The Role of the Government in Capitalism

"Why do you think corporations are sending jobs overseas? Lower costs? Larger margins? Cheaper labor? Less taxes? Less regulations? Unions?"

This series of questions was asked by someone commenting on an article about jobs a few weeks back.  The person posing the questions seemed to be hostile:  He wanted to make sure that people who were complaining about the lack of jobs understood that the problem was all of those regulations, nasty unions, the insistence of the American labor force on fair wages and working conditions.  (Just a touch of sarcasm there.)


I didn't reply to that particular post, but I did copy these questions and thought about them, as these kinds of questions are typical in discussions about the current jobs crisis. 

Do we want to become a Third World country?

After consideration, here's my reply to the series of questions in the first paragraph:

Happy Labor Day! A Tribute to My Father.

My Dad was a veteran and a union man.    

Happy Labor Day!  from Cognitive Dissonance 

(Updated for Labor Day 2013, September 2, 2013)
He wasn't an activist; he wasn't a union steward; he just worked in a union shop for about 35 years. 

He was bright but not educated; he never finished high school, but he was awarded a number of patents over the years.  He was a self-taught man.  In these days of degrees and advanced degrees, someone like my dad would go nowhere.  The garage and his workshop in the basement were filled with every kind of tool imaginable, pieces of wood, metal, odds and ends that he picked up.  He could fix anything, and, for a while when we were really little, he fixed cars out of the garage and also did some electrical work for pay.  After he got his union job, however, he did less of that, content to keep our home, our grandmother's home, and the apartment buildings that my parents owned in good repair.  

He never went on strike, but he was concerned about it a few times; there was always a settlement before the strike date came.  The company he worked for changed owners, was bought out, was sold again, but eventually it became part of what is now Verizon.  

HERE's MORE about my dad and about what it meant (and still means) to be a union member in these United States.

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Index to all Jobs & Employment Reports HERE  

The Unemployed: Lazy? Irresponsible spongers?

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And, remember, unions wouldn't be necessary if companies paid their employees reasonably, treated them like human beings, and insisted on decent working conditions.. and didn't insist on paying CEO's millions because they are so "worth it".  "Class warfare" didn't start with the workers.

I just came across this article about Labor Day:  Republicans Should Use This Labor Day to Ponder Their Assault on the American Worker--

...And that's what Labor Day has transformed into: Not about the history of labor, respect for union or an opportunity to affirm our commitment to fundamental worker rights, just a chance for some family-friendly fun.

That family-friendly fun, by the way, is made possible by child labor laws, weekends and minimum wage - all progress that was championed by labor unions. But you won't hear about that on Monday, politicians will be too busy discussing how to get government out of the way of Big Business and regular Americans will be too preoccupied worrying about their economic future.

Thanks, Justin Krebs!

For Labor Day 2013, Paul Krugman talks about the loss of respect for the working man, particularly among the Republican right-wing:

No, what’s unimaginable now is that Congress would unanimously offer even an empty gesture of support for workers’ dignity. For the fact is that many of today’s politicians can’t even bring themselves to fake respect for ordinary working Americans. 

Consider, for example, how Eric Cantor, the House majority leader, marked Labor Day last year: with a Twitter post declaring “Today, we celebrate those who have taken a risk, worked hard, built a business and earned their own success.” Yep, he saw Labor Day as an occasion to honor business owners.

But, while we contemplate the state of the American worker, we can appreciate Labor Day.

And to all workers everywhere, whether labor or management, whether union or self-employed:

 Have a good day and remember the middle class life that we all took for granted.  It's still not too late to save it!

Crushing the Human Spirit Indeed!

Crushing the human spirit indeed.


A comment by a conservative at the Huffington Post a few weeks ago:

The thing the Dems need to work on is completely crushing the human spirit. Once they can make sure nobody thinks they have a chance to succeed, the more they will realize that they need to join the collective and surrender their individual­ity and creativity­.

Crushing the human spirit?  Does this poster even know what that means? 


What kind of things really crush the human spirit?  

You Cannot Have My State!

Excerpted from "You Cannot Have My State!"


You believe we are broke; I believe we live in one of the wealthiest nations on Earth.
...


You believe it is o.k. to silence your opponents; I believe that everyone's voice should be heard.
...


