Unions and 'Greed' - The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
Unions and ‘Greed’
by

The Communications Workers of America have been engaged in contract negotiations with AT&T, which this week announced its “last, best and final offer” to the union.

The company noted that its offer would maintain “one of the most robust health care plans in the nation” and increase wages “at a time when many U.S. employers are seeking wage concessions or freezing wages.” Not enough, says CWA:

“This contract offer by the Company does not even come up to the status quo, and they are attempting to run rough-shod over your elected Bargaining Committee and circumvent the bargaining process.  This contract offer is substandard for a company that just made $12.9 billion in profits last year, and is already on track this year to do just as well, despite a down economy.”

Ah. So the problem, according to the union officials, is that AT&T made a profit! Even though the price of AT&T stock has declined 37 percent (from about 40 to about 25) in the past year, CWA insists that stockholders are reaping too much profit:

Thursday, union leaders delivered a petition with 3,500 names on it declaring “corporate greed” and calling on the company to settle on a fair labor agreement.
“It’s all about jobs. It’s all about keeping jobs in Connecticut,” said union president Bill Henderson. Over the last four years, AT&T has shipped out 1,000 Connecticut union jobs out of state, to places like Ohio and Michigan, he said.

“Corporate greed” = profit. Can’t have that, can we? The job of Democratic politicians is to reinforce this kind of atavistic mentality, and Connecticut Attorney General is mulling a Senate campaign against Joe Lieberman, so he’s only too happy to parrot the CWA line:

Blumenthal showed up to the rainy sidewalk, where a couple dozen workers gathered, clad in red and holding umbrellas. He joined their rallying cry.
“This issue is about service and jobs,” said Blumenthal.
“You can’t have good service if you don’t have people providing that service,” said the attorney general . . .

CWA’s political action committee collected $7.6 million in the 2008 election cycle, and 98% of its contributions went to Democrats. But only profitable corporations — not unions or Democrats — are ever guilty of “greed.”

Sign up to receive our latest updates! Register


By submitting this form, you are consenting to receive marketing emails from: . You can revoke your consent to receive emails at any time by using the SafeUnsubscribe® link, found at the bottom of every email. Emails are serviced by Constant Contact

Be a Free Market Loving Patriot. Subscribe Today!