The American Spectator

Jocon307| 12.15.09 @ 7:09AM

The Teachers' Unions, and ALL government worker unions need to be done away with before they bankrupt this country, in any and all senses of the word. NYC should have done this 40 years ago, during the infamous strike.

I read that New Yorker article, and it was excellent.

Break the Unions! Save the Children!

Le Cracquere| 12.15.09 @ 7:52AM

On reading this article, I was moved to look up the Detroit News photos from the 1937 battle, and felt a stab of regret for those golden moments of history when union membership could still meet with something approaching (though still far short of) the response it deserved.

Tonight I shall raise a glass to the good men who once staffed the Ford security forces; may their example one day guide us again at every unionized factory, newspaper building, school, and post office.

Marc Jeric| 12.15.09 @ 9:13AM

Show me a strong union and I will show you a dead or dying industry - auto, textile, steel, electronics, apparel....and education, of course. Teacher union members "teach" to the tune of 45%; the other 55% administer, coordinate, develop, lobby, interrelate, congregate, write reports, compose tests,....and sit on their asses.

JamesF| 12.15.09 @ 9:42AM

Just a quick encouraging word from Australia - you are not alone in this issue. We don't even have charter schools in our state - with a single bureaucratic Dept of Education covering the largest state in Australia of more than 6 million people (based on Sydney, NSW).
We have spent years struggling against a Labor government affiliated with unions -as the Democrats are - and who exhibit a complete disregard for the evidence emerging from public school underperformance.
Without the charter school experiments in DC, NY and the UK we wouldn't have a model to work towards. We may be years away but we'll get there.
As will you. You can't suppress the truth forever.

fran campbell| 12.15.09 @ 11:54AM

obama's payoff to the uaw. he stole the secured bondholders stake in general motors thereby violating the taking provision of the 5th amendment of the constitution of the united states. this country is turning into a dictatorship run by communists, socialists, statists, fascists progressives and felons. why not just tear up the constitution since congress admits that most of what they do violates the constitution. we are watching the death of the the usa and our culture and obama is leading the pack of thieves.

L. Ross| 12.15.09 @ 12:31PM

I used to be an airline pilot. I will never forget the most frightening thing I heard a unionized pilot tell me as we rode the crew van.

"It doesn't matter a lick how much money the company makes. It only matters how much money I make."

Thinking like that helps to ensure that our unionized industries will always be running on the ragged edge of bankruptcy.

Pat| 12.15.09 @ 1:31PM

Physicians know that patients suffering from long term illnesses often exhibit secondary complications, shortness of breath, digestive complaints, headaches, etc. and which are not directly related to the illness but brought on by it. And labor unions are one of those puzzlers; a major illness or a complication brought on by the illness? And, sometimes, examining the dying patient, it’s hard to tell which ailment will kill him first. Is it unionism, is it Democratic Party politics creating a long-lasting corrosive effect, is it the people themselves, weak-willed, greedy and gullible?

Growing up I heard stories of the UAW stalwarts vs. the Ford goons, but I also heard stories of Paul Bunyan and his Blue Ox, Babe – the union “hero” mythology was really intended for those outside the union, inside the union it was about anger, entitlement and getting yours through politics and physical force. But did unionism kill Detroit – or many of the other Rust Belt cities? It’s no coincidence these same areas are ruled by the Democratic Party – and on a long term basis spanning decades. Detroit recently announced that its students placed dead last in standardized academic achievement tests throughout the country – no single area within America has students with less demonstrable education. Teacher’s unions, corrupt politicians, indifferent parents – who can say exactly?

The UAW’s Walter Reuther wisely chose to link the UAW with political parties to obtain through political force what the union couldn’t achieve through a demonstrated economic usefulness – and Reuther didn’t really care which political party the union supported; the Democrats won out because they chose to defend the unions as a counterpoint to the voters’ perceived linkage of the Republicans with Big Business. So, which came first – the unions or the Democrats? And does it matter, today Detroit is totally immersed in the union mentality what with angry demands the country must “rescue” them and pathetic pleas for aid based on hardship. No leader in Detroit has realistic answers, not the politicians, not the teachers and not the UAW – they patiently wait though, suffering and hoping that someone outside their self-imposed impotence will rescue them. Maybe it’s time the country finally told the unions and their Democratic Party fairy godmothers: “P*ss off, you can save yourselves”.

