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At 77 He Prepares Burgers Earning in Week His Former Hourly Wage
At 77 He Prepares Burgers Earning in Week His Former Hourly Wage
At 77 He Prepares Burgers Earning in Week His Former Hourly Wage
Many middle-class Americans plan to work until they die
Many middle-class Americans plan to work until they die
By Melanie Hicken @melhicken
October 23, 2013: 2:00 PM ET
A growing percentage of middle-class Americans say they have saved so little for retirement that they expect to work into their 80s or even until they either get too sick or die, according to a recent survey.
Nearly half of middle-class workers said they are not confident that they will be able to save enough to retire comfortably, according to a Wells Fargo survey of 1,000 workers between the ages of 25 and 75, with household incomes between $25,000 and $100,000.
As a result, 34% said they plan to work until they're at least 80 -- that's up from 25% in 2011 and 30% last year. An even larger percentage, 37%, said they'll never retire and plan to either work until they get too sick or die, the survey found.
Driving these concerns is that many of the respondents said they simply can't afford to pay their monthly bills and save for retirement at the same time.
"For the past three years, the struggle to pay bills is a growing concern and the prospect of saving for retirement looks dim, particularly for those in their prime saving years," Laurie Nordquist, head of Wells Fargo Institutional Retirement and Trust, said in a statement.
The concerns come as many middle-class families are trying to make do with less. The country's median annual household income is down by more than 8% since 2007. And many of the jobs lost during the recent recession have been replaced with lower wage positions.
With minimal savings built up, a third of those surveyed said Social Security will be their primary source of income during retirement. Of those making less than $50,000, nearly half said they will rely mainly on Social Security.
In August, the average Social Security recipient received around $15,000 a year in retirement benefits, according to the Social Security Administration.
Another factor holding back middle-class savers is a fear of investing in the stock market, said Nordquist.
Across workers of all ages, only 24% said they were confident in the stock market as a place to invest for retirement. And slightly more than half said they don't invest in the stocks because they are afraid to lose their savings in the ups and downs of the market.
This is despite the fact that financial planners say that investing in stocks is the best way to grow a nest egg that will be large enough to cover decades of retirement. Over years of savings, short-term losses are overtaken by the long-term gains that years of compounded returns offer.
"There is a striking amount of fear about the stock market among all investors," she said. "The middle class just isn't making the link between being invested and the potential growth of their savings.
http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/23/retirement/middle-class-retirement/index.html?iid=HP_LN
Many middle-class Americans plan to work until they die
By Melanie Hicken @melhicken
October 23, 2013: 2:00 PM ET
A growing percentage of middle-class Americans say they have saved so little for retirement that they expect to work into their 80s or even until they either get too sick or die, according to a recent survey.
Nearly half of middle-class workers said they are not confident that they will be able to save enough to retire comfortably, according to a Wells Fargo survey of 1,000 workers between the ages of 25 and 75, with household incomes between $25,000 and $100,000.
As a result, 34% said they plan to work until they're at least 80 -- that's up from 25% in 2011 and 30% last year. An even larger percentage, 37%, said they'll never retire and plan to either work until they get too sick or die, the survey found.
Driving these concerns is that many of the respondents said they simply can't afford to pay their monthly bills and save for retirement at the same time.
"For the past three years, the struggle to pay bills is a growing concern and the prospect of saving for retirement looks dim, particularly for those in their prime saving years," Laurie Nordquist, head of Wells Fargo Institutional Retirement and Trust, said in a statement.
The concerns come as many middle-class families are trying to make do with less. The country's median annual household income is down by more than 8% since 2007. And many of the jobs lost during the recent recession have been replaced with lower wage positions.
With minimal savings built up, a third of those surveyed said Social Security will be their primary source of income during retirement. Of those making less than $50,000, nearly half said they will rely mainly on Social Security.
In August, the average Social Security recipient received around $15,000 a year in retirement benefits, according to the Social Security Administration.
Another factor holding back middle-class savers is a fear of investing in the stock market, said Nordquist.
Across workers of all ages, only 24% said they were confident in the stock market as a place to invest for retirement. And slightly more than half said they don't invest in the stocks because they are afraid to lose their savings in the ups and downs of the market.
This is despite the fact that financial planners say that investing in stocks is the best way to grow a nest egg that will be large enough to cover decades of retirement. Over years of savings, short-term losses are overtaken by the long-term gains that years of compounded returns offer.
"There is a striking amount of fear about the stock market among all investors," she said. "The middle class just isn't making the link between being invested and the potential growth of their savings.
http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/23/retirement/middle-class-retirement/index.html?iid=HP_LN
<iframe src="http://www.unionplus.org/union-made/halloween-treats/" width=800 height=1000></iframe>
Retirement unlikely for some blue-collar Americans
Retirement unlikely for some blue-collar Americans
AGING AMERICA: For some blue-collar Americans, retirement is nothing more than elusive dream
By Emily Wagster Pettus, Associated Press | Associated Press
Tue, Dec 31, 2013
Tom Edwards grew up in a family that's been cutting trees and hauling timber in the Pacific Northwest for more than a century. The Spanaway, Wash., resident says he has worked as a logger since he was a kid — it's just what an able-bodied youngster was expected to do.
Now, at 53, with business in a slump and little money in savings, he's pessimistic about his chances of retiring.
"It's never going to happen. By the time I reach retirement age, there won't be Social Security. There's not going to be any money," Edwards said. "I'll do like my father did: I'll work 'til I die."
Across the U.S., such concerns are common among blue-collar baby boomers — the 78 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964. Many have jobs that provide paltry pensions or none at all, as many companies have been moving toward less generous retirement packages in the past decade.
Many boomers expect to work the rest of their lives because they have little cash put away for their old age and they worry Social Security won't cover their bills. Some hope to move to jobs that are less physically demanding.
The share of U.S. workers who are 55 and older is expected to continue growing, according to the "The Oxford Handbook of Retirement 2013." The group comprised 12.4 percent of the workforce in 1998. The share jumped to 18.1 percent in 2008 and is expected to be almost 25 percent by 2018.
The book is edited by Mo Wang, co-director of the Human Resource Research Center at the University of Florida's Warrington College of Business Administration. In an interview, Wang said it's a misconception that lower-wage workers are slackers in preparing for retirement.
"People don't have adequate earnings," Wang told The Associated Press. "It's not because they don't want to save. It's because they just can't."
Many people don't save enough for their own retirement because they lack financial literacy skills, Wang said. Also, he said it can be incorrect to assume that people with lower incomes have more financial concerns than people with higher incomes. Psychologically, the important thing is the ratio of life earnings to wealth — how much money a person earns in a life span, compared to how much of it she gets to keep.
"Whether they have the 401(k) is not the decisive factor in influencing how well they live," Wang said. "Whether they have their own house is a big factor."
For homeowners, about 50 percent of wealth is typically tied up in the house and other investments, while a pension accounts for about 25 percent and Social Security accounts for about 25 percent, Wang said. For people who don't own their homes, particularly those who've worked low-income jobs, "Social Security is super important," he said. "Social Security is one way to pull them out of poverty."
People can receive full retirement benefits from Social Security between 65 and 67, depending on when they were born, and Medicare coverage at 65.
Farmers, loggers and other agriculture workers often have their wealth tied up in their homes or work property. Business consultant Mike Salisbury of American Falls, Idaho, has spent more than three decades helping farmers plan their financial futures. He said the biggest concern for most is succession — whether any children want the farm once a farmer retires.
"Now, statistics pretty well show that about two-thirds of farm families do not have successors interested in coming back into the business," Salisbury said.
Without someone to take over the family business, farmers look for an exit strategy, he said. "There are some really complex tax ramifications for when a farmer decides to stop farming."
He said farmers approaching retirement want to know how to convert the equity in their land, fixtures, buildings and machinery into cash without having to pay the upper tax rates or having to pay taxes in a lump sum the day assets are sold.
"We like to think of our farmers as just barely getting by and dirt poor," Salisbury said. "For the vast majority of farmers today, the ones that survived the economic crash of the '80s, they're probably in pretty good shape."
People who've worked low-wage jobs for decades, such as 46-year-old Catherine Bacon of Durant, Miss., say they have a tough time envisioning an affordable retirement, even if that goal is decades away. Bacon worked 21 years in a catfish processing plant, cutting filets and hoisting bags of fish to make sure they weighed 15 pounds, never earning more than $16,000 a year. To supplement her income for nine of those years, she also worked weekends as a convenience store cashier. The seven-days-a-week routine meant she rarely saw her two oldest daughters when they were young.
The kind of retirement many Americans envision — travel, hobbies, leisure time without financial stress — is just a wistful fantasy for her.
Bacon is a single mother with two grown children and two younger children still living at home. Sitting at the kitchen counter of the double-wide trailer she rents from one of her sisters, she sighed.
"I haven't given up on living," Bacon said. "It's just, certain things I want to do, I know I won't do them. Traditional retirement — I won't have that."
Some blue-collar workers have employers who chip in toward retirement.
In Atlanta, 41-year-old Jason Baumgartner works as a master carpenter, helping build luxury homes. He said his employer contributes to a Roth IRA for him, and he puts in some money each week, as well. He and his wife have a son who's about to turn 2, and they've consulted a financial planner. He said he wants to save enough money to start his own business and work for himself rather than for somebody else.
"I think the hours and, you know, the labor intensive stuff won't be as bad," Baumgartner said. "But, still, I plan on working until I'm 60, 75. Well, 70."
In the southern Louisiana fishing village of Lafitte, Robert Boudreaux's cut and callused hands worked quickly, spinning, looping and threading twine that would, when finished, be a fishing net used by fishermen to trawl for shrimp in the Gulf of Mexico. It's a trade Boudreaux, 52, has practiced for decades in the small net shop he owns — and something he may end up doing longer than he had anticipated.
"To plan for retirement in today's economy is very, very hard because people who started planning for retirement years ago put money on the side in IRAs and stuff like that, and the way the economy is and the interest rate is, they don't get anything anymore," Boudreaux said.
Boudreaux said he opened his net shop in 1980 and has also been a part of a family boat-making business since 1981. He said he invested thousands into IRAs that today are worth very little. It's disappointing, he said, but the good news is that he loves what he does and probably wouldn't retire even if he had the means.
"Most of the people that's in the community — that's fishermen, that's small business owners — they don't retire," he said. "They work until they pass on."
http://news.yahoo.com/retirement-unlikely-blue-collar-americans-192842589.html
Retirement unlikely for some blue-collar Americans
AGING AMERICA: For some blue-collar Americans, retirement is nothing more than elusive dream
By Emily Wagster Pettus, Associated Press | Associated Press
Tue, Dec 31, 2013
Tom Edwards grew up in a family that's been cutting trees and hauling timber in the Pacific Northwest for more than a century. The Spanaway, Wash., resident says he has worked as a logger since he was a kid — it's just what an able-bodied youngster was expected to do.
Now, at 53, with business in a slump and little money in savings, he's pessimistic about his chances of retiring.
"It's never going to happen. By the time I reach retirement age, there won't be Social Security. There's not going to be any money," Edwards said. "I'll do like my father did: I'll work 'til I die."
Across the U.S., such concerns are common among blue-collar baby boomers — the 78 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964. Many have jobs that provide paltry pensions or none at all, as many companies have been moving toward less generous retirement packages in the past decade.
Many boomers expect to work the rest of their lives because they have little cash put away for their old age and they worry Social Security won't cover their bills. Some hope to move to jobs that are less physically demanding.
The share of U.S. workers who are 55 and older is expected to continue growing, according to the "The Oxford Handbook of Retirement 2013." The group comprised 12.4 percent of the workforce in 1998. The share jumped to 18.1 percent in 2008 and is expected to be almost 25 percent by 2018.
The book is edited by Mo Wang, co-director of the Human Resource Research Center at the University of Florida's Warrington College of Business Administration. In an interview, Wang said it's a misconception that lower-wage workers are slackers in preparing for retirement.
"People don't have adequate earnings," Wang told The Associated Press. "It's not because they don't want to save. It's because they just can't."
Many people don't save enough for their own retirement because they lack financial literacy skills, Wang said. Also, he said it can be incorrect to assume that people with lower incomes have more financial concerns than people with higher incomes. Psychologically, the important thing is the ratio of life earnings to wealth — how much money a person earns in a life span, compared to how much of it she gets to keep.
