Mythbusting attacks against public workers

[Fairweather]

 

I tend to agree with JB on more things than not, certainly on this particular post, so as a business owner and employer I thought I'd share my employment practices.

 

I've got 5 employees, and I pay them as much as I can, including health insurance, dental insurance, vacation pay, sick pay, and flexibility with regards to unpaid time off. I think I'm roughly 10 to 15 percent over the competition in terms of total compensation, but folks in construction aren't always that forthcoming about this topic. A few years back I did have a conversation with one of my best competitors, and he did share info based on my promise that I wouldn't try and steal any of his people, so I'm not completely whistling in the dark.

 

My employees are my greatest single business asset, and I want them to feel both valued by me and proud of their work. Perhaps more importantly than the compensation numbers, I encourage everyone to do their best and follow their own sense of how best to do things. Empowering the employees with authority over their own work is a good thing for them, the clients, and the company.

 

Funny thing is, this is also a successful business strategy. Employee satisfaction and retention matters. My clients appreciate having the same folks they've come to know and love come back to work on their homes, and they notice the respect and attitude that flows throughout the company. In an industry where 95% of businesses fail on a ten year cycle, we're at 22 years and looking to weather this particular downturn just fine. Oh, I'm sure I personally could make more money by paying my employees as little as possible, but we wouldn't be doing the same work for the same people. I wouldn't be as happy or proud of my company either.

 

So how would you feel if your employees held a meeting, pointed out the fact that you live in a nicer house than do they, demanded more money and paid time off, and then physically (violently even!) blocked access to your jobsites until you relented?

[pink]

Or - seeing how globalization appears to be working and leveling the playing field - we just take our place along side every other struggling third world country given our unwillingness to foster a healthy, highly-skilled workforce.

 

That was another of Thurow's comments that day:

 

we have 15,000 local school boards all cranking out a lousy product.

 

His point being no nation can run a decent school system with everyone doing their own thing with no national standards of achievement.

 

P.S. Oh, and it isn't the teachers who are to blame - it's the parents.

 

i personally think we should all make the same money no matter what or skill levels or ages are... basically a itch digger and a doctor should make the same wages but a ditch digger should be taxed less cause it just seems right .......

[pink]

hmmm....but on a tuesday?

 

perhaps if i change what i'm drinking i'll be able to understand you?

 

nobody likes a monday, but ur pretty cool... who should make more money??? a ditch digger or a teacher??? seriously???

[tvashtarkatena]

Those who can, ditch. Those who can't, teach.

[tvashtarkatena]

 

I tend to agree with JB on more things than not, certainly on this particular post, so as a business owner and employer I thought I'd share my employment practices.

 

I've got 5 employees, and I pay them as much as I can, including health insurance, dental insurance, vacation pay, sick pay, and flexibility with regards to unpaid time off. I think I'm roughly 10 to 15 percent over the competition in terms of total compensation, but folks in construction aren't always that forthcoming about this topic. A few years back I did have a conversation with one of my best competitors, and he did share info based on my promise that I wouldn't try and steal any of his people, so I'm not completely whistling in the dark.

 

My employees are my greatest single business asset, and I want them to feel both valued by me and proud of their work. Perhaps more importantly than the compensation numbers, I encourage everyone to do their best and follow their own sense of how best to do things. Empowering the employees with authority over their own work is a good thing for them, the clients, and the company.

 

Funny thing is, this is also a successful business strategy. Employee satisfaction and retention matters. My clients appreciate having the same folks they've come to know and love come back to work on their homes, and they notice the respect and attitude that flows throughout the company. In an industry where 95% of businesses fail on a ten year cycle, we're at 22 years and looking to weather this particular downturn just fine. Oh, I'm sure I personally could make more money by paying my employees as little as possible, but we wouldn't be doing the same work for the same people. I wouldn't be as happy or proud of my company either.

