Income Inequality / Union Membership

[Lucky]

Speaks for itself?

[revo]

when attaching a jpeg, uncheck the box and it will post as normal.

[Lucky]

when attaching a jpeg, uncheck the box and it will post as normal.

Thanks. I could only make it work, though, by using the URL and not the image from my computer. But, I still think it is magic that we can make our words appear on these lighted screens.

[revo]

Thanks. I could only make it work, though, by using the URL and not the image from my computer. But, I still think it is magic that we can make our words appear on these lighted screens.

"What are these amazing magical boxes that we can hear words!" -- Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer, 1991


Interesting graph, but couldn't one argue that the amount of educated Americans have increased dramatically since the 1940s? I haven't checked this, just assuming this is the case.

[Lucky]

"What are these amazing magical boxes that we can hear words!" -- Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer, 1991


Interesting graph, but couldn't one argue that the amount of educated Americans have increased dramatically since the 1940s? I haven't checked this, just assuming this is the case.

I'm not sure that Americans are smarter, on the whole, than in the 1940s, but are you implying that increased education results in decreased Union membership? That would be a pretty bold position.

I see three plausible scenarios:

1. There is no connection between the decline in Union membership and the increase in the share of income going to the top 10% of our population;
2. The increase of income disparity between the top 10% of our population and the rest of us has caused a decline in Union membership; or
3. The decrease in Union membership has contributed to the increase in income disparity.

To go with the first scenario is to whistle past the graveyard.
The problem with the second scenario is that the top 10% of our population, income-wise, were not and are not members of Unions.
That leaves the third scenario. Unions pushed wages and benefits upward, which made the super-rich slightly less super-rich. Removing Unions from the picture has allowed wages and benefits to fall, increasing the profits of the wealthiest 10%.

You can be the smartest guy on the assembly line, but without a Union behind you, you're not going to get a raise in your hourly wage. If you are that one in a hundred (or one in a thousand) who has the skill and the foresight to leave the assembly line and start your own business, you have a decent shot to make that top 10%. But Unions don't exist only to serve the one in a hundred or one in a thousand. Those guys can take care of themselves.

In some aspects it's a zero sum game. What is taken from the workers goes straight to the top.

Some of the great lies of our generation...you'll be better off without a Union, they will just take your dues...you don't need a lawyer to handle your insurance claim, they'll just take a portion of your recovery...you can do better investing your retirement account than the "professionals", they'll just charge you a commission. On their face, these bits of wisdom all appear to protect the little guy. In reality, they all help move the lines on that income disparity chart.

[chancellor]

As many accurately note around these parts, correlation does not necessarily equal causation. IMO, on that graph alone, you can make just as strong of a case for Adam Smith's invisible hand - to wit, the highest unionized wages came during the time when labor available to produce goods was scarcest. The post-WWII timeframe from 1945 to 1960 was when the US was the pre-eminent industrial power through the damage done to world-wide production capacity during WWII. So, European labor and Asian (especially Japanese) labor was plentiful, but had limited infrastructure to produce goods. Once European and Asian industrial capacity began to come on line, the labor pool sharply increased world wide, leading to the first wave of labor wage losses. This was followed by industries shuttering since they could no longer compete with either lower labor rates or more efficient faclilities (or both) in the world wide competitive market for goods, followed by domestic companies moving abroad for a huge variety of reasons - lower labor rates, newer facilities, favorable tax codes, less stringent regulations and so on.

I disagree with your premise concerning the smartest guy on the assembly line, too - look in industries like steel, plastics, paper, and you'll see people who used to be foremen and tenders now are "master technicians" and they make a very good wage. The master techs where I'm working now are pulling down nearly $100k with good benefits in a non-union facility. They can pick up the phone and have a job next month, worst case, as long as they're willing to move. IMO, the combination of larger, more efficient lines paired with mind-blowing technology, has been a bigger impacter on typical union jobs than anything - it's not that the existing jobs are lesser paid, in fact, I'd surmise they're better paid, but there's far fewer of them. I have the broadest background in paper, and the workforce required to efficiently operate a plant has been halved in a generation - and the same plant can produce easily twice as much.

