Satellite radio - don't let them lie

brettw22

If retail clerk unions existed primarily to provide benefits, I'd be for them. In this particular industry, it allows idiots to keep jobs far longer than they should, and makes it difficult to get rid of a truely useless employee. They don't possess any specialized skill is my point, so I don't see why they deserve/expect to be paid what they are.

amulford

I agree with you there. There are ways to deal with useless employees. The manager has to do it, and if they are not doing their job, it will have a trickle down effect. If the person doesn't perform, get rid if them. I have to do it quite often.

My only point is that benefits such as healthcare insurance are fast becoming a necessity and the average employee at that level cannot afford it. With the group rates available and matching contributions, it is feasable.

PoweredByDodge

the american union is an institution you should bow down before, not ridicule. go rent "F.I.S.T.".

MacLeod

Im very pro union as well. I think a union is the very essence of capitalism. A group of people taking their collective bargaining power and coming to an amicable arrangement for both parties. However I usually disagree with unions when they get ridiculously greedy and price their members right out of a job. Trucking is notorious for this and several companies have gone **** up because they simply cant pay their drivers $40/hr and still have competitive rates.

I hate Walmart too but not for the same reasons most people do. I have no problem with them taking over the world, obviously we dont mind because we're the ones shopping there. Same principle with them closing down mom and pop stores. My mom is a prime example. She **** about how evil Walmart is and how theyve closed down so many stores but yet she shops there at least twice a week! I also like being able to buy stuff really cheap. And I dont mind them paying low wages. Yeah their wages and benifits suck but you dont have to work there and if their wages arent high enough for you, then dont work there. Nobody is keeping their employees hostage.

I hate Walmart because, as a beer distributor, I deal with them for a living and they are the single largest collection of **** in the known universe! I dont know how they do it but all their managers and dept managers are some of the biggest wastes of skin I could imagine. There is one here in town, on Brainerd Rd, that I wish would burn to the ground with most of the management in it.

SportsFan

I used to like and sympathize with Unions, but not anymore. Unions are a major reason that companies have to lay off and downsize tens of thousands of employees (please see General Motors, Ford, General Electric in the nineties, etc.). For example, I worked for a company in the 90's that was NON-union. Things were good...employees were well paid, benefits were good, and the company was hiring, growing and expanding. THEN....the union was brought in to represent a certain segment of the manufacturing sector. Before you know it, the company is cutting jobs, pulling out of markets that they WERE expanding in to before arrival of the union, and cutting both blue collar AND white collar jobs. The sales force for this company went from nearly 50, to under 20...in just a few years.

See, the UNION fights for paying their members beyond the company's actual means.....even for lower skilled employees. And that is during the good times AND the bad! Therefore, the piper has to be paid someday.....and when that time comes, it means a loss in the total number of jobs - simply because of the outrageous wages that some low level, underskilled-yet-overpaid (as Brett suggested) employees get at all times. These members also get their 60 minutes worth of "bathroom" breaks" daily along with their hour long lunch and thirty minute morning and afternoon breaks.....to go along with their 6 weeks paid vacation yearly, etc. OK, so this is slightly exagerrated...but I think you get the picture. Unions AT ONE TIME were both necessary and GREAT! BUT....lately they've become simply a money source using member's dues for the DNC these days, and little else. And not all unions, but many, fit this category. I believe that they have simply overstayed their welcome, in the sense that their tactics to get top dollar for lower skill and less production has killed the "hard working" spirit of the American people (i.e.-they've made people lazy, while raising expectations of pay, benefits, etc.).....

Demiurge

Unions haven't served their intended purpose for decades, not only have they become a complete racket, they have in turn lost people well paying jobs as a result of their greed. Until they own the businesses they scream at the top of their lungs about they will most likely never have a clue.

masanz1

I liked the talk radio and comedy channels on satellite radio, make it $5 a month and I'd go back

aaharvel

Demiurge wrote:

XM & Sirius are both going to go down the crapper, I predicted this before both companies posted massive losses this week, but it didn't take a rocket scientist to see this technology wouldn't sell when you have so many other free options available out there.

and links

http://money.cnn.com/2006/02/17/news/companies/sirius_earnings.reut/

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20060217.RSATRADIO17/TPStory/Business

PoweredByDodge

Unions just keep labor honest... instead of slave-like and partial.

