Would you cross a picket line?

Actually, it's very simple.

If you don't want to work for a union shop, don't accept the job.

Maybe you can find one of those "Right to Work" employers who can fire your ass on a moment's notice without cause and without compensation.

Jesus, how difficult is this?

 

Actually, I believe it is that simple.

 

I took a job years ago with one of those shops that basically required union membership. Wasn't thrilled about it (my old man had been a vehement anti-union laborer). You could petition the union to be exempt -- some tiny percentage, like 2 percent, of those who would be in the unit could opt out -- but as a new hire, you ran a real risk of making yourself an offic pariah within a few weeks of starting work. So no one ever opted out.

Could I have waited for a different job? Probably at that time, yes I could have (lots younger and singler then). But I was leaving a pretty bad situation, so it didn't feel like it at the time. What has been persuasive to me, in the above posts, about not crossing a picket line is that I made a contractual agreement with the union by joining. That, after all, is how our country works -- majority rules, and those who lose elections don't get to form their own nation or heed their own laws. Unfortunately, my local has been a huge disappointment, time and again through the years, in terms of spine. But I had no way of knowing how much starch they had, or would have, when I had that tiny window so soon into my new job to decide (if it was a real decision in the first place).

Unions might do a better job of selling themselves to new hires, rather than forcing themselves on those folks. The threat of being ostracized if you don't do something isn't intellectually persuasive. Coming with tales of management abuse is a little better, but it would have helped me a lot to learn of actual grievances fought and won, or issues that were resolved in an employee's favor through compromise led by the union reps. Sure, it probably was on me to seek out that info, but when you're pretty young and inexperienced, and you have 100 other things coming at you fast in the early days of a new job (from relocation to learning where to park to shining on your new beat, etc.) doing a thorough vetting of the union's track record can get lose in the shuffle.

At that point -- once in, paying dues and disappointed by the local's performance -- my only options were to quit my job and move out of town, or run for union office and devote long hours (while holding down a more demanding beat than many in that newsroom) in the hopes of steering the whole ship in another direction. My dues -- real folding money, month after month -- weren't enough to wrest anyone's attention in an impactful way. The union seemed too often to exist for the union itself, not the individual members. Half of the issues revolved around local elections and how much salary bump the main folks would get (y'know, the guy who only worked for the union, not for the paper too). Then every five years or so, they would "negotiate" a new contract and our teeny, tiny scale raises would barely be noticeable in the paycheck.

My recommendation to new hires is, learn everything you possibly can at a union shop before you sign up. Being ostracized (a really negative inducement) might be preferrable to being stuck in a weak union that tells you to give up your paycheck over an issue you might not believe in. Just because management often is filled with jerks doesn't mean unions are the good guys. Sometimes it's bad cop/worse cop.

 

What country is this? I'll work anywhere I want and make decisions about memberships in groups on a case-by-case basis.

And no, I have no interest in accepting raises and benefits negotiated by a union I'm not in. Most white collar businesses (including non-union papers) have good pay and benefits because it's the best way to attract good workers, not because it's forced upon them. And yes, non-media corporations are just as greedy as newspapers, but the market for talented workers creates good salaries and good benefits.

 

Thank you, Joe Williams.

 

You make a lot of great points. I felt almost identically to what you describe in my early years at my shop. My decision, as you mention in your outline, was to get involved -- first in my bureau, than on the national committee and eventually the executive board. It does take a lot of time but I felt I couldn't very well complain about others who were trying to do the job if I wasn't willing to get involved myself.

 

Joe's points really have nothing to do with crossing a picket line. Crossing has little to do with whether you are pro-union or anti-union or ambivalent about unions. The heads of unions will remain in their positions whether you cross or not. But your colleagues might not remain in theirs. You can rationalize that this is a philosophical distaste for an institution, but what it really comes down to is that those are real people on that picket line, working people who for the most part would rather not be on strike, as they too have bills to pay.

 

I'm in Jones' situation. My dad is union, through and through. He is a blue-collar steelworker from a generation that quickly disappeared: he got an industrial job pretty much straight out of high school at a place that offered the kind of wage and benefits that he could raise a family on. He's been on strike twice that I can remember and he was out there holding up the placards. He said he got thumbs up from people driving junkers and the bird from people in new cars. To him, the union was a social contract that he joined on when he was hired and, like a marriage, that meant sticking with it in good times and bad. The strike pay was meager -- I would describe it as enough to make a good faith effort to keep the foreclosure department at bay. You certainly couldn't provide for your family on it alone if the strike lasted more than a week or two.

My father would respect me if I told him I declined to join a union because I didn't think the one that was available would represent me well. He would never respect me, and I could never look him in the eye, if I crossed a picket line. Especially right now as a single guy when he did it when he had three kids, a mortgage and a wife that only worked part-time so she could be home with those kids. He once told me, just barely joking, that he would disown me if I became an union-busting lawyer and he would view crossing the picket line the same way. Feel free to chose not to join, but you should never actively work to make the union weaker.

I respect people who join unions, people who decline to join unions and unions that strike for good reason (and my definition of good reason is fairly broad -- as long as you aren't doing it just to show you can). I think that solidarity should extend even farther when you are on strike; employees should help each other to the greatest extent possible. I have no respect for workers who cross the picket line. None.

 

HC is a member of two unions that represent performers who work in media (TV, radio) and live theatre, including, in her case opera.

The artistic unions negotiate collective bargaining agreements--like sports--and they negotiate the basics of the working relationships between the artists and the producers.

It's pretty fundamental: basic salaries, hours, stuff like that.

The end result (HC, correct me if I'm wrong) is that neither party has the upper hand. A director can't arbitrarily decide that rehearsals are going to be fourteen hours long with no breaks. The actors can't decide arbitrarily to go for lunch when they feel like it.

It works because it forces the employer i.e the director and his staff to show up for rehearsals with a game plan because they only have x amount of hours. They cannot fuck around for the first hour and then decide at 9:00 pm, "Oh, we're gonna work on this till midnight".

Anyone who thinks that unions promote inefficiency and lower standards is wrong.

If there's a true partnership (God, I can't believe I just typed that word), between workers and management, a union promotes efficiency and a healthy working environment.