Where unions have really, really fallen short of serving blue-collar workers is in terms of support for education and training for jobs that would traditionally lead to union membership. Part of this ties to revo's point - ask a person in a traditional union job what they want their kids to be, and it's not a blue-collar goal, most of the time. The USW in my area hasn't dropped a penny into technical college support, and they mouth a lot of words about supporting job retraining, but put very little cash behind it. It's a complete bafflement to me. Companies in our area are screaming - I mean, flat out begging - for machinists, welders, and electricians. If you have a high school and tech college GPA of 1.8 or better, can pass a drug screen, and one of those certificates, you'll have your choice of good job offers. If your GPA is a little better - say, over 2.0 - and you have a 2-year degree in electrical, instrumentation, or control system design, same thing.

In addition, trade policy certainly has impacted traditional blue-collar union jobs. Our trade policy toward China - through multiple administrations, Dem and GOP, is at a depth of stupid I can't even comprehend. We also need a grip on energy policy, and need to be producing energy at a cost that's much lower than today. Even if we clean up trade policy, we still need to be competitive world wide in cost production rates. Production costs basically boil down to four categories - raw materials, labor, energy and efficiency. We're already first rate at efficiency in most industrial production, and cost of most raw materials is essentially the same around the world. That means if we want our labor force to be able to earn higher wages, we better be able to produce them with an energy cost that is lower than our competitors.

[Fresno Bob]

As many accurately note around these parts, correlation does not necessarily equal causation. IMO, on that graph alone, you can make just as strong of a case for Adam Smith's invisible hand - to wit, the highest unionized wages came during the time when labor available to produce goods was scarcest. The post-WWII timeframe from 1945 to 1960 was when the US was the pre-eminent industrial power through the damage done to world-wide production capacity during WWII. So, European labor and Asian (especially Japanese) labor was plentiful, but had limited infrastructure to produce goods. Once European and Asian industrial capacity began to come on line, the labor pool sharply increased world wide, leading to the first wave of labor wage losses. This was followed by industries shuttering since they could no longer compete with either lower labor rates or more efficient faclilities (or both) in the world wide competitive market for goods, followed by domestic companies moving abroad for a huge variety of reasons - lower labor rates, newer facilities, favorable tax codes, less stringent regulations and so on.

I disagree with your premise concerning the smartest guy on the assembly line, too - look in industries like steel, plastics, paper, and you'll see people who used to be foremen and tenders now are "master technicians" and they make a very good wage. The master techs where I'm working now are pulling down nearly $100k with good benefits in a non-union facility. They can pick up the phone and have a job next month, worst case, as long as they're willing to move. IMO, the combination of larger, more efficient lines paired with mind-blowing technology, has been a bigger impacter on typical union jobs than anything - it's not that the existing jobs are lesser paid, in fact, I'd surmise they're better paid, but there's far fewer of them. I have the broadest background in paper, and the workforce required to efficiently operate a plant has been halved in a generation - and the same plant can produce easily twice as much.

Where unions have really, really fallen short of serving blue-collar workers is in terms of support for education and training for jobs that would traditionally lead to union membership. Part of this ties to revo's point - ask a person in a traditional union job what they want their kids to be, and it's not a blue-collar goal, most of the time. The USW in my area hasn't dropped a penny into technical college support, and they mouth a lot of words about supporting job retraining, but put very little cash behind it. It's a complete bafflement to me. Companies in our area are screaming - I mean, flat out begging - for machinists, welders, and electricians. If you have a high school and tech college GPA of 1.8 or better, can pass a drug screen, and one of those certificates, you'll have your choice of good job offers. If your GPA is a little better - say, over 2.0 - and you have a 2-year degree in electrical, instrumentation, or control system design, same thing.