When the steel plant started up in Buffalo here, people who would never get to own a car in their life would walk 90 minutes to 2 hours to work every day of the week... if they were German they would get lucky and told they could work that day. If they were Irish, they had a 50/50 chance... the Italians and Polaks got sent home more days than not, but they kept coming every day, because there was nothing else they could do. When they did get to work, they got the shittiest wages on the planet for some of the hardest work on the planet.

An average laborer would start in the yard department, digging ditches all day and night, burying slag, throwing chunks of manganese off a truck and then carrying these 40 to 80 pound chunks in doors.

After a few years of that, or after they'd broken every bone in their body, they got the honor of being moved up to general labor, at which time they'd get their choice of jobs from such wonderful things as slag man, a person who's job it was to beat slag chips off the inside of cauldrons; coke ovens helper, someone who'd do nothing but push the raw **** derivative of coal around and inhale it all day long; boiler washer helper, who had the joy of going into a shithole well over 100 degrees and blasting it out with a fire hose - of course scraping it down first... oh ya... average boiler is about three times the size of my house wide... and 4 times as tall.

Safety equipment? what safety equipment? you bitched about anything and they wouldn't fire you... they would simply make sure that you and no one in your family ever was allowed to work there again. look at a boss wrong, forget it, you're whole family was kicked to the bricks.

health insurance? nah... who needs health insurance, there's a lot of Daego's and ****'s left to kill... just let them inhale enough asbestos that it kills 2 out of 3 of them, and then the rest of them maybe we'll give masks to... ah, on second thought, let it get all of them.

let the 50 year old dude with half a lung and a bad heart, from workin in this shithole, go pick up coal along the side of the lackawanna tracks rather than take a little home from work... or better yet, instead of paying him enough to buy some **** timber to heat his home with. let him drop dead walking home after a 20 hour day. let him leave a family of 7 kids.

and after things start to get better and the company gets some money, let the **** who called Osha get beat down.

and let some sons of **** who are buddy - buddy with a building manager get all the nice cushy job that involves more time sitting on your butt than doing anything all day when the new building opens... oh leave the **** slaves in the open hearts and put the preppy **** in the cushy oxygen furnaces. pay em more, make them work less for more. and leave the 20 and 30 year vets in the **** holes.

and when they're all burned out and they can't work anymore, too bad.. pension? what pension... 401 k ? what 401k, we never paid them enough to put anything away in the first place. they barely had enough to keep the bank from taking their homes and keep their kids with food in their stomach -- **** owning a car... **** having anything.

how quickly the young forget when the old don't tell them how it is, how it was... then again i got to see some of it first hand at Ford... nothin nearly as bad as the above, but it still lingered to a grave extent... it all made sense...

got a **** problem with unions? that's your perogative... but come up to buffalo and talk that **** -- it's my perogative to put my **** foot through your skull and spill your brain all over the rail tracks outside of what's left of that plant.

you're anti union - you're anti american.

got a problem with that statement? too **** bad.

i'm not going to be politically correct, i'm not going to be nice. i'm not going to tell you i'm sorry for hurting you're feelings. i'm just going to be honest. i'm going to tell you the truth. and if it hurts, then good. it means you're still alive.

without union health insurance, my grandmother would have never made it through labor with my mother -- i wouldn't be here. without union demanded safety equipment, my old man woulda been dead before he was 40... not that he's in any kind of good shape, but he's alive because even after that **** company went under and their locked up stocks went to ****, the union as a national organization took a baseball bat to everyone ever associated with the steel company... they've lobbied health insurance, and they're keeping the pensions alive. they're not asking for a shitload of money... they're aksing for what they deserve, for what they were promised... for what they earned.

go live in **** India if you don't like unions. stupid ill educated **** art-loving english major **** liberal arts tree hugging **** sucking **** "free thinking" ****.

now i know why people go on killing sprees.

