Just woke up in a parking lot, in my RV, traveling with the Kennedy 24 bus caravan currently in beootifull South Carolina. We are getting thumbs up from many drivers while traveling and the hopefull comments when we stop are all about a future with justice, honest government, getting out of endless wars, a fair economy for the middle class and cleaning up the environment. The corporate greed and governing from the top have got to go, the people are speaking. Kennedy 2024!!!
It is worse than this when you look at the burden of a higher paid family with children lens. I have several children, and have seen my food bill balloon to over 1,500 per month - in some months over 2,000 - no alcohol included and no restaurants. Local public schools have become unacceptable, and I pay 3,000 per month for private catholic schools. Property taxes climb 2,000 per year these past few years. My heath insurance in now 2,300 per month, primarily due to my age and my wifes age. Co-Pays at the doctor are horrific. And universities are between 35,000 to 80,000 per year that we are looking at for our children. Basically, huge wealth is transferred to the largess of health care, education, government, food supply, fuel and taxes. Meanwhile we send billions to Ukraine.
coming from a long-time pro-union household, I was appalled to see most of the mega-unions like USW come out in support of Biden. (United Steelworkers Union, which gobbled up other unions like Oil, Atomic & Chemical Workers Union, who together make up the vast majority of the union workers in the greater Chicago/Gary, Indiana area.) While still wearing the populist mantle, these unions sold out the bottom tier workers long ago.
when I was growing up in the 70's, a kid graduating high school could still count on a secure, life-long job in the steel mills and oil refineries, here in NW Indiana. those days are long gone. with the big mills changing hands (many time to foreign-owned conglomerates) every decade, their profit schemes threw workers and retirees under the bus, cutting pensions and benefits to the bone.
labor unions have had their share of negatives over the years, that's for sure but without them, working class people, who do the dirtiest and most dangerous jobs, will be little more than debt-slave serfs.
yet the elites in the unions are making sure to get out the vote for Biden, toeing the party line. hopefully Bobby's grassroots approach makes a dent in that. GO BOBBY!!
1979 was the year with highest union membership and highest number of manufacturing jobs…manufacturing jobs always decline during a recession but didn’t come back during the Reagan recovery?? Go back and read the coverage in 83/84 and the reason output returned to normal while jobs didn’t had to do with health insurance! So the auto companies preferred paying overtime to hiring new workers because every new worker required health insurance which was a big cost. So had we had universal health care in 1980 manufacturing jobs wouldn’t have declined because the auto companies would not have been on the line to cover health insurance for entire families until they turned 65!?!
very valid take on the situation. I have no experience with auto workers union though (only person I know belonging to them has only been since early 2000's)
my point was more along the lines of mills changing hands so often & blowing off previous contracts, retirees got screwed, pension funds looted. Union seemed to have their hands tied at that point (not sure?)
my dad's medical benefits only covered me until the age of 18. my mom got zero coverage after he retired. he got a small pension and zero benefits when the mill was bought by Mittel (originally Youngstown, back in the day). some kind of action on the part of the Feds got him some small benefits back.
the steep decline of our manufacturing base is a complicating, multifactorial issue, I'm sure. cheaper labor overseas seems to have been a major factor.
UAW should unite with the actors, railroad workers, longshoreman, teachers and the farm workers for a general strike with political demands. The first demand should be stop all foreign wars starting with Ukraine. Second, use all the money spent on military adventures abroad on rebuilding the country and raising wages. I'm sure we can think of more such demands: like quality health insurance for all citizens and free quality education for the youth. Political demands would draw universal support for the strikers among the vast majority of workers (wage/debt slaves in the US). They got the guns, but we've got the numbers!
This is a difficult situation and most if not all is to be blamed to inflation, thank you Biden. Everyone wants to earn more money, who wouldn't but companies also are there to make money. Unions have a function for the employees but we also need to remember that if unions grow too powerful it also brings problems. Union demands were bankrupting car companies, it was almost non-profitable to remain in business but there has to be a middle point. If companies give salary raises they come with a cost, and that cost is more expensive cars, more expensive food, more expensive everything, is a wash.
did you know how much the auto workers sacrificed to save the auto industry? they were told they'd be paid back once it was profitable again. guess what happened and who got screwed? that is a huge part of this process. UAW under Sean Fain are doing what they need to. support them please.
Not even close to reality.. the clowns sitting on top who were once founders who risked their fortunes to launch corps are now fat talentless bureaucrats sucking obscene compensation straight out of worker pockets with slave wages.
