I'm in the USW and I don't know anyone I work with who would support him. There are Trump stickers and "Let's go Brandon!" grafitti all over the mill. People wear Trump shirts to work, have the bumper stickers on their trucks and helmets, and drink out of Trump branded mugs. They'll put Democrat stickers on trash cans and in urinals.
The union leaders understand politics and business, but the rank and file are your average blue-collar assholes. They've worked union jobs so long they don't have a clue what it's like to not have that safety net. But they fall for the culture war. I see it first hand every day.
Maybe it's just my local, but it's what I deal with, and it fucking sucks.
He later got them everything they wanted, and they have since endorsed him.
Edit: he later got them the sick days they wanted, on top of pushing through the contract that only a handful of the 12 unions hadn’t ratified. I guess it’s not technically “everything they wanted” but it’s certainly more than the unions that ratified the agreement were expecting.
Because the short notice sick days weren’t in the agreement that some of the unions ratified. That was on top of the agreement that he imposed on them, which some of them had already ratified as written. I’m not happy that he did that, I think they should’ve been allowed to go on strike anyways and get all that they could from management, but at least he didn’t just force it on them and then leave it at that.
He got the contract that the unions were about to strike for agreed to. I agree that it’s shitty as hell to force them not to strike and I was furious with Biden too, but it seems like the Unions are happy with the results of his actions now so I see no reason I should continue to actively hold that against him.
Second paragraph: “We’re thankful that the Biden administration played the long game on sick days and stuck with us for months after Congress imposed our updated national agreement”
You’re right, “On deadline day, the parties reached an agreement on an updated contract that included the biggest wage increases in 47 years. Over the next several weeks, while acknowledging that the agreement was less than perfect, the IBEW and several of its fellow coalition unions voted to ratify the agreement. A handful of others, however, did not, instead threatening a December freight rail strike.”
Biden enforced this agreement despite only some of the 12 unions voting to ratify it, and then worked behind the scenes to get them the extra short notice sick days too. Nobody ever gets everything, but this certainly sounds like getting something that about half of the unions ratified anyways, plus more sick days. How can you discount getting them a better contract just because it wasn’t absolutely everything they asked for? It’s still a vast improvement.
There were 11 other unions involved. Their members (the site said they combine for over 100k workers) got these benefits too, they negotiated together for a deal that would affect all of them.
I get hating Biden, I really do. He’s not nearly far enough left for me either. But do you have anything to back that claim up besides your word?
Then why haven’t they made the same statements praising Biden? IBEW represents a small amount of rail workers and their leadership is corrupt. Most members on r/railroading are not happy with the deal they got, but you don’t care about them.
they negotiated together for a deal that would affect all of them.
Which is?
But do you have anything to back that claim up besides your word?
Literally the topic of the OP article is "If you look at what the economic situation is for workers in the US, it's almost as good as it was pre-Covid which is a goddamned miracle. It's not perfect, still a lot of people are struggling, but $15/hr being the new more-or-less entry level minimum wage and some increased union membership has produced real progress especially at the bottom end of the scale, when a lot of first-world economies are still struggling to dig themselves out even back to normal. Wage inequality is down, unemployment is the lowest it's been in decades, etc etc, Biden deserves some credit for that. Here are detailed citations to back all that up. It's weird that that's not the popular perception."
Then, go look at the comments and read them through. It's literally a nonstop tide of rando user accounts saying "but inflation stacks year on year, they don't know basic math" and "they just think stocks going up means the economy's better, they don't care people are hurting" and "my grocery bill is high things are real bad, I'm suffering, this article's not true." It's almost impossible to read the comments front to back and hold on in your head to the fact that they're objectively wrong. It's like Goebbels's propaganda theory in real time -- if you grab out one individual comment and analyze it and really think about it, compare it to evidence, it falls apart. But looking at them all together it really looks like there's this groundswell of opinion. It also makes it more or less impossible to actually have a conversation about the article because it gets swarmed with people talking discouraging nonsense and being apparently incapable of absorbing anything different.
holy smokes ur right, it’s so bad (or maybe im so weak willed) that i genuinely can’t tell if you are the one full of b.s. or not (no offense to you im just trippin out over this)
I am biased, because I think I'm right and they are wrong, but to me it is instructive to look at an example like this
It removes it from that flood-of-unopposed-propaganda world and puts it into a more manageable context, like here are questions, and here's how people answer the questions or not.
after much lip biting and teeth grinding i posted a comment which represents my position which i hope isn’t too enlightened centrist. you at least seem good faith so i’d appreciate your opinion lol
The guy who broke the strike of an absurdly profitable rail company?