J. Kelley| 12.15.09 @ 2:35PM

The time for unions have come and gone. The Postal Service Union is a good example. The US Post Office is 7 billion in the red. Not only do Unions demand excess pay and benifits, but the work place rules are imposible.A Union worker can only do the task in their job description. If this means stopping production, then that is what happens.And we now have a President and Congress that are in the pocket of the Union thugs. We must change coures in 2010.

Jeff L| 12.15.09 @ 3:37PM

I am a business owner but I was once a union member and I have seen both sides of the issue. Unions have created far better working conditions for employees in this country then any legislative issues that have come to pass in the last 40years and President George Bush repealed every pro-worker piece of legislation that he possibly could in his eight years in office. I treat my employees very well with both a very good wage and I provide them with health benefits. Why? Because it is the right thing to do! I probably wouldn't have seen it this way if I would have started out as a business owner or I may have since both of my parents were union members and I saw the difference in their wages and benefits growing up compared to the non-union represented employees in their industries.
When Wal-Mart is telling their employees how to qualify for public assistance and Medicaid instead of using the billions of dollars that they make in profit each month on the employees that have earned that money for them to give them a livable wage, tells me that Corporate America and the US Chamber of Commerce don't give a damn about the hard working men and women in this great country! When currently we have CEO's salaries over 500 times more then there hourly workers make when it used to be approximately 30 times more, then I know this country is headed in the wrong direction and all I can do is my part. However, for people trying to blame the labor unions and not Wall Street and their executives for the financial collapse this country is facing right now will never make any logical sense to anybody who has worked for a living and knows the truth about what is going on.
If you want to blame Labor Unions for all of the economic distress please explain this to me...In Israel, Canada and Germany where there organized labor workforce is over 60% when ours is now less then 10% they are ahead of the United States in virtually every economic category including total national debt! Every year that the organized labor workforce has gone down, the national deficit has gone up! This very well may be because when American workers earn less money then they use to then that only means the government has to collect less taxes from those workers then they used to. So please, if you want to blast an issue that obviously is so far biased that it isn't even disguised then please don't print it as journalism. Print it as what it really is an editorial comment that anybody can write and submit to there local newspaper!!!

ts| 12.15.09 @ 8:15PM

Jeff L : As a business owner you should understand the basics of doing what you are doing. Ok.. I am going to "unionize" your employees and they will then demand wages beyond what your meager profits are for the year. Do you really want to have a situation like that? Yes, there are some large corporations that "abuse" pay and benefits. But, guess what? You do not have to work for them.. That is the whole problem with unions, it takes the personal responsibility away from the individual worker. If you are screwing me as an employer, I have every right, and the duty to tell you to **** off, and find another job that pays what the skills and knowledge warrant, according to what the market bears. It is that simple. If everyone in this formerly Great Country would do just that, the unions would be completely gone from the landscape, no longer muddling the employer - employee relationship.
The unions are a perfect example of the corruption principle. Any organization, when it reaches a critical mass of approximately 35- 75 people, ALWAYS becomes corrupt. I don't care if it is a church, government, or club. It is a fairly hard and fast rule when it comes to organizations of any type. And, the inherent corruptive nature of the unions allows the disease to grow much faster than other situations. So, you will not convince me, or many other people that unions have a place any longer in our society. I can honestly say of any and all unions, Good Riddance of a Blight on our society.

Roy| 12.16.09 @ 4:53PM

It's not really needed to "outlaw" unions or apply anti-trust law to them, I don't think, anyway. Make it clear that it is perfectly legally permissible to replace striking workers, and 99% of current strikes would instantly collapse. In cases where the employer really WAS doing something that was wrong enough to where most people would voluntarily choose not to work for them, as was the case with most of the horror stories in the 19th century, he wouldn't be able to hire replacements.

Lu| 12.15.09 @ 10:34PM

Pleases get rid of pingback. Very annoying and useless.

David Cay Johnston| 1.13.10 @ 2:19PM

Bethell writes "The media just don't publish criticism of unions (or they didn't until very recently -- and I shall come to that later)."

What utter nonsense.

Unions are a frequent and ongoing subject of serious investigation by journalists who belong to The Newspaper Guild and other unions, including me, who joined the Guild in 1968.

