the coast is certainly not done cheaply. Fast forward to my senior year in high school and the owner unexpectedly died from complications of diabetes. The shareholders immediately sold the mill to a non-union chain. By law, them buying it meant they now had to deal with the union and that company hated unions. So also by the law, they completely shut the business down for 30 days. That forced a new vote for unionization when it re-opened, and the company stacked the deck by relocating several of their existing employees and making them over 50% of the hired workforce for the newly opened business. So yeah, workers vote to unionize, all Target would have to do is close the business and then be careful in who they hire back when they reopen to get a future union vote to be no.

But for all those who say unions are useless, when the mill was sold, wages were cut in half and benefits gutted. From what I hear now (it being 25+ years without going home) the chain mill has pretty much run out of physical resources provided by that sale, despite the old owner's family having had a sustainable business plan that had worked for 70 years and expected to last easily twice that long. So the change in business practice was bad for the business too, lots of money at once and then poof it's gone, instead of less at any given moment but staying steady for generations. The symbiotic relationship between business and union kept both thriving.

You are absolutely right, the company can do (and has done) awful things to shut down a union.
That doesn't mean it isn't worth trying.
Like I said, they shot at my grandfather when he was organizing and he kept at it.
Joe Hill, the guy who wrote the song I posted, was executed on false charges by a firing squad. He is famous for saying, "Don't mourn, organize." Personally, I'm more impressed by how when the squad raised their rifles and went, "Ready", "Aim",...Joe yelled "Fire."
That is how you make sure to have the last word.

 

[pellinore]

Just to be a bit snarky....and not knowing how to get to the correct font......: The best way to get the last word is to apologize.

 

[commiecorvus]

To stand on the firing parapet and expose yourself to danger; to stand and fight a thousand miles from home when you’re all alone and outnumbered and probably beaten; to spit on your hands and lower the pike; to stand fast over the body of Leonidas the King; to be rear guard at Kunu-Ri; to stand and be still to the Birkenhead Drill; these are not rational acts. They are often merely necessary. -- Jerry Pournell There Will Be War (1983)

 

[Fluttervale]

The idea that any job out there does not take a skill that has value is a lie that has been fed to you by the bosses.

No, I mean it is considered a skilled trade, meaning that the unions view it as a completely separate type of work on par with pipe fitting, electricians, etc. Proper meat cutting (not what is done in grocery stores, but taking an unskinned carcass and turning it into usable cuts of meat) requires years of specialized training. That is why they get a special contract. Because before cryovaced cuts that just had to be sliced were a thing, meat cutters had to butcher the cow and pig in the store.

 

[Tessa120]

Since you reference your grandfather, unless you are very, very young and there were a couple of generations of young parents, his union days were likely when they had the mafia's muscle to pull it off. Trying to stop the attempt to unionize when you know the person on point is more than willing to burn your factory and your house to the ground is a lot different than stopping the attempt to unionize when you can just fire everyone and tell future potential employers that they are not rehireable and they can't do a thing in return.

 

[commiecorvus]

Since you reference your grandfather, unless you are very, very young and there were a couple of generations of young parents, his union days were likely when they had the mafia's muscle to pull it off. Trying to stop the attempt to unionize when you know the person on point is more than willing to burn your factory and your house to the ground is a lot different than stopping the attempt to unionize when you can just fire everyone and tell future potential employers that they are not rehireable and they can't do a thing in return.

My grandfather was pre-mob days.
Like I said he was a Wobblie, IWW. They were a whole different animal.
It's hard to describe what they were like except to say they were both a union, a political movement, and seriously badass, back in the day.
A lot of them got tossed in jail for organizing during war time because they were considered un-American.
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn is one of my favorites.
World War II was kind of the end of the Wobblies because of this.

The mob involvement in unions is actually highly overplayed, often used by the bosses as a way of justifying keeping out unions.
Mob involvement in unions was largely tied to the east coast and yes, they hurt seriously the image of unions.
The mob wasn't there to force organization, they were there to funnel money off and through the union.
Most of the unions they took over were already pretty strong already.
If you watched The Sopranos, you see them use the union to create fake jobs and wash money through the union.
These days the members have been voting out the mob members and fighting back.