Unions can be great, and they can be your enemy.
The same may be said for our police, our military, our elected and appointed officials, our neighbors and even some of our "friends."
I agree that years ago they were needed and helped people to earn a decent wage.
They still are needed. And although their numbers have severely diminished those unions that remain continue to influence the wage standard. But if the right wing corporatists are successful in their objective to eliminate unions entirely you will see a rapid return to the an age in which America was a two-class society consisting of the wealthy and the poor with nothing in between but a nominal management class of virtual slave-drivers and brutal law enforcers.
But i think since they've evolved, some are just greedy.
The operative word in that statement is
some and you are quite right. Some unions have become corrupted and there needs to be carefully studied legislation to impose effective but equitable controls. Corruption in unions, like corruption in government, can be eliminated by motivated, carefully monitored investigations and prosecutions. In fact, most union corruption could not exist without some level of cooperation by corrupt government officials who are willing to look the other way and ignore complaints.
I believe it's the fault of many unions that the prices of our everyday products have skyrocketed, hell you used to be able to buy a brand new car in the 70's for $3000.00!
If you will research the precipitous rise in corporate executive pay and bonuses, which occurred in proportion with rising corporate profits, you will find those unions which did indeed aggressively coerce inordinate wage increases did so on the basis of formulas which were proportional to their respective corporation's profit margins. I.e., When the auto industry realized a substantial rise in profits the UAW demanded a wage increase, which caused a rise in prices, which produced another rise in profits, which prompted another demand for wage increases, and so on.
Don't look only at wage increases while ignoring the respective industry's profit margins and their exorbitant increases in executive salaries and bonuses. When you have a CEO who formerly received a $50,000 bonus take home a $3,000,000 bonus, it simply isn't fair to point an accusing finger at a union that demands a piece of the obvious action for its member workers.
Yes it's greed, alternately escalating greed on the parts of both the unions and the corporations. But the only solution to the problem is
government regulation -- which is anathema to the right wing.
Unions protect people, which is great. But they also have to protect the people that are idiots on the job and think they can get away with whatever they want, and the union is right there to represent them.
I agree completely on that specific issue.
My son-in-law has worked for UPS for over twenty years. He started out sorting packages on the night shift, graduated to route package delivery and now he drives a trailer on daily airport runs. He said there were problems such as you've described in one of his former stations but because the situation caused tension between management and the drivers they voted out the Shop Steward and the union's Business Agent, which corrected the problem.
You should know that unions are democracies, meaning their executive boards are voted in
and out. Most problems in union management arise mainly from the same cause as problems in social management, which is voter apathy.
If your husband's union shop is not performing as it should, there is an available remedy.
