CWA on strike against SBC

[jrdavid68]

I would be interested in hearing perspectives from the Pelicans on this one. Click the following link for more details:

http://www.sbcupdate.com/

The offer SBC gave the union several days ago expires at 11:59 p.m ET, tomorrow. As you know, it provides for:

Lump sum payments and wage increases that keep our CWA-represented employees among the best paid in the industry; pay is 50% higher than cable companies.
Outstanding health care with no monthly premium and only modest co-pays; by the end of today, the average CWA-represented employee who has lost three days of pay has lost more than the company is asking for in increased health care co-pays for a year.
Job security commitment.
Not surprisingly, in the last few days, we've seen a big uptick in unsolicited calls from people wanting a job with SBC.
There are many union claims being circulated, primarily around job losses and jobs of the future. Here are the facts:

On job losses:

Not one CWA-represented employee has lost their job to outsourcing.

Our workforce has been reduced, but that's because our sales have fallen every quarter for 10 straight quarters.

Of the 29,000 the union claims have lost a job, all but 400 of them either took retirement, were offered another job but refused it or tested for another job but failed the test.
On jobs of the future:
The vast majority of the jobs of the future — fiber, video, Wi-Fi — will be hometown, U.S. jobs. We want the CWA to compete for those jobs with their neighbors across town, but the wage rates and overall costs have to be competitive.

[jrdavid68]

Sorry, meant to post this in the OT forum.

[mikester]

Probably should have posted this in the off topic section...

Having worked for cable companies for many years I would say that the telecom employees have it very nice. The cables companies that I have worked for are extremely anti union. If an employee starts to discuss union ideas and spread them to other employees they get very nervous. The fact is health care costs, retirement expectations as well as worker's compensation costs are only going up. If the union things that things will stay the way they are and that their employees will not have to pay some of these costs out of pocket - especially if the company isn't making the money it used to then they are sadly mistaken and I have no sympathy for them.

The cable companies are already offering phone service in many areas and they are competitive for many reasons. One of them is that they don't have to pay union wages. That doesn't mean that their wages are lower or worse really but it does mean that they don't have to organize their labor force the way the telecoms do. They can pay what the market will accept rather than what the union and the company agree is fair. I was always well paid working for the cable companies and my benefits were always competitive. I am in a union now and I do not care for it one bit. It makes it impossible for me to be individually valuable and compensated accordingly. Where is my incentive to be better than the next guy in that situation? If I am - I get nothing for it. Screw that - when I can find something else I will surely take it.

Unions I suppose have some place - but I would much rather have an employer pay me what the market will bear - it is more conductive of a fair and productive economy than unions dictations.

Just my .02 cents.

[Jim Chambers]

From what I can tell the market is bearing less and less. People in India will do anything for less than what is paid here. Seems to me we are going to have fewer and fewer people who can afford their cable bill. Unions have a place alright. It just may take a return to the 1930's for our work force to figure it out again!
Remember, the health and retirement benefits that are being lost today were gained through the effort of organized labor.

[no substitute]

"I am in a union now and I do not care for it one bit. It makes it impossible for me to be individually valuable and compensated accordingly. Where is my incentive to be better than the next guy in that situation? If I am - I get nothing for it. Screw that - when I can find something else I will surely take it."

I'm sure you could find a lower paying non union job. Go for it.

[jrdavid68]

Originally posted by no substitute
I'm sure you could find a lower paying non union job. Go for it.

I would guess that the Mikester probably outperforms many of his peers in the union but is stuck with the contract. I'm sure he could do much better with a position that pays based on merit.

Wayne - good point.

[lendaddy]

It's total crap, I have spoken with 3 guys involved in this. The details would astound you. I hope they strike again and all get fired and replaced. I make no apologies, I mean it.

[no substitute]

I'm sure Mikester is a good guy and a good worker, and I think he would be happier in a salaried field. Union jobs, however, are typically the best paying, so to complain about it rings somewhat hollow.
The healthcare issue is a real problem, as the increase in costs are real. The ultimate solution probably will be to have a national program. The healthcare for profit companies don't like this, which is one reason it hasn't happened yet. It could be paid for with your taxes (remember, it's your money, not the governments) instead of being used to pay for some of the questionable items currently being "purchased".
It's difficult to determine what is going on, from your link. I would want to hear the unions side directly, in order to understand the situation.
Sorry Wayne, but unions aren't to blame for cost structures. It's foreign competition at much cheaper prices from countries with low standards of living that are killing us. Globalization is fine, but economic patriotism (protecting American jobs, and thus our standard of living) is necessary in the meantime. Markets need to have time to adjust globally.
And corporate greed of the huge corporations is more to blame than anything. It was in the news recently, or one can read Arianna Huffington's book Pigs at the Trough.
Small businesses such as Wayne's ought to be the focus of business in this country, and incomes ought be such that we can afford to pay prices that allow Wayne a profit, and the ability to pay his employees a living wage.

