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Thursday, September 3, 2009

Question for Trumka: Are unions relevant?

Next week, I'm going out to Pittsburgh to meet Rich Trumka, the number two guy at the AFL-CIO and a complete shoo-in to take over the nation's largest labor federation when current leader John Sweeney retires this year. So what should I ask Trumka? Trumka's a former miner and a lawyer who grew up in southwestern Pennsylvania. One of the top officials in the United Mine Workers told me that he was happy that Trumka would be leading the AFL-CIO because, as he said, Trumka has chutzpah. He used another word related to the male anatomy

I've met Trumka before and he is very personable, but I find that, at least in public, most leaders of large organizations are personable. 

Please, send me your suggestions. My question is whether unions have any ability whatsoever to turn around the flood of layoffs we've seen.  
Posted by Jane Von Bergen @ 4:50 AM  Permalink | 13 comments
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  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 12:25 PM, 09/03/2009
    Hey Big Earn, I'm a union member and your sadly mistaken. You don't know what your talking about. My union bends over backwards to keep our employers in business and our employers appreciate our membership. Our employers prefer to be union.
    — jim4723
  • Comment removed.
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 12:45 PM, 09/03/2009
    Hey jim4723, I know a little about Unions, my wife belongs to the do-nothing but take members money and give to lib dems for socialist crapola, AFSCME sucks!!! As most Unions do, they rely on a socialist agenda, that America as a whole hates!!! ORGANIZED LABOR = ORGANIZED CRIME, and if you don't believe that, why the hell is the former AFL-CIO head now on board of the New York Fed, the POSER in the whitehouse is returning the favor for the thugocracy union support!!!
    — Mike S.
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 12:47 PM, 09/03/2009
    I despise the lazy unions so much, for the first time in my life I bought a HONDA over a GM = Gov't Motors, also see that GM and Chrysler didn't fare to well on the ill-conceived and even more ineptly run "Cash for Foreigners", no one wants to keep propping up the miserable UAW goons!!!
    — Mike S.
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 1:21 PM, 09/03/2009
    Unions are relevant. Look, without unions such as AFSCME, SEIU, Teachers, etc we would probably have Republicans as Mayor and city council, lower taxes, more efficient and courteous bureaucracy, lower prices for goods and services, fair and unbiased reporting in the media ad infinitum.
    — junethe4th
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 1:48 PM, 09/03/2009
    Labor Unions fought for almost all the qualities that make up the modern workplace! You morons take it for granted that you have a weekend! Unions have there problems no doubt but to loathe the labor movement just shows what a bunch of dopes you really are! Hey Mike s if you and your wife hate her union so much tell he to quit - go non-union - take a pay cut - get less benefits - less job security etc.... Drive your Honda to the unemployment line!
    — hexyscores
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 9:01 PM, 09/03/2009
    Good for you hexyscores! Mike S. is a moron! He should tell his lazy wife she's making the union look bad, and to do a fair days work for a fair days pay. I really hope he enjoys his Honda.
    — jim4723
  • Comment removed.
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 7:51 AM, 09/04/2009
    Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Unions ARE necessary in our society--what else protects workers rights? If you're hell-bent on improving companies productivity, how about tieing C.E.O.s' salaries to the success of their company measured in terms of employment and productivity? Only in the U.S.A. can you sink a company, receive your 20 mill parachute and then end up as a C.E.O. of another company after a couple years. Upper management incompetence and nepotism is the real reason we are losing our economic vitality
    — Tracer41
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 11:44 AM, 09/04/2009
    Without unions companies wouldn't have to avoid the child labor laws like they do by setting up their factories overseas.
    — Mark Chalupa
  • 0 like this / 0 don't   •   Posted 10:11 AM, 09/05/2009
    Any talk about unions always brings the reactionaries out.I've worked both union and non-union and I'll always go for the union shop.Working people are in their most difficult economic period in the last 70 years, which the wealthy with their insatiable greed caused.My only problem with unions is that after 60 yrs of cutting deals with the bosses all they can say is vote Democratic.Neither party represents working people,they're just two different wings of the same Property Party.
    — redbeagle


13 comments
About Jane M. Von Bergen
Jane M. Von Bergen covers workplace issues, health insurance and organized labor for the Philadelphia Inquirer. A veteran business writer, she is now covering her second recession. She can be reached at jvonbergen@phillynews.com.

Every day for 60 days, Inquirer staff writer Jane M. Von Bergen profiled someone from the ranks of the region’s unemployed.

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