I mean it’s a choice between open contempt for the workers, and open contempt, but occasionally putting on a union hat for a photo op before either doing nothing or siding with management.
There were 458,900 workers involved in work stoppages in 2023, notably including the even-more-unprecedented-than-the-rail-strike motion picture strike and the autoworkers strike. You can believe, if you want to, that Biden is anti-union and he just overlooked his responsibility to shut down the 458,900 people who did work stoppages in 2023. Personally my feeling is that he shut down the rail strike because it would have a big impact on the rest of the economy, then his labor department kept working the issue and got the workers the sick days they were fighting for in the first place by having the strike.
Is your assertion here that United Steelworkers just fucked up and endorsed a rabidly anti-union candidate because they're not as up to speed on labor issues as you are?
Is your assertion here that United Steelworkers just fucked up and endorsed a rabidly anti-union candidate because they’re not as up to speed on labor issues as you are?
I really appreciate the “you really think you’re smarter than the people whose job it is to do this?” Energy being exuded here. Spot on.
If you actually look at the details of the story you’re taking about you’ll find that after Biden ordered them back to work he then ALSO got the train companies to give the workers everything the union had been asking for
In September 2022, U.S. Senators Richard Burr and Roger Wicker introduced a bill that would have required labor unions to agree to the terms proposed by the Presidential Emergency Board, to prevent a strike.[18] It was blocked by Senator Bernie Sanders, who noted that freight rail workers receive a “grand total of zero sick days” while railroad companies made significant profits.[19] In the House of Representatives, Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, “We’d rather see negotiations prevail so there’s no need for any actions from Congress.”[16]
In late November, after some unions had rejected the agreement, Biden asked Congress to pass the agreement into law. On November 30, the House of Representatives passed the existing tentative agreement along with an amended version that would require railroad employers to ensure 7 days paid sick leave.[20] On December 1, the Senate passed the tentative agreement with only 1 day of sick leave.[21] President Joe Biden signed the legislation into law on December 2.[4] Writing for Jacobin, Barry Eidlin, associate professor of sociology at McGill University, said the message sent to the rail workers by the president and Congress was “shut up and get back to work.”[22] The Biden administration’s intervention in the dispute was condemned by over 500 labor historians in an open letter to Joe Biden and Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh.[23]
Sounds like Bernie went to bat for them, and then Biden forced a compromise the industry wanted but most unions disagreed with…
I mean, Biden got them a single sick day when they were only asking for 7 days.
That’s not a great win for unions, that’s a middle finger.
It’s literally the smallest amount of sick days they could have so they could stop saying “we do t get sick days”.
And a cynic would say the only reason they got the one is “we don’t have enough sick days” doesn’t Garner as much sympathy in a headline.
But I’m just going off what you linked, do you want to try and find one that does back up your version of events?
Thanks for posting and explaining some of this. I also had the mistaken impression that he just had forced them all back to work. It never sat right with me. I wasn’t aware that a lot of things happened after that.
The unions wanted 15 sick days, Biden forced them to accept the company’s offer of 1 day unpaid sickleave. Later it was increased to 7, plus a wage increase of 14%+4.5% per year for 5 years. That doesn’t even keep up with inflation.
Biden could have simply ordered the railroad to accept the union’s demands, hell he could have nationalized the rail companies in question, but his job is to represent capital, not labor.
To put into perspective how much of a pittance this is, BNSF is so profitable, they could afford to give every worker a raise of 100,000 and still afford to give Warren Buffet a billion dollars every year. This is the equivalent of Trump giving the .1% billions in tax breaks and telling workers they should support him because they get an extra 12 bucks in their tax returns.
Dude you just moved the goalposts a million lightyears away from what you said in your original comment.
Secondly, YOU don’t get to decide what the rail union’s opinion on the matter is, only the rail union can speak for the rail union, and they’ve all publicly said how very happy they are with the outcome of Biden’s actions
He literally required them to accept the board’s offer. The company offering minor concessions afterword doesn’t change the fact that he sided against the workers.
The U.S. Senate voted 80 to 15 on Thursday to impose a tentative contract deal reached in September on a dozen unions representing 115,000 workers, who could have gone on strike on Dec. 9.
The deal referenced was an offer by the board. Biden signed it.
Oy are you trying to be obstinate? That act got them back to work while Biden continued negotiations til literally days later when he won for them all the benefits they were seeking
Biden could have simply ordered the railroad to accept the union's demands
Ah yes, the "president has a magic wand" theory of governance.
It is, in fact, not quite as simple as I'm trying to make it sound, and there are some things to complain about in what Biden did. Here's a pretty good summary of the "Biden did wrong" thesis.
My take on it is that Biden launched legislation to grant them 7 days of sick leave by law. It passed the house on a party-line vote, and then failed in the senate by 8 votes. When the senate passed an amended version that would grant 1 day of sick leave, what would you want Biden to do? Assuming he doesn't have the ability to just ignore the law and order the rail companies to give the benefits he thinks they should be giving, because we don't have a command economy under the total authority of one person?
Here's a partial summary of what Biden's labor department had done by working the issue after the fuss had died down in the rest of government. It's complicated by the fact that there are multiple companies and multiple unions all with separate agreements, but my overall take is that it looks like he's been trying to balance securing justice for the workers, with what he can get the rest of government to cooperate with, with keeping the economy running and not grinding to a halt.
Honestly, the point of view that he should have let the economy grind to a halt if that's what the people who actually do the work want to have happen, in order to secure some economic justice for themselves, I can understand that. It makes sense to me. Honestly, that is more or less my personal point of view on it. But I think calling him a shockingly anti-union US president because he won't do that is overstating how pro-union people in US politics tend to be.
There has been controversy before where Unions endorse a candidate, and then a few days later we find out it was just union leadership picking a favorite.
The union’s endorsement was the culmination of a months-long process that included surveying USW members regarding their top priorities. The union also sent prospective presidential candidates in both parties a detailed questionnaire to determine where each of them stands on key issues affecting working people.
"Our members told us that they value retirement security, affordable health care and labor laws that support our ability to form unions and negotiate strong contracts,” said McCall. “President Biden’s record on all these issues speaks for itself. He also laid out a strong plan for building on this momentum well into the future.”
So in 2016 a bunch of unions endorsed Hillary and everyone celebrated.
Then a few days later we started hearing about the only union members who wanted her in the primary was the heads who had been getting wined and dined by her campaign.
There was a large public outcry and unions said they’d do better.
They’re now asking for a sample survey on issues, taking candidates at their word, and then making ng an endorsement.
It’s better than it was, but nowhere near as good as letting union members submit a vote if they want and whoever gets the most wins the unions endorsement.
I don’t know how you thought at any point I meant unions could force their members to vote a certain way. What I meant is these endorsements are supposedly to literally be the union as a whole endorsing the candidate that represents them most, rather than u ion leadership trying to sway their members vote
I don’t know what weird thing you linked because I’m not downloading random files from someone without a shift key, and I highly recommend no one else download random files either
But consider the fucked up part was 2016, and there’s only been one election cycle since…
It feels like you’re trying to argue that because shit got a tiny bit better, we’re not allowed to ever ask for it to keep being fixed
Which is pretty much the neoliberals national slogan.
Stuff was worse once, so nothing can get better until it’s gets worse again
Sorry For Not Using The Shift Key I Hope This Is Better.
You Are Simply Asking The Union To Give Up Its Power By Having It Just Host Another Unsecure Election Based On Publicly Available Information Its Constituents Already Know. The Union Is Able To Provide A Service By Using Its Power To Get Answers Directly From Candidates Without Needing To Rely On Fallible Media Channels. (edit: think of the service debate moderators provide)
And, As You Admit Yourself, The Union Is Comparing Candidate Answers With Their Voting Record. So It’s Not Like Candidates Can Just Lie On The Questionaire.
tldr it seems like you are spreading FUD or something, unions have been doing this exact thing for ages lmao.
You Are Simply Asking The Union To Give Up Its Power By Having It Just Host Another Unsecure Election Based On Publicly Available Information Its Constituents Already Know.
Man, you’re hitting all the greatest hit today, aren’t you?
Just coming out and open with:
Why should the working people have a say? They don’t know what’s good for them!
Waaaay better to let a handful of people dictate what the poors should do and how they should vote
Have a nice life champ, glad you found that shift key. Enjoy telling people on the internet that voting is bad, I’m sure it’s very fulfilling
Union leadership doesn't always represent their members well (true)
Union leadership didn't represent their members well in this case (not proven, just asserted)
They obviously didn't look at what Biden actually did, including some specific things listed in the article, because they wouldn't care about that kind of thing or deal with it as part of their working day (false)
Republicans are more progressive than Biden (the total-nonsense statement that serves to throw a smokescreen of confusion around any factual discussion surrounding the earlier more coherent statements)
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