"Whether they have the 401(k) is not the decisive factor in influencing how well they live," Wang said. "Whether they have their own house is a big factor."
For homeowners, about 50 percent of wealth is typically tied up in the house and other investments, while a pension accounts for about 25 percent and Social Security accounts for about 25 percent, Wang said. For people who don't own their homes, particularly those who've worked low-income jobs, "Social Security is super important," he said. "Social Security is one way to pull them out of poverty."
People can receive full retirement benefits from Social Security between 65 and 67, depending on when they were born, and Medicare coverage at 65.
Farmers, loggers and other agriculture workers often have their wealth tied up in their homes or work property. Business consultant Mike Salisbury of American Falls, Idaho, has spent more than three decades helping farmers plan their financial futures. He said the biggest concern for most is succession — whether any children want the farm once a farmer retires.
"Now, statistics pretty well show that about two-thirds of farm families do not have successors interested in coming back into the business," Salisbury said.
Without someone to take over the family business, farmers look for an exit strategy, he said. "There are some really complex tax ramifications for when a farmer decides to stop farming."
He said farmers approaching retirement want to know how to convert the equity in their land, fixtures, buildings and machinery into cash without having to pay the upper tax rates or having to pay taxes in a lump sum the day assets are sold.
"We like to think of our farmers as just barely getting by and dirt poor," Salisbury said. "For the vast majority of farmers today, the ones that survived the economic crash of the '80s, they're probably in pretty good shape."
People who've worked low-wage jobs for decades, such as 46-year-old Catherine Bacon of Durant, Miss., say they have a tough time envisioning an affordable retirement, even if that goal is decades away. Bacon worked 21 years in a catfish processing plant, cutting filets and hoisting bags of fish to make sure they weighed 15 pounds, never earning more than $16,000 a year. To supplement her income for nine of those years, she also worked weekends as a convenience store cashier. The seven-days-a-week routine meant she rarely saw her two oldest daughters when they were young.
The kind of retirement many Americans envision — travel, hobbies, leisure time without financial stress — is just a wistful fantasy for her.
Bacon is a single mother with two grown children and two younger children still living at home. Sitting at the kitchen counter of the double-wide trailer she rents from one of her sisters, she sighed.
"I haven't given up on living," Bacon said. "It's just, certain things I want to do, I know I won't do them. Traditional retirement — I won't have that."
Some blue-collar workers have employers who chip in toward retirement.
In Atlanta, 41-year-old Jason Baumgartner works as a master carpenter, helping build luxury homes. He said his employer contributes to a Roth IRA for him, and he puts in some money each week, as well. He and his wife have a son who's about to turn 2, and they've consulted a financial planner. He said he wants to save enough money to start his own business and work for himself rather than for somebody else.
"I think the hours and, you know, the labor intensive stuff won't be as bad," Baumgartner said. "But, still, I plan on working until I'm 60, 75. Well, 70."
In the southern Louisiana fishing village of Lafitte, Robert Boudreaux's cut and callused hands worked quickly, spinning, looping and threading twine that would, when finished, be a fishing net used by fishermen to trawl for shrimp in the Gulf of Mexico. It's a trade Boudreaux, 52, has practiced for decades in the small net shop he owns — and something he may end up doing longer than he had anticipated.
"To plan for retirement in today's economy is very, very hard because people who started planning for retirement years ago put money on the side in IRAs and stuff like that, and the way the economy is and the interest rate is, they don't get anything anymore," Boudreaux said.
Boudreaux said he opened his net shop in 1980 and has also been a part of a family boat-making business since 1981. He said he invested thousands into IRAs that today are worth very little. It's disappointing, he said, but the good news is that he loves what he does and probably wouldn't retire even if he had the means.
"Most of the people that's in the community — that's fishermen, that's small business owners — they don't retire," he said. "They work until they pass on."
http://news.yahoo.com/retirement-unlikely-blue-collar-americans-192842589.html
Will A Computer Decide Whether You Get Your Next Job?
Will A Computer Decide Whether You Get Your Next Job? (18:38)
January 15, 2014 8:29 PM
To hire new employees, some companies are paying less attention to resumes and more attention to data — and the data are leading to some surprising findings.
On today's show, we take a weird hiring test for a call-center job. And we hear what does (and doesn't) predict success for everyone from call-center workers to software developers.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014...computer-decide-whether-you-get-your-next-job
Will A Computer Decide Whether You Get Your Next Job? (18:38)
January 15, 2014 8:29 PM
To hire new employees, some companies are paying less attention to resumes and more attention to data — and the data are leading to some surprising findings.
On today's show, we take a weird hiring test for a call-center job. And we hear what does (and doesn't) predict success for everyone from call-center workers to software developers.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014...computer-decide-whether-you-get-your-next-job
source: Moyers & Company
VW Isn’t Fighting Unionization—But Leaked Docs Show Right-Wing Groups Are
Anti-union conservatives are worried that if the UAW successfully organizes Volkwagen's Tennessee plant, it will create a domino effect in the South. Here, protesters lift a sign supporting a UAW organizing campaign at a Nissan plant in Canton, Miss. (Photo from United Auto Workers on Facebook)
After Volkswagen issued a letter in September saying the company would not oppose an attempt by the United Auto Workers (UAW) to unionize its 1,600-worker Chattanooga, Tenn., facility, Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) was flabbergasted.
“For management to invite the UAW in is almost beyond belief,” Corker, who campaigned heavily for the plant’s construction during his tenure as mayor of Chattanooga, told the Associated Press. “They will become the object of many business school studies — and I’m a little worried could become a laughingstock in many ways — if they inflict this wound.”
Corker isn’t the only right-winger out to halt UAW’s campaign. In the absence of any overt anti-union offensive by Volkswagen, conservative political operatives worried about the UAW getting a foothold in the South have stepped into the fray.
Leaked documents obtained by In These Times, as well as interviews with a veteran anti-union consultant, indicate that a conservative group, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, appears to be pumping hundred of thousands of dollars into media and grassroots organizing in an effort to stop the union drive. In addition, the National Right-to-Work Legal Defense Foundation helped four anti-union workers in October file a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board claiming that Volkswagen was forcing a union on them.
“Everyone is definitely looking at this fight,” the anti-union consultant, Martin (not his real name), told In These Times. “This is the union fight going on right now and everybody [in the anti-union world] is looking to play their part and get compensated for playing their part.”
The last VW plant where workers don’t have a voice
As the only major VW plant in the United States, Chattanooga is also the only plant whose workers have no opportunity to join German-style “works councils” — committees of hourly and salaried employees who discuss management decisions, like which plant will make specific car models, on a local and global scale.
Organizing with the UAW, workers say, would help them to both form new works councils and gain representation at existing ones — which, in turn, would attract more jobs to the area.
“I personally feel like not having a union and not participating in a works council is going to do more damage for future expansion and new product development in Chattanooga than any unionization would do,” says Volkswagen employee Justin King. “The way VW works on the international level, [management] almost expects to work with a union. Now, we aren’t able to say, ‘Hey we would like to build that new SUV, or we would like to hire some new workers.’ We are only hurting ourselves by not going union.”
Workers also say having a union would help the plant be more efficient. “On the assembly line, the process changes each year because [of] new models,” says worker Chris Brown. “A voice in the company would help smooth the process from year to year.”
Beyond this, VW employees feel that organizing could help address their problems with corporate policy, including the fact that nearly one-fifth of workers at peak times in auto production have been temporary employees. Temporary employees’ starting wages are more than two dollars an hour lower than full-time employees’, and their healthcare and retirement benefits are much less robust, says the UAW.
According to Brown, approximately 200-300 “temps” are currently employed in the VW factory — and the UAW says they can remain classified as temporary even if they work at VW for years.
“I am friends with these people, and they want a job. Some of these people have been there for 18 months as a temp and that’s just … wrong,” says Brown. “If this is a job that I do, they should be making the pay that I make. [They] should have the same job security that I have as an employee.”
Fellow employee Lauren Feinauer agrees that a union would improve workers’ communication with management. “We heard a lot in the beginning about how VW works with their employees: close relationships and a lot of communication. I know there is a lot of that going on, but I think some of the VW way got lost in translation,” she says. “This is why we want a union.”
This September, the UAW announced that a majority of VW workers have signed up to join the union. But according to the UAW, it and VW still have yet to agree on a process for recognizing the union. That has left time for outside anti-union forces to try to dissuade workers from joining the UAW — time that many of those groups have capitalized upon.
Anti-union consultants get in the game
In a proposal dated Aug. 23, 2013, which was presented to a prominent anti-union group before being leaked to In These Times, Washington, DC-based consultant Matt Patterson outlined a vision of how anti-union forces can work with community groups to persuade VW workers that organizing is not in their long-term economic interest.
In the report, Patterson explained his approach thus far to laying the groundwork for an anti-union campaign, which he calls the “Keep Tennessee Free Project,” in Chattanooga. From last May to August, he said, he “leveraged a $4,000 budget into a deep and effective anti-UAW campaign that received national media attention, pressured politicians to issue public statements against unionization, forced the union to expend resources to counter our efforts, developed an extensive intelligence network that stretched from Chattanooga to Germany to Detroit and brought the terrible economic legacy of the UAW to the forefront of the debate.”
Patterson claimed that during the summer, he generated 63 stories denouncing the UAW effort in Chattanooga. In three months, he said, he was able to build a media echo chamber that now hammers Chattanooga with anti-union messaging on a regular basis.
And such remarks aren’t idle boasting. The fruits of Patterson’s anti-organizing crusade have appeared in the National Review, Forbes and local Chattanooga TV station WDEF 12, in addition to a host of smaller conservative talk radio shows.
But he didn’t stop there — he also gathered grassroots support. “Within a few weeks,” he wrote, “I had organized a coalition consisting of members of the Tea Party, Students for Liberty, former VW employees, politician and businessmen to craft and deliver a consistent message that has shaped public opinion.”
It’s clear that Patterson’s proposal was intended for an audience worried that a victory at Volkswagen could fuel UAW unionization campaigns at the Nissan plant in Canton, Miss., and at Mercedes-Benz in Vance, Ala. “Based on the successes my coalition has already achieved, I am confident that with the request[ed] resources, significant impact can made be over the next year in Tennessee, Alabama, and throughout the South to keep the UAW from organizing the foreign-owned auto facilities that are the source of so many badly-needed jobs,” he assured possible funders.
According to veteran anti-union consultant Martin, Patterson originally asked for $160,000 in the proposal, which he sent to a variety of anti-union groups, including Martin’s. This, however, was before Patterson found a backer for his project: Americans for Tax Reform (ATR), the pet project of Republican mastermind Grover Norquist. Martin says that after Patterson decided to work with Americans for Tax Reform, his proposed budget rose “significantly.”
After the injection of new funds, Patterson’s voice in Chattanooga’s anti-union debate grew even louder. Local TV station WTVC News Channel 9 included him as an anti-union panelist in a televised October 17 discussion about UAW organizing. Since September, Patterson has also been quoted by the Associated Press, Nashville Public Radio, the Chattanooga Times Free Press and even the Detroit Free Press, the UAW’s home turf newspaper.
Who’s funding the funder?
Martin says he’s uncertain of where the money for Patterson’s project is coming from, because Americans for Tax Reform is a 501(c)(4) that doesn’t have to disclose its donors. However, he finds this secrecy to be telling.
“It is definitely corporate money. It is obviously someone who doesn’t want it known who is doing this, and they have done a good job of covering it up, because I have absolutely no idea who is doing it,” he says. “It could be the local Chamber [of Commerce] trying to keep their fingerprint off of it. It could be Nissan seeing this is where they go to cut [unionization] off before it makes it way down to Mississippi.”
Or, as he points out, the funding could be coming from Volkswagen itself. Though it stated in September that it would not oppose the union, months later, the company has yet to announce how it will recognize the signatures the UAW has gathered from a majority of workers. Indeed, a top leader at VW recently proposed that workers should have to vote to unionize on a secret ballot in addition to signing what the UAW says are legally binding cards.
Furthermore, when speaking about VW’s statement of neutrality, Corker told the Associated Press, “There was a lot of dissension within the company … I don’t think it, I know it. Candidly, one board member got very involved and forced this letter to go out. I know that it’s created tremendous amounts of tension within the company.”
