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Unions... Forced Dues???

Stoked said:
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/12/opinion/strong-unions-strong-democracy.html?ref=opinion&_r=0

NY Times article about the possible Supreme Court ruling stripping the requirement for non union members to pay union dues.

Do you think people should be forced/required to pay union dues in applicable jobs? Or do you think that only the actual members of said union should pay dues?
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I work at a unionized plant. Some people don't pay dues. So this changes nothing imo
 
fishonjazz said:
I work at a unionized plant. Some people don't pay dues. So this changes nothing imo
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For you maybe. But there are some states and some jobs that take union dues from any one in certain positions, union member or not. Public schools California teachers for example.
 
I think that if you want to get the benefits that the union fought to get in the contract (raises, 401K company matches, pto increases, pension etc) and want the union reps to go to bat for you in disputes (disciplinary discrepancies, suspensions, firings) then you should have to pay the dues.

If none of that stuff is important to you and you want to with things on your own then you shouldn't have to pay dues
 
So the government believes people shouldn't be able to secede from the Unions? Haha.. hypocrites.
 
fishonjazz said:
I work at a unionized plant. Some people don't pay dues. So this changes nothing imo
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I've talked to several people who say that the Union gave up more than it got. Do you think that's true?
 
Gameface said:
I've talked to several people who say that the Union gave up more than it got. Do you think that's true?
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Not at all. In fact I can't think of anything we gave up.

Our hours were being cut big time. We were lucky to get 36 per week. The union contract guarantees that we get 80 hours per week.

There was talk of pto being decreased right before the union got here. The contract guarantees that we keep the pto amounts that we had and the amount goes up the longer you are employed.

There was talk of pay decreases due to the recession. The union got us guaranteed yearly pay increases instead. (The one thing that we did give in on was making new hires in the warehouse start out at less per hour than before as like an entry level wage. The guys who were already in the warehouse kept their higher pay)

We got more company match on 401K than before.

We get paid to change our clothes now due to the union.

We keep our pension, which we definitely would no longer have (management fought hard to take it away and lost)

Those are the things off the top of my head that I can think of.
Plus you have someone to fight for you if you feel you are being treated unfairly.

I think allot of new guys don't understand what the union has done to make things better because they were not here before the union.

The only thing I can think of that got worse post union vs pre union is the starting wage in the warehouse.


And this is coming from a guy that voted against the union when they tried to come into our plant the first 4 times.
When I finally voted yes (and the union won the vote) it was because of the current climate in the workplace at that time. We needed the union at that point.
 
fishonjazz said:
Not at all. In fact I can't think of anything we gave up.

Our hours were being cut big time. We were lucky to get 36 per week. The union contract guarantees that we get 80 hours per week.

There was talk of pto being decreased right before the union got here. The contract guarantees that we keep the pto amounts that we had and the amount goes up the longer you are employed.

There was talk of pay decreases due to the recession. The union got us guaranteed yearly pay increases instead. (The one thing that we did give in on was making new hires in the warehouse start out at less per hour than before as like an entry level wage. The guys who were already in the warehouse kept their higher pay)

We got more company match on 401K than before.

We get paid to change our clothes now due to the union.

We keep our pension, which we definitely would no longer have (management fought hard to take it away and lost)

Those are the things off the top of my head that I can think of.
Plus you have someone to fight for you if you feel you are being treated unfairly.

I think allot of new guys don't understand what the union has done to make things better because they were not here before the union.

The only thing I can think of that got worse post union vs pre union is the starting wage in the warehouse.


And this is coming from a guy that voted against the union when they tried to come into our plant the first 4 times.
When I finally voted yes (and the union won the vote) it was because of the current climate in the workplace at that time. We needed the union at that point.
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From what I heard there were a couple holidays that we lost, plus the occurrence system came in with the Union, and there used to be both sick time and PTO, now there's only PTO.

Besides that, how credible was it that PTO was going to be reduced or that insurance premiums were going to go way up? Were those just scare tactics the pro-union guys used to push for the union?

