Years ago I watched a boy from Alabama get his a$$ beat by a couple of teamsters on the docks at a convention center. Seems that he didn't follow protocol when he unknowingly jumped his turn to unload.
Another occation I was threatened by a BA in the same center.
A couple of years later at a different center had a teamster intentionally destroy a whole exhibit display with a fork lift just because he was asked to please bring it to the booth. I actually had a BA in NY call me at my office in NC and threatened to kick my a$$ because I had a crew working in his mall. I said please, please come on down here is my address!
I have been forced to hire union gardeners to set plants on the floor. I have been forced to hire union decorators to hang pictures in the booths.
I have seen it at it's worst! But never, not once have I ever felt that union labor was beneficial . Sorry! Bunch of dang worthless thugs. I understand why companies move to RTW states.
I have a bad taste for any labor union. Period.

__________________
2012 DL1000 Adventure (Tinkerbell)
PC-V, Smart TRE, CR8EIX plugs, Madstad bracket, Madstad 22" shield, Fork brace, 43T rear, Airhawks, Chinese mirrors, mirror extenders, RDL.

Ah yes, we'd all be so much better off if the wagon wheel makers hadn't gone out of business when the other greedy bastards invested in assembly line technology and concentrated on automobile wheels. Those evil wagon wheel execs should have kept the business open so they could pay their employees regardless of sales. They could have made less money. After all, does any exec really need to make $500 per year? Scumbags, all of them.

It would be nice to make enough money to need to use the Cayman Islands. I do not. But not hard to understand why any intelligent person or business looks at their legal options when the facing confiscatory tax rates on the their earning. There's nothing patriotic about being stupid.

Always interesting to hear the "virtuous" people label some high producing person as "greedy." At the same time the virtuous people who did not earn the money are pressing their politicians to confiscate a higher and higher percentage of earning from the people who did earn it. So produce and earn, you're greedy; whine and moan about someone that has more than you and try to get it taken away from them, you're salt of the earth.

__________________

2012 XT1200Z Blue, 2012 XT1200Z Black

This is an incredibly complex statement and one that may be argued point for point but I doubt either perspective can be changed . . . well, I'll sum up later:

1. It makes no sense for investors to "destroy" solely for immediate gain because doing so throws out the wheat with the chaff. Investors can sell or liquidate - immediate and long-term gain - because that is what investing is about: making money for one's self or to those with whom they have a fiduciary relationship . . . or shareholders.
2. I don't mind my taxes being used to help my fellow man/woman/Strommer but the safety net was intended to be a short-term assistance to enable those unfortunate to get themselves back up. If has not worked as intended but has become the primary form of sustenance; its beneficiaries become long-term denizens of the "welfare state" to the chagrin of hard-working people like you and me.

And they pay the bulk of the taxes that sustain this country.


If it is my money and I pay my taxes, who determines (well, besides my wife ) how I shall spend or invest it? If I want to go to Vegas or New Jersey and try to make a quick buck or invest it in bonds or stocks, is it not my business to do as I please? This idea of "benefits all" is Marxist in nature and any system - other than what is in a person's heart to share with their fellow man/woman - is flawed and prone to abuse: Social Security, welfare benefits, health insurance/maintenance organization. Using that "responsible for each other" bromide, no one should buy a motorcycle for +$25,000 when that can be divided up to three purchases of a V-Strom and "shared for the benefit" of others. After all, why pay all that money when there are those less fortunate?

Any social benefits or similar construct should be tied to a timeframe or some type of accountability to get back to work - forget about "fair share of taxes"; how about "fair share of the work"? Otherwise, as the saying goes, that safety net becomes a hammock.


This is such a gross mischaracterization that my response neatly ties up what I began earlier in this post. I was born and emigrated from a country run by a dictator - he arguably began as a socialist ("benefit for all") but became corrupted, like all other failed Marxist-based systems that ignore or fail to account for the natural tendency of our species to survive/compete/better themselves: they enculturate and rule by the power of their arrogance and their office to enrich themselves. There are those who espouse and clothe themselves within Orwellian-sounding altruistic goals of "sharing the wealth" or "fair share" and mischaracterize who are not aligned with that utopian vision as greedy or vultures.