This is a very, very interesting story. There are aspects I would not discuss here, but would gladly discuss over a beverage. The union was going after more wages. The wages there are, in my opinion, soft. All or nearly all those workers live 2+ hours away. Those wages do not support housing prices in Seattle, and the plant is downtown. Merlino had no choice. Glacier does not just own a competing concrete business, it also owns the cement (the active ingredient in concrete) that supplies the other concrete-makers. They are at Glacier's mercy. The thing that made that strike especially scary is that the guy pulling the levers at Glacier is a determined union-buster, his tactics are brutal and he doesn't give a **** about the community. Glacier is multinational. They could screw the entire Seattle construction industry for a year and not notice any impact on itself. Everyone got involved in that one. The Governor, for example. Again, there are aspects of that story I would prefer to discuss over a beverage.

I hear ya. I have a new roommate because he can't afford the house anymore due to increases in gas and his modest living.

I hear Glacier just doesn't care....

We should do a mini UPM up here over beers..I'm game

rjp

:confused: I thought you said basically there was no such thing as a large non-union company in Seattle and if there was, it could never do a good job as it would have sub-par workers :confused:


:D Supe, you and I probably agree on more subjects than we disagree on, but unions and republicans.....ain't gonna happen! :D

Sounds like my kinda guy :p:D

I find it incredibly amusing that you refer to yourself in the third person when discussing arrogance.;) If you expect me to be suprised at a lack of willing skilled workers in the N.O. area, I'm sorry to dissapoint.

Supe, when operated as you describe, I can't say I have a huge problem with unions. Like a really good temp agency, at least in your world. Unfortunately, that's OFTEN not the way it works. I'm in the aerospace industry, you figure out the rest. Blue collar guys protesting their wages that start at $25/hr is where I draw the line.

Andras, I'm an engineer at a Wichita aircraft company. We use a good number of metric fasteners and hardware, but all dimensions are in english. However, they are in tenths as opposed to 1/16, 1/8, 1/4, etc. To some extent, all companies in town are the same. Doesn't seem to hurt business.

Update - we are in Chicago now. The electrical union has graciously allowed us to install provided the vendor puts three of their guys to work - they did. However, yesterday they decided they didn't like moving boxes. Guess that's a different union. So, they complained and brought the plumbers in on the deal who now want to have their guys help. The vendor pretty much freaked and sent a rep for an a.m. meeting today. My solution is to *****can them all and tell the hospital that when they and the union have settled their issues, we'll be happy to install. My other solution is to hire a different union electrical contractor. The way it sits, we have the enemy working for us and they do little we instruct them to do. If we hire our own guys we are not in violation of union rules and we might get some production. Right now we are operating at about 20% our normal pace. we'' never make deadline - because of the union.

Funny thing is, the plumbers are saying it's their work. The electricians are saying it's their work. If the millwrights got involved....and so on. The plumber said that "they put this stuff up all the time. My response to him was having not recalled seeing him at the training in France. No response, at least not verbally. My respect for these crybabies could not be lower.

Just ask Sup to explain it to you, it's likely just a comprehension thing.:D

Union guys are all professional, I'm sure your foolish non-union workers are to blame.

Not because they're bad guys, they just lack the superior union training.

Turns out it was me to blame. Apparently, I offended some of the thin skinned union bros when I questioned their ability to install equipment that they have never seen before, but put up all the time. I was actually named in the meeting and I was told I needed to be "nicer". I could only laugh. What a bunch of pussys. Be nice.:rolleyes: I have been nice! What the hell would they do if I was actually nasty? Would they go into shock and curl up in a fetal position on the floor??

The end result of that meeting as that the vendor (that I work for) needed to hire on another skilled plumber/worker. We can't work during their breaks or lunch. We can't work overtime. Ah yes - we now have momentum!:rolleyes:

Also - I might need to start a whole seperate thread on the elevator guy. I could go on all day about the fat arsed guy who makes $50+/hr on the check for simply pushing the button. We have a lot of equipment to move and it all has to happen during his regular work day and not during breaks - God no!! Just that one union BS factor alone costs this project his near 6 figure wage not to mention all the costs related to the inefficiency of not being able to use the elevator after 3:20 PM.

An elevator is a dangerous piece of equipment. Only a properly trained and compensated union laborer can operated it properly. You may think you could get more done without him but I assure you your project could not be completed (properly anyway) without him.

I don't know how you do it Bob, I would have been canned or would have quit by now if I had to deal with that union BS. About five minutes and I would have told those union b@stards to eff off and I would have started the work just to further rile them up. ;):D

Well folks, one thing that I think that many people don't understand, especially right-wing types, is that there is no such thing as absolute.

-Listen, here's the other side of the coin. In 1999 I was fresh out of Captain's training on the Boeing 727's that my company flew around Europe in sub-service to DHL. I was working for a non-union airline.

I was tasked one night with a nice assignment: one easy flight leg from Brussels Belgium down to Bergamo Italy, and then spend the day in the beautiful town in the foothills of the Italian alps. I rode out to the airplane with my crew, did a preflight, and took off for Italy.