In an email to In These Times, Volkswagen spokesperson Carsten Krebs denied that the company was giving money to Patterson, but would not expand further on Volkswagen’s position on the union drive.
Republican dissent
In his frequent comments to the press, Corker has echoed Patterson’s assertion that unionization will limit job opportunities.
“If they see the UAW is building momentum in our state, other companies that are looking are not going to choose Tennessee [to settle in]; they’re just not,” an outraged Corker said in September.
In a high-profile interview with NPR in October, Corker continued, “I mean, look at Detroit. Look at what’s happened.” Referring to Chrysler and General Motors, he said, “Look at all of the businesses that have left there. I mean, it’s been phenomenal. It’s sad.”
However, not all Republicans are as alarmed by the prospect of the UAW entering the region. Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), whose district includes many VW workers who make the short commute across the border to Chattanooga, said in an interview at the Atlanta airport, “Honestly we have got a lot of employees that work up at the Volkswagen plant … You know I think one reason people are attracted to the South is that we are not heavily unionized, but we have got unions … I really had not thought too heavily about the VW plant, to tell you the truth.”
When asked in a follow-up question if having “one union plant threatens all the rest of the South,” Chambliss responded, “We have got a lot of union plants in the South … No, I don’t think it’s a problem.”
Workers under fire
Nevertheless, the amplification of the Patterson-Corker message in the local media is putting a great deal of pressure on VW workers in Chattanooga.
“I have had a lot of friends and neighbors come up and ask about me about the union,” says King. “Some of them come up and say it’s really great, but I have had a lot people come up to me and say, ‘You guys are idiots. You guys are going to bankrupt Volkswagen and shut the plant down.’ It definitely has turned into something that everyone has an opinion on.”
Brown says Corker’s statements have also turned some of his co-workers against the union in a plant where he says the overwhelming majority of the workers are Republicans.
“It does have an effect because this is a hardcore Republican area in the Deep South, and a lot of these people are Republicans, so what the party tells them is what they believe,” he says.
Martin tells In These Times that the campaign could get even more intense as other anti-union groups try to enter the conflict, including his own. In his opinion, Patterson’s campaign hasn’t been that sophisticated, mainly focusing on getting politicians to make statements and getting Patterson himself to appear regularly in the press—leaving plenty of room for other anti-union groups to join in the effort.
“It remains to be seen if [Patterson’s strategy] will be effective,” says Martin. “In the anti-union work that I have done in the past, we are far more surgical and high-tech … [Patterson’s campaign] is surprisingly unsophisticated. There is no web presence now, no Facebook, no Twitter — all the stuff that is usually typical in anti-union campaigns.”
In the meantime, VW workers think it’s unfair that outside forces are pressuring them.
“I find it disturbing that outside parties are trying to interfere with a decision that should rest solely with the company, the workers, and the UAW,” says Brown. “The Republican party is into government keeping its hands off of business, but in this instance they are seeing how deep they can get into it.”
King agrees that anti-union consultants and legislators don’t actually have VW employees’ interests at heart.
“I would invite any of the representative from these special interests or any of those politicians to come work for a few weeks in the factory and see how they feel about issue,” he says. “They should walk a few days in our shoes … A lot of people would feel different about it if they got more of a chance to talk to some of the Volkswagen employees.”
VW Isn’t Fighting Unionization—But Leaked Docs Show Right-Wing Groups Are
Anti-union conservatives are worried that if the UAW successfully organizes Volkwagen's Tennessee plant, it will create a domino effect in the South. Here, protesters lift a sign supporting a UAW organizing campaign at a Nissan plant in Canton, Miss. (Photo from United Auto Workers on Facebook)
After Volkswagen issued a letter in September saying the company would not oppose an attempt by the United Auto Workers (UAW) to unionize its 1,600-worker Chattanooga, Tenn., facility, Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) was flabbergasted.
“For management to invite the UAW in is almost beyond belief,” Corker, who campaigned heavily for the plant’s construction during his tenure as mayor of Chattanooga, told the Associated Press. “They will become the object of many business school studies — and I’m a little worried could become a laughingstock in many ways — if they inflict this wound.”
Corker isn’t the only right-winger out to halt UAW’s campaign. In the absence of any overt anti-union offensive by Volkswagen, conservative political operatives worried about the UAW getting a foothold in the South have stepped into the fray.
Leaked documents obtained by In These Times, as well as interviews with a veteran anti-union consultant, indicate that a conservative group, Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, appears to be pumping hundred of thousands of dollars into media and grassroots organizing in an effort to stop the union drive. In addition, the National Right-to-Work Legal Defense Foundation helped four anti-union workers in October file a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board claiming that Volkswagen was forcing a union on them.
“Everyone is definitely looking at this fight,” the anti-union consultant, Martin (not his real name), told In These Times. “This is the union fight going on right now and everybody [in the anti-union world] is looking to play their part and get compensated for playing their part.”
The last VW plant where workers don’t have a voice
As the only major VW plant in the United States, Chattanooga is also the only plant whose workers have no opportunity to join German-style “works councils” — committees of hourly and salaried employees who discuss management decisions, like which plant will make specific car models, on a local and global scale.
Organizing with the UAW, workers say, would help them to both form new works councils and gain representation at existing ones — which, in turn, would attract more jobs to the area.
“I personally feel like not having a union and not participating in a works council is going to do more damage for future expansion and new product development in Chattanooga than any unionization would do,” says Volkswagen employee Justin King. “The way VW works on the international level, [management] almost expects to work with a union. Now, we aren’t able to say, ‘Hey we would like to build that new SUV, or we would like to hire some new workers.’ We are only hurting ourselves by not going union.”
Workers also say having a union would help the plant be more efficient. “On the assembly line, the process changes each year because [of] new models,” says worker Chris Brown. “A voice in the company would help smooth the process from year to year.”
Beyond this, VW employees feel that organizing could help address their problems with corporate policy, including the fact that nearly one-fifth of workers at peak times in auto production have been temporary employees. Temporary employees’ starting wages are more than two dollars an hour lower than full-time employees’, and their healthcare and retirement benefits are much less robust, says the UAW.
According to Brown, approximately 200-300 “temps” are currently employed in the VW factory — and the UAW says they can remain classified as temporary even if they work at VW for years.
“I am friends with these people, and they want a job. Some of these people have been there for 18 months as a temp and that’s just … wrong,” says Brown. “If this is a job that I do, they should be making the pay that I make. [They] should have the same job security that I have as an employee.”
Fellow employee Lauren Feinauer agrees that a union would improve workers’ communication with management. “We heard a lot in the beginning about how VW works with their employees: close relationships and a lot of communication. I know there is a lot of that going on, but I think some of the VW way got lost in translation,” she says. “This is why we want a union.”
This September, the UAW announced that a majority of VW workers have signed up to join the union. But according to the UAW, it and VW still have yet to agree on a process for recognizing the union. That has left time for outside anti-union forces to try to dissuade workers from joining the UAW — time that many of those groups have capitalized upon.
Anti-union consultants get in the game
In a proposal dated Aug. 23, 2013, which was presented to a prominent anti-union group before being leaked to In These Times, Washington, DC-based consultant Matt Patterson outlined a vision of how anti-union forces can work with community groups to persuade VW workers that organizing is not in their long-term economic interest.
In the report, Patterson explained his approach thus far to laying the groundwork for an anti-union campaign, which he calls the “Keep Tennessee Free Project,” in Chattanooga. From last May to August, he said, he “leveraged a $4,000 budget into a deep and effective anti-UAW campaign that received national media attention, pressured politicians to issue public statements against unionization, forced the union to expend resources to counter our efforts, developed an extensive intelligence network that stretched from Chattanooga to Germany to Detroit and brought the terrible economic legacy of the UAW to the forefront of the debate.”
Patterson claimed that during the summer, he generated 63 stories denouncing the UAW effort in Chattanooga. In three months, he said, he was able to build a media echo chamber that now hammers Chattanooga with anti-union messaging on a regular basis.
And such remarks aren’t idle boasting. The fruits of Patterson’s anti-organizing crusade have appeared in the National Review, Forbes and local Chattanooga TV station WDEF 12, in addition to a host of smaller conservative talk radio shows.
But he didn’t stop there — he also gathered grassroots support. “Within a few weeks,” he wrote, “I had organized a coalition consisting of members of the Tea Party, Students for Liberty, former VW employees, politician and businessmen to craft and deliver a consistent message that has shaped public opinion.”
It’s clear that Patterson’s proposal was intended for an audience worried that a victory at Volkswagen could fuel UAW unionization campaigns at the Nissan plant in Canton, Miss., and at Mercedes-Benz in Vance, Ala. “Based on the successes my coalition has already achieved, I am confident that with the request[ed] resources, significant impact can made be over the next year in Tennessee, Alabama, and throughout the South to keep the UAW from organizing the foreign-owned auto facilities that are the source of so many badly-needed jobs,” he assured possible funders.
According to veteran anti-union consultant Martin, Patterson originally asked for $160,000 in the proposal, which he sent to a variety of anti-union groups, including Martin’s. This, however, was before Patterson found a backer for his project: Americans for Tax Reform (ATR), the pet project of Republican mastermind Grover Norquist. Martin says that after Patterson decided to work with Americans for Tax Reform, his proposed budget rose “significantly.”
After the injection of new funds, Patterson’s voice in Chattanooga’s anti-union debate grew even louder. Local TV station WTVC News Channel 9 included him as an anti-union panelist in a televised October 17 discussion about UAW organizing. Since September, Patterson has also been quoted by the Associated Press, Nashville Public Radio, the Chattanooga Times Free Press and even the Detroit Free Press, the UAW’s home turf newspaper.
Who’s funding the funder?
Martin says he’s uncertain of where the money for Patterson’s project is coming from, because Americans for Tax Reform is a 501(c)(4) that doesn’t have to disclose its donors. However, he finds this secrecy to be telling.
“It is definitely corporate money. It is obviously someone who doesn’t want it known who is doing this, and they have done a good job of covering it up, because I have absolutely no idea who is doing it,” he says. “It could be the local Chamber [of Commerce] trying to keep their fingerprint off of it. It could be Nissan seeing this is where they go to cut [unionization] off before it makes it way down to Mississippi.”
Or, as he points out, the funding could be coming from Volkswagen itself. Though it stated in September that it would not oppose the union, months later, the company has yet to announce how it will recognize the signatures the UAW has gathered from a majority of workers. Indeed, a top leader at VW recently proposed that workers should have to vote to unionize on a secret ballot in addition to signing what the UAW says are legally binding cards.
Furthermore, when speaking about VW’s statement of neutrality, Corker told the Associated Press, “There was a lot of dissension within the company … I don’t think it, I know it. Candidly, one board member got very involved and forced this letter to go out. I know that it’s created tremendous amounts of tension within the company.”
In an email to In These Times, Volkswagen spokesperson Carsten Krebs denied that the company was giving money to Patterson, but would not expand further on Volkswagen’s position on the union drive.
Republican dissent
In his frequent comments to the press, Corker has echoed Patterson’s assertion that unionization will limit job opportunities.
“If they see the UAW is building momentum in our state, other companies that are looking are not going to choose Tennessee [to settle in]; they’re just not,” an outraged Corker said in September.
In a high-profile interview with NPR in October, Corker continued, “I mean, look at Detroit. Look at what’s happened.” Referring to Chrysler and General Motors, he said, “Look at all of the businesses that have left there. I mean, it’s been phenomenal. It’s sad.”
However, not all Republicans are as alarmed by the prospect of the UAW entering the region. Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), whose district includes many VW workers who make the short commute across the border to Chattanooga, said in an interview at the Atlanta airport, “Honestly we have got a lot of employees that work up at the Volkswagen plant … You know I think one reason people are attracted to the South is that we are not heavily unionized, but we have got unions … I really had not thought too heavily about the VW plant, to tell you the truth.”
When asked in a follow-up question if having “one union plant threatens all the rest of the South,” Chambliss responded, “We have got a lot of union plants in the South … No, I don’t think it’s a problem.”
Workers under fire
Nevertheless, the amplification of the Patterson-Corker message in the local media is putting a great deal of pressure on VW workers in Chattanooga.
“I have had a lot of friends and neighbors come up and ask about me about the union,” says King. “Some of them come up and say it’s really great, but I have had a lot people come up to me and say, ‘You guys are idiots. You guys are going to bankrupt Volkswagen and shut the plant down.’ It definitely has turned into something that everyone has an opinion on.”