In addition, trade policy certainly has impacted traditional blue-collar union jobs. Our trade policy toward China - through multiple administrations, Dem and GOP, is at a depth of stupid I can't even comprehend. We also need a grip on energy policy, and need to be producing energy at a cost that's much lower than today. Even if we clean up trade policy, we still need to be competitive world wide in cost production rates. Production costs basically boil down to four categories - raw materials, labor, energy and efficiency. We're already first rate at efficiency in most industrial production, and cost of most raw materials is essentially the same around the world. That means if we want our labor force to be able to earn higher wages, we better be able to produce them with an energy cost that is lower than our competitors.

Thanks for that chancellor, best post of yours ive seen

[revo]

I'm not sure that Americans are smarter, on the whole, than in the 1940s, but are you implying that increased education results in decreased Union membership? That would be a pretty bold position.

That post didn't come across as clear as I would've liked. My thinking was that in the past, union membership was seen as "the" goal of the many young people bypassing college and beginning in the workforce, whereas today, the increase in enrollment in colleges has increased substantially, leading to a more educated workforce.

This guy says it better than me:
"Today's workers are less interested in unionization. The declining numbers of union members over the past 20 years has spawned another problem for unions—the current generation of workers comes largely from households where there are no union workers to serve as models. Hence, these younger workers have little knowledge of, and do not particularly care about, unions. More than 70 percent of the current civilian labor force is under the age of 45. Today's workers also tend to be highly mobile, better educated, and often in white-collar or new-collar (computer, technical, etc.) careers. They care about wages, but many care more about such issues as career advancement, day care, quality of life on the job, developing new skills, and having some say in how their jobs are done."

http://www.mackinac.org/2325

[Moonlight J]

somewhat on-topic read

http://talkingunion.wordpress.com/2012/07/07/there-is-no-substitute-for-organizing-how-unions-might-help-win-future-battles/

[chancellor]

Of course there's correlation....let's not be dense. Corporations will always pay the least amount possible to their workers. Studies done in the late 2000s attributed the majority of increased corporate profits to reductions in wages and benefits.

Which were driven by efficiency gains, which drove reduced traditional blue collar labor needs. A quote from 1915 doesn't even remotely come close to realizing the impact of technology in the blue collar workplace. Distributed control systems, smart instrumentation, and maintenance monitoring systems readily allow one well-trained individual to do the work of what 5 to 10 did a generation ago.

The countervailing presence of unions has always served to drive up wages for the middle class. Middle class share of aggregate income correlates very neatly with union membership rate.

Middile class share of aggregate income also correlates very neatly with regular church attendance. Do we also blame the drop in middle class share of aggregate income with declining moral behavior?

Edit: In case you don't believe the numbers are correlative, this Harvard study says otherwise: http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2011...ome-inequality

And in case you don't trust Mother Jones selective editing of the data, here's one of Dr. Bruce Meyer's, U of Chicago, counter: http://mag.uchicago.edu/law-policy-society/and

Or you can google Dr. Davenport out of Notre Dame, if you prefer the Jesuit view.

[Lucky]

Which were driven by efficiency gains, which drove reduced traditional blue collar labor needs. A quote from 1915 doesn't even remotely come close to realizing the impact of technology in the blue collar workplace. Distributed control systems, smart instrumentation, and maintenance monitoring systems readily allow one well-trained individual to do the work of what 5 to 10 did a generation ago.

Middile class share of aggregate income also correlates very neatly with regular church attendance. Do we also blame the drop in middle class share of aggregate income with declining moral behavior?

And in case you don't trust Mother Jones selective editing of the data, here's one of Dr. Bruce Meyer's, U of Chicago, counter: http://mag.uchicago.edu/law-policy-society/and

Or you can google Dr. Davenport out of Notre Dame, if you prefer the Jesuit view.