Jim Chambers, I couldn't agree more with your statement brother.

[mikester]

Originally posted by no substitute
"I am in a union now and I do not care for it one bit. It makes it impossible for me to be individually valuable and compensated accordingly. Where is my incentive to be better than the next guy in that situation? If I am - I get nothing for it. Screw that - when I can find something else I will surely take it."

I'm sure you could find a lower paying non union job. Go for it.

True true and if my wife wasn't expecting I would be more active in my search. ( I Didn't take that personally by the way)

Honestly speaking I work for the government and my job is not at the moment "classified" and hasn't been for 6 months. What that means is that I fall under the least possible bargaining unit. Which is the union. When I'm classified I could be classified as management or union. I won't know until that is done - when I was hired I had no idea there was anything going to happen regarding a union. It was never mentioned to me and if it had been I would have probably told them to shove it as I am anti union for myself at least. I was a victim of my own ignorance and I make no bones about that. It didn't even cross my mind at the time to ask (6 months ago). They only classify jobs once a year and that's this month - my job may or may not be classified in this round. If not - I have to wait until NEXT year. At the moment I am accruing vacation at the lower union rate which seems to be the only difference in benefits. If I am found to be in the management bargaining unit I will get my vacation adjusted from day one to the management rate. That's cool but like I said - if I had known - I would still be at my job in the cable company or I would have found something else. I had been commuting 100 miles a day which sucked and was the major reason for changing jobs.

My pay did not change much and if it went up - it was because of the savings in gas and vehicle maintenance. At the old corporate job there were spot bonuses, yearly bonuses and much more vacation time as well as better benefits. Oh, and no union. I could negotiate my salary with my employer and it was between me and his perceived need for my services. We had negotiated things on a yearly basis and I was very enticed to make myself more valuable to them every year. I took this job as a stepping stone and I don't truly regret it based on the union problems I'm having. It's given me the time I need to prepare for the growth of my family - with the same pay I had at the other job where I Was working harder and did feel like I was more incentive to do so.

My benefits at the corporate job were also better, better retirement, paid paternity leave (2 weeks but that's more than the govt give me) and the ability to telecommute on occasion.

Anyway - as far as this union squabble is concerned - the unions are going to change their own environment. Look at the cable companies who aren't union and the power companies who are. They are both encroaching on the Telecoms. The cable companies by offering the basic services and the power companies using their own infrastructure to provide local loops and long hauls for data delivery. All of this at a fraction of the cost the existing telecoms do it for. While I agree that there needs to be some pride in American labor there also has to be some reality on the part of the labor force.

Vote with your dollars - buy American and the companies who aren't won't make the money. It's that simple - know where you spend your money. Wal-Mart and places like that are more likely to use over seas product because they are exponentially cheaper than American products. Look at where products are made and if it isn't American (or German) then buy a product that is. We should vote with our dollars and regulate ourselves rather than expecting the government to do something about it for us. We have the power - we just have to exercise it.

[nostatic]

the gorcery strike was all about WalMart. As for the telcos, look out below...especially the cellular carriers. Why? Mesh networks. If things go that way, Verizon, Cingular and the rest will just be commodity brokers who keep the main plumbing going. They will be locked out of the content market (where the future money is) by massively p2p mesh systems. That is unless they squash everything through policy/legislation.

I worked for a cable company as an installer back in the early 80's. We did the exact same work as the telco installers for 1/3 the money. I was an IBEW member, but we were not a closed shop, so it didn't matter much.

[mikester]

I was a cable installer in the mid 90's working through college.

[no substitute]

Originally posted by mikester
Vote with your dollars - buy American and the companies who aren't won't make the money. It's that simple - know where you spend your money. Wal-Mart and places like that are more likely to use over seas product because they are exponentially cheaper than American products. Look at where products are made and if it isn't American (or German) then buy a product that is. We should vote with our dollars and regulate ourselves rather than expecting the government to do something about it for us. We have the power - we just have to exercise it.

I agree, and sorry if my initial response seemed harsh. I do however believe government should be doing these things too. In speaking with people about the issues at hand, I hear again and again we shouldn't rely on government. I always answer with YOU ARE the government, or you should be. Government was originally intended to be members of our midst elected to act on behalf of all of us for the common good. That people no longer regard the government as representing them is a sad statement. It has taken on a life of it's own, and too often acts on behalf of it's members, and the ultra rich rather than those they are supposed to represent.
But....we do indeed have the power, and we do indeed need to exercise same in the form of our votes and writing our elected leaders. They need to be told to act on behalf of the majority who work for a living, and not on behalf of rich corporations seeking offshore tax breaks, among other things.