Brown says Corker’s statements have also turned some of his co-workers against the union in a plant where he says the overwhelming majority of the workers are Republicans.
“It does have an effect because this is a hardcore Republican area in the Deep South, and a lot of these people are Republicans, so what the party tells them is what they believe,” he says.
Martin tells In These Times that the campaign could get even more intense as other anti-union groups try to enter the conflict, including his own. In his opinion, Patterson’s campaign hasn’t been that sophisticated, mainly focusing on getting politicians to make statements and getting Patterson himself to appear regularly in the press—leaving plenty of room for other anti-union groups to join in the effort.
“It remains to be seen if [Patterson’s strategy] will be effective,” says Martin. “In the anti-union work that I have done in the past, we are far more surgical and high-tech … [Patterson’s campaign] is surprisingly unsophisticated. There is no web presence now, no Facebook, no Twitter — all the stuff that is usually typical in anti-union campaigns.”
In the meantime, VW workers think it’s unfair that outside forces are pressuring them.
“I find it disturbing that outside parties are trying to interfere with a decision that should rest solely with the company, the workers, and the UAW,” says Brown. “The Republican party is into government keeping its hands off of business, but in this instance they are seeing how deep they can get into it.”
King agrees that anti-union consultants and legislators don’t actually have VW employees’ interests at heart.
“I would invite any of the representative from these special interests or any of those politicians to come work for a few weeks in the factory and see how they feel about issue,” he says. “They should walk a few days in our shoes … A lot of people would feel different about it if they got more of a chance to talk to some of the Volkswagen employees.”
VW Chattanooga Plant To Vote On UAW Membership
Next week in Tennessee, workers at Volkswagen's Chattanooga plant will vote on whether to join the United Auto Workers. It's the first attempt to unionize a non-Detroit-run factory in 13 years. Volkswagen has given the drive its blessing but outside groups have stepped in to fight the union.
<EMBED height=386 type=application/x-shockwave-flash width=400 src=http://www.npr.org/v2/?i=271355290&m=271355297&t=audio wmode="opaque" allowfullscreen="true" base="http://www.npr.org"></EMBED>
Next week in Tennessee, workers at Volkswagen's Chattanooga plant will vote on whether to join the United Auto Workers. It's the first attempt to unionize a non-Detroit-run factory in 13 years. Volkswagen has given the drive its blessing but outside groups have stepped in to fight the union.
<EMBED height=386 type=application/x-shockwave-flash width=400 src=http://www.npr.org/v2/?i=271355290&m=271355297&t=audio wmode="opaque" allowfullscreen="true" base="http://www.npr.org"></EMBED>
source: Wall Street Journal
VW Workers in Chattanooga Reject Auto Workers Union
Workers at Volkswagen's plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., voted against the United Auto Workers union. AP
The United Auto Workers union suffered a crushing defeat Friday, falling short in an election in which it seemed to have a clear path to organizing workers at <!-- module article chiclet -->Volkswagen AG <!-- up, down, neutral -->VOW3.XE +1.10% <!--ticker content box-->Volkswagen AG Non-Vtg Pfd.<!--row 1-->'s plant in Chattanooga, Tenn.
The setback is a bitter defeat because the union had the cooperation of Volkswagen management and the aid of Germany's powerful IG Metall union, yet it failed to win a majority among the plants 1,550 hourly workers.
Volkswagen workers rejected the union by a vote of 712-626. The defeat raises questions about the future of a union that for years has suffered from declining membership and influence, and almost certainly leaves its president, Bob King, who had vowed to organize at least one foreign auto maker by the time he retires in June, with a tarnished legacy.
"If the union can't win in [in Chattanooga], it can't win anywhere," said Steve Silvia, a economics and trade professor at American University who has studied labor unions.
A win would have marked the first time the union has been able to organize a foreign-owned auto plant in the U.S., and would have been particularly meaningful because the vote was set in a right-to-work state in the South, where anti-union sentiment is strong and all past UAW organizing drives at automobile plants have failed.
The Chattanooga workers had been courted steadily for nearly two years by both the UAW and Germany's powerful IG Metall union, which pushed Volkswagen management to open talks with the UAW and to refrain from trying to dissuade American workers to vote against union representation.
Mr. King made forging alliances with overseas unions the centerpiece of his strategy after he was elected in 2010. The union now must come up with a way to halting its decline. It once represented 1.5 million workers, but now has about 400,000, and diminished influence, as a result of years of downsizing, layoffs and cutbacks by the three Detroit auto makers General Motors Co., <!-- module article chiclet -->Ford Motor Co. <!-- up, down, neutral -->F +1.06% <!--ticker content box-->Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler Group.
"The union needs new members. They have to organize the transplants or they don't have much of a future," said Sean McAlinden, chief economist at the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.
The election was also extraordinary because Volkswagen choose to cooperate closely with the UAW. Volkswagen allowed UAW organizers to campaign inside the factory—a step rarely seen in this or any other industry.
"This is like an alternate universe where everything is turned upside down," said Cliff Hammond, a labor lawyer at Nemeth Law PC in Detroit, who represents management clients but previously worked at the Service Employees International Union. "Usually companies fight" union drives, he added.
The union's loss adds to a long list of defeats for organized labor in recent years. States like Wisconsin, and its governor, Scott Walker, enacted laws that cut the power of public-employee unions, and more states, including Michigan, home of the UAW, adopted right-to-work laws that allow workers to opt out of union membership if they choose.
The vote was held amid public campaigning against the union by Republican politicians, including Gov. Bill Haslam, and conservative activist groups. Conservative political groups, including one backed by anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, put up anti-union billboards around Chattanooga. A small but determined group of workers who oppose the UAW also worked to tilt their colleagues against the union, an effort that ultimately proved successful.
The UAW had appeared to have strong chances in the election because both Volkswagen and the IG Metall union wanted the Chattanooga plant to have a works council, a formal committee of both union and nonunion employees who negotiate with management on day to day working matters at the plant.
Works councils are standard in German workplaces—almost all other Volkswagen facilities around the world have one. In the U.S., however, it appears to many labor law experts that they can only be implemented legally if workers are represented by an outside union. That difference proved a critical factor in that helped the UAW.
Since both Volkswagen and IG Metall have expressed a strong desire to have a works council in Chattanooga, the auto maker chose to work with the UAW. In addition to letting union representatives into the plant, Volkswagen kept members of management from expressing any views on the vote, and agreed to coordinate its public statements with the union during the election campaign.
"This vote was essentially gift-wrapped for the union by Volkswagen," Mr. Hammond, the labor lawyer, said.
The works council concept also proved a winner for some Chattanooga workers. Jonathan Walden, 39, earns about $19.50 an hour—about $4 an hour more than starting workers at GM, Ford and Chrysler—but he voted for the union because he wants a works council. "I don't know why more companies don't do this," said Mr. Walden, works in the paint shop.
But more workers were persuaded by the UAW's contentious past of bitter battles with management, costly labor contracts and complex work rules that sapped productivity and quality. "If the union comes in, we'll have a divided workforce," said Cheryl Hawkins, a 44-year-old assembly line worker with three sons. "It will ruin what we have."
VW Workers in Chattanooga Reject Auto Workers Union
Workers at Volkswagen's plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., voted against the United Auto Workers union. AP
The United Auto Workers union suffered a crushing defeat Friday, falling short in an election in which it seemed to have a clear path to organizing workers at <!-- module article chiclet -->Volkswagen AG <!-- up, down, neutral -->VOW3.XE +1.10% <!--ticker content box-->Volkswagen AG Non-Vtg Pfd.<!--row 1-->'s plant in Chattanooga, Tenn.
The setback is a bitter defeat because the union had the cooperation of Volkswagen management and the aid of Germany's powerful IG Metall union, yet it failed to win a majority among the plants 1,550 hourly workers.
Volkswagen workers rejected the union by a vote of 712-626. The defeat raises questions about the future of a union that for years has suffered from declining membership and influence, and almost certainly leaves its president, Bob King, who had vowed to organize at least one foreign auto maker by the time he retires in June, with a tarnished legacy.
"If the union can't win in [in Chattanooga], it can't win anywhere," said Steve Silvia, a economics and trade professor at American University who has studied labor unions.
A win would have marked the first time the union has been able to organize a foreign-owned auto plant in the U.S., and would have been particularly meaningful because the vote was set in a right-to-work state in the South, where anti-union sentiment is strong and all past UAW organizing drives at automobile plants have failed.
The Chattanooga workers had been courted steadily for nearly two years by both the UAW and Germany's powerful IG Metall union, which pushed Volkswagen management to open talks with the UAW and to refrain from trying to dissuade American workers to vote against union representation.
Mr. King made forging alliances with overseas unions the centerpiece of his strategy after he was elected in 2010. The union now must come up with a way to halting its decline. It once represented 1.5 million workers, but now has about 400,000, and diminished influence, as a result of years of downsizing, layoffs and cutbacks by the three Detroit auto makers General Motors Co., <!-- module article chiclet -->Ford Motor Co. <!-- up, down, neutral -->F +1.06% <!--ticker content box-->Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler Group.
"The union needs new members. They have to organize the transplants or they don't have much of a future," said Sean McAlinden, chief economist at the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.
The election was also extraordinary because Volkswagen choose to cooperate closely with the UAW. Volkswagen allowed UAW organizers to campaign inside the factory—a step rarely seen in this or any other industry.
"This is like an alternate universe where everything is turned upside down," said Cliff Hammond, a labor lawyer at Nemeth Law PC in Detroit, who represents management clients but previously worked at the Service Employees International Union. "Usually companies fight" union drives, he added.
The union's loss adds to a long list of defeats for organized labor in recent years. States like Wisconsin, and its governor, Scott Walker, enacted laws that cut the power of public-employee unions, and more states, including Michigan, home of the UAW, adopted right-to-work laws that allow workers to opt out of union membership if they choose.
The vote was held amid public campaigning against the union by Republican politicians, including Gov. Bill Haslam, and conservative activist groups. Conservative political groups, including one backed by anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, put up anti-union billboards around Chattanooga. A small but determined group of workers who oppose the UAW also worked to tilt their colleagues against the union, an effort that ultimately proved successful.
The UAW had appeared to have strong chances in the election because both Volkswagen and the IG Metall union wanted the Chattanooga plant to have a works council, a formal committee of both union and nonunion employees who negotiate with management on day to day working matters at the plant.
Works councils are standard in German workplaces—almost all other Volkswagen facilities around the world have one. In the U.S., however, it appears to many labor law experts that they can only be implemented legally if workers are represented by an outside union. That difference proved a critical factor in that helped the UAW.
Since both Volkswagen and IG Metall have expressed a strong desire to have a works council in Chattanooga, the auto maker chose to work with the UAW. In addition to letting union representatives into the plant, Volkswagen kept members of management from expressing any views on the vote, and agreed to coordinate its public statements with the union during the election campaign.
"This vote was essentially gift-wrapped for the union by Volkswagen," Mr. Hammond, the labor lawyer, said.
The works council concept also proved a winner for some Chattanooga workers. Jonathan Walden, 39, earns about $19.50 an hour—about $4 an hour more than starting workers at GM, Ford and Chrysler—but he voted for the union because he wants a works council. "I don't know why more companies don't do this," said Mr. Walden, works in the paint shop.
But more workers were persuaded by the UAW's contentious past of bitter battles with management, costly labor contracts and complex work rules that sapped productivity and quality. "If the union comes in, we'll have a divided workforce," said Cheryl Hawkins, a 44-year-old assembly line worker with three sons. "It will ruin what we have."
Yes, you are correct. More corporate welfare. I'm sure you are very pleased!
source: Daily Kos
Tennessee Republicans celebrate union loss at Volkswagen by talking subsidies
Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN)
Sen. Bob Corker's (R-TN) threats against jobs may or may not have changed the outcome of a union election at a Tennessee Volkswagen plant, in which the UAW lost a narrow victory. We'll probably never know exactly how many workers decided to vote against unionizing after the Republican senator claimed that if they voted no, Volkswagen would quickly expand production at the plant. But Corker is certainly pleased with himself:
Corker, who had originally announced he would refrain from making public comments during the election, changed course last week after he said the union tried to use his silence to chastise other critics. Corker said after the vote that he was happy he joined the fray.