 

So how would you feel if your employees held a meeting, pointed out the fact that you live in a nicer house than do they, demanded more money and paid time off, and then physically (violently even!) blocked access to your jobsites until you relented?

 

I'm working in a small startup (again). Biggest reported challenge to startup managers (and most common reason why they fail): inability to retain and motivate valuable employees.

 

The split between the 'squeeze them until they bleed' philosophy of labor management presented here and those who actually run businesses and know the real deal about what your employees are worth is stark. Funny how none of the right wingers here actually run businesses that have employees. Hmmmmm......

[Fairweather]

Those who can, ditch. Those who can't, teach.

 

The A students now work for the C students.

[tvashtarkatena]

Those who can, ditch. Those who can't, teach.

 

The A students now work for the C students.

 

Complete bullshit, of course. If you're job is all you care about, you're likelihood of landing a good one is more correlated with level of education and academic achievement than ever before. Sorry...the A students are still in charge.

 

But life is more than a job. And those who include their job as just another aspect of a life well lived seem to be just a wee bit happier than those who view a job (or taking the LOLSAT) as yet one more another reason to chest beat to an empty auditorium.

[tvashtarkatena]

...an empty auditorium full of imaginary cheering Nazis.

[Off_White]

Ivan: more lefty than hippy, but then again I don't think of hippyness as translating to business skills. I've certainly been more hippy in the past than I am now.

 

Pink: Yes, my wife works, and not for my company either. You worry me, you shouldn't just be taking what's left over in your company, you need to proactively plan for what you need to make and structure that into your company's pricing. Pay yourself a salary regularly, know your numbers intimately, keep company finances clearly separate from your own. Email me or call me if you want to talk business sometime, or come visit next time you're in the NW.

 

Fairweather: If my employees did that, I'd be concerned that something was really wrong in my company and some serious work,

reorganization, and conversation needed to happen.

[tvashtarkatena]

Or - seeing how globalization appears to be working and leveling the playing field - we just take our place along side every other struggling third world country given our unwillingness to foster a healthy, highly-skilled workforce.

 

That was another of Thurow's comments that day:

 

we have 15,000 local school boards all cranking out a lousy product.

 

 

 

His point being no nation can run a decent school system with everyone doing their own thing with no national standards of achievement.

 

P.S. Oh, and it isn't the teachers who are to blame - it's the parents.

 

i personally think we should all make the same money no matter what or skill levels or ages are... basically a itch digger and a doctor should make the same wages but a ditch digger should be taxed less cause it just seems right .......

 

An itch digger IS a doctor in most cases, no?

Edited July 27, 2010 by tvashtarkatena

[JayB]

 

I tend to agree with JB on more things than not, certainly on this particular post, so as a business owner and employer I thought I'd share my employment practices.

 

I've got 5 employees, and I pay them as much as I can, including health insurance, dental insurance, vacation pay, sick pay, and flexibility with regards to unpaid time off. I think I'm roughly 10 to 15 percent over the competition in terms of total compensation, but folks in construction aren't always that forthcoming about this topic. A few years back I did have a conversation with one of my best competitors, and he did share info based on my promise that I wouldn't try and steal any of his people, so I'm not completely whistling in the dark.

 

My employees are my greatest single business asset, and I want them to feel both valued by me and proud of their work. Perhaps more importantly than the compensation numbers, I encourage everyone to do their best and follow their own sense of how best to do things. Empowering the employees with authority over their own work is a good thing for them, the clients, and the company.

 

Funny thing is, this is also a successful business strategy. Employee satisfaction and retention matters. My clients appreciate having the same folks they've come to know and love come back to work on their homes, and they notice the respect and attitude that flows throughout the company. In an industry where 95% of businesses fail on a ten year cycle, we're at 22 years and looking to weather this particular downturn just fine. Oh, I'm sure I personally could make more money by paying my employees as little as possible, but we wouldn't be doing the same work for the same people. I wouldn't be as happy or proud of my company either.