So hard to figure out where to begin. First, my thread wasn't about middle class income. It was about the ultra-rich getting richer as union membership declines. It is telling that you keep pushing the discussion into areas that play into your economic theories, even when they are not relevant to the subject.

Second, I am very disappointed that you equate church attendance with declining moral behavior. My experience shows no correlation. Perhaps you can elaborate upon how church attendance is the vanguard of our nation's morality.

Third, you accept as an article of faith that anything which makes the manufacturing process more efficient and inexpensive is a good thing. This is so hard-wired into your economic world view that you probably can't even recognize there is another way to look at this. Technology which allows one man to do the work of ten is much more profitable for those who own the technology, but it does nothing for the nine who are now without a job, for their families, for the butchers and grocers who relied upon their patronage, etc. The notion that it is always better to save a nickel has brought us dangerous products, a disposable society, and an end to the once universal concept of the value of a person's labor.

I've worked in those very paper plants that you mentioned. From my end of the paper industry, you get a completely different perspective.

[The Dane]

My take on unions isn't nearly as informed as the rest of this thread. My experience and understanding of them doesn't go very deep. I grew up thinking unions=good, as my father was a union leader at an oil refinery, perhaps the definition of a blue-collar man. When, I first became a teacher, I heard some union shoptalk because a friend of me was our union president. Again, more union=good.

However, in recent years, my opinion has changed somewhat. Eight years ago, we had a shift in union leadership. My friend was out and a "friendlier" union president was elected. In those years:

* We have had peace in the district. No actions. No fighting. No harsh words even. Both sides consistently thank the other side for being reasonable and easy to work with.

* I make 11.5% less now than I did eight years ago. We have taken furlough days and pay cuts.

* I teach 33% more students in a day.

* Of my eight fewer paid days, four of them are my teacher work days, so I have no paid time to compute grades at the ends of semesters or set up my room in the beginning of the year.

* In those eight years, although we have never been given a raise, the district admin has been given two, one of which was recently negated by an identical pay cut as ours. Their average salaries are up 6% from eight years ago, ours are down 11.5%

* In those eight years, staffing at the district has gone up 20%. So there are 20% more of them and they are making 6% more money. At the same time, there are 30% fewer teachers making 11.5% less money.

I am not a reformer in the vein of Michelle Rhee or anything, but I understand their main goal is to skin the 20% lowest performing teachers and replace them with average teachers. I am chair for my department of about 30 teachers. One of my duties is to make the schedule for the year, to ultimately decide who is teaching what in English at my school. Now, I am at a good school, not a great one, but a good one. When I make this schedule, I have to spread out the good teachers between grade levels, between tracks. You can't have too many good teachers in honors because then the on-level program suffers. You cannot have too many teachers in 11th and 12th grade because then the underclassmen suffer. You must improve this new important program with vibrant teachers, but you cannot take from some other vital program. That sort of thing. Frankly, when I make this schedule I find that there are not nearly enough adequate teachers to go around. In that situation, replacing my worst six teachers with merely adequate ones VASTLY improves my department.

So, while I appreciate my union ostensibly protecting my job, they are also the main obstacle to true reform. And I suppose, if I was making the same as I was eight years ago, and felt "protected", I would accept the lack of reform as the cost of doing business. But, we seem to be getting the worst of it from both ends. The lasting peace in our district does not mean as much to me as paying my mortgage, feeding and clothing myself, and having manageable class sizes.

I appreciate the need for a union, I guess. But, right now, in my particular situation, I see very little good coming from mine.

[Mithrandir]

so hard to figure out where to begin. First, my thread wasn't about middle class income. It was about the ultra-rich getting richer as union membership declines. It is telling that you keep pushing the discussion into areas that play into your economic theories, even when they are not relevant to the subject.