And the 36hr weeks were temporary and were used to avoid layoffs. Once the Union came in and demanded 40hr guaranteed per week they had to lay people off.

This is all second hand info to me, obviously. I wasn't there before the union.
 
Gameface said:
From what I heard there were a couple holidays that we lost, plus the occurrence system came in with the Union, and there used to be both sick time and PTO, now there's only PTO.

Besides that, how credible was it that PTO was going to be reduced or that insurance premiums were going to go way up? Were those just scare tactics the pro-union guys used to push for the union?

And the 36hr weeks were temporary and were used to avoid layoffs. Once the Union came in and demanded 40hr guaranteed per week they had to lay people off.

This is all second hand info to me, obviously. I wasn't there before the union.
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Some good points. I think we lost one holiday (Christmas eve) and iirc we went to pto only pre union.
The occurrence system did go from 8 to 6.

As for the scare tactics of the company cutting pto, wages, etc... that may in fact be the case. Maybe it was just a scare tactic. But I remember other company's making drastic, negative changes during the recession and I believe that dannon was going to in fact make some negative changes of their own.

And things can be looked at both ways. Maybe the occurrences would have decreased union or not, maybe we lose the holiday union or not, etc.


As for the layoffs.... I might seem like a dick for saying this but I would rather have people get laid off and myself get more hours/pay than everyone keep their job while my hours and pay decrease. Gotta look out for myself.

I would hate for the company to be able to **** with my hours, pay, pto, pension, etc as they see fit due to volume or whatever.
The best thing about the union imo is the fact that everything is on paper and cannot be changed on the whims of management.
 
I have negotiated collective bargaining agreements with unions, and I will say that they often negotiate with their heads up their Corbins. Hostess was an extreme example (put them out of work) but I see idiotic decisions all the time from the Union side.

An example is the 50% Cadillac Tax that is going to hit "rich" benefits plans in 2018. We tried to lower the health benefit to avoid the 50% tax and pay the employees the decreased health benefits in salary, plus an additional 25% (essentially putting half of the upcoming 50% penalty into their pocket instead of the governments). Even though this would have resulted in higher overall wages for all employees, the minute we started talking about fewer health benefits everything else fell on deaf ears. So the negotiated agreement kept the rich benefits and the employer I represent will now have to pay this tax and the employees are getting a much smaller overall compensation package than they could have. And these employees pay to have these people look out for their interests. We could have changed the benefits plan to a High Deductible Health Plan, and if the employees each put half of their increased salaries into an HSA they would have had an overall better coverage with the upside of keeping what they don't use.

You may think this scenario sounds crazy, but the EXACT same thing happened on the 3 CBAs I worked on over the past year or so.
 
JAZZGASM said:
I have negotiated collective bargaining agreements with unions, and I will say that they often negotiate with their heads up their Corbins. Hostess was an extreme example (put them out of work) but I see idiotic decisions all the time from the Union side.

An example is the 50% Cadillac Tax that is going to hit "rich" benefits plans in 2018. We tried to lower the health benefit to avoid the 50% tax and pay the employees the decreased health benefits in salary, plus an additional 25% (essentially putting half of the upcoming 50% penalty into their pocket instead of the governments). Even though this would have resulted in higher overall wages for all employees, the minute we started talking about fewer health benefits everything else fell on deaf ears. So the negotiated agreement kept the rich benefits and the employer I represent will now have to pay this tax and the employees are getting a much smaller overall compensation package than they could have. And these employees pay to have these people look out for their interests. We could have changed the benefits plan to a High Deductible Health Plan, and if the employees each put half of their increased salaries into an HSA they would have had an overall better coverage with the upside of keeping what they don't use.

You may think this scenario sounds crazy, but the EXACT same thing happened on the 3 CBAs I worked on over the past year or so.
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Part(s) of the Hostess issue(s) were the smallest of the unions voted to strike after the CEO threatened any work stoppage would result in a shutdown and liquidation. He NEVER intended to "save" the company. His history everywhere he's been is liquidate and sell. In addition, the Teamsters here in Utah represented the route guys(myself included) fought like hell to keep the company operating. We were ready to take the concessions(I don't recall the specifics) just to stay working. Again, the SMALLEST bakers union was the lynchpin that gave the CEO his reason to pull the plug.
 
