Las Vegas Sun

I see both sides of the story and from several angles here. Unions were a benefit to our country in the early part of the 1900's and serve a purpose of working on decent work rules for employees in large companies. While I see a needfor unions to some extent to counter the corporate boards and management, their philosophy isn't working because it's the government's job to create rules that are by and for the people to benefit society as a whole.

The problem is that the government is filled with Attorney Politicians who are coerced by Attorney Lobbyists that are paid for by Corporations and the Rich/Business Interests out to protect themselves.

That is called "The American Apartheid" , and we're not talking about skin color or ethnic heritage here, it's about the policies of economic oppression that have been damaging our country as a few gain while we and our children all loose in the long run.

While unions have their part to play for sure, this must be done within reason and unfortunately we don't have reasonable unions in many cases. When I was younger I was a part of a hotel union and while I had health insurance, I had a lower wage at the Westin stocking minibars at $4.20hr when the non union Sheraton was $5.95 & the Four Seasons was $6.45hr with health benefits, but they didn't have to pay $30 a month in dues either.

Now being an event manager, My exhibitors get royally screwed over by union employees with the "No Power Tool Rule" (meaning an exhibitor cannot use a power tool to assemble their own booth on an expo floor and must pay a union guy to do it), move in and out rules that say union employees must move the exhibitors booths into and out of the building thereby costing them more to exhibit and us booth sales. We can't forget about the outrageous gratuity charges for any food service that hovers in the 20% range on already way overpriced food.

Then there's the government union employees who being employees that are there for the benefit of the people, by the people and for the people, who SCREW OVER the people, by not being accountable due to the union for actually doing their jobs FOR the people who pay for their employment.

As for another venture assembling a product that I'm getting going, We'll pay a Living Wage and provide some kind of health benefits (hopefully our next president will make that more affordable for all of us)& go the extra mile with flex time for families and other perks, because keeping your employees happy and a part of the company for the long term insures success for everyone. Yet we still have the competition problems and government oppression problems that cause companies to pack up and go to other countries where those issues don't exist or are applied with common sense to not screw over a business and put them out of business.

So Big Corporate Unions, YES, Government Unions, NO, Growing Business Unions, NO. It's just common sense.