General Motors CEO Mary Barra's 2022 compensation was worth $28.98 million. It would take a GM worker 362 years to earn that much... Tell me what Mary added that's worth 362 years of worker input. Walton family fortune is built & sustained on taxpayer welfare to keep their employees fed.
Spare me the complicated blather it's corrupt, in your face exploitation & Fat Cat Mafia rules.
My perception flips that and still sees wage theft as an abuse that does not present as everyone wins scenario but scales back exploitation. Workforce needs to be vibrant for industry to survive.. workers can apply their skills in many ways and different places but business can not do anything without workers.
Rich People Don’t Create Jobs.¨ Billionaire Nick Hanauer. Are they going to understand this statement one day? Nick Hanauer on inequality 5:49 min https://youtu.be/bBx2Y5HhplI
agree with you, it has to be fair. Employees are very expensive to corporations too, is not just the salary but all the benefits, medical, retirement, etc. I work for a utility company and believe me I feel the inflation and want a raise too, we are all impacted. What I am saying, and it never happens is that there has to be middle point that work for both. If you are a company or business owner you are there to make money and you should pay what is right, forget about what one or two people are making, that's company decision and might sound not reasonable. If you overpay or become trapped in demands you go out of business and everyone loses.
I am from the Detroit area and grew up hearing about 'the big 3' all of the time. My mother worked for a company that made conveyor belts, and she also was the company rep in contract talks. Around 1980, things really changed, and contract talks became adversarial. I am very conflicted about what both the automakers and the unions have done over the years wrt polluting the city and corruption within the unions past and ongoing. The union bosses are just as greedy as the corporate guys, and most folks who pay union dues are forced to pay them.
I cover that in my comment above—essentially health care costs started getting more expensive and the Big 3 preferred paying overtime to hiring new workers because each new worker also required health insurance for his family. That’s what was in the news coverage in 83/84 when we were producing more cars than prior to the recession.
Just woke up in a parking lot, in my RV, traveling with the Kennedy 24 bus caravan currently in beootifull South Carolina. We are getting thumbs up from many drivers while traveling and the hopefull comments when we stop are all about a future with justice, honest government, getting out of endless wars, a fair economy for the middle class and cleaning up the environment. The corporate greed and governing from the top have got to go, the people are speaking. Kennedy 2024!!!
It is worse than this when you look at the burden of a higher paid family with children lens. I have several children, and have seen my food bill balloon to over 1,500 per month - in some months over 2,000 - no alcohol included and no restaurants. Local public schools have become unacceptable, and I pay 3,000 per month for private catholic schools. Property taxes climb 2,000 per year these past few years. My heath insurance in now 2,300 per month, primarily due to my age and my wifes age. Co-Pays at the doctor are horrific. And universities are between 35,000 to 80,000 per year that we are looking at for our children. Basically, huge wealth is transferred to the largess of health care, education, government, food supply, fuel and taxes. Meanwhile we send billions to Ukraine.
coming from a long-time pro-union household, I was appalled to see most of the mega-unions like USW come out in support of Biden. (United Steelworkers Union, which gobbled up other unions like Oil, Atomic & Chemical Workers Union, who together make up the vast majority of the union workers in the greater Chicago/Gary, Indiana area.) While still wearing the populist mantle, these unions sold out the bottom tier workers long ago.
when I was growing up in the 70's, a kid graduating high school could still count on a secure, life-long job in the steel mills and oil refineries, here in NW Indiana. those days are long gone. with the big mills changing hands (many time to foreign-owned conglomerates) every decade, their profit schemes threw workers and retirees under the bus, cutting pensions and benefits to the bone.
labor unions have had their share of negatives over the years, that's for sure but without them, working class people, who do the dirtiest and most dangerous jobs, will be little more than debt-slave serfs.
yet the elites in the unions are making sure to get out the vote for Biden, toeing the party line. hopefully Bobby's grassroots approach makes a dent in that. GO BOBBY!!
1979 was the year with highest union membership and highest number of manufacturing jobs…manufacturing jobs always decline during a recession but didn’t come back during the Reagan recovery?? Go back and read the coverage in 83/84 and the reason output returned to normal while jobs didn’t had to do with health insurance! So the auto companies preferred paying overtime to hiring new workers because every new worker required health insurance which was a big cost. So had we had universal health care in 1980 manufacturing jobs wouldn’t have declined because the auto companies would not have been on the line to cover health insurance for entire families until they turned 65!?!
very valid take on the situation. I have no experience with auto workers union though (only person I know belonging to them has only been since early 2000's)
my point was more along the lines of mills changing hands so often & blowing off previous contracts, retirees got screwed, pension funds looted. Union seemed to have their hands tied at that point (not sure?)
my dad's medical benefits only covered me until the age of 18. my mom got zero coverage after he retired. he got a small pension and zero benefits when the mill was bought by Mittel (originally Youngstown, back in the day). some kind of action on the part of the Feds got him some small benefits back.
the steep decline of our manufacturing base is a complicating, multifactorial issue, I'm sure. cheaper labor overseas seems to have been a major factor.
