Bill Bumpus Somerville MA - An injury to one is an injury to all

Why Many Liberals Hate Unions

By DAVID MACARAY

During a union-management contract negotiation it’s illegal for a company to “plead poverty.” They can’t legally tell the union reps that, as much as they’d like to give them those pay raises and improved benefits, they simply can’t afford it, because, alas, the additional costs would very likely bust them.

Why is that tactic illegal? For the simple reason that it’s a show-stopper, an H-bomb being dropped, an impossible bluff to call. What union in its right mind is going to insist on wage and benefit increases that will risk bankrupting the employer and causing the facility to shut down?

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http://massjwj.net/content/victory-haskon

Sisters and Brothers,

Over this past weekend Esterline Technologies improved its severance offer to UE Local 204 members at Haskon in Taunton, MA and then proceeded to threaten these UE members with the loss of their severance pay if the union continued to pursue attempts to stop the auction or negatively affect the company’s ability to get the highest profit for presses and equipment they don’t want.

UE Local 204 has stated to its members from the beginning that it would not jeopardize the severance pay unless there was a certainty of workers getting the presses and equipment. We do not have that certainty.

Therefore, the UE Local 204 executive board voted this afternoon to accept the company’s improved severance offer and to call off the action scheduled for Wednesday, January 19th at Haskon.

We will be issuing a more detailed release later tomorrow but wanted to make sure those supporters planning to participate in the action were made aware of the cancellation. On behalf of UE Local 204 members we want to thank everyone for their support and solidarity. We would not have gotten this far without it.

In Solidarity,

UE Local 204

By DAVID MACARAY

The UAW’s recent endorsement of the U.S.-South Korean trade pact illustrates not only the difficulty of navigating the treacherous waters of global trade, but the schizophrenic nature of juggling two contradictory positions—steadfastly refusing to have anything to do with something while, simultaneously, trying to improve it.

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