“I have no idea what effect we may or may not have had,” Corker said. “But I think I would have forever felt tremendous remorse if … I had not re-engaged and made sure that people understand other arguments that needed to be put forth.”
"Other arguments that needed to be put forth" equaling Corker's assertions, plus other politicians' similar threats. In fact:“I have no idea what effect we may or may not have had,” Corker said. “But I think I would have forever felt tremendous remorse if … I had not re-engaged and made sure that people understand other arguments that needed to be put forth.”
Corker said the day after the vote that he and other state officials planned to restart discussions with Volkswagen officials this week about state subsidies for expanded production in Chattanooga.
Those are subsidies that were explicitly threatened if workers had voted to unionize. There were, of course, other factors in the loss. As Erik Loomis points out "There were almost certainly several hundred no votes from the beginning" in a workforce with a lot of white southerners. Douglas Williams and pseudonymous organizer Cato Uticensis also argue that the UAW made significant organizing errors. Whatever the combination of causes leading to the 712 to 626 loss, though, Tennessee Republicans made clear that their opposition to having a significant workplace organized is strong enough to threaten jobs over. Which makes total sense: Republicans want workers weak and scared. Defeating unions and keeping jobs scarce both contribute to that goal.
Keep fighting the good fight thoughtone, I'm sure Democrats would never give money to corporations.
I'm confused, are you asking me if I support Democrats and Republicans?
Didn't you just point out in the other thread how I don't vote.
You're the one that perpetuates this system of corporate welfare remember.
I'm sure you didn't care about the VW subsidies when you thought the UAW would win.
Your article said they were RESTARTING talks.
Where was your attention-whoring post about those subsidies when VW looked pro-union?
Where was you anti-Solyndra post?
This is one of the problems I have with discussing anything with you. The question was explicit:
Last edited:
How many threads have I contributed to on the subject?
How many started by you and others, and how many I started?
How many where we've gone back and forth about it?
If you weren't paying attention then, should I really care to answer you now so you can ask me again in the future?
source: Reuters
VW workers may block southern U.S. deals if no unions: labor chief
Volkswagen's top labor representative threatened on Wednesday to try to block further investments by the German carmaker in the southern United States if its workers there are not unionized.
Workers at VW's factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee, last Friday voted against representation by the United Auto Workers union (UAW), rejecting efforts by VW representatives to set up a German-style works council at the plant.
German workers enjoy considerable influence over company decisions under the legally enshrined "co-determination" principle which is anathema to many politicians in the U.S. who see organized labor as a threat to profits and job growth.
Chattanooga is VW's only factory in the U.S. and one of the company's few in the world without a works council.
"I can imagine fairly well that another VW factory in the United States, provided that one more should still be set up there, does not necessarily have to be assigned to the south again," said Bernd Osterloh, head of VW's works council.
"If co-determination isn't guaranteed in the first place, we as workers will hardly be able to vote in favor" of potentially building another plant in the U.S. south, Osterloh, who is also on VW's supervisory board, said.
The 20-member panel - evenly split between labor and management - has to approve any decision on closing plants or building new ones.
Osterloh's comments were published on Wednesday in German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung. A spokesman at the Wolfsburg-based works council confirmed the remarks.
"The conservatives stirred up massive, anti-union sentiments," Osterloh said. "It's possible that the conclusion will be drawn that this interference amounted to unfair labor praxis."
Republican U.S. Senator Bob Corker, a staunch opponent of unionization, said last Wednesday after the first day of voting that VW would award the factory another model if the UAW was rejected.
The comments even prompted U.S. President Barack Obama to intervene, accusing Republicans of trying to block the Chattanooga workforce's efforts.
Undeterred by last Friday's vote, VW's works council has said it will press on with efforts to set up labor representation at Chattanooga which builds the Passat sedan.
Pretty consistent with your position as well.
If work isn't executed under the condition you set forth, then work isn't worth having.
Whether it be minimum wage or union representation. Anyone that could benefit should understand they are better off by not working if they aren't making a politician-prescribed wage and represented by an arbitrary union official. Welfare will take care of you in the meantime.
Volkswagen has learned ti's lesson. They should relocate from the slave states and let them revel in their freedom.
How dare you dismiss the will of the majority.
You've changed thoughtone. You use to have a deep appreciation for majority rule.
I'm beginning to get the impression that you don't value the legitimacy of any position that's not consistent with your own. Those 700 workers don't want a slave state because they voted down organizing with the UAW.
Stop supporting bitter retaliation.
Majority rule? Are they electing public officials? Your lack of knowledge of the US Constitution is laughable.
Volkswagen can choose to put it's plants anywhere it wants If it decides to expand in a facility outside of that slave labor state, than it can.
fuck dat klansman,
he proved the klansman went
from hoods too looking nerdy
in three piece suits...
cuz no man wears a suit..
like
The Melanin Rich man....
everyone else like truman
are just overly privileged boys
wearing expensive material,
he looked better in a white hood...
oh and fuckk all that,
once those assholes
sold us up the river
with this federal reserve
bullshit...
it was a wrap!!
he proved the klansman went
from hoods too looking nerdy
in three piece suits...
cuz no man wears a suit..
like
The Melanin Rich man....
everyone else like truman
are just overly privileged boys
wearing expensive material,
he looked better in a white hood...
oh and fuckk all that,
once those assholes
sold us up the river
with this federal reserve
bullshit...
it was a wrap!!
source: Marxist.org
Source: International Socialist Review , Vol. IV, No. 5. November 1903
Online Version: E.V. Debs Internet Archive, 2006
Transcribed/HTML Markup: Robert Bills for the Socialist Labor Party of America and David Walters, December, 2006
<HR>
Eugene V. Debs
Danger Ahead
November 5, 1855 – October 20, 1926
It so happens that I write upon the Negro question, in compliance with the request of the editor of the International Socialist Review , in the state of Louisiana, where the race prejudice is as strong and the feeling against the “******” as bitter and relentless as when Lincoln’s proclamation of emancipation lashed the waning Confederacy into fury and incited the final and desperate attempts to burst the bonds that held the southern states in the federal union. Indeed, so thoroughly is the south permeated with the malign spirit of race hatred that even Socialists are to be found, and by no means rarely, who either share directly in the race hostility against the Negro, or avoid the issue, or apologize for the social obliteration of the color line in the class struggle.
The white man in the south declares that “the ****** is all right in his place”; that is, as menial, servant and slave. If he dare hold up his head, feel the thrill of manhood in his veins and nurse the hope that some day may bring deliverance; if in his brain the thought of freedom dawns and in his heart the aspiration to rise above the animal plane and propensities of his sires, he must be made to realize that notwithstanding the white man is civilized (?) the black man is a “******” still and must so remain as long as planets wheel in space.
But while the white man is considerate enough to tolerate the Negro “in his place,” the remotest suggestion at social recognition arouses all the pent-up wrath of his Anglo-Saxon civilization; and my observation is that the less real ground there is for such indignant assertion of self -superiority, the more passionately it is proclaimed.
At Yoakum, Texas, a few days ago, leaving the depot with two grips in my hands, I passed four or five bearers of the white man’s burden perched on a railing and decorating their environment with tobacco juice. One of them, addressing me, said: “There’s a ****** that’ll carry your grips.” A second one added: “That’s what he’s here for,” and the third chimed in with “That’s right, by God.” Here was a savory bouquet of white superiority. One glance was sufficient to satisfy me that they represented all there is of justification for the implacable hatred of the Negro race. They were ignorant, lazy, unclean, totally void of ambition, themselves the foul product of the capitalist system and held in lowest contempt by the master class, yet esteeming themselves immeasurably above the cleanest, most intelligent and self-respecting Negro, having by reflex absorbed the “******” hatred of their masters.
As a matter of fact the industrial supremacy of the south before the war would not have been possible without the Negro, and the south of today would totally collapse without his labor. Cotton culture has been and is the great staple and it will not be denied that the fineness and superiority of the fibre that makes the export of the southern states the greatest in the world is due in large measure to the genius of the Negroes charged with its cultivation.
The whole world is under obligation to the Negro, and that the white heel is still upon the black neck is simply proof that the world is not yet civilized.
The history of the Negro in the United States is a history of crime without a parallel.
Why should the white man hate him? Because he stole him from his native land and for two centuries and a half robbed him of the fruit of his labor, kept him in beastly ignorance and subjected him to the brutal domination of the lash? Because he tore the black child from the breast of its mother and ravished the black man’s daughter before her father’s eyes?
There are thousands of Negroes who bear testimony in their whitening skins that men who so furiously resent the suggestion of “social equality” are far less sensitive in respect to the sexual equality of the races.
But of all the senseless agitation in capitalist society, that in respect to “social equality” takes the palm. The very instant it is mentioned the old aristocratic plantation owner’s shrill cry about the “buck ******” marrying the “fair young daughter” of his master is heard from the tomb and echoed and re-echoed across the spaces and repeated by the “white trash” in proud vindication of their social superiority.
Social equality, forsooth! Is the black man pressing his claims for social recognition upon his white burden bearer? Is there any reason why he should? Is the white man’s social recognition of his own white brother such as to excite the Negro’s ambition to covet the noble prize? Has the Negro any greater desire, or is there any reason why he should have, for social intercourse with the white man than the white man has for social relations with the Negro? This phase of the Negro question is pure fraud and serves to mask the real issue, which is not social equality , BUT ECONOMIC FREEDOM.
There never was any social inferiority that was not the shrivelled fruit of economic inequality.
The Negro, given economic freedom, will not ask the white man any social favors; and the burning question of “social equality” will disappear like mist before the sunrise.
I have said and say again that, properly speaking, there is no Negro question outside of the labor question—the working class struggle. Our position as Socialists and as a party is perfectly plain. We have simply to say: “The class struggle is colorless.” The capitalists, white, black and other shades, are on one side and the workers, white, black and all other colors, on the other side.
When Marx said: “Workingmen of all countries unite,” he gave concrete expression to the socialist philosophy of the class struggle; unlike the framers of the Declaration of Independence who announced that “all men are created equal” and then basely repudiated their own doctrine, Marx issued the call to all the workers of the globe, regardless of race, sex, creed or any other condition whatsoever.
As a social party we receive the Negro and all other races upon absolutely equal terms. We are the party of the working class, the whole working class, and we will not suffer ourselves to be divided by any specious appeal to race prejudice; and if we should be coaxed or driven from the straight road we will be lost in the wilderness and ought to perish there, for we shall no longer be a Socialist party.
Let the capitalist press and capitalist “public opinion” indulge themselves in alternate flattery and abuse of the Negro; we as Socialists will receive him in our party, treat him in our counsels and stand by him all around the same as if his skin were white instead of black; and this we do, not from any considerations of sentiment, but because it accords with the philosophy of Socialism, the genius of the class struggle, and is eternally right and bound to triumph in the end.
With the “’******” question, the “’race war” from the capitalist viewpoint we have nothing to do. In capitalism the Negro question is a grave one and will grow more threatening as the contradictions and complications of capitalist society multiply, but this need not worry us. Let them settle the Negro question in their way, if they can. We have nothing to do with it, for that is their fight. We have simply to open the eyes of as many Negroes as we can and bring them into the Socialist movement to do battle for emancipation from wage slavery, and when the working class have triumphed in the class struggle and stand forth economic as well as political free men, the race problem will forever disappear.
Socialists should with pride proclaim their sympathy with and fealty to the black race, and if any there be who hesitate to avow themselves in the face of ignorant and unreasoning prejudice, they lack the true spirit of the slavery-destroying revolutionary movement.
The voice of Socialism must be as inspiring music to the ears of those in bondage, especially the weak black brethren, doubly enslaved, who are bowed to the earth and groan in despair beneath the burden of the centuries.
For myself, my heart goes to the Negro and I make no apology to any white man for it. In fact, when I see the poor, brutalized, outraged black victim, I feel a burning sense of guilt for his intellectual poverty and moral debasement that makes me blush for the unspeakable crimes committed by my own race.
In closing, permit me to express the hope that the next convention may repeal the resolutions on the Negro question. The Negro does not need them and they serve to increase rather than diminish the necessity for explanation.
We have nothing special to offer the Negro, and we cannot make separate appeals to all the races.