 

So how would you feel if your employees held a meeting, pointed out the fact that you live in a nicer house than do they, demanded more money and paid time off, and then physically (violently even!) blocked access to your jobsites until you relented?

 

I'm working in a small startup (again). Biggest reported challenge to startup managers (and most common reason why they fail): inability to retain and motivate valuable employees.

 

The split between the 'squeeze them until they bleed' philosophy of labor management presented here and those who actually run businesses and know the real deal about what your employees are worth is stark. Funny how none of the right wingers here actually run businesses that have employees. Hmmmmm......

 

Uh - who is trafficking in caricatures here, exactly? There are well defined costs associated with high turnover, short-staffing, workplace injuries, etc, etc, etc, etc that check the impulses of even employers who have no concern whatsoever for their employees.

 

What percentage of managers, foremen, shift-leads, etc, etc, etc, are actually sociopaths that have no sympathy or empathy, don't care about how others see them in the workplace or in the community they live in, etc, etc, etc, etc?

 

I've lost count of the number of jobs I had between the ages of 13 and 30, but it's probably somewhere in the low 20's, and ranged from graveyard-shift busboy, dog-kennel pressure-washer, temporary nigh-janitor, bucking hay-bales, production work in factories, restaurants, etc, etc, etc.

 

I ran into a couple of bad bosses, but they were mostly bad because they just didn't have the expertise or temperament to be good managers - but most were decent people doing the best that they could. Most of the time the people that I ran into at those jobs were the best part of the experience, and made even the roughest jobs more tolerable.

 

How any of this relates to the question of whether or not the HR specialist IV in Olympia needs union representation to shield her from the dreadful lash wielded by Pam the office manager, or whether or not the state would be able to staff the position with someone of equal quality despite horrific prospect of them having to bear the burden of financing their own healthcare and retirement costs like the schmucks in the private sector is beyond me.

 

It's also worth rephrasing Jeff Adachi's question - which is how you can be a good progressive when you support a health and retirement cost structure that crowds out funding for libraries, parks, services for the indigent, etc, etc, etc.

[j_b]

Absolutely not. In theory, the private sector could create jobs but as a matter of fact, it doesn't because a few individuals are too busy shoveling the dough in their pockets.

 

The Great Decoupling of Corporate Profits from Jobs

 

by Robert Reich

 

Second-quarter earnings reports are coming in, and they're making Wall Street smile. Corporate profits are up. And big American companies are sitting on a gigantic pile of money. The 500 largest non-financial firms held almost a trillion dollars in the second quarter, and that money pile is growing larger this quarter. Profits that plummeted in the recession have bounced back. Big businesses have recovered almost 90 percent of what they lost.

 

So with all this money and profit, they'll start hiring again, right? Wrong - for three reasons.

 

First, lots of their profits are coming from their overseas operations. So that's where they're investing and expanding production.

 

GM now sells more cars in China than it does in the US, but makes most of them there. The company now employs 32,000 hourly workers in China. But only 52,000 GM hourly workers remain in the United States - down from 468,000 in 1970.

 

GM isn't just hiring low-tech assembly workers in China. Last week the firm broke ground there on a $250 million advanced technology center to develop batteries and other alternative energy sources.

 

You and I and other American taxpayers still own over 60 percent of GM. We bought GM to save GM jobs, remember?

 

GM officials say no American taxpayer money is being used to expand in China. But money is fungible. Because of our generosity, GM can now use the dollars it doesn't have to spend in the United States meeting its American payrolls and repaying its creditors, for new investments in China.

 

Second, big U.S. businesses are investing their cash in labor-saving technologies. This boosts their productivity, but not their payrolls.

 

Last Friday, for example, Ford reported a $2.6 billion second-quarter profit. The firm is already more than two-thirds the way to equaling its record 1999 profits. But due to labor-saving technologies, Ford now has half as many employees as it did a decade ago.

