Legal aspects [was: anybody else see darl on teevee?]

[Matthew Carpenter]

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dep wrote:

>and why might that be? why would companies find benefit in sending jobs 
>elsewhere? and no, "because people will work for less" is not the 
>answer, though *why* people elsewhere will work for less is part of the 
>answer.
>  
>
Having spend 22 years of my life living in Flint (and no, my school's 
roofs never leaked that I was aware of) I would have to say the Auto 
Industry and the UAW.

The reigning belief in our country is that we are the "Chosen People" or 
the Godless version of it, and that we don't have to work hard to get 
our paycheck.  Our employers exist in order to pay for our "living" 
habit.  Being a Flintite for so long, I know the story and history.  The 
UAW started out as a good thing, as most Unions do.  But the tried and 
true axiom remains thus: All Unions go the way of Microsoft... and how 
can they not?  You don't start an organization with plans to shut it 
down when it's not necessary.  No!  Like many churches today, Unions are 
interested in growing in numbers.  The problem that manifests is much 
like the one Microsoft is facing right now...  When you grow the beast, 
you must feed it.

In 1936 my grandfather and many other autoworkers had been good 
employees of the mighty General Motors Corporation.  They worked hard, 
made good cars, and valued the small sum an hour they made on the line.  
The problem was that management demanded too much, too fast, and 
wouldn't spend the extra money for even common sensical safety precautions.

They had had enough.

So in 1936 they organized the first automotive sit-down strike.  It was 
scary as H-E-double-hockeysticks.  These were family-men, with other 
mouths to feed.  But they had seen in too much detail just what the 
insides of the human limbs can look like when sheered from their 
intended location.  They understood the exhaustion of working long and 
hard without break.  They would have no more, even if it cost them their 
livelihood.  The sit-down strike of '36 started in Flint, spread to 
Detroit, other GM-towns, and ended up in the home town of my alma-mater, 
Anderson Indiana.  The effects were felt immediately.  Action was 
finally taken and the workers resumed working.

And the UAW was formed...  Over the years, the UAW swung that pendulum a 
great deal in favor of the autoworker, and as such the workplace is much 
safer and nicer place to work.  Obviously, there was leadership 
necessary, and the leadership had to work out a relationship with the 
automakers.  There were administrative tasks, and power, to be held in 
the UAW leadership... and the pendulum kept swinging.

Over time, autowork had become a profession to be sought after.  
Employee benefits rivaled those of many other "white-collar" 
professions, hours were reasonable, and jobs were fairly secure... and 
it kept swinging...

The UAW, and many other modern unions have created a beast with a large 
appetite.  The leadership are full-time and require income...  which 
requires members to pay out of their pockets.  Since there must be some 
reason for workers to pay, the leadership keeps going back to the well, 
demanding continual improvements.  Work of union-members cannot be done 
by non-union members.  Union-members can't be pushed to perform.  It 
takes an act of God, in all His might, to fire a union-member.  
Employers are poop-stuck.  They can't demand work for pay.  They can't 
discipline in many ways, they can hardly teach employees.  Meanwhile the 
autoworkers poke along at as close to the minimum required rate as they 
can.  Is this all the fault of the employees?  Of course not.  If an 
employee overachieves... well, they are encouraged not to make the rest 
of them look bad.  And this mentality finds its way into the very roots 
of life.  One of the main reasons for leaving Flint is because of the 
overpowering death mentality.

And who in their right mind would keep their company here?  GM has moved 
many plants into other countries, but definitely out of Michigan.  
Saturn, a new type of car?  Sure, because it was a new type of people.  
They started Saturn in Tennissee, where the UAW didn't have hold.  And 
you know what?  They did a pretty decent job.  There were incentives to 
succeed and perform.  There was a fresh new outlook on life and work.  
An outlook that is impossible for people ruled by the leech-mentality 
which the UAW has encouraged.

So, Alex....  I'll take your Socio-Economic Cluster-Fucks for $2000:
        "What is the UAW and the AutoIndustry?"

And why should they stay?