Unions Do More Than Fight For Pay, Pensions

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So true. Unions protect with up to hundreds of thousands of dollars of union dues incompetent teachers and union employees especially in the public sector. Unions create job tenure making it next to impossible to fire ANY teacher. A study by the Illinois based Small Business Group found that only 7% of the state's 876 school systems have attempted to fire a tenured teacher in 10 years with 2% being successful.

Of the more than 95,000 tenured teachers employed in the State of Illinois, an average of only two a year are fired for poor job performance and another 5 a year are fired for misconduct. The Genoseo school district has spent over $400,000 in attorney fees over five years stemming from appeals of ONE tenured teacher. (Source, JS, 12/05/05)

Wages and benefits for the unionized public sector average about 30% more than employees in the private sector. Corrupt ACORN founded in 1970 by union organizer, Wade Rathke, boasted as early as 2006 of having $40 million in the bank.

Of all $50+ millions of dollars donated to candidates in 2008 by all unions, all but $10,000 was given to Democrat candidates.

On December 7, 2010, the Democrat mayor of Los Angeles was quoted, "Over the past 5 years, while partnering with students, parents and non profits, business groups higher education, charter schools, elected board members and teachers, school district leadership, there has ben one unwavering roadblock to reform; the UTLA (United Teachers of L.A."

Some Democrats are realizing that they and belligerent unions have pushed the button too many times and as Tolstoy argued nearly a century ago that no group be allowed to arrogate the the right to educate. The outcome would be perverse for education and for society itself.

The writer of the article below is a left leaning Democrat known more for his actions protecting the right of unions to dictate to the dues payers. The belligerent actions of those belligerent teachers led by a dirty and lying number of union thugs, sometimes violently accosting Republican lawmakers, makes Tolstoy's statement ring true.

Merle

From the Chicago Sun Times, Tuesday, March 2, 2011. See
http://www.suntimes.com/news/otherviews/4083538-452/unions-do-more-than-fight-for-pay-pensions.html
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Unions do more than fight for pay, pensions
By Robert Bruno
The intense debate unfolding in Midwestern state legislatures and,
more loudly, outside of their marble chambers is not about fiscal
sanity. As real as soaring state budget deficits are, the central
issue bringing thousands of spirited Americans to Wisconsin is an
assault on collective bargaining.

If Gov. Scott Walker had simply accepted the state workers' union
concessions on health care and pension contributions, the once proud
heartland of progressive politics would not today be the site of a
working-class upsurge. Who could have imagined a few weeks ago such a
grass-roots uproar over something of which most Americans know very
little and have too little appreciation?

Collective bargaining in the private sector has been the law of the
land since it was enshrined in the National Labor Relations Act of
1935. The law protects the collective rights of most private-sector
workers to act as a group to negotiate in good faith and secure decent
wages, benefits, and working conditions. Since the 1950s all but 10
states have adopted some form of collective bargaining rights for
public-sector works.

The right to have a legitimate say in how your labor is treated is not
a union right, but rather, a human right that belongs to all workers.

Wages and benefits are unquestionably the core issues that animate the
collective bargaining process, and union workers - whether from the
private or public sector - are better rewarded for their work than
unorganized employees. But what is rarely addressed in nearly all of
the popular stories and rhetoric about collective bargaining is that
it is a very dynamic and flexible tool for problem solving. We hear
about the rancor over health care and pension payments for union
workers, but never a word is uttered about the way that collective
bargaining can be used to restructure work, increase efficiency or
design productivity enhancements.

For example, in the early 1980s New York City and the Sanitation
Workers Union negotiated a productivity bargaining agreement that
reduced truck crew size from three to two and included a shift bonus
for crew workers. Reducing the crew size created the incentive to
adopt cost-saving equipment improvements (such as automated
side-loading trash containers and the standardization of trash bins)
and rules for how work would get done (such as the requirement that
bins be placed at curbside). The agreement introduced measures that
substantially reduced the amount of labor that was required to do
sanitation pickup and disposal.

Nor is there any mention of how collective bargaining can identify
training needs, integrate socio-technical systems, reduce turnover,
lower workplace tensions or create a mechanism for joint
problem-solving. Collective bargaining serves both employees and
employers by providing a means to raise shared interests, lower
production and service costs, reach out to consumers and taxpayers,
improve product quality and services, and when necessary, reduce labor
costs. Collective bargaining can work so effectively that it can even
keep public bodies from financial insolvency.

Despite Walker's misguided call to withdraw bargaining rights from
state employees on the grounds that it somehow shares responsibility
for the state's fiscal crisis, the truth is that the citizens of
Wisconsin have already "benefitted" from the process. It was through
collective bargaining that the state employee unions agreed to pony up
more for health care and pension benefits. They did so without
strikes, service disruptions, public rallies or sit-ins.

In Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana and in thousands of municipalities across
this country, the collective bargaining process has worked creatively
to address not just well-funded but underfunded pensions, not just
teacher retention but teacher evaluations, and not just job security
but job retrenchment.
Collective bargaining is not always easy, pretty, logical, or without
abuse, but neither employers nor workers have ever found a more
effective and democratic way to promote the interests of multiple
constituencies.
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Robert Bruno is a professor of labor and employment relations at the
University of Illinois.
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