[mikester]

Originally posted by no substitute
I agree, and sorry if my initial response seemed harsh. I do however believe government should be doing these things too. In speaking with people about the issues at hand, I hear again and again we shouldn't rely on government. I always answer with YOU ARE the government, or you should be. Government was originally intended to be members of our midst elected to act on behalf of all of us for the common good. That people no longer regard the government as representing them is a sad statement. It has taken on a life of it's own, and too often acts on behalf of it's members, and the ultra rich rather than those they are supposed to represent.
But....we do indeed have the power, and we do indeed need to exercise same in the form of our votes and writing our elected leaders. They need to be told to act on behalf of the majority who work for a living, and not on behalf of rich corporations seeking offshore tax breaks, among other things.

I agree, I too have been looking for my way into local government as you had expressed in an earlier post.

We have the power, too few of us have the motivation. If WE can't get off our butts to do something about something we don't like then we deserve what ever it is we get.

[A Quiet Boom]

My opinion is that today's unions only purpose is to keep a lazy man in a job. There is no incentive to work harder like there is in non union shops. My wife worked for a grocery chain for 9 years and when she lost her job due to medical reasons that FMLA should have covered her union did very little to help her. I found out later that her union is largely in the pocket of management. Neither I or her will ever work a union job again. I currently work for a small family owned business run by my brother in law, as part of my job I do a lot of traveling to our customers and technical liason and it's easy to tell a union shop because the pace is always slow. At our shop our workers are paid very well and given bonuses on their merits as well as how well the company performs as a result there is always a sense of urgency and the will to try harder from everyone that I work with.

There was a time for strong unions but in this day and age they just hamstring businesses too much and in the end hurt the employees when some of those businesses close because they can't compete. IMHO unions are socialism at it's worst.

[jyl]

While reading this interesting thread, I came up with a theory that the traditional union is most needed when an industry is concentrated, most of the employees are not highly skilled, and there is a surplus of labor. Kind of like the steel industry in the Depression, which if my vague memory of history class serves, is when the US union movement realy started. There were a few hugely powerful companies, most steelworkers could be replaced by a new employee without a long training period, and there were lots of unemployed workers ready to step in. Without the union the steel companies would have ground their employees into dust.

If this theory is true, maybe there's a place for unions in the grocery industry and some other industries.

Maybe I'm trying too hard to find a reason for some unions to exist. I'm mostly hostile to unions, which I see as barriers to businesses getting lean and competitive, as well as often corrupt. The longshoremen's union comes most readily to mind - there's a reason why US ports are far less efficient than they could be. But at the same time I look at WalMart and how it is squeezing its employees, and I look at my local supermarket checkout lady and think that she should have a decent life. I think a little ashamedly about how the financial markets l-o-v-e it when companies do lots of layoffs - we applaud the management and send their options up, then clamour for more RIFs - and I get a little bit less hostile to unions.

[mikester]

Everything happens slowly where I work. EVERYTHING.

It drives me insane and I've had multiple confrontations with multiple departments who just don't get things done. The people directly above me DO get things done and since they are the directors that have the power - when I say someone is going slowly - they take action and come down on them. Unfortunately I'm not very popular and because I qualify for my job they are now required to qualify for theirs (they have been provisional for over a year - provisional allows you to get the qualifications within a year - if not they hire someone else and you go back to your old job and pay rate). Because they now don't qualify for their jobs they (about 10 people) have had to be reduced in pay and job title - though they haven't been moved from their jobs as of yet - and they blame it on me. They are small for doing so of course and I hold no sympathy for them but still - it isn't always comfortable. The union protects them in that they will be given their previous job, title and pay rather than be told where the door is. Not all of them are bad employees but a lot of them aren't good ones and it goes all the way up to the director level.

Unions in skilled positions in my opinion allow for very little efficiency. People simply can't be let go and while I don't think people should be fired off the cuff (there are legal things to be done before someone can be 'fired') I do think that where I work the union makes it so that people don't even get disciplined. Without that they can't ever be fired for cause.

It's a shame, people in typical union jobs have little incentive to be anything other than average at best.

[A Quiet Boom]

Originally posted by mikester
It's a shame, people in typical union jobs have little incentive to be anything other than average at best.