 

Wall Street analysts are happy with Ford's "commitment to keeping capacity in check," according to the Wall Street Journal. Ford shares rose 5.2 percent Friday. "Keeping capacity in check" is the Street's way of saying "no new hiring." In fact, the Street is advising investors to sell the stocks of companies that talk openly of expanding capacity.

 

Finally, corporations are using their pile of money to pay dividends to their shareholders and buy back their own stock - thereby pushing up share prices.

 

Last Friday, GE announced it would raise its dividend by 20 percent and reinstate its share-buyback plan. It's GE's first dividend increase since the company cut its dividend in early 2009. As a result, GE shares are up more than 5% in the past few days.

 

Bottom line: Higher corporate profits no longer lead to higher employment. We're witnessing a great decoupling of company profits from jobs.

 

The next supply-side economist who tells you companies need more incentive (i.e. lower taxes) before they'll hire is living on another planet.

 

The reality is this: Big American companies may never rehire large numbers of workers. And they won't even begin to think about hiring until they know American consumers will buy their products. The problem is, American consumers won't start buying against until they know they have reliable paychecks.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/07/27-3

[j_b]

OK -time to put up or shut up, how much more than your competitors are you paying YOUR employees? Maybe I should walk away from this and go to work for you, oh blessed great employer jb who does so much for so many. I must have been wrong about you as strictly based on your posts you sound like a know-nothing parasite.

 

How many employees do you have?

 

By opposition to you, when I call somebody names it has to do with the policies they advocate, not my imagination, jackass.

 

"time to put up or shut up" what planet do you live, moron, that you think I need to be an employer to discuss the issue of what amounts to a fair remuneration?

 

When I ran a start up decades ago, I used to pay my dozen employees above market wages. Satisfied, fuckwit?

[j_b]

It's also worth rephrasing Jeff Adachi's question - which is how you can be a good progressive when you support a health and retirement cost structure that crowds out funding for libraries, parks, services for the indigent, etc, etc, etc.

 

It's also worth remembering that besides cherry picking data you have never, ever shown that anything other than your voodoo economics and your wall street casino are responsible for the fiscal and economic crisis we are in.

[ivan]

nobody likes a monday, but ur pretty cool... who should make more money??? a ditch digger or a teacher??? seriously???

i'm fine w/ the market largely determining who gets paid what - supply n' demand n' whatnot - my point was that, no matter the job, you ought to be able to make a basic living, i.e. have a decent roof over your head, food on the table, n' the ability to see a doctor when botflies have taken up residence in your colon - if the boss can't afford to pay a decent wage, he can do his own damn work

[billcoe]

when I call somebody names it has to do with the policies they advocate, not my imagination, jackass.

Well what do ya know: that's the same with me you worthless, ignorant, parasitical piece of shit. .....See, we have that in common!

 

well that was a valueless exchange.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

It's also worth rephrasing Jeff Adachi's question - which is how you can be a good progressive when you support a health and retirement cost structure that crowds out funding for libraries, parks, services for the indigent, etc, etc, etc.

 

It's also worth remembering that besides cherry picking data you have never, ever shown that anything other than your voodoo economics and your wall street casino are responsible for the fiscal and economic crisis we are in.

 

More vocabulary for j_b BINGO!

[ivan]

 

I've never heard a defensible case for public employees unionizing, which is probably why FDR, Fiorello LaGuardia, and George Meany were all strongly opposed to it.

 

I can see how public sector unions serve the private interests of public sector employees, but it's never been clear how the public benefits from them.

 

What's your argument?

 

the public benefits when teachers are paid well and work in a good environment - what well qualified teacher would want to work in a place that treats him like a slave? do you want your kids' teachers to be indistinguisable from wal-mart employees?

 

teacher unions organized precisely b/c that's how they were being treated, as slaves - how do you propose public employees exert influence to insure they're treated fairly? i suppose they could use the election process, but that's much more unwieldy and requires getting a lot of people who have no direct connection to the problem to get involved.

