mad_machine wrote:
that is one problem with Unions.. I admit that. as I have stated before, I work both in and out of the union houses here in atlantic City as both a stage electrician and an A/V tech (depending on the house) and I can tell you in both respects.. they are the same.
I get paid the same wether I am hanging 40 feet up in the air atop some cable hung truss focusing lights (my favourit job and one of the most dangerous) or plugging cables into laptops for people to do powerpoint presentations.
Fair? no.. but honestly, I work hard and so does everyone around me. There are a few slackers, but eventually get caught and punished. Just the way it is. Being younger and new to the union scene, I do not get the calls that the older guys get, but my skills do get me jobs they cannot do.
I think before people criticise unions, they should try working under one. It never hurts to have both sides of the argument in your realm of experience
No offense, but I've worked around Unions in a couple of different places and not experienced what you're talking about. Through my job, I have visited a number of Union shops. In each instance, I have been confronted with the stereotype that I think many attribute to Unions, generally lazy workers with an entitlement attitude.
Once was in San Francisco where we visited an airline maintenance shop. I don't think I saw anyone do anything that could remotely be described as work the entire 2 days that we were there, but I did see a lot of newspaper reading, card playing and other non work activities.
Another happened at a smaller shop and wasn't quite as egregious, but disturbing none-the-less. I was in their facility to do some testing with highly specialized equipment that was borrowed from a sister company and virtually priceless. I couldn't physically carry everything myself, so I asked the resident engineer I was working with to carry some of my stuff. He was hesitant and I asked why. He said that if he carried anything more than a notepad across the shop floor, a "material handler" would file a grievance with the Union because he was taking work away from them. Being somewhat naive about Union shops, I told him to tell whomever that I insisted that he carry my specialized equipment because I honestly didn't want just anyone's hands on it, since 6 months of my work were culminating in this test and I didn't want it compromised by some "material handler". Just as he suspected, a grievance was filed, he was written up and the "material handler" got 4 hours of compensation out of it.
After what I've seen, I truly wonder sometimes how any Union shop in a manufacturing environment can be profitable.
