It's not that union workers are overpaid as a rule, but that a few unions manage to get unmaintainable benefits for their workers (particularly the more influential ones) in order to justify high union dues and bring more power to those union bosses. A lot of union workers I know don't really like their unions too much, but it doesn't matter — those unions have become hungry political entities that are no more the sum of their workers than the American government is the sum of its populace.
Unions are just another source of abuse for workers. Their leaders often make much more than those they represent. You have to pay the dues, even when you know the union is going to waste the money on this type of largess, as well as on politicians you don't agree with and who you know aren't going to help you anyway. Got talent? It doesn't matter. In union jobs, it's the politically connected and those who have been in the union the longest that will get the job.
* Unionized workers make very good money in New York.
I didn't believe a friend of mine who only finish college was making $218,000 a year basically for early morning train track cleanups (device to pickup trash, stay away from 3rd rail), until I saw his bi-weekly paycheck with my own eyes. He's been doing that for last 5 years and they hire more people to do the same. What an insult to anyone with MBA, PhD., anyone pretty much who doesn't work for Union.
To be fair, when I know Union workers doing the same job as me are being paid nearly twice as much with medical benefits, sick time, regular raises, proper safety equipment, regulated working hours etc. It's kind of hard not to feel a bit exploited by comparison.
You're making union shops and the people who support them sound so depressing and indifferent to their jobs and careers that I really don't want to be anywhere near either.
>In the jobs that I do, "bad performance" is super subjective and very hard to measure. It's also the common canard to use from the managerial class to get rid of someone they don't like.
Personally I'll take risk of getting fired over having to spend 8 hours a day dealing with utter idiots. Not spending 8 hours a day miserable is worth a lot to me personally.
>And, it's a common and well understood in the tech field that if you want better pay, you job hop.
Exactly, you have the option and path for getting a better pay through your own efforts. In a union industry you don't. New job will pay the same as the old one based on union rules.
I don't see how the union was doing any worthwhile work for me back when I was making minimum wage at a grocery store. All I saw was that they wanted to skim hundreds of dollars off my meager paychecks every year.
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