Hmmm.. maybe b/c you sit in an airconditioned store all day?
Maybe b/c your not out climbing poles or crawling around bed bug infected homes all day?
Maybe b/c you don’t put your life/health in jeopardy every day just so your community can have communications?
or
Maybe its because you enjoy many of the same benefits that the landline workers do… all because CWA fought for what is right!

What am I thinking.. your complaining Union workers are Lazy.. but yet… this little article probably interrupted your game of Solitare/Facebook.. etc…

We can all sit back and do nothing but say “F the Union” just like you do.. but then.. in a year.. we can all sit back and blame the Gov’t for giving freebies away to BigBusiness and charging us more and more $$$ in taxes and toll hikes…

If you’ve watched anything of the news within the past month.. you realize that Gov’t was fighting about their budget / US Credit… we’re in debt up to our ears – and China owns a big part of us… but – do we see anyone going after Big Business telling them they have to pay their share?  Nope.. we’ll just extend our gov’ts credit line  (don’t you wish your Credit Cards would extend your credit line when you don’t have the $$ to pay them?? ).. then we’ll go after Jane & Joe Shmo who were too stupid to fight for a union against Big Business…

Do you really think the workers are to blame for missed appointments and poor service? Do you really think that our desire for a non-hostile work place and a middle-class wage is an unreasonable demand from Verizon Management who earns 300% more than the rank & file?
 
What a red-herring you present: “…you knew what the job was…” How about yourself in that statement? You were surprised about having to pay for something? Who twisted your arm?

It is evident that you only hear what you want to believe and do not seek out all of the facts. If you did, you would know that the union has only demanded reasonable bargaining from Verizon. So far Verizon has only lied about who is “walking” away from the table without bothering to mention the unreasonable demands they are making.  They demand to rescind 50 years of bargaining rights that never were given freely, but hard earned. When I walk the picket line is means No Pay now for rights later on. Do you enjoy vacations privileges, worker safety rights, child labor laws and competitive wages? If so, thank a union.

Big Business in our country has never been known for anything except personal greed. If you are the small business owner, ask yourself, did Big Business help me get started or was it in spite of them that I succeeded?

Even Anita Long, the 32 year union employee, agrees with me. She gave her boss a 5 million dollar raise just within the time period of this article being posted.

Even Anita Long, the 32 year union employee, agrees with me. She gave her boss a 5 million dollar raise just within the time period of this article being posted.

Don’t be confused–this type of
additional cost has been exacted on the American worker most recently by Wall
Street and folks in the company of Bernie Madoff.  And during that time, we watched blissfully
as the market value of our homes doubled or tripled inside of 5 years while the
banks were more than happy to write us mortgages at any rate or term.  And over the last 30 years we have been
hollowing out the shell of our economy by outsourcing and simultaneously funding
the victims of outsourcing with entitlement programs at any cost…  We have been hemorrhaging money, watching on
as our economy evolve into an absolutely unsustainable model over the last 30
years.  How many of you reading this owns
an American-brand automobile or cell phone or television set?   And
now, all of the bubbles have burst—sending every domestic industry reeling in
the wake of it all. 

            We can get
angry at Verizon and say that they are taking advantage of their union, but let’s
look at the whole picture here:  The
economic landscape has changed and companies that do not find a way to offer
consumers a lower price while still remaining profitable will be out of
business and all employees will be at risk. 
And the real problem is not only wages and benefits, but the union is
not nimble like the workforce that you would find at say, Comcast for example…..

            Nobody
wants to see union workers being duped into walking out on their jobs in a time
of over 20% unemployment (don’t believe the 9.x% that the govt wants you to
believe).  9.x% represents the unemployed
who are still deemed trackable by recent losses.  We can argue that the CEO of Verizon is
overcompensated, but I wonder how much the leadership at the union is being
compensated even in the face of the strike. 

            The sort of
artificial job security that this union environment fosters breeds complacency.  Complacency leads to extinction.  And as a sidenote, Verizon wireline is not
profitable (it has been losing money for years), Verizon Wireless is highly
profitable (a non-union, highly driven workforce).  Were it not for Wireless, Verizon would have
already folded. 
The union needs to sober up and come to terms with the market that the rest of
us have been working in for our entire lives. 

            We are not
mining coal or steel here for crying out loud. 
These guys are installing FiOS and DSL…..lol  You don’t need a union for that.  

And before any of you trolls start in on me let me head you off – in my business (like many others) we pay our employees first, business expenses second and ourselves third.  Let me tell you, there are times when my workers make more than I do… and I pay my workers based on three principles: (in order) work ethic, attendance, seniority.

I’ve had a few ‘pro-union’ mouths that I hired over the years complain up a storm… and let me tell you, they were the ones I ended up firing for various reasons. (sleeping on the job, bad attitudes, poor workmanship)  I’m not saying you’re ALL like that, it’s just been my experience!

And before any of you trolls start in on me let me head you off – in my business (like many others) we pay our employees first, business expenses second and ourselves third.  Let me tell you, there are times when my workers make more than I do… and I pay my workers based on three principles: (in order) work ethic, attendance, seniority.

I’ve had a few ‘pro-union’ mouths that I hired over the years complain up a storm… and let me tell you, they were the ones I ended up firing for various reasons. (sleeping on the job, bad attitudes, poor workmanship)  I’m not saying you’re ALL like that, it’s just been my experience!

It seems there is some middle ground that
these comments do not reflect. The same people who point out the ridiculous
amounts of compensation that are paid to senior management ignore the largess
of their own union bosses.  

As for Verizon workers being overpaid;  without knowing what the average Verizon
worker makes and how that compares to the average wage of other people in the
same geographic area with similar occupations, I think it is a bit presumptuous
to assume they are overpaid.

The biggest problem for companies trying to
offer healthcare is the never ending rapid increase in its costs. The company I
work for simply has given up on trying to offer it because there is no easy way
to budget for it.  Workers need to
understand no company can afford to offer any benefit for which there are no
cost controls.  Some of the best, well
intentioned companies learned this the hard way, IBM comes to mind.  Until the unrealistic increases in health
care costs are contained more and more companies are gong to back away from offering
healthcare coverage.