HiPerf360

In owning a construction company I get to see both sides of this on a regular basis and to tell you the truth I couldn’t be more proud to say I will not even deal with union subcontractors… Poor reliability, poor attitude, EXPENSIVE, and even worse the quality SUCKS 90% of the time. Ant they will always run you over schedule.

Thankfully the construction related unions in Oklahoma are not very strong or I would be in another business.

BTW- My employees make MORE than their union counterparts with comparable benefits; they just have to perform to keep their jobs.

Trust me it is already hard enough to fire someone for misconduct, stealing, and substance abuse… The state labor board is union enough!


PS- If you don't like your job then go get a new one.

Red230SX

And what does a CEO do? Besides steal from the company (legally).

Lets see.. Earn 20 Million a year after incentives, to be a glorified USED CAR SALESMAN.

Yes, that's right.. That is the ONLY skill you need, to be a CEO. Do you really need to
be educated? Do you need math skills? (Accounting group) do you need law skills?
(Lawyers Group) do you need to address the public all the time? (Public PR Person).

As you can see, most of the actual responsibility is delegated to people who do have
the skill. The crap always floats to the top of the bowl.

aaharvel

excellent post P.B.Dodge. I'm pro-union, but also understand that they're not perfect either. You've got the political party positions on Unions completely reversed however.

aaharvel

Red230SX wrote:

And what does a CEO do? Besides steal from the company (legally).

Lets see.. Earn 20 Million a year after incentives, to be a glorified USED CAR SALESMAN.

Yes, that's right.. That is the ONLY skill you need, to be a CEO. Do you really need to
be educated? Do you need math skills? (Accounting group) do you need law skills?
(Lawyers Group) do you need to address the public all the time? (Public PR Person).

As you can see, most of the actual responsibility is delegated to people who do have
the skill. The crap always floats to the top of the bowl.

disagree. How do you think most CEOS become CEOS? They work their way up. Right through to where you say all the hardwork and actual ability come from. Not every CEO is an Enron or World-Com type.

kmartin971

Give $100 to a working stiff and end up with nothing! Give $100 to a "CEO" and watch it grow!

General comments regarding CEO are worthless! These are the people that drive wealth in this country!

brettw22

PoweredByDodge wrote:

got a **** problem with unions? that's your perogative... but come up to buffalo and talk that **** -- it's my perogative to put my **** foot through your skull and spill your brain all over the rail tracks outside of what's left of that plant.

you're anti union - you're anti american.

got a problem with that statement? too **** bad.

And people wonder where the hostility comes from in labor disputes.........

Great, so your point is that Unions provided some benefits 20 or 30 years ago before regulations and health requirements were made. That's a good example of how they did some positive work back then. How many of those union run plants are still surviving any more?

I have no problem with people being given benefits or retirement options.

I do have a problem with people that are too lazy to go and get a job that actually provides those benefits automatically so they aren't forced to donate money to an entity that basically exists with a self preservation mentality.

In SoCal, workers were kept from their overpaid jobs for months because they didn't want to pay $5-15 a week (depending on single or family coverage, and still far below non-union workers) for health coverage. Why people in the union think that they have this sense of entitlement is beyond me.

As I said earlier, my biggest issue is people such as cashiers that are making insane amounts of money do to below mindless work. Have to smile and greet the public? Is that something that you need to be paid $20+/hr to do? I don't think so.

EDIT: Difference of opinion is something that needs to be accepted more than people acting like they have the final say......

kmartin971

I'll take a free market over union labor any day!

MacLeod

Unions were useful 100 years ago when you were either born into a rich family or worked in a coal mine. Not any more. You have countless opportunities and choices in the job market these days and employers are competing more than ever nowadays for workers.

The job market continues to grow and expand every year yet union membership continues to decline. They are partially to blame for becoming obsolete as the job market moves on without them.

