With proper labor laws in place (some yet to be written), would we still need unions? many years ago I could see why. What in the way of legeslation would be required to make unions obsolete?

Yes, dear. ;)

NoH2O-
You are right about the UAW. I have also seen instances as you have described in the plants I work with. If the old guys with 30+ yeasrs would retire, maybe GM could get some of the younger, more ambitious workers in place. As I motored up to one large Delphi plant today, I noticed quite a few folks outside sleeping, sunning themselves, reading the paper, etc. Ok, maybe ALL of them were on break at the same time at different locations. Yeah, toobad it wasn't break time! This is part of the problem with the UAW, IMO. The union that represents our employees is very easy to work with. No, they are not pushovers. They realize that we can work together and they keep their jobs and we make the company profitable. Let's see what happens in Detroit tomorrow after GM and the UAW sit down to talk.

Oh Haha - Unless you have seen it first hand it's hard to believe. Looks like you have been to many of the plants as well. I could tell you stories of things I have seen and acts that I have witnessed that blow my mine.

There was a time and place for the UAW, the time has past.

Maybe these folks are training to be gubmint employees. Coming to a DMV near you soon!!!! ;)

What's it like working for non-union car manufacturers? I assume Toyota, Honda, Mercedes Benz are non-union - don't know, to be honest.

I mean, is there a huge waiting list for a worker to get into these places? I'm sure these manfacturers don't put up with much union mentality.

But who would sponsor such legislation? Certainly not the companies!

With uber-industrialists like Lendaddy in charge, the mandatory working age would be 7, minimum wage laws would be eliminated, and the work week would be lenghtned to 60 hours, overtime and holiday pay would be eliminated, and arbitrary 'disciplinary' measures would mean your pay was docked. Health benefits would consist of one leeching a month, but you have to buy your own leeches. The water and air pollution would be explained away as 'natural climate cycles'.

dd, a young, dedicated, intelligent Chinese or Indian manufacturing worker costs about US $1.00-2.00/hour.*

Without unions, how competitive would US wages be with that?

Unions do some bad things, no question, and in the case of the airlines and automakers it is very visible. Just like management does some bad things - also very visible in the case of airlines and automakers, and I'll debate you on how of GM's problem is high unions benefits and how much is crappy cars that no-one wants to buy. I mean, when GM has to put $1500 incentives on the hood and Toyota sells at list, you can't blame that on unions. The UAW didn't design that car.

Overall I think all this "unions drove US jobs overseas" rhetoric is something that businesses drum up as a way to weaken unions in industries that cannot go overseas.

I think most US companies who sent manufacturing jobs overseas did so due to (1) improving and spreading technology which enables long global supply chains and manufacture of complex devices using fairly low-skill labor, (2) improving international transportation, (3) removal of trade tariffs and other restrictions on import/export, (4) the long period of recession and weak growth since 2000 that has reduced corporate revenue growth, thus placing more emphasis on expense reduction as a way to grow profits.

Service job offshoring is kind of a similar story, but point (1) would focus more on improving global communications (that allows a call center in Pakistan serve a customer in Dallas) and add a point (5) the high standard of education in some developing countries (that produces large numbers of skilled workers, e.g. programmers).

(* You'll see <$1.00/hr referenced in the media, I think it is not quite that low. I actually have actual numbers I got from a visit to electronics assembly plants in China a couple years ago but I haven't dug them out. Anyway, $1-$2 should cover it.)

Actually, jyl, I think dd74 was referring to the non-union manufacturing plants owned by Toyota, Nissan, MB, Honda, and perhaps Saturn. These plants are in the Southeastern US where the unions haven't the deathgrip. The plants are seeing advantages, because the cost of living is much lower in middle Tennessee and Alabama. $13/hr goes a lot futher in TN than say Michigan or California.

Re: American business question...no more unions...
 

Carp.

FYI: Ford Motor Company is demanding that suppliers open factories in China or meet Chinese factory pricing.

This has nothing to do with unions; it has to do with the world market. Ford is forcing suppliers to outsource.

How do you feel about this?

Oh, right I forgot you expect the US worker to work for the same wage as they do in China. Give me a break, be realistic.

Meanwhile China continues to abuse human rights and periodically threatens to conduct mass murder on the citizens of Taiwan should they ever declare independence.

You have never been to Chicago. In that town, unions are the very tool used to enforce political cronyism.

Oh, okay, I read his initial post as referring to jobs going overseas from the US to other countries.

I was told that a UAW worker costs the company $80k a year. If that's true GM will go out of business.

The average wage for a non -skilled trades UAW employee at GM/Delphi is a bit more than 25.00 per hour plus annual COLA increases.That equates to around 50,000 a year. If you include the health care and other incidentals, it is probably closer to 60,000.
That is straight 40 hours. Once you get into OT , it increases rapidly.
There was one very nice guy that worked in the foundry in Saginaw i had the opportunity to meet over the years. He worked 7 days a week, 8 hours a day. Only time off was his vacations. He even worked during the annual shutdowns in July. This old guy was pulling down over 100,000 and he never graduated high school! He had no family and no life outside of the shop but from what I understand, a local church got a nice little inheritance when he passed last year. I believe he was in his 70's at the time. Really a genuine good guy. He was always a gentleman.