As a judge of many journalism contests I have read hundreds of articles that were sharply critical of unions and the conduct of individual union leaders, in some cases resulting in prosecution and being voted out of office.

As a teenager in the 60s I read accounts of union corruption involving the Teamsters, mine workers, laborers, culinary workers and others. Journalists who belonged to unions wrote entire books on everything from the mob and the Teamsters to the coal mine workers murders to the reasons that GM wanted a union and its benefits to management (see "The Company and The Union" by William Serrin.)

Check the clips (now online for many papers going back more than 100 years) and you will find abundant coverage, often on Page One, in papers across the country.

Against whom was the 1890 Sherman Antitrust Act first applied? Answer: unions. Why were they an issue? Reporters, in those preunion days for newsrooms, exposing problems.

During my 40 years as a reporter, 28 of them represented by a union, I read, wrote and edited stories about sweetheart deals, excessive pay, multi-layered pay arrangements though multiple locals of some unions. Hanging on my wall at home is an Auth cartoon from the Philadelphia Inquirer based on my coverage of how the longshoremen were losing business to another port because of work rules.

The Wall Street Journal (whose reporters belong to an independent union), and reporters at such Guild papers as the NYTimes, Washington Post, Baltimore Sun, Philadelphia Inquirer, San Jose Mercury, Detroit Free Press, Seattle Times and on and on and on have written stories, righted wrongs, exposed thievery and sweetheart deals with management.
White collar unions (airline pilots, journalists, doctors), blue collar unions (including cops and corrections officers), pink collar unions and even no collar unions (athletes) have all been scrutinized in depth by journalists who belong to unions.

I am one of many reporters who has been roughed up by union members over my coverage, but then I have also been beaten by cops, as well as threatened by revolutionaries and CEOs, so intimidation is not unique to union members.

The first rule of journalism is grossly violated here by Bethell and his editors: check it out.

The second rule is to cross check and then repeat as long as necessary to get the facts straight.

Making up facts is not journalism. Building your entire case on make up facts is despicable. And when your work is shown to be fiction the honest response is to acknowledge forthrightly and correct the record.

Tim Martell| 1.13.10 @ 3:50PM

Well said David -- though I might offer one, small correction . . .

The Wall Street Journal, too, is a Guild shop. We at IAPE (the "independent" in our moniker is a holdover from our pre- TNG/CWA days) also proudly represent journalists - and employees holding hundreds of other job titles - at WSJ.com, Dow Jones Newswires, MarketWatch, SmartMoney (magazine and .com), Factiva, and other Dow Jones (a News Corp. Company) products.

Methinks Tom Blethell may have just canceled his subscriptions.

David Cay Johnston| 1.13.10 @ 5:19PM

Thank you for catching my dumb mistake..

I should have written that the WSJ used to have an independent (or house) union, but it is now a Guild shop.

YO| 1.13.10 @ 4:13PM

We should also quit writing about schools, since because reporters have kids we're probably biased about a good education system. Forget covering churches objectively since we're all in a pew on Sunday. IDIOT.

Shiloh| 1.13.10 @ 5:05PM

Well said Jeff L.
You can trace the downfall of our middle class to the lagging fortunes of the labor unions which started with the passage of Taft-Hartley.

BTW, those bankers and money managers who ran our economy into the ground and are now paying themselves millions of dollars in bonuses--what union to they belong to?

David Cay Johnston| 1.13.10 @ 5:42PM

Shiloh,
Executives belong to the "union" of managers who benefit from lax rules to protect the interests of investors.
These rules, set by Congress and the SEC, allow them to extract rents that often bear no relationship to the marginal contribution of their work and in many cases ( John Snow when he ran CSX is a fine example) to make their pay soar as stock prices plummet. That's pay for anti-performance, which has been well documented by consultants, academics and actual reporters, including me.

Bethell unfortunately did not do any substantial research, he just made things up.

Had he committed actual journalism by looking for facts (and especially facts that run counter to his thesis, as all real journalists do) he might have found a well done U of Minn. study of more than 1,000 companies showing that union and nonunion firms failed at the same rate.

He might also have learned the reasons why some executives want unions (see Serrin book cited above).

Bethell might also have looked into why most workers, including managers, belong to unions in Europe and Asia. Now why is that? And what benefits (and costs) does it confer?