PoweredByDodge

most CEO's are born into it -- their parents founded a company or worked their way up and now it's become an old boy's club. most higher management jobs are granted on a basis of "hey my kid just got out of college with a liberal arts degree after 12 years, why don't you make him the head of marketing". some of ford's highest ranking management across the country is "new" old boys club (meaning the kids of people who were given 'patronage' jobs). and look where that company is going.... into the ****. william clay ford didn't work his way up in the organization... he was given the title by inheritance. it happens this way in more companies that you would believe.

some work places do not need unions.

if an employer is honest and straight - then there really is not a need. if anything i suppose a "union spirit" is simply needed... where if an employer gets weird then the employees, as a group without even thinking about it, will stick together and express their feelings and thoughts. this is often the case now a days, and it works.

however, many jobs are still basic labor now a days... construction and such is not basic labor, its semi - skilled to skilled labor... you've got to be decent at it in order to do it... there are still "**** shovelers" out there though. these people are treated like dirt most of hte time, and they do deserve unions.

walmart employees don't want a union because of the dollar amount their being paid, but rather the way the company is treating its employees. they want respect. many people, myself included, would almost rather have respect than money any day.

unions didn't start 100 years ago... they started about 60 years ago... and a lot of people were killed getting them started across the U.S.

and while the job enviornment has imporved due to government standards and such, all i can say is that i've still seen gross misconduct.

i've seen safety equipment denied to employees because its "too expensive". i've seen employees threatened for taking a day off for valid reasons (death in family, surgery, etc). and i've seen management try to overwork an employee to the point where, if he had done it management's way, teh short cuts he would have had to taken to complete the tasks on time would have resulted in exposing himself to what i would consider semi-extreme danger all day long.

unions fight for people who don't have a choice. jobs aren't as plentiful as you think... and there's always someone who'lldo it for a dollar less and an hour more just to put food on his table. that leads to abuse in the workplace.

... and while you have the right to have a difference of opinion with me... you also have the right to be a **** sucker... you'd be surprised how close those two things actually are.

amulford

Yeah, and when you lose that "Plentiful Oppurtunity" you HAD because some **** jerkoff just robbed the company blind and will walk off with a **** fortune, where are you? Will you go back out and get another job paying the same??

"Sorry honey, we are gonna have to sell the house and pull the kids from Catholic school."

I go back out at the same wage. No starting over, no more "probation period".

If I come across some dipshit who can't find his **** with both hands and a flashlight, I can tell him to blow it up his **** and don't have to worry about him having it out for me and getting my job.

Boss tells me "You don't need that ****, just get the **** job done..." I tell him politely to BLOW ME, now get the **** safety gear to do the job.

Your company has a problem living up to it's end of the bargain? No problem. We'll get that straightened out REAL quick.

PS- If you don't like your job then go get a new one.

That's a typical answer. Just who are you to make that statement?

Poor reliability, poor attitude, EXPENSIVE, and even worse the quality SUCKS 90% of the time. Ant they will always run you over schedule.

Sorry, but you are full of **** ****. I have worked both sides of the fence, pal. I know. I have worked on projects the scope of which you can't even comprehend. The proffessionalism I deal with is exemplary.

Poor attitude? Well it's pretty much a reflection, you get what you give.

Expensive? I guess they don't deserve a quality of life like you have, now do they?

Quality? I suppose you are in residential construction, huh?

On schedule? How about setting a world record for the change out of a nuclear reactor head and refuel? 25 days. I guess you could have come out and done it in 20, right? :rolleyes:

You don't have a clue. STFU while you are ahead.

Not even worth the time.

I work hard, I make good money. Joke 'em if they can't take a ****...

SportsFan

amulford wrote:

You don't have a clue. STFU while you are ahead.

I think that is good advice for ALL involved here. Some of you are too emotional to make a good argument, and are just throwing around 4-letter words like that somehow proves a point.