The Socialist Party is the party of the working class, regardless of color—the whole working class of the whole world.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Source: International Socialist Review , Vol. IV, No. 5. November 1903
Online Version: E.V. Debs Internet Archive, 2006
Transcribed/HTML Markup: Robert Bills for the Socialist Labor Party of America and David Walters, December, 2006
<HR>
Eugene V. Debs
Danger Ahead
November 5, 1855 – October 20, 1926
It so happens that I write upon the Negro question, in compliance with the request of the editor of the International Socialist Review , in the state of Louisiana, where the race prejudice is as strong and the feeling against the “******” as bitter and relentless as when Lincoln’s proclamation of emancipation lashed the waning Confederacy into fury and incited the final and desperate attempts to burst the bonds that held the southern states in the federal union. Indeed, so thoroughly is the south permeated with the malign spirit of race hatred that even Socialists are to be found, and by no means rarely, who either share directly in the race hostility against the Negro, or avoid the issue, or apologize for the social obliteration of the color line in the class struggle.
The white man in the south declares that “the ****** is all right in his place”; that is, as menial, servant and slave. If he dare hold up his head, feel the thrill of manhood in his veins and nurse the hope that some day may bring deliverance; if in his brain the thought of freedom dawns and in his heart the aspiration to rise above the animal plane and propensities of his sires, he must be made to realize that notwithstanding the white man is civilized (?) the black man is a “******” still and must so remain as long as planets wheel in space.
But while the white man is considerate enough to tolerate the Negro “in his place,” the remotest suggestion at social recognition arouses all the pent-up wrath of his Anglo-Saxon civilization; and my observation is that the less real ground there is for such indignant assertion of self -superiority, the more passionately it is proclaimed.
At Yoakum, Texas, a few days ago, leaving the depot with two grips in my hands, I passed four or five bearers of the white man’s burden perched on a railing and decorating their environment with tobacco juice. One of them, addressing me, said: “There’s a ****** that’ll carry your grips.” A second one added: “That’s what he’s here for,” and the third chimed in with “That’s right, by God.” Here was a savory bouquet of white superiority. One glance was sufficient to satisfy me that they represented all there is of justification for the implacable hatred of the Negro race. They were ignorant, lazy, unclean, totally void of ambition, themselves the foul product of the capitalist system and held in lowest contempt by the master class, yet esteeming themselves immeasurably above the cleanest, most intelligent and self-respecting Negro, having by reflex absorbed the “******” hatred of their masters.
As a matter of fact the industrial supremacy of the south before the war would not have been possible without the Negro, and the south of today would totally collapse without his labor. Cotton culture has been and is the great staple and it will not be denied that the fineness and superiority of the fibre that makes the export of the southern states the greatest in the world is due in large measure to the genius of the Negroes charged with its cultivation.
The whole world is under obligation to the Negro, and that the white heel is still upon the black neck is simply proof that the world is not yet civilized.
The history of the Negro in the United States is a history of crime without a parallel.
Why should the white man hate him? Because he stole him from his native land and for two centuries and a half robbed him of the fruit of his labor, kept him in beastly ignorance and subjected him to the brutal domination of the lash? Because he tore the black child from the breast of its mother and ravished the black man’s daughter before her father’s eyes?
There are thousands of Negroes who bear testimony in their whitening skins that men who so furiously resent the suggestion of “social equality” are far less sensitive in respect to the sexual equality of the races.
But of all the senseless agitation in capitalist society, that in respect to “social equality” takes the palm. The very instant it is mentioned the old aristocratic plantation owner’s shrill cry about the “buck ******” marrying the “fair young daughter” of his master is heard from the tomb and echoed and re-echoed across the spaces and repeated by the “white trash” in proud vindication of their social superiority.
Social equality, forsooth! Is the black man pressing his claims for social recognition upon his white burden bearer? Is there any reason why he should? Is the white man’s social recognition of his own white brother such as to excite the Negro’s ambition to covet the noble prize? Has the Negro any greater desire, or is there any reason why he should have, for social intercourse with the white man than the white man has for social relations with the Negro? This phase of the Negro question is pure fraud and serves to mask the real issue, which is not social equality , BUT ECONOMIC FREEDOM.
There never was any social inferiority that was not the shrivelled fruit of economic inequality.
The Negro, given economic freedom, will not ask the white man any social favors; and the burning question of “social equality” will disappear like mist before the sunrise.
I have said and say again that, properly speaking, there is no Negro question outside of the labor question—the working class struggle. Our position as Socialists and as a party is perfectly plain. We have simply to say: “The class struggle is colorless.” The capitalists, white, black and other shades, are on one side and the workers, white, black and all other colors, on the other side.
When Marx said: “Workingmen of all countries unite,” he gave concrete expression to the socialist philosophy of the class struggle; unlike the framers of the Declaration of Independence who announced that “all men are created equal” and then basely repudiated their own doctrine, Marx issued the call to all the workers of the globe, regardless of race, sex, creed or any other condition whatsoever.
As a social party we receive the Negro and all other races upon absolutely equal terms. We are the party of the working class, the whole working class, and we will not suffer ourselves to be divided by any specious appeal to race prejudice; and if we should be coaxed or driven from the straight road we will be lost in the wilderness and ought to perish there, for we shall no longer be a Socialist party.
Let the capitalist press and capitalist “public opinion” indulge themselves in alternate flattery and abuse of the Negro; we as Socialists will receive him in our party, treat him in our counsels and stand by him all around the same as if his skin were white instead of black; and this we do, not from any considerations of sentiment, but because it accords with the philosophy of Socialism, the genius of the class struggle, and is eternally right and bound to triumph in the end.
With the “’******” question, the “’race war” from the capitalist viewpoint we have nothing to do. In capitalism the Negro question is a grave one and will grow more threatening as the contradictions and complications of capitalist society multiply, but this need not worry us. Let them settle the Negro question in their way, if they can. We have nothing to do with it, for that is their fight. We have simply to open the eyes of as many Negroes as we can and bring them into the Socialist movement to do battle for emancipation from wage slavery, and when the working class have triumphed in the class struggle and stand forth economic as well as political free men, the race problem will forever disappear.
Socialists should with pride proclaim their sympathy with and fealty to the black race, and if any there be who hesitate to avow themselves in the face of ignorant and unreasoning prejudice, they lack the true spirit of the slavery-destroying revolutionary movement.
The voice of Socialism must be as inspiring music to the ears of those in bondage, especially the weak black brethren, doubly enslaved, who are bowed to the earth and groan in despair beneath the burden of the centuries.
For myself, my heart goes to the Negro and I make no apology to any white man for it. In fact, when I see the poor, brutalized, outraged black victim, I feel a burning sense of guilt for his intellectual poverty and moral debasement that makes me blush for the unspeakable crimes committed by my own race.
In closing, permit me to express the hope that the next convention may repeal the resolutions on the Negro question. The Negro does not need them and they serve to increase rather than diminish the necessity for explanation.
We have nothing special to offer the Negro, and we cannot make separate appeals to all the races.
The Socialist Party is the party of the working class, regardless of color—the whole working class of the whole world.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Employees Who Stay In Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less
Employees Who Stay In Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less
Cameron Keng,
6/22/2014 @ 11:03AM
The worst kept secret is that employees are making less on average every year. There are millions of reasons for this, but we’re going to focus on one that we can control. Staying employed at the same company for over two years on average is going to make you earn less over your lifetime by about 50% or more.
Keep in mind that 50% is a conservative number at the lowest end of the spectrum. This is assuming that your career is only going to last 10 years. The longer you work, the greater the difference will become over your lifetime.
Arguments for Changing Jobs
The average raise an employee can expect in 2014 is 3%. Even the most underperforming employee can expect a 1.3% raise. The best performers can hope for a 4.5% raise. But, the inflation rate is currently 2.1% calculated based on the Consumer Price Index published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This means that your raise is actually less than 1%. This is probably sobering enough to make you reach for a drink.
In 2014, the average employee is going to earn less than a 1% raise and there is very little that we can do to change management’s decision. But, we can decide whether we want to stay at a company that is going to give us a raise for less than 1%. The average raise an employee receives for leaving is between a 10% to 20% increase in salary. Obviously, there are extreme cases where people receive upwards of 50%, but this depends on each person’s individual circumstances and industries.
Why are people who jump ship rewarded, when loyal employees are punished for their dedication? The answer is simple. Recessions allow businesses to freeze their payroll and decrease salaries of the newly hired based on “market trends.” These reactions to the recession are understandable, but the problem is that these reactions were meant to be “temporary.” Instead they have become the “norm” in the marketplace. More importantly, we have all become used to hearing about “3% raises” and we’ve accepted it as the new “norm.”
John Hollon, former editor of Workforce.com, remembers when “5% was considered an average annual pay increase.” The amount of fear the media created surrounding the recession and its length has given companies the perfect excuse to shrink payroll and lower employee salary expectations in the long-run.
The world is desperate for skilled labor and companies around the globe are starving for talent. Companies can tout technology replacing labor, but it is only exacerbating the global shortage of human capital and skilled workers. This means that we as employees are positioned better than ever to leverage our abilities for increased pay.
Bethany Devine, a Senior Hiring Manager in Silicon Valley, CA who has worked with Intuit and other Fortune 500 companies explains, “I would often see resumes that only had a few years at each company. I found that the people who had switched companies usually commanded a higher salary. The problem with staying at a company forever is you start with a base salary and usually annual raises are based on a percentage of your current salary. There is often a limit to how high your manager can bump you up since it’s based on a percentage of your current salary. However, if you move to another company, you start fresh and can usually command a higher base salary to hire you. Companies competing for talent are often not afraid to pay more when hiring if it means they can hire the best talent. Same thing applies for titles. Some companies have a limit to how many promotions they allow each year. Once you are entrenched in a company, it may become more difficult to be promoted as you may be waiting in line behind others who should have been promoted a year ago but were not due to the limit. However, if you apply to another company, your skills may match the higher title, and that company will hire you with the new title. I have seen many coworkers who were waiting on a certain title and finally received it the day they left and were hired at a new company.”
Even more importantly, when I asked Devine her thoughts on employees who had remained in the same company for periods long past the two year mark, she explained that she did feel that some were “underpaid” or had the potential to earn more.
Jessica Derkis started her career earning $8 per hour ($16,640 annual salary) as the YMCA’s marketing manager. Over 10 years, she’s changed employers five times to ultimately earn $72,000 per year at her most recent marketing position. This is approximately a 430% increase over a 10 year career. Derkis’ most recent transition resulted in a 50% increase to her salary. Derkis’ is a great example of how “owning your career” can make a huge difference in your income and career path.
Arguments Against Changing Jobs
People are worried that “changing jobs too often” will reflect negatively on employee resumes. I can definitely understand this fear because everyone is always worried about being unmarketable. I will be the first to admit that it is possible that certain employers may look at a resume with multiple transitions as a negative and may even disqualify an applicant based on that alone.
But, the important question is whether the risk outweighs the reward. Christine Mueller, President of TechniSearch Recruiters, has had clients that “will not consider anyone who has had more than three jobs in the last 10 years, no matter the reason.” Even so, Mueller still recommends that an employee makes a transition every three to four years for maximum salary gains. Thus, the question is less about whether employees should jump ship, but how long they should they wait before jumping to maximize their salaries and achieve their goals.
Brendan Burke, Director at Headwaters MB, strongly disagrees with the “up-and-out culture.” He explains that “companies turn over great employees because they’re not organizationally strong enough to support rapid development within their ranks. In many cases, that is a recipe for discontinuity in service and product offerings as well as disloyalty in the ranks. As such, we take the opposite approach. Rather than force folks out after 24 months, we try to retain our junior and mid-level staff and develop them within the ranks.”
Mr. Burke is absolutely correct. Most companies are not equipped to “rapidly” promote and reward their best employees for a variety of reasons such as office politics. Everyone that has worked in the labor pool hates office politics, but understands that it is an unavoidable evil and is more often than not a major obstacle to rewarding talent.
Finally, we’ve been talking about money a lot. Andrew Bauer, CEO of Royce Leather, explains that jumping ship can be “stressful.” Employees also need to consider their “quality of life, mental health, physical health and better moral standards.” Mr. Bauer is right. Money is important, but it must be balanced with everything else in your life. Monetary compensation is only one part of your life, and it should not dictate everything.
