"Hawke" wrote in message
...

Ed Huntress


I think the labor wage should be whatever the market will bear. We
have
huge advantages in automation, quality, service and that "Made in USA"
sticker still means a lot. I'd like to pay higher wages than I do now,
and my wages are better than most in the industry. The "correct" wage
is
one that the workers can prosper the most while the company can prosper
too. The union mentality is: "Lets cut the goose open and get ALL the
gold."

I think that the union mentality, for around 150 years, was this: "We
know
you'll screw us as much as you can, and nobody knows how little income
you'll work for. So we'll push you until you can't be pushed
anymore...because, for 60 or 70 years (from 1870 to 1930), that's
exactly
what you did to us. And you'd do it again starting tomorrow if you could
get away with it."

It worked out a fairly stable equilibrium until we faced high volumes of
dirt-cheap imported products. Now the manufacturers who can't move have
no
way to prosper, if they're in competition with some of those dirt-cheap
imported products.

But they'll give it a try. They'll see if they can squeeze it out of
labor. But they really can't, except at the margins, because nobody can
live on what they can now afford to pay.

Surprise; it turned out that the golden goose is a whore. She followed
the
companies that were able to move their manufacturing to the
dirt-cheap-labor countries. They're still making a bundle, the goose is
laying her eggs for them, and we've gone from being a country with the
biggest middle class and the lowest income schisms in modern history to
one of the worst in the developed world. And everyone is looking for a
scapegoat, because they've been blinded by the minions of wealth who
feed
them a half-assed economic theory we imported from Austria, telling them
they're really better off, and any pain they perceive is either an
illusion or somebody else's fault.

Hey, you gotta' squeeze somebody or you'll go out of business, right?
And
all the nice guys who want to pay their employees more are wringing
their
hands, because they've bought the bill of goods the rich guys are
feeding
them, and there's just nothing else they can do.

Maybe they'll pipe in some violin music.

--
Ed Huntress


If I had it to do all over again, I sure wouldn't be in manufacturing! I
see a number of friends that have cushy Government jobs making 5 times
what
I make and they are ready to retire in their 50s. Only a fool fights the
battles I do and get so little appreciation or even understanding that I'm
looking out for peoples' best interests.


If you're putting other people's best interests ahead of your own then you
really are in the wrong business, actually being in business at all. Take a
look at the guy who was running Countrywide Mortgage. He ruined the company,
cost thousands of people their jobs, drove the price of the stock into the
dirt, and helped create the housing mess we now have. But when Bank of
America bought the company he walked away from it with a 110 million dollar
payday. Now that's a businessman! He was putting his interests first. That's
the way a real capitalist does things. And nobody says or does anything
about him being over paid like those lazy union workers either. Things sure
are different when you're on top, huh? No such thing as too much pay for
those at the top is there, no matter how lousy a job they do?

Hawke



I have a lot of friends that own their own businesses, we all have a common
thread in that we treat our employees, suppliers and customers with honesty,
dignity and appreciation. We are all devout Christians, that has a lot to do
with it, you and the left might not understand because that is SOOO un-cool.