I don't think anyone is going to change anyone's mind here, so the best solution is for everyone to STFU! How the Hell did this thread get so off-track anyway???

kmartin971

Respect is earned - with respect comes $$$!!!! My parents had nothing and were uneducated. I am first generation college graduate and now hold a masters degree as well. I make 150k+ a year! I have lived in the "hood".

I will take a free market any day! Respect is earned! Education is valued and rewarded!

I have a staff of 20+ the are all treated with respect and well paid!

I wounded how much time the people ripping CEOs have invested in education. Also, a degree by itself is meaningless! Perhaps your son with the liberal acts degree choose the wrong concentration or frankly is not very good at the field he has choosen to persue.

People need to develope skills that are in demand and stop forcing company's to over pay for jobs that no longer have value. Ever hear of the oars man startegy - bascially a company should only pay so much to empty a trash can and not more - people use the same discression every day when deciding what to blow their $ on! You would not over pay the plumber to do repairs in your home just because hes union! Your probably the guy paying him under the table!

One comment - go back to school, educate yourself, and provide real value!

How did a discussion regarding sat radio develop into this non-sense?

aaharvel

For someone that has a Masters Degree your sentence structure and spelling aren't so hot.

OH I KID! Good post and good points, particularly regarding the judging of CEOS.

kmartin971

I was never an english major!

amulford

We can tell...

brettw22

PoweredByDodge wrote:

... and while you have the right to have a difference of opinion with me... you also have the right to be a **** sucker... you'd be surprised how close those two things actually are.

Care to clarify this one?

Red230SX

kmartin971 wrote:

Give $100 to a working stiff and end up with nothing! Give $100 to a "CEO" and watch it grow!

General comments regarding CEO are worthless! These are the people that drive wealth in this country!

Give your hard earned 401k money to the CEO in the form of Stock Options and
watch as it all dissapears....

CEO's drive nothing in this country except layoffs, and thier own personal GREED.

Defend them all you want, some day you will see the light.

Red230SX

You "Wondered" ?

I do not have a degree and I operate a Mainframe and Small Servers. Yes I
work in I.T. and I work with lots of College Uneducated folk. The folk who
come into a job expecting $150K/Year jobs just because they got
drunk and high for four years of thier teenage lives. They get the jobs and
they show us how little they actually learned in school.

Are all College students worthless? No, it just seems my field attracts most
of the slackers. I am just happy that even a College Degree doesn't mean
much these days in my field, it's great to see lots of graduates turned down
for jobs and it's nice to see those with actual working experiance get the
job. The playing field is starting to level off again and it's nice to see external
certifications mean more than just a "general information sciences" degree.

My next career won't be in I.T. though... I want to be a CEO or a **** Star
that way I can screw people and earn millions! :eek:

kmartin971 wrote:

Respect is earned - with respect comes $$$!!!! My parents had nothing and were uneducated. I am first generation college graduate and now hold a masters degree as well. I make 150k+ a year! I have lived in the "hood".

I will take a free market any day! Respect is earned! Education is valued and rewarded!

I have a staff of 20+ the are all treated with respect and well paid!

I wounded how much time the people ripping CEOs have invested in education. Also, a degree by itself is meaningless! Perhaps your son with the liberal acts degree choose the wrong concentration or frankly is not very good at the field he has choosen to persue.

People need to develope skills that are in demand and stop forcing company's to over pay for jobs that no longer have value. Ever hear of the oars man startegy - bascially a company should only pay so much to empty a trash can and not more - people use the same discression every day when deciding what to blow their $ on! You would not over pay the plumber to do repairs in your home just because hes union! Your probably the guy paying him under the table!

One comment - go back to school, educate yourself, and provide real value!

How did a discussion regarding sat radio develop into this non-sense?

Demiurge

Red230SX wrote:

Give your hard earned 401k money to the CEO in the form of Stock Options and
watch as it all dissapears....

CEO's drive nothing in this country except layoffs, and thier own personal GREED.

Defend them all you want, some day you will see the light.

Is that what I do?

"Nobody notices what I do until I stop doing it."

MacLeod

Al Bundy says:

aaharvel

Red's jaded that's all.