WHAT HAPPENS WHEN UNION MEMBERSHIP ISN’T MANDATORY: WEAC Official Admits Most Locals Will Not Re-certify. “Now that Wisconsin’s educators have been given the right to choose whether or not to belong to a labor union, the unions are struggling to attract enough members to stay afloat. Proving all along that the union leaders didn’t really represent their members, as much as sponge off of them.” (boldface mine--Darren)
Plus: “Kenosha is a trend setter, not an outlier. . . . So, in the end, it wasn’t just the mean old Republican lawmakers who had issues with teachers’ unions. Teachers themselves were/are dissatisfied with the union’s strong arm tactics. As it turns out, Act 10 was the largest anti-bullying initiative in the nation. Who knew?”
Education, politics, and anything else that catches my attention.
Saturday, September 14, 2013
I Can Dream That California Will Come To Its Senses Like Wisconsin Did....
I'll just copy Instapundit's entire post here:
It's not a question of "if" but "when".
ReplyDeleteUnions always end up pissing in the soup. It's in their nature and a result of what they are.
Being based on coercion, and having nothing to offer but coercion, unions are inherently inimical to the free market. The basis of unions is a monopoly relationship with their single customer, the employer, and when that monopoly is broken, as in Wisconsin, it's only the employees that know the reason they're still employed is that coercive power that stick with the union.
Where unions have the power to fend off political threats to their monopoly, as in, say, California, they still can't escape their essential nature and the grip of the free market.
Every union leader lives with the danger of a rabble-rouser who convinces the membership that the current leadership's in bed with management. That better contracts aren't forthcoming because the leadership's interest and that of the membership no longer coincide.
The only way to fend off that danger is to continue to periodically get that "more" Walter Reuther describes as the only thing unions want.
The free market however is uninterested in the problems of union leadership and when that "more" drives the price of the finished product to unsustainable levels the free market has the final say.
Turns out the same dynamic, much to the surprise of union supporters everywhere, operates even when the employer's government and unions are selecting the legislators.
At a certain point the union's demands become unsustainable and the previously unelectable politicians who oppose the insatiable demands of unions become electable.
That's what's in store for California because the unvoiced savior of union excess, federalizing California's union pension obligations, isn't going to happen. If it didn't happen when the Democrats controlled the U.S. House, Senate and White House it'll never happen.