What Bethell apparently wants is asymmetrical bargaining power for managers. Investors should be as alarmed as unionists at that.

Asymmetrical power is NOT part of a market. Reading Adam Smith is instructive on actual markets and what is required to create and maintain them.

I can make arguments for asymmetrical bargaining power and as chairman of the board of a small corporation I founded I can appreciate the benefits to me of my having all the economic power and my employees having to negotiate one-on-one. That is part of considering all sides of an issue, something Bethell fails to do.

I wonder if Bethell even knows about the advance fee of 40 percent that investors must bear when executives defer their pay, often into accounts that guarantee returns far above what shareholders earn? Defer $100 million and shareholders must fork out $40 million at no interest. Some individual executives have billion-dollar deferral accounts that cost taxpayers $400 million up front plus the annual interest on that sum. Imagine the total cost of every deferral beyond the modest limits in tax-qualified plans.

Since I exposed this stealthy executive compensation expense in 1996 a literature developed. But knowing that would require actual reporting, not just starting an essay with made up facts (the false that journalists who belong to unions are in the tank for unions).

How, Bethell might have asked, does the growing annual cost of this stealth advance fee hurt companies -- or help them? What is its relative cost and benefit to the costs and benefits of unionization?

Rose| 1.13.10 @ 5:41PM

You can thank the unions and the labor movement for the weekend, and for laws forbidding child labor, and for most of our workplace safety regulations, and for minimum wage laws. You can thank unions for the fact that school teachers and librarians are allowed to work and earn money for their families to live on, even after they are married. Unions have bargained wages and hours for those in the union, but that also affects other workers, in a positive way.

Syl| 1.13.10 @ 6:03PM

If you care about things that newspaper guilds are doing, please see an article about the Indianapolis Newspaper guild, in which ethics were a guild issue. The company had wanted to breech the wall between journalism and advertorial, and it was the guild who fought back:

http://mediaworkers.org/includes/print.php?ID=3115

David Cay Johnston| 1.13.10 @ 8:42PM

The Newspaper Guild has often fought against efforts to corrupt news by owners who in some cases were just making dumb mistakes and in others put short term profit ahead of the integrity on which the profits rest.
And of course newspapers have a long history of self-investigations, from the Phila. Inquirer exposes of Harry Karafin and later Laura Foreman to the NYTimes's front page report and sidebar at 14,000 words on Jayson Blair, who used datelines for places he did not visit and stole facts from others.
I wonder what Bethell thinks about The Newspaper Guild as a promoter and defender of journalistic integrity. And what of, as noted by another poster above, the role of unions in promoting safety, from limits on how many hours airline pilots can fly to avoid crashes caused by errors due to fatigue to rules that lessen the risk underground construction sites will collapse and kill sand hogs, miners and others.

Yoko Kuramoto-Eidsmoe| 1.14.10 @ 7:34PM

The idea that membership in a union would preclude a journalist from covering unions critically is not only professionally insulting, it argues against the average member's own self interest.

If I am paying dues out of my pocket to an organization for purposes of representation, why would I then be in favor of mismanagement of that? Guild-represented journalists should have a higher interest in exposing union corruption than those who have no such member investment in unions.

One of the best stories I've seen on the topic was in the Union Record, the Guild-supported newspaper put out by Seattle Times and Post-Intelligencer workers during the 2000-2001 strike. (It detailed questionable practices and relationships on the part of a local Teamsters official.)

Guild members hold their own leadership to high standards as well, because that's our own dues money, our own union's reputation and our own industry's future at stake. How would it personally benefit any of us to encourage bad practices by unions?

tgdonlan| 1.15.10 @ 12:59PM

Tom Bethell repeated a common mistake about the Pulitzer Prize photo showing picket-line violence at Ford. There was no Pulitzer Prize for photos in 1937. The first prize was awarded in 1942, and it went to Milton Brooks of the Detroit News for his photo showing a striker beating a strikebreaker.
The essential element of a union picket line is the threat of violence: We will beat you up if you work for less pay than we do; or, We will beat you up if you patronize this non-union establishment. Some unions and union workers do not follow through on this, which is good, but they often lose their strikes. For all the good work of guild members mentioned recently, guild strikes are rarely successful unless the guild rides on the coattails of more violent unions. Who do our Guild friends think blew up New York Daily News delivery trucks in the strike of 1990?

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