Jumping ship is a risk that we all need to weigh at a personal level. In my career, jumping ship is something I’ve done aggressively and frequently. I’ve never looked back and regretted my decisions because I’ve always felt that my skills deserved more. Hiring a single employee who is able to perform even 10% more efficiently is worth at least a 25% increase in salary. Companies spend a lot of money to pay recruiters, human resourcing to conduct background checks and the time of existing employees to hire and train new people. It’s always cheaper to just hire better people and pay them more.
Conclusion:
It’s a fact that employees are underpaid. Instead of focusing on things we can’t control like the economy or management decisions, focus on the things we can. Employees can control their own salaries by aggressively negotiating their opportunities and being unafraid to ask for more.
Clearly, there will always be exceptions to the rule. Not everyone may be able to make this decision immediately, but every employee should consider the option. I don’t fault employers and businesses for the market because it’s their right and duty to maximize their profits. But, as an individual, you’re a CEO of one, and you have a duty to maximize your profits.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/cameron...-less/2/?&_suid=14038006955620786761321593076
Employees Who Stay In Companies Longer Than Two Years Get Paid 50% Less
Cameron Keng,
6/22/2014 @ 11:03AM
The worst kept secret is that employees are making less on average every year. There are millions of reasons for this, but we’re going to focus on one that we can control. Staying employed at the same company for over two years on average is going to make you earn less over your lifetime by about 50% or more.
Keep in mind that 50% is a conservative number at the lowest end of the spectrum. This is assuming that your career is only going to last 10 years. The longer you work, the greater the difference will become over your lifetime.
Arguments for Changing Jobs
The average raise an employee can expect in 2014 is 3%. Even the most underperforming employee can expect a 1.3% raise. The best performers can hope for a 4.5% raise. But, the inflation rate is currently 2.1% calculated based on the Consumer Price Index published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This means that your raise is actually less than 1%. This is probably sobering enough to make you reach for a drink.
In 2014, the average employee is going to earn less than a 1% raise and there is very little that we can do to change management’s decision. But, we can decide whether we want to stay at a company that is going to give us a raise for less than 1%. The average raise an employee receives for leaving is between a 10% to 20% increase in salary. Obviously, there are extreme cases where people receive upwards of 50%, but this depends on each person’s individual circumstances and industries.
Why are people who jump ship rewarded, when loyal employees are punished for their dedication? The answer is simple. Recessions allow businesses to freeze their payroll and decrease salaries of the newly hired based on “market trends.” These reactions to the recession are understandable, but the problem is that these reactions were meant to be “temporary.” Instead they have become the “norm” in the marketplace. More importantly, we have all become used to hearing about “3% raises” and we’ve accepted it as the new “norm.”
John Hollon, former editor of Workforce.com, remembers when “5% was considered an average annual pay increase.” The amount of fear the media created surrounding the recession and its length has given companies the perfect excuse to shrink payroll and lower employee salary expectations in the long-run.
The world is desperate for skilled labor and companies around the globe are starving for talent. Companies can tout technology replacing labor, but it is only exacerbating the global shortage of human capital and skilled workers. This means that we as employees are positioned better than ever to leverage our abilities for increased pay.
Bethany Devine, a Senior Hiring Manager in Silicon Valley, CA who has worked with Intuit and other Fortune 500 companies explains, “I would often see resumes that only had a few years at each company. I found that the people who had switched companies usually commanded a higher salary. The problem with staying at a company forever is you start with a base salary and usually annual raises are based on a percentage of your current salary. There is often a limit to how high your manager can bump you up since it’s based on a percentage of your current salary. However, if you move to another company, you start fresh and can usually command a higher base salary to hire you. Companies competing for talent are often not afraid to pay more when hiring if it means they can hire the best talent. Same thing applies for titles. Some companies have a limit to how many promotions they allow each year. Once you are entrenched in a company, it may become more difficult to be promoted as you may be waiting in line behind others who should have been promoted a year ago but were not due to the limit. However, if you apply to another company, your skills may match the higher title, and that company will hire you with the new title. I have seen many coworkers who were waiting on a certain title and finally received it the day they left and were hired at a new company.”
Even more importantly, when I asked Devine her thoughts on employees who had remained in the same company for periods long past the two year mark, she explained that she did feel that some were “underpaid” or had the potential to earn more.
Jessica Derkis started her career earning $8 per hour ($16,640 annual salary) as the YMCA’s marketing manager. Over 10 years, she’s changed employers five times to ultimately earn $72,000 per year at her most recent marketing position. This is approximately a 430% increase over a 10 year career. Derkis’ most recent transition resulted in a 50% increase to her salary. Derkis’ is a great example of how “owning your career” can make a huge difference in your income and career path.
Arguments Against Changing Jobs
People are worried that “changing jobs too often” will reflect negatively on employee resumes. I can definitely understand this fear because everyone is always worried about being unmarketable. I will be the first to admit that it is possible that certain employers may look at a resume with multiple transitions as a negative and may even disqualify an applicant based on that alone.
But, the important question is whether the risk outweighs the reward. Christine Mueller, President of TechniSearch Recruiters, has had clients that “will not consider anyone who has had more than three jobs in the last 10 years, no matter the reason.” Even so, Mueller still recommends that an employee makes a transition every three to four years for maximum salary gains. Thus, the question is less about whether employees should jump ship, but how long they should they wait before jumping to maximize their salaries and achieve their goals.
Brendan Burke, Director at Headwaters MB, strongly disagrees with the “up-and-out culture.” He explains that “companies turn over great employees because they’re not organizationally strong enough to support rapid development within their ranks. In many cases, that is a recipe for discontinuity in service and product offerings as well as disloyalty in the ranks. As such, we take the opposite approach. Rather than force folks out after 24 months, we try to retain our junior and mid-level staff and develop them within the ranks.”
Mr. Burke is absolutely correct. Most companies are not equipped to “rapidly” promote and reward their best employees for a variety of reasons such as office politics. Everyone that has worked in the labor pool hates office politics, but understands that it is an unavoidable evil and is more often than not a major obstacle to rewarding talent.
Finally, we’ve been talking about money a lot. Andrew Bauer, CEO of Royce Leather, explains that jumping ship can be “stressful.” Employees also need to consider their “quality of life, mental health, physical health and better moral standards.” Mr. Bauer is right. Money is important, but it must be balanced with everything else in your life. Monetary compensation is only one part of your life, and it should not dictate everything.
Jumping ship is a risk that we all need to weigh at a personal level. In my career, jumping ship is something I’ve done aggressively and frequently. I’ve never looked back and regretted my decisions because I’ve always felt that my skills deserved more. Hiring a single employee who is able to perform even 10% more efficiently is worth at least a 25% increase in salary. Companies spend a lot of money to pay recruiters, human resourcing to conduct background checks and the time of existing employees to hire and train new people. It’s always cheaper to just hire better people and pay them more.
Conclusion:
It’s a fact that employees are underpaid. Instead of focusing on things we can’t control like the economy or management decisions, focus on the things we can. Employees can control their own salaries by aggressively negotiating their opportunities and being unafraid to ask for more.
Clearly, there will always be exceptions to the rule. Not everyone may be able to make this decision immediately, but every employee should consider the option. I don’t fault employers and businesses for the market because it’s their right and duty to maximize their profits. But, as an individual, you’re a CEO of one, and you have a duty to maximize your profits.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/cameron...-less/2/?&_suid=14038006955620786761321593076
source: Move to Amendent
<iframe src="http://movetoamend.org/sites/default/files/timeline_hmprint.pdf#page=1&zoom=150,-4,617" width=800 height=1000></iframe>
<iframe src="http://movetoamend.org/sites/default/files/timeline_hmprint.pdf#page=1&zoom=150,-4,617" width=800 height=1000></iframe>
source: Huffington Post
Republicans Formally Oppose A Union For College Athletes
After holding a hearing to air their concerns over college football players unionizing, congressional Republicans took their opposition to the idea a step further on Thursday, filing a brief with the federal labor board against collective bargaining for college athletes.
The brief, submitted by six Republicans who help oversee the National Labor Relations Board, took aim at the decision by the agency's regional director in Chicago to allow a union election for athletes at Northwestern University. The lawmakers argued that the ruling "artificially conflated and improperly applied" labor law in determining that the players were employees of the school and therefore covered under the law.
"As a matter of policy and law, this is wrong: scholarship football players are not and should not be treated as ... employees," they wrote. "The inevitable conclusion from the [regional director's] analysis in this case would lead to countless undergraduate students -- in a variety of extracurricular activities -- being considered employees of their colleges and universities."
With the backing of the United Steelworkers, Northwestern players had presented the labor board with a petition earlier this year seeking an election for their would-be union, the College Athletes Players Association. The players' case rested on the argument that college scholarships constitute a form of payment for services rendered and that Northwestern controlled the terms of those services.
The players cleared the first hurdle to their potentially historic unionization effort in March, when Peter S. Ohr, the board's Chicago regional director, issued a ruling letting the election proceed.
That decision, however, has been appealed to the five-member labor board in Washington, which can affirm or overturn Ohr's ruling. (Even if the board sides with the players, Northwestern can still take its case to federal court.) The election went ahead, but the ballots have been impounded until the board makes its determination.
The brief from the six Republican lawmakers was one of a batch of amicus filings in the case on Thursday by interested groups. These include the National Collegiate Athletic Association, which isn't a formal party in the case but could see its entire model shaken by the outcome. In its brief in support of Northwestern, the NCAA contended that letting players unionize would lead to "significant and irreversible, negative impact on the future of intercollegiate athletics and higher education in the United States."
The congressional Republicans on the filing were Rep. John Kline (Minn.), who chairs the House Committee on Education and the Workforce; Sen. Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions; Rep. Virginia Foxx (N.C.); Rep. Phil Roe (Tenn.); Sen. Johnny Isakson (Ga.); and Sen. Richard Burr (N.C.).
Unions representing athletes in five pro sports -- MLB, MLS, NBA, NFL and NHL -- filed a joint brief in support of the college athletes on Thursday.
Republicans Formally Oppose A Union For College Athletes
After holding a hearing to air their concerns over college football players unionizing, congressional Republicans took their opposition to the idea a step further on Thursday, filing a brief with the federal labor board against collective bargaining for college athletes.
The brief, submitted by six Republicans who help oversee the National Labor Relations Board, took aim at the decision by the agency's regional director in Chicago to allow a union election for athletes at Northwestern University. The lawmakers argued that the ruling "artificially conflated and improperly applied" labor law in determining that the players were employees of the school and therefore covered under the law.
"As a matter of policy and law, this is wrong: scholarship football players are not and should not be treated as ... employees," they wrote. "The inevitable conclusion from the [regional director's] analysis in this case would lead to countless undergraduate students -- in a variety of extracurricular activities -- being considered employees of their colleges and universities."
With the backing of the United Steelworkers, Northwestern players had presented the labor board with a petition earlier this year seeking an election for their would-be union, the College Athletes Players Association. The players' case rested on the argument that college scholarships constitute a form of payment for services rendered and that Northwestern controlled the terms of those services.
The players cleared the first hurdle to their potentially historic unionization effort in March, when Peter S. Ohr, the board's Chicago regional director, issued a ruling letting the election proceed.
That decision, however, has been appealed to the five-member labor board in Washington, which can affirm or overturn Ohr's ruling. (Even if the board sides with the players, Northwestern can still take its case to federal court.) The election went ahead, but the ballots have been impounded until the board makes its determination.
The brief from the six Republican lawmakers was one of a batch of amicus filings in the case on Thursday by interested groups. These include the National Collegiate Athletic Association, which isn't a formal party in the case but could see its entire model shaken by the outcome. In its brief in support of Northwestern, the NCAA contended that letting players unionize would lead to "significant and irreversible, negative impact on the future of intercollegiate athletics and higher education in the United States."
The congressional Republicans on the filing were Rep. John Kline (Minn.), who chairs the House Committee on Education and the Workforce; Sen. Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions; Rep. Virginia Foxx (N.C.); Rep. Phil Roe (Tenn.); Sen. Johnny Isakson (Ga.); and Sen. Richard Burr (N.C.).
Unions representing athletes in five pro sports -- MLB, MLS, NBA, NFL and NHL -- filed a joint brief in support of the college athletes on Thursday.
Profit over people...
