[AT] Union Labor

[Roger Welsch]

Thanks, Grant.  Your measured response was long overdue.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Grant Brians" <gbrians at hollinet.com>
To: "Antique tractor email discussion group" <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Saturday, December 03, 2005 10:12 AM
Subject: Re: [AT] Union Labor


> Ok, I've stayed out up to this point. First, a lot of very negative things
> have been said about American workers. I am a farmer, have no insurance
> (like most employed folks) and no certainty that my business might not
fail.
> But this is true nowadays of nearly all workers in the US because big and
> medium size business no longer cares about the human capital that makes
the
> money for them. Second, I have worked for companies ranging from 50
> employees to well over 130,000. Nearly all of them outsourced jobs to
> overseas. In most cases the companies now either no longer exist or a re
> shadows of their former selves and make less money than they did before. A
> part of this is due to competitive pressures, but mostly it is because of
> the attitude that only short term cost effectiveness is important.
>     Third, I have worked for both nominally American and foreign owned
> companies. The biggest difference has been that the foreign owned
companies
> protect their home country workers and don't protect their American
workers,
> while the nominally American ones protect only the executives. Both lobby
> the state and federal governments to lower the requirements of worker
> protections of their American workers.
>     Fourth, the US is the ONLY industrialized country without national
> health care and also the most expensive health care by every measure any
> economist has come up with. US health care is NOT better for the money
> either. The reason is not overpaid nurses or other typical personnel, but
> rather the structure of our system. Many people talk about how inefficient
> "Government" is. And yes there are many things it is very inefficient at.
> However health care management and Social Security are NOT areas this
> applies. The overhead level for Medicare and the California state-run
> Medical programs are less than 2% of  paid costs. LESS THAN 2%. The
> Privately run insurance companies add 25% or more in overhead! The most
> efficient private employer paid programs are in the 20% range.
>     Fifth, due to item 4 (no national health care program), GM pays nearly
> $1300 in health care costs per car, Toyota on the other hand because they
> have a younger workforce and zero retiree cost pays under $300 in health
> care cost per car. But the workers at GM are not less healthy, just
> older.... Think about it.
>     Sixth, lets get back to farming in the conversations. Does anyone have
a
> cheap set of bull and pinion gears for an MF 390T?
>
>         Grant Brians
>         Hollister, California
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Danny Tabor" <dannytabor2000 at yahoo.com>
> To: "Antique tractor email discussion group"
<at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
> Sent: Saturday, December 03, 2005 7:18 AM
> Subject: Re: [AT] Union Labor
>
>
> >      I'm not well versed with the inner workings of
> > Unions but I've noticed hauling out of different
> > cement mills. The mind-set of many of the Union
> > laborers is that the company they work for is the bad
> > guy. I'm not certain where this comes from and it
> > seems not to be limited with union laborers. Is there
> > no such thing as a "company man". I believe before a
> > bigger, stronger work force can be established in the
> > USA. American workers must change their attitudes
> > towards the hand(s) that feed them. Being self
> > employed I certainly can not be called a company man
> > but I praise God there are those wealthier than I, who
> > are willing to take the risk of investing their money
> > so I can work today, tomorrow and years to come.
> >
> > Danny Tabor
>
> _______________________________________________
> AT mailing list
> Remembering Our Friend Cecil Monson 11-4-2005
> http://www.antique-tractor.com/mailman/listinfo/at
>
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