That's exactly what I notice when I visit union shops and exactly the opposite of what I notice in non union shops. One of the non union shops I visit regularly has a 28 yr old third shift supervisor, he's the youngest person in a management position in the whole place and when I asked him how he got promoted he told me he learned to use all the equipment better than everyone else on second shift which he used to work, as a result he was offered his new position and pay. That is the way it should be IMHO. At my job hard work has allowed me to DOUBLE my pay in the last four years even through the recession and that's before bonuses. And lest you think being related by marriage allowed me such success our plant manager has done the same in the last five years. In fact as a whole our small company has grown by at least 5 percent per year for 3 years running, not bad for a manufacturing company.

[lendaddy]

My first post was harsh and intentionally so, but I wan't to clarify a little. I would not have a problem if the playing field were not being messed with. If a companies employees fell they are being taken advantage of, I encourage them to strike! It's the American way and I have no problem with them doing so. However, when 500 trained employees strike and management decides they are better off hiring all new people and paying for all the upfront training, AND there is a line for the jobs around the corner, well I would imagine you probably didn't have it that bad! Let em strike, and let management replace them if they feel it makes sense, that's free market. The SBC guys cannot be locked out until they go beyond the 4 day strike and they are talking about extending it. At that point management can lock them out and they are promising to do so. Slitting their own throats, and for what? Irealize this rant is wandering a little, but this stuff really pisses me off, it's like my dad use to tell me "you don't know how good you've got it" and he was right.

[jrdavid68]

Here is the current offer on the table. Apparently, there has been "some progress" over the weekend.

My current co-pays are in line with this and I do pay a monthly premium. For the wife and I, it's about $130-140 /mo - and I think that's a heck of a deal!!

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Wages and pensions

Our wage proposal provides for wage increases.

Specifically, our proposal calls for the following wage adjustments:

1st year: 4 percent lump sum. For Technicians, that's an average of $2,328. For Operators, it comes to an average of $1,581
2nd year: 2.5 percent base wage increase

3rd year: 2.5 percent wage increase

4th year: 2.25 percent wage increase with a cost of living adjustment

5th year: 2.25 percent wage increase with a cost of living adjustment

The proposal also includes pension band increases in similar ranges and addresses some particular concerns unique to our SBC East region.

Health care

As you know, health care is our single fastest rising cost - an expense that rose to nearly $3 billion in 2003 for the 700,000 employees, retirees and dependents covered under SBC health care plans.

Our health care proposal provides continued coverage under SBC's excellent health care plans with no monthly contribution required and copays of only about 10 percent of the total cost of health care, far less than what most Americans and all SBC managers pay, and a small increase over the 4 to 7 percent of the total cost that CWA-represented employees currently pay.

The impact of the proposed copay increases would average only about $35 per month.

Some of the specific elements of the proposal include:

Office visit copays at $15 in 2005 and 2006; $25 in 2007 and 2008; and $30 in 2009.

Emergency room copay at $50 in 2005 through 2007, and $75 in 2008 and 2009.

A three-tier drug plan starting in 2005 at $10 for generic drugs, $20 for formulary drugs and $40 for nonformulary brands for prescriptions filled at network retail. Mail order copays for the same years and classes of drugs are $20, $40 and $80, respectively; mail orders provide triple the supply of medication at only twice the copay. Maximum increases have been set for each of the subsequent years of the contract.
Note: Copays which are already higher by contract will not be reduced.

With the modest cost sharing of less than 10 percent and no monthly contribution, this compares very favorably with national averages. On average, most Americans with health insurance pay about 38 percent of the cost of their health care and 90 percent of those with company-provided health care are required to pay a monthly contribution.
I am at a loss to explain what the CWA leadership finds objectionable about this offer, especially when you consider that our health care proposal is very similar to what they have already accepted at Qwest and other companies.

Let's put this in context of the four-day strike. After only three days of lost wages, most CWA-represented employees will have lost more pay than the company has asked for in increased health care contributions for an entire year.

Employment security

The union requested, and we agreed, to return the issue of job offer guarantees to the regional bargaining tables. At the regional tables, we will remain committed to the proposal we had presented at the national table of a guaranteed job offer in the state in which an employee works if the employee's job is surplused. Essentially, this means no layoffs for three years.

Our national proposal still contains strong elements enhancing job security.

For example, we propose utilizing union-represented employees for future new technology work such as Fiber to the Premises, WiFi, Video, DataComm and DSL Technical Support, as long as the labor agreements for this work are competitive on wages, benefits and overall costs with those of outside contractors.

We also propose a mechanism that would allow qualified surplused employees to move to wholly owned subsidiaries before those subsidiaries hire from outside.

This offer will be withdrawn at 11:59 p.m. on Monday night. In the meantime, we will continue working on a solution, as you continue doing the best job you can for our customers. Thank you again for your commitment to SBC.

[lendaddy]

Just to put it in perspective, technicians make over $58k a year plus OT, and a stellar benefits package.