Thread: I detest unions, here is a good example why:

http://biggovernment.com/2009/12/14/...ge-negotiator/

At a time of year when blood donations are at their lowest levels and are the most urgently needed, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, SEIU’s sister union and member of Burger’s Change to Win labor coalition, took advantage of the opportunity to go on strike on December 4th against the American Red Cross Blood Services Penn-Jersey Region. Local 929 initiated the strike at midnight just as their contract expired. Hours later, the Red Cross was forced to take legal action when some strikers illegally blocked one blood delivery in particular

“the Red Cross says it had to inform union members that a two-year-old child’s life depended on our blood delivery before they would allow a Red Cross vehicle to exit the yard to get the necessary blood products to the hospital.”

In the Penn-Jersey region alone, the Red Cross provides blood to over 100 hospitals. This incident forced the Red Cross to seek a court injunction against the union, which it won from the court later the same day.

The Red Cross says it is currently in negotiations with union leaders over a pay raise for union workers who package and deliver blood to hospitals, provide assistance at blood drives and help maintain their facility. While the agency struggles during this economic slump, it has been forced to temporarily suspend merit raises for its non-union staff, as are so many other businesses and non-profit organizations. This has become the primary sticking point in negotiations with the union, which will not agree to the freeze.

“We are simply asking union employees to make the same sacrifices that their non-union colleagues have already made,” said Anthony Tornetta, Communications Manager for the Red Cross Penn-Jersey Blood Region. “Their refusal to do so remains a significant issue in these negotiations.”

As a lifelong resident of Michigan I have seen for decades the unbelievable selfishness and contempt for their employer unions have. They were created as a response to the greed of the companies and they made big changes that were needed. Like every other organization that gets what it wants (see M.A.D.D.) they must continue to find new reasons to justify their existence. Unions went from helping the workers to helping themselves. They want to extract every damn dollar the can from every company they can and keep them just solvent enough. $30+ an hour to assemble cars? Jobs banks to be paid for nothing? Incredibly expensive and unrealistic retirement benefits? Mandatory membership and donations to politicians and causes you don't support? Unions support all these things.



Be happy you have a job asshole.


Fuck unions.

When that comment held meaning I would have supported unions. Companies were exploiting workers horribly. Now it's the unions destroying the companies.

Originally Posted by ems_goof

So the IAFF (International Association of Fire Fighters) fighting several cities about illegal hiring practices (discrimination against white applicants, race quotas) is a bad thing? Just wondering.

For every example like that I could fine 10 of union misdeeds.

My problem with unions is they all merge into mega unions that can actually have more resources and employees than the actually employers they are up against, meaning they can bully them around in exactly the same way as the employers did before unions. Really there should be a legal limit to the size of unions.