[billcoe]

Try and keep up, I think that this is the thread which one must end every sentence with a word like "fuckwit" or "jackass".

[Nitrox]

Try and keep up, I think that this is the thread which one must end every sentence with a word like "fuckwit" or "jackass".

 

Don't forget "cockstain".

 

 

[rob]

 

I've never heard a defensible case for public employees unionizing, which is probably why FDR, Fiorello LaGuardia, and George Meany were all strongly opposed to it.

 

I can see how public sector unions serve the private interests of public sector employees, but it's never been clear how the public benefits from them.

 

What's your argument?

 

the public benefits when teachers are paid well and work in a good environment - what well qualified teacher would want to work in a place that treats him like a slave? do you want your kids' teachers to be indistinguisable from wal-mart employees?

 

teacher unions organized precisely b/c that's how they were being treated, as slaves - how do you propose public employees exert influence to insure they're treated fairly? i suppose they could use the election process, but that's much more unwieldy and requires getting a lot of people who have no direct connection to the problem to get involved.

 

Things were better when teachers were single and family-less, travelling the prairie and lodging in townsfolk's homes. I think they used to get paid in whatever was leftover from the harvest or something. Those were the days.

 

Hopefully, Palin and her teabagging friends get elected so we can return America back to it's halcyon days of yore. Afterall, she knows how to field-dress a moose!

[ivan]

Rules for Teacher - 1915

 

1. You will not marry during the term of your contract

 

2. You are not to keep company with men

 

3. You must be home between the hours of 8:00PM and 6:00AM unless attending a school function

 

4. You may not loiter downtown in ice-cream stores

 

5. You may not travel beyond the city limits unless you have permission of the Chairman of the Board

 

6. You may not ride a carriage or automobile with any man unless he is your father or brother

 

7. You may not smoke cigarettes

 

8. You may not dress in bright colours

 

9. You may under no circumstances dye your hair

 

10. You must wear at least two petticoats

 

11. Your dresses must not be any shorter than two inches above the ankle

 

 

[billcoe]

Don't forget "cockstain".

 

Thank you! In fact I haven't been playing with jb for long and had forgotten it. Isn't that 2 words.... "Cock Stain".

 

A full sentence as jb might use it in his political discourse threads to help people understand his viewpoint might then be "you fucking fuckwit jackass Cock Stain." I will defer to Ivan as he is a teacher and will know this.

Edited July 27, 2010 by billcoe

[rob]

Rules for Teacher - 1915

 

1. You will not marry during the term of your contract

 

2. You are not to keep company with men

 

3. You must be home between the hours of 8:00PM and 6:00AM unless attending a school function

 

4. You may not loiter downtown in ice-cream stores

 

5. You may not travel beyond the city limits unless you have permission of the Chairman of the Board

 

6. You may not ride a carriage or automobile with any man unless he is your father or brother

 

7. You may not smoke cigarettes

 

8. You may not dress in bright colours

 

9. You may under no circumstances dye your hair

 

10. You must wear at least two petticoats

 

11. Your dresses must not be any shorter than two inches above the ankle

 

 

And now teachers are sleeping with students! You see why we needed all those rules.

 

Damn liberals, destroying america. Don't worry though, Nitrox says their days are numbered.

 

Phew!

[Nitrox]

Rules for Teacher - 1915

 

1. You will not marry during the term of your contract

 

2. You are not to keep company with men

3. You must be home between the hours of 8:00PM and 6:00AM unless attending a school function

 

4. You may not loiter downtown in ice-cream stores

 

5. You may not travel beyond the city limits unless you have permission of the Chairman of the Board

 

6. You may not ride a carriage or automobile with any man unless he is your father or brother

 

7. You may not smoke cigarettes

 

8. You may not dress in bright colours

 

9. You may under no circumstances dye your hair

 

10. You must wear at least two petticoats

 

11. Your dresses must not be any shorter than two inches above the ankle

 

 

You just lost j_b.