What it also means is that any corporate entity can contribute unlimited amounts of money to any US political campaign. The devil is in the details. Any Chinese, Israeli, Saudi, Yemeni, South African, French, Russian, United Arab Emirates, etc, registered in the US (like that’s real hard to do) can contribute AS MUCH AS THEY FRIGGIN WANT to whatever candidate they choose.

Think they’re not going to take advantage?

Maybe someone here could convince me I’ve misread this situation. Because, if I, troglaman, am correct, then we’re in the final stages of a corporate coup.

The other side of the coin is that unions are like most bureaucracies – unless they are well managed they tend to go off the deep end by:
1. Forgetting that the jobs are there because of the company and whatever good or service it provides. As a result they often try to kill the Golden Goose that lays the eggs because they think the goose is immortal.
2. Putting themselves in a constant anti-management stance. This creates constant tension and ill feelings in a company. I saw this happen at the airline I worked at. It is bad karma for a company. Fortunately, we were able to vote that slate of officers out and get some more reasonable leadership.
3. Unions are ripe to be taken over by “professional union organizers” who do not care about the members and line their pockets with dues. They also are nearly impossible to get rid of.
4. Many union leaders pursue political clout that makes them ever more powerful and opens up new avenues for self-enrichment.

Government employee unions are providing government services. Therefore, they should not be able to strike or perform any other job action (slowdowns, sickouts, etc.) because it is the customers (students, postal customers, etc.) that suffer. If the union and management cannot agree on pay, the negotiation should go to a mediator – period.

Most city, county, and state governments are now in fiscal trouble because of their negotiated pension liabilities as pointed out in the WSJ article. This is an issue that is going to have to be resolved in the next few years. California is already broke because of pension liabilities and its generous social safety net. Somehow these government entities are going to have to renegotiate or renege on those pensions. I predict a lot of strife coming down the road on this issue. Maybe such issues will be a motivator for getting rid of or reducing the power of government unions. I wonder how many politicians are willing to face these unions down?

But State public sector Unions can bargain over pay; rather than taking a portion of private profit, they are extracting public taxes and as the articles tates, becomes a vicious, self-serving cycle of extraction–>payment for campaigns—>more benefits for the union.

I think union membership in private industry should be an option (although I believe unions have done more harm than good). I think government unions should be outlawed altogether. Those people work for us, and they should not be allowed to have that kind of clout over the taxpayers. If they don’t like their working conditions, they’re free to get a job in private industry.

Personally, I’ve always worked in the private sector, I’ve never belonged to a union, and I’m doing fine.

So does this mean that unions of federal government employees could be abolished simply by an executive order?

The unions, do indeed, harm education. One of the reasons I left was because the profession seemed a lot like the communism I was teaching about. I could work 12 hours a day in my room and the 25 year teacher in the room next to me could work less than half that and make twice as much as me just because he/she had been around longer.

I was at a great school yet saw so many BAD teachers who no longer cared. Yet, the district couldn’t get rid of them. Needless to say, our kids are in private school.

I work as an engineer and i have been on both sides of the public sector/private sector divide. when I worked for the public sector, there was absolutely nothing to do besides keep your chair warm all day. and of course everyone’s number one priority was keeping their own job with a pay raise every year.

Currently I work in the private sector, where as others in this thread have said, a little balance and common sense is required. i have now gone several years without a pay raise despite having gotten additional education that increased my productivity. its kind of “rage against the Man” which I am usually cautious to engage in but find myself in that position now. I haven’t fully thought through how much worker abuse is all in the worker’s head (myself included) but I do acknowledge that worker abuse can and does happen.

Here is one thing I have been batting around in my head, well 2 things actually.

1) As an engineer, my profession has a stringent ethics code that engineers adhere to by self-regulation. I am grateful that engineers have not taken the ethical hit that so many other professions have (doctors, lawyers, teachers, etc) and for the most part they adhere to the ethics well. On threat of losing their license. I wonder if politicians could be made to adhere to a similar ethics code?

2) recently my state had a referendum on something called the “taxpayer’s bill of rights” which I understand has been considered in other states. it failed at the polls, and I understand that other states measures have not gone well so far. I wonder if there would be such a thing as a taxpayer’s bill of rights that would be effective?

I know its crazy talk but still… if one profession can do it why not others.