To the point of the thread though, if you reap the rewards of the CBA, you should pay dues. If you don't get those same benefits then you should not pay dues.
 
Gregory Rayburn, and other execs also still got their enormous bonuses in the face of shuttering and liquidating. The rest of the 19,000 who were instantly out of work got pennies, if anything. Man, I thought I was over this but it still gets my blood boiling!
 
fishonjazz said:
Some good points. I think we lost one holiday (Christmas eve) and iirc we went to pto only pre union.
The occurrence system did go from 8 to 6.

As for the scare tactics of the company cutting pto, wages, etc... that may in fact be the case. Maybe it was just a scare tactic. But I remember other company's making drastic, negative changes during the recession and I believe that dannon was going to in fact make some negative changes of their own.

And things can be looked at both ways. Maybe the occurrences would have decreased union or not, maybe we lose the holiday union or not, etc.


As for the layoffs.... I might seem like a dick for saying this but I would rather have people get laid off and myself get more hours/pay than everyone keep their job while my hours and pay decrease. Gotta look out for myself.

I would hate for the company to be able to **** with my hours, pay, pto, pension, etc as they see fit due to volume or whatever.
The best thing about the union imo is the fact that everything is on paper and cannot be changed on the whims of management.
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So is everybody in your plant union? Or are some not part?
 
bigb said:
So is everybody in your plant union? Or are some not part?
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Not everyone is union.

I would say it's something like 70% union and 30% non union maybe.
 
Red Jazz Fan said:
To the point of the thread though, if you reap the rewards of the CBA, you should pay dues. If you don't get those same benefits then you should not pay dues.
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I agree
 
fishonjazz said:
Not everyone is union.

I would say it's something like 70% union and 30% non union maybe.
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Reading your posts, I'm under the impression you're union. Do the other employees regularly get fewer hours? Do they get the same amount of holidays? Do they get paid the same?
 
bigb said:
Reading your posts, I'm under the impression you're union. Do the other employees regularly get fewer hours? Do they get the same amount of holidays? Do they get paid the same?
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Yes I'm union.
Yes the other guys get the same benefits of the union contract that I get.

I think that should not be the case though. I think that if you don't want to be part of the union and don't want to pay dues then you shouldn't get the benefits that the cba provides. I don't know how that would work though, I just think it sucks that I pay my dues and others don't yet we get the same pay and benefits.

In fact, I have considered leaving the union to save the $8 per week since I have a baby on the way and my wife will no longer be working so every penny counts.


To be clear, I'm not a pro union guy or a non union guy like some people are. I have no agenda. The union tried to come into my workplace many times and I voted no each time. Then we got a new plant manager, new management team, and the recession hit and I finally decided to vote for the union and the vote of the plant ended up in favor of the union.
So far I think that the union has done a good job and our employees are better off with the union than without.... I have no way of knowing for certain if that is the case since I don't know what my plant would be like without the union but my gut says it's been good so far
 
fishonjazz said:
Yes I'm union.
Yes the other guys get the same benefits of the union contract that I get.

I think that should not be the case though. I think that if you don't want to be part of the union and don't want to pay dues then you shouldn't get the benefits that the cba provides. I don't know how that would work though, I just think it sucks that I pay my dues and others don't yet we get the same pay and benefits.

In fact, I have considered leaving the union to save the $8 per week since I have a baby on the way and my wife will no longer be working so every penny counts.


To be clear, I'm not a pro union guy or a non union guy like some people are. I have no agenda. The union tried to come into my workplace many times and I voted no each time. Then we got a new plant manager, new management team, and the recession hit and I finally decided to vote for the union and the vote of the plant ended up in favor of the union.
So far I think that the union has done a good job and our employees are better off with the union than without.... I have no way of knowing for certain if that is the case since I don't know what my plant would be like without the union but my gut says it's been good so far
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Yeah, that's kind of messed up.
 
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