With all the fervor and strength I can muster I tell you now, 

YOU CANNOT HAVE MY STATE!

There is room in this world for honest disagreements. There is room for differing policy views and different world views. ...There is no place for those who would trample the rights of anyone, be they in the minority or the majority. ... There is no place for those who would serve the interests of wealthy corporations ahead of the poor or disadvantaged.

Read the rest here!

Thanks to "Left on Red" at Huffington Post.

Those Mean Old Unions!

From "Rashnak" at Huffington Post:

If private sector jobs go union and demand increased pay the company will simply move to another state, or another country."

I couldn't leave that comment unanswered, so I replied to Rashnak:

Why Is It? Questions for the Right Wing

"Why is it that the same people who despise organized labor are the ones who can't spell and exhibit poor syntax in their posts?

Why are they the ones who rationaliz­ed torture when that was the topic du jour?

Why are they the ones who see no purpose to a government agency that would protect consumers - or the environmen­t?

Why are they the ones whose homes and investment­s lost significan­t value - but oppose regulation of the financial sector?

Why are they the ones who obsess about the deficit now - but it never crossed their minds before Obama was sworn in?

Why are they the ones who go ballistic when a poor person gets food or services from the government - but could care less when some big political "contribut­or" gets a no-bid contract?

Why is it they have no concern about record income disparity - but think teachers are paid too much?

Why is that?"

Thanks to 3dtrix at Huffington Post

If You Care About "Family Values", Support the Unions!

From a discussion of single-earner families at Huffington Post: 


"There was a time when people could raise their children on one salary, and do a good job of it.

That was the time when unions were strong. 

I talk about it here (How I learned to love the unions)   .

Now, the same people who espouse "family values" are usually the same people who pillory the unions. 


Interesting, isn't it?  The best things for "family values" in the past 60 years were the same unions that the "family values" crowd usually despises.

How Dare Those Union Workers!

An article, entitled "Labor Unions Admit they are Killing American Jobs", written in 2006, was quoted by a conservative poster at Huffington Post.  Unfortunately, the link to this article doesn't work, but the article reads in part:

From the article:  


"One must admit that members of industrial unions have made out rather well, able to afford nice homes, automobile­s, vacations, and college educations for their children."

Yes, unions truly are evil, aren't they?  How dare people who aren't of wealthy birth, who don't have college degrees, actually think they should have a nice home, automobile­s, vacations, and college educations for their children! How dare they! How could anyone think they actually deserve a middle class existence?

Those people should be working on those assembly lines for $1/hr!!.. or less... Who do these workers think they are? Their children, instead of going to college, should be working on the assembly lines along with their working class parents, at the age of 6 or 7!

(Of course, the above is tongue-in-­cheek.) 

Interestin­g that the people at "Intellect­ual Conservati­ve" never think to examine the increasing gap between the salaries of senior corporate executives and the average worker when talking about the lack of competitiv­eness of U.S. manufactur­ers... Somehow it's the worker's fault, not the executives­. 

(More tongue in cheek) Well, we know the executives deserve mansions, several vacation homes, a garage full of classic collector cars, and their kids should have fancy sports cars the day they turn 16. The executives deserve that... they work hard! Those ungrateful workers... Let's get rid of those unions and send those workers back to the tenements and slums where they belong.


Related articles:


 How I learned to love the unions 


and Chinese workers making iPods:

Labor uni­ons admit ­they are k­illing Ame­rican jobs­ 

On Wisconsin!

Wisconsin is our neighbor state around here, and "weekend getaways" (when we used to take weekend getaways) often meant jumping on the Tollway and crossing the border into Wisconsin. I've probably traveled more throughout Wisconsin over my lifetime than I have traveled throughout Illinois. Rivalry between the Chicago Bears and the Green Bay Packers aside, I love Wisconsin; let me make that perfectly clear.

I'm closely following the happenings in Wisconsin these days. The new Republican governor is trying to break the public unions.

He says it is necessary to break the unions to fix a budget shortfall. How does ending collective bargaining fix a budget shortfall? Of course, accompanying the end of collective bargaining would be cuts in benefits for public workers, but these really are two separate issues, aren't they?

Here's an article at Talking Points Memo that discusses the Wisconsin budget crisis.. important reading for anyone who is following this issue.