Temp worker killed on the job 13 days after managers removed safety device
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/...-13-days-after-managers-removed-safety-device
Temp workers face enormously elevated danger in the workplace, as a running investigatory series by ProPublica in collaboration with Univision shows. Those dangers are in addition to the low wages and unstable employment of temp work—it's a total package of exploitation. Now, a new story in the series shows how weak enforcement and penalties are even when workers are killed.
In states across the country, temp workers are dramatically more likely to be injured on the job—50 percent more in California and Florida, 72 percent more in Minnesota. In at least four states, temp workers are three times more likely to suffer amputations than permanent employees. Numbers like that are the product of reckless disregard by employers. Disregard like this: In 2013, a temp named Janio Salinas was buried alive in sugar in a Pennsylvania warehouse staffed entirely by temps, up to and including the warehouse manager. This was not an innocent accident:
For this, the company was hit with a $25,855 fine that was dropped to $18,098 when it installed a safety guard and improved its safety procedures. What's more:
If removing a safety device in the name of profit isn't total disregard, what is? And if you wonder why companies are willing to risk workers' lives—well, why wouldn't they, at the cost of fines like that?
Temp worker killed on the job 13 days after managers removed safety device
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/...-13-days-after-managers-removed-safety-device
Temp workers face enormously elevated danger in the workplace, as a running investigatory series by ProPublica in collaboration with Univision shows. Those dangers are in addition to the low wages and unstable employment of temp work—it's a total package of exploitation. Now, a new story in the series shows how weak enforcement and penalties are even when workers are killed.
In states across the country, temp workers are dramatically more likely to be injured on the job—50 percent more in California and Florida, 72 percent more in Minnesota. In at least four states, temp workers are three times more likely to suffer amputations than permanent employees. Numbers like that are the product of reckless disregard by employers. Disregard like this: In 2013, a temp named Janio Salinas was buried alive in sugar in a Pennsylvania warehouse staffed entirely by temps, up to and including the warehouse manager. This was not an innocent accident:
For this, the company was hit with a $25,855 fine that was dropped to $18,098 when it installed a safety guard and improved its safety procedures. What's more:
If removing a safety device in the name of profit isn't total disregard, what is? And if you wonder why companies are willing to risk workers' lives—well, why wouldn't they, at the cost of fines like that?
source: Huffington Post
Temp Work Growth Has Spawned New Dangers For Workers, Study Finds
The growing use of temporary or "contingent" workers in American industries like construction and warehousing has helped diminish corporate accountability and lead to unsafe working conditions, according to a new report released Friday.
By shifting responsibilities to outside firms, employers who rely on sub-contracted temp workers have fewer incentives to safeguard their workforce from injury and illness, putting those vulnerable workers in harm's way, scholars with the Center for Progressive Reform, a left-leaning research non-profit, found.
"Their shared experience is one of little job security, low wages, minimal opportunities for advancement, and, all too often, hazardous working conditions," the report said of such workers. "Employers of contingent labor may escape the financial incentives that are a main driver of business decisions to eliminate hazards for other workers."
The report cited four industries where corporations now use temporary workers on a permanent basis to help cut down on labor costs: farming, construction, warehousing and hotels. By getting workers through outside agencies, the corporation benefiting from the work doesn't have to worry about what kind of wages the workers are paid or what kind of benefits they receive.
Nor do those companies have to provide health care coverage or pay for workers compensation benefits, giving them less motivation to keep their farms, construction sites, warehouses or hotels safe. A large portion of the contingent workers in these industries tend to be Latino, the report notes.
"This is a phenomenon that's here to stay, and it's probably increasing," said Martha McCluskey, a professor at the State University of New York-Buffalo Law School and a co-author of the report. "It's not just a supplement [anymore]. Firms that engage in hazardous work now use contingent labor as a central part of their workforce on a regular basis. That changes the picture."
As HuffPost reported in 2011, the use of temp workers has become common in warehousing, an industry where workers traditionally were employed directly by the company producing or moving the goods. Now, companies including Walmart contract out much of their operations to logistics companies, which in turn hire labor companies to provide workers, often leading to a dizzying contract arrangement.
With the increased reliance on temps come lawsuits and labor citations alleging unsafe working conditions, as well as wage theft. Numerous temporary warehouse workers have told HuffPost over the past year and a half that they've been cheated out of pay even as they work for minimum wage, and that they toil in hot warehouses under strenuous productivity guidelines. One worker employed in an Illinois warehouse moving Walmart goods said she ultimately suffered a bladder infection because she didn't get enough bathroom breaks.
HuffPost also reported on similar contracting arrangements in the hotel industry that lead to lower pay and perhaps greater occupational hazards. As hotels such as Hyatt outsource housekeeping duties to outside labor firms, the lines of corporate accountability can become blurred, with some workers even unsure who to report injuries to.
"The indirect nature of the employment relationship inherently creates some special health and safety risks," McCluskey said. "Because workers by definition are working for an agency that's not designing and doing the work, number one, it can cause a lot of confusion and misunderstanding over how to allocate responsibility for the education of workers and for protective equipment."]
The prevalence of contingent workers today calls for changes to decades-old occupational health laws, according to the report. The authors recommend that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which is overseen by the Labor Department, establish rules requiring that companies using temps provide a minimum amount of training to workers, and that the agency should carry out enforcement sweeps of workplaces where temps are employed.
Because the workers are employed on a day-to-day basis, many of them probably don't report injuries or illness for fear they won't have a job the following week, McCluskey noted.
"The firm controlling the work is not invested in the particular workers," McCluskey said. "It just creates a whole new set of questions and risks."
Temp Work Growth Has Spawned New Dangers For Workers, Study Finds
The growing use of temporary or "contingent" workers in American industries like construction and warehousing has helped diminish corporate accountability and lead to unsafe working conditions, according to a new report released Friday.
By shifting responsibilities to outside firms, employers who rely on sub-contracted temp workers have fewer incentives to safeguard their workforce from injury and illness, putting those vulnerable workers in harm's way, scholars with the Center for Progressive Reform, a left-leaning research non-profit, found.
"Their shared experience is one of little job security, low wages, minimal opportunities for advancement, and, all too often, hazardous working conditions," the report said of such workers. "Employers of contingent labor may escape the financial incentives that are a main driver of business decisions to eliminate hazards for other workers."
The report cited four industries where corporations now use temporary workers on a permanent basis to help cut down on labor costs: farming, construction, warehousing and hotels. By getting workers through outside agencies, the corporation benefiting from the work doesn't have to worry about what kind of wages the workers are paid or what kind of benefits they receive.
Nor do those companies have to provide health care coverage or pay for workers compensation benefits, giving them less motivation to keep their farms, construction sites, warehouses or hotels safe. A large portion of the contingent workers in these industries tend to be Latino, the report notes.
"This is a phenomenon that's here to stay, and it's probably increasing," said Martha McCluskey, a professor at the State University of New York-Buffalo Law School and a co-author of the report. "It's not just a supplement [anymore]. Firms that engage in hazardous work now use contingent labor as a central part of their workforce on a regular basis. That changes the picture."
As HuffPost reported in 2011, the use of temp workers has become common in warehousing, an industry where workers traditionally were employed directly by the company producing or moving the goods. Now, companies including Walmart contract out much of their operations to logistics companies, which in turn hire labor companies to provide workers, often leading to a dizzying contract arrangement.
With the increased reliance on temps come lawsuits and labor citations alleging unsafe working conditions, as well as wage theft. Numerous temporary warehouse workers have told HuffPost over the past year and a half that they've been cheated out of pay even as they work for minimum wage, and that they toil in hot warehouses under strenuous productivity guidelines. One worker employed in an Illinois warehouse moving Walmart goods said she ultimately suffered a bladder infection because she didn't get enough bathroom breaks.
HuffPost also reported on similar contracting arrangements in the hotel industry that lead to lower pay and perhaps greater occupational hazards. As hotels such as Hyatt outsource housekeeping duties to outside labor firms, the lines of corporate accountability can become blurred, with some workers even unsure who to report injuries to.
"The indirect nature of the employment relationship inherently creates some special health and safety risks," McCluskey said. "Because workers by definition are working for an agency that's not designing and doing the work, number one, it can cause a lot of confusion and misunderstanding over how to allocate responsibility for the education of workers and for protective equipment."]
The prevalence of contingent workers today calls for changes to decades-old occupational health laws, according to the report. The authors recommend that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which is overseen by the Labor Department, establish rules requiring that companies using temps provide a minimum amount of training to workers, and that the agency should carry out enforcement sweeps of workplaces where temps are employed.
Because the workers are employed on a day-to-day basis, many of them probably don't report injuries or illness for fear they won't have a job the following week, McCluskey noted.
"The firm controlling the work is not invested in the particular workers," McCluskey said. "It just creates a whole new set of questions and risks."
UAW creates local for Volkswagen's Chattanooga plant
Joey Bitsill performs quality control on a VW Passat body Jan. 28, 2011, at the Volkswagen
plant in Chattanooga, Tenn. (Photo: Larry McCormack, The Tennessean)
"The election was so close, we don't feel it's right to turn our backs on these workers," Casteel said.
Although there is no formal recognition by Volkswagen that would let the union represent the entire hourly workforce at the plant, there is a "consensus" agreement between the automaker and UAW, Casteel said.
"What there won't be is exclusive representation," he said. "If you deal with a local union, you have recognized them under federal labor law. We have an agreement with them that they're going to do that. It's a consensus on the formation of this local, and we're agreed on this path forward."
The members of the new UAW Local 42 in Chattanooga won't have to pay dues to the union right away, Casteel said.
"Our administrative policy is that no dues are collected until 30 days after the first contract is approved. That won't happen until there is a majority (of VW workers in the union) and we negotiate a contract."
But unlike exclusive representation, any contract approved with the UAW at the Chattanooga plant under this setup would apply only to union members, Casteel said.
"This is a good thing for us because it's members-only bargaining, and our members might get something in the contract that the rest of the employees won't get."
In a statement, VW, meanwhile, says there is no "formal" agreement between the company and the union.
"Just like anywhere else in the world, the establishment of a local organization is a matter for the trade union concerned. There is no contract or other formal agreement with UAW on this matter," the VW statement said.
This move comes as Volkswagen continues negotiations with the state of Tennessee over a proposed incentives package reported to be about $300 million that the automaker is seeking in return for expanding the Chattanooga plant by adding a second vehicle to be produced there, a new crossover utility vehicle. The facility now makes only the Passat midsize sedan, sales of which have been lagging this year.
Chattanooga reportedly is the leader in competition for the new vehicle over an existing VW plant in Puebla, Mexico. Union officials expect Volkswagen to keep silent on the UAW representation issue until after the incentives package is secured and Chattanooga is announced as the production site for the new crossover. Some reports from Germany indicate that a decision could be announced within a few days.
But the Haslam administration says it wants to hear from the company on this latest development.
"It is most appropriate for the company to speak for itself on this issue," said David Smith, a spokesman for Gov. Haslam. "Our understanding is that there is no agreement between the company and the UAW."
The union got involved in discussions with Volkswagen's German management more than a year ago to try to work out a plan to create an employee "works council" at the Chattanooga plant like the councils VW has in almost all of its other plants worldwide. Works councils meet with managers to solve work issues other than pay and benefits at the other plants.
The fact that the UAW would go ahead with organizing at Volkswagen despite losing the February election is "not unexpected," said Matt Patterson, president of the Center for Worker Freedom, an anti-union group that has led efforts against the union in Chattanooga.
"I've been beating that drum ever since the election," Patterson said. "I can't say I'm surprised. And I can't really blame them, since it was such a close vote. But it's really shocking that they can lose a vote and have a union anyway.
"I'm extremely disappointed that the union is not respecting the wishes of the workers, who said loudly and clearly they did not want the UAW in their workplace. If the union truly respects the workers, like they say they do, then they will respect the decision these workers made."
Patterson, whose group is an offshoot of the Washington, D.C.-based Americans for Tax Reform, said he had never heard of a union going ahead and setting up shop even though it had lost an election.
"I don't know of any case like this, but the whole situation in Chattanooga is bizarre and unique," he said. "But they wouldn't be doing this if they didn't have the tacit approval of Volkswagen management. I never believed they would wait another year before they tried something else."
He said he would be returning to Chattanooga and "talking to some folks about what we can do about this."
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2014/07/10/uaw-vw-chattanooga-local/12471533/
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