Two weeks before this, I had flown this airplane and had made a report to maintenance because it was using slightly more than the maximum of one quart of oil per hour. I never heard what happened, but the plane was flying the next day I'm sure.

Well, there I was looking down on the snow-covered valleys of the Swiss Alps on a beautiful clear night with a full moon...when my flight engineer tapped me on the shoulder:

"Norm, we're loosing oil on the #3 engine. We took off with just over three gallons, and we're down to 1.5 gallons right now". This was just about an hour into the 90 minute flight. Suddenly, the mountains below started to look a LOT taller and uglier!

"Ok...keep me informed. We're 35 minutes out of Bergamo, my plan is to bring that one to idle thrust at one gallon so we have it still alive in case we have to go around". It hit 1.0 gallons about 15 minutes later, and I idled it into Bergamo, where we landed uneventfully just after sunrise. Just as we were pulling into the parking space, the Italian ground controller came on the frequency and said to us: "Eurotrans, be advised you had large amount of blue smoke after you landed". Great. Only NOW you tell me that my plane is on fire!

Anyway, as soon as we were parked and stairs were brought up to the plane, I ran down them and to the back of the airplane. It was amazing- there was oil pouring out of the engine, approximately like a garden hose at full blast! How it managed to hold its oil until I was safely past the Alps I'll never know. Well, I figured on staying in Bergamo for a day or two until they fixed the leak or changed the engine. Someone handed me a phone, and I called the company to inform them what was going on. I promptly wound up on a conference call with the Chief Pilot, the Director of Maintenance, and the Vice President of Operations. The plan that they had come up with:

They were going to fill the engine with oil and I was to ferry it back to Brussels for an engine change.

:eek: HELLO?

"I don't think so!" I said to them. And then they started threatening me. "Well, we really need the airplane in Brussels so we can perform the maintenance, and we need you to be a part of the team on this" so on and so forth, until finally, I heard "We might have to reconsider your employment with our firm if you can't work with us on this". Yeah right. Uhmm...I value my life more than any job! Also, if the FAA had found out that I'd done that...I'd have possibly lost my pilot's license. A license that was earning me just about 6-figures per year!

They coerced and coerced, but in the end I wound up at the hotel. You see, they had another Captain who lived in the area [former Eastern Airlines scab...] who agreed to take the plane to Brussels. And of course, he lost all the oil and had to shut the engine down over Germany. And the FAA did find out about it and he received a letter of investigation as a result.

I'm certain that I'd have been fired if that guy hadn't been there to take the plane.

NOW....do you think that airlines with unionized pilots try that sort of thing with their pilots? I think not. They know that if they did, the pilot would simply call the FAA and there is not much the company could do about it. They can try to fire him, but the union will quickly get him his job back and back pay with it.

Think about this next time you put your children or family on a flight: do you want them to be riding on a plane flown by an airline that can fire the pilots if they refuse to fly a danerous airplane [and thus...stand by your anti-union attitude], or would you prefer them to ride with people who aren't afraid to walk away from something that is leaking oil all over the place? You decide.

The moral of my story: Dogmatism is never correct. Nothing is black and white, it is all shades of gray.

N

You've told that story before, bad business is bad business.

A good union can MAKE a bad business behave however.

That's a pretty amazing story. I agree with your point. I'm not against all unions. Doesn't mean I'm for them either. I used to be in the union. Some are good and provide a value - perhaps your story illustrates that. Some are bad and they hurt way more than they help, like my story. In my story, the hospital is paying a whole lot more to have unqualified individuals install critical equipment. So, like your "which would you rather have" story - where would you rather be in surgery, hooked up to equipment and under lighting installed by unqualified bullies who muscled their way onto the job, or equipment installed by trained, certified technicians with years of experience?

It's not at all easy. The only things that keeps me from going absolutely ape***** are it's my business and my client really counts on me. I don't want to let them down because some union douche bags got me to lose my cool.

However, the last week I want to load the job up with manpower at 4PM after the trades leave. We'll work through the night. I figure we can get a weeks worth of work done if we pull an all nighter. We'll be walking out at 7am when they arrive to find that their cow went dry overnight.

I work for the worlds largest *non-unionized* telephone company. (Sprint) And I love it.

Its like a breath of fresh air, coming from the telecom dept at the Union Pac railroad. I have seen things that are beyond comprehension when I was at UP. There was this one woman who didn't come to work for a month. The union said she was mentally unstable and couldn't be fired. Then they would treat contractors like $h1t. I once got in trouble for packing some equipment into a box I was going to ship.

It really bothers me when people think they are entitled to a job.

A days work for a days pay, thats how I run things here.

Normy, sounds like a bad situation, but you had every right to quit on the spot. Bad businesses are just that, with or without union labor.

You must have overlooked co.s like Boh Brothers, The Shaw Group, Brown & Root, J. Ray McDermott. Arrogant, who cares. Ignorant, times my social security number.