The Republicans are not a bunch of dumb bunnies. They know people are hurting, and they are following the right-wing bagger-think playbook of villainizing government workers, in particular, unionized government workers. Government workers these days can actually pay their mortgages, put food on the tables, and they still have health care coverage. The Repubs know that they are then good targets for those who are struggling and can't do these things. They know that there are people out there who want public workers to be as miserable as they are.

They know that unions, in particular, public worker unions have been villainized for years by many segments of the population who believe that government workers are lazy and useless, including the nation's teachers. I've had mixed feelings about teachers' unions, but I also remember days when teachers made 7 grand a year, and that was considered progress!

The Republicans want to divide and conquer the population: Let's get the "taxpayers" on our side by blaming government workers whom "we" support. The big problem in budgets these days isn't really spending, it's revenue. Tax cuts for the wealthiest (a big issue in the Wisconsin mess), high unemployment with people not contributing to the nation's and states' coffers, and loopholes for various corporations have combined to make a mess for the states. Instead of the "taxpayers" being angry at the wealthiest among us and the big corporations who pay little or nothing, the "taxpayers" will be angry at the government unions. The union employees, however, are just middle class people like all of the rest of us, and they are getting squeezed like all of the rest of us.

But better to get people angry at a teacher making $60,000 grand a year instead of a hedge fund manager making billions a year, right?

How I Learned to Love the Unions

What would the 50's and 60's have been like without the unions?

Found at IAM's site

"Love" is probably a strong word as I do have some complaints about unions.  However, I have developed a newly-found appreciation for them as I watch the attempts to strip them of authority and power.

My Dad, Union Man

My Dad was a bright guy, but he came from a dirt poor family and never finished high school. The house he lived in as a kid was still standing when we were little, and we couldn't believe that Dad had lived in a ...shack.  

Dad struggled as an adolescent in the late 30's, taking odd jobs, and trying to get enough cash together to take a few courses in car or truck repair. He went into WWII, married my Mom, got out of the service, worked this job and that, and eventually got a solid job, a union job, in the mid 50's. 

He stayed there for 33 years. He got a few patents while he worked for his telephone manufacturer employer; he was bright and worked closely with the engineers and earned their respect over and over again even though he lacked formal education.

During those 33 years, he and my mom raised two kids, bought a house, paid it off, bought an apartment building for rental income and paid that off. They helped to put their two kids through college, though state universities were not very expensive back then. (Working class kids could actually go through the state university system and not graduate owing tens of thousands of dollars.)  My parents accumulated capital, helped their kids out, enjoyed their grandkids, lived a comfortable, though not ostentatious, life, and enjoyed a dignified retirement..

Now, my dad was bright. The anti-union people would say that he didn't need the union, and maybe the union held him back. I don't think that was true. He was not educated, though degrees weren't as important back then as they are now, and he was kind of a quiet guy. I don't think he would have come across well in interviews. He worked his tail off for those 33 years, rarely took a day off. Because he was in a union, nobody laid him off from his company when he was in his 50's or 60's, which is what companies without unions can easily do these days.  (Ask my husband about that.)

His company eventually shut down the plant that he worked in, as they shipped their functions to cheaper labor places in the south and booming southwest. The company needed to be "competitive" of course, and all of those highly-paid union guys, you know the ones who actually made enough money to feed their families, buy homes, and send their kids off to school, were not making the company "competitive" enough.  But my Dad had retired by that time.

For all of those people, mostly men, who were able to provide a much better life for their families in the 50's, 60's, and 70's than their parents could have ever imagined, the unions were a very good thing.

The problem isn't the unions; it is that there aren't enough of them.. all over the world.

Yes, there are some corrupt union officials who just take money from the union members. But aren't the people who are really taking money from the working people these days the CEO's who get more in bonuses  every time a person is let go or every time a job is off-shored? And the hedge fund managers and banksters who have turned our financial system into a casino often on the backs of the middle and working classes?

Organized labor wouldn't be a necessity if corporations treated their employees as valued participants in the products they are producing... instead of as buckets on a spreadsheet somewhere. Too many people have forgotten why unions started and gained strength.  It's not that the pie isn't big enough; it's that some people are getting really, really big pieces.... and others are getting crumbs.

Perhaps the unions can re-invigorate themselves by helping people fight for a bigger piece of pie.