The picket president. Bobby could just tour America attending strike marches and get into the White House on the back of people power.
FINGERS CROSSED.
👍
The picket president. Bobby could just tour America attending strike marches and get into the White House on the back of people power.
UAW should unite with the actors, railroad workers, longshoreman, teachers and the farm workers for a general strike with political demands. The first demand should be stop all foreign wars starting with Ukraine. Second, use all the money spent on military adventures abroad on rebuilding the country and raising wages. I'm sure we can think of more such demands: like quality health insurance for all citizens and free quality education for the youth. Political demands would draw universal support for the strikers among the vast majority of workers (wage/debt slaves in the US). They got the guns, but we've got the numbers!
👍Kennedy 2024! US President Robert F KennedyJr!👍💕
This is a difficult situation and most if not all is to be blamed to inflation, thank you Biden. Everyone wants to earn more money, who wouldn't but companies also are there to make money. Unions have a function for the employees but we also need to remember that if unions grow too powerful it also brings problems. Union demands were bankrupting car companies, it was almost non-profitable to remain in business but there has to be a middle point. If companies give salary raises they come with a cost, and that cost is more expensive cars, more expensive food, more expensive everything, is a wash.
did you know how much the auto workers sacrificed to save the auto industry? they were told they'd be paid back once it was profitable again. guess what happened and who got screwed? that is a huge part of this process. UAW under Sean Fain are doing what they need to. support them please.
Not even close to reality.. the clowns sitting on top who were once founders who risked their fortunes to launch corps are now fat talentless bureaucrats sucking obscene compensation straight out of worker pockets with slave wages.
General Motors CEO Mary Barra's 2022 compensation was worth $28.98 million. It would take a GM worker 362 years to earn that much... Tell me what Mary added that's worth 362 years of worker input. Walton family fortune is built & sustained on taxpayer welfare to keep their employees fed.
Spare me the complicated blather it's corrupt, in your face exploitation & Fat Cat Mafia rules.
yes I agree but as was mentioned has to be an even field were everyone wins. Industry needs to be maintain in order for workforce to be alive.
My perception flips that and still sees wage theft as an abuse that does not present as everyone wins scenario but scales back exploitation. Workforce needs to be vibrant for industry to survive.. workers can apply their skills in many ways and different places but business can not do anything without workers.
Nick Hanauer TEDSalon NY2014 Beware, fellow plutocrats, the pitchforks are coming https://youtu.be/q2gO4DKVpa8 20:27 min or 19:43 min https://www.ted.com/talks/nick_hanauer_beware_fellow_plutocrats_the_pitchforks_are_coming?language=en
Rich People Don’t Create Jobs.¨ Billionaire Nick Hanauer. Are they going to understand this statement one day? Nick Hanauer on inequality 5:49 min https://youtu.be/bBx2Y5HhplI
Uh, Trump has cancer because he went to East Palestine…I hope RFK Jr didn’t go there.
agree with you, it has to be fair. Employees are very expensive to corporations too, is not just the salary but all the benefits, medical, retirement, etc. I work for a utility company and believe me I feel the inflation and want a raise too, we are all impacted. What I am saying, and it never happens is that there has to be middle point that work for both. If you are a company or business owner you are there to make money and you should pay what is right, forget about what one or two people are making, that's company decision and might sound not reasonable. If you overpay or become trapped in demands you go out of business and everyone loses.
I am from the Detroit area and grew up hearing about 'the big 3' all of the time. My mother worked for a company that made conveyor belts, and she also was the company rep in contract talks. Around 1980, things really changed, and contract talks became adversarial. I am very conflicted about what both the automakers and the unions have done over the years wrt polluting the city and corruption within the unions past and ongoing. The union bosses are just as greedy as the corporate guys, and most folks who pay union dues are forced to pay them.
I cover that in my comment above—essentially health care costs started getting more expensive and the Big 3 preferred paying overtime to hiring new workers because each new worker also required health insurance for his family. That’s what was in the news coverage in 83/84 when we were producing more cars than prior to the recession.