Second, i am very disappointed that you equate church attendance with declining moral behavior. My experience shows no correlation. Perhaps you can elaborate upon how church attendance is the vanguard of our nation's morality.

third, you accept as an article of faith that anything which makes the manufacturing process more efficient and inexpensive is a good thing. This is so hard-wired into your economic world view that you probably can't even recognize there is another way to look at this. Technology which allows one man to do the work of ten is much more profitable for those who own the technology, but it does nothing for the nine who are now without a job, for their families, for the butchers and grocers who relied upon their patronage, etc. The notion that it is always better to save a nickel has brought us dangerous products, a disposable society, and an end to the once universal concept of the value of a person's labor.

i've worked in those very paper plants that you mentioned. From my end of the paper industry, you get a completely different perspective.

here here!!

[Lucky]

My take on unions isn't nearly as informed as the rest of this thread. My experience and understanding of them doesn't go very deep. I grew up thinking unions=good, as my father was a union leader at an oil refinery, perhaps the definition of a blue-collar man. When, I first became a teacher, I heard some union shoptalk because a friend of me was our union president. Again, more union=good.

However, in recent years, my opinion has changed somewhat. Eight years ago, we had a shift in union leadership. My friend was out and a "friendlier" union president was elected. In those years:

* We have had peace in the district. No actions. No fighting. No harsh words even. Both sides consistently thank the other side for being reasonable and easy to work with.

* I make 11.5% less now than I did eight years ago. We have taken furlough days and pay cuts.

* I teach 33% more students in a day.

* Of my eight fewer paid days, four of them are my teacher work days, so I have no paid time to compute grades at the ends of semesters or set up my room in the beginning of the year.

* In those eight years, although we have never been given a raise, the district admin has been given two, one of which was recently negated by an identical pay cut as ours. Their average salaries are up 6% from eight years ago, ours are down 11.5%

* In those eight years, staffing at the district has gone up 20%. So there are 20% more of them and they are making 6% more money. At the same time, there are 30% fewer teachers making 11.5% less money.

I am not a reformer in the vein of Michelle Rhee or anything, but I understand their main goal is to skin the 20% lowest performing teachers and replace them with average teachers. I am chair for my department of about 30 teachers. One of my duties is to make the schedule for the year, to ultimately decide who is teaching what in English at my school. Now, I am at a good school, not a great one, but a good one. When I make this schedule, I have to spread out the good teachers between grade levels, between tracks. You can't have too many good teachers in honors because then the on-level program suffers. You cannot have too many teachers in 11th and 12th grade because then the underclassmen suffer. You must improve this new important program with vibrant teachers, but you cannot take from some other vital program. That sort of thing. Frankly, when I make this schedule I find that there are not nearly enough adequate teachers to go around. In that situation, replacing my worst six teachers with merely adequate ones VASTLY improves my department.

So, while I appreciate my union ostensibly protecting my job, they are also the main obstacle to true reform. And I suppose, if I was making the same as I was eight years ago, and felt "protected", I would accept the lack of reform as the cost of doing business. But, we seem to be getting the worst of it from both ends. The lasting peace in our district does not mean as much to me as paying my mortgage, feeding and clothing myself, and having manageable class sizes.

I appreciate the need for a union, I guess. But, right now, in my particular situation, I see very little good coming from mine.

The situation you describe is appalling. We'll never be able to keep (or attract) good teachers if we continue to take them for granted, or as a fungible commodity.

For what your union has done for you (or failed to do), you might as well not have a union. It's clear that the administrator is building his empire on the backs of the teachers. My guess is that you weren't making nearly enough, even before they started cutting your pay and benefits.

Somewhere, some a**hole is bragging about how he has made the district more efficient. In the meantime, the "owner friendly" union president should be relieved of his duties, cuffed around a bit, and replaced by someone who will stand up for the teachers.

[Erik]

Middile class share of aggregate income also correlates very neatly with regular church attendance. Do we also blame the drop in middle class share of aggregate income with declining moral behavior?

Evidence suggests it's the other way around -- moral behavior declines when income declines.