Re: HAPPY LABOR DAY!

esmerelda · ‎03-10-2010

On 9/1/2014 gazelle77 said:
On 9/1/2014 Preds said:
Unions did a great job until they became greedy. I appreciate what they did to get the ball rolling. Past American workers were and are the best, but what is coming up behind us, I'm not so sure.

The big companies with the CEO's making billions of dollars are the greedy ones. The workers deserve better.

Nobody's making them stay. They should leave and find better.

*********************
Keepin' it real.

kittymomNC · ‎08-09-2012

On 9/1/2014 Preds said:
Most CEO's and businesses' are greedy, but the unions are so busy trying to be high and mighty that they are causing all the workers to stop working and all the companies going out of the country. They don't work for a "happy medium" to keep America working. They are costing us now instead of helping. As long as they get their "dues", they will keep burying the people that have keep them alive.

If unions are causing companies to go out of the country, then why is Burger King relocating its headquarters to Canada? Burger King is not unionized. They're going out of the country to avoid paying their fair share of taxes here in the U.S., it's not because of unions. The number of unions and union members has drastically decreased - maybe if they hadn't been beaten almost totally out of existence, their strength might help get the minimum wage raised for workers who have to work 2 or 3 jobs to support a family. It was due to unions that we even have a minimum wage.

This is an excerpt from an interview with a Burger King employee in 2013:

August 6, 2013 Claudette Wilson is 20 and works two jobs in the fast food industry, one at Burger King and one at a pizza place. She is on her feet, sometimes for 12 hours a day, and makes $7.40 an hour.

What's your annual salary? Do you get benefits?

I get paid $7.40 an hour. My annual salary varies depending upon how many hours I work, but I have not made over $15,000 ever annually. I do not receive benefits. I have worked as a cook, cashier and in just about every position short of management off and on for the last three years. I still live at home with my mother and try to go to school on the side. I do dream of something more, but it's really hard to get jobs right now.

I participated in the strike on 31 July 2013 for District 15 (Detroit, Michigan area). I did it because I desire to accomplish a few things: I want to be able to form a fast food workers union and earn a higher wage. Also I would like to see fast food workers taken more seriously and actually respected for the hard work that we do.

esmerelda · ‎03-10-2010

Not directed at the OP...but I find the "Happy Labor Day" greeting to be...well, frankly, a little stupid.

*********************
Keepin' it real.

Lila Belle · ‎01-24-2013

On 9/1/2014 esmerelda said:
On 9/1/2014 gazelle77 said:
On 9/1/2014 Preds said:
Unions did a great job until they became greedy. I appreciate what they did to get the ball rolling. Past American workers were and are the best, but what is coming up behind us, I'm not so sure.

The big companies with the CEO's making billions of dollars are the greedy ones. The workers deserve better.

Nobody's making them stay. They should leave and find better.

Really ?

kittymomNC · ‎08-09-2012

On 9/1/2014 Preds said:
Unions did a great job until they became greedy. I appreciate what they did to get the ball rolling. Past American workers were and are the best, but what is coming up behind us, I'm not so sure.

Many unions and their members have taken cuts in pay and benefits to help keep companies going -- take for instance, the auto industry, which has come back in a big way. That doesn't sound like greed to me. Did all the CEO's and top execs take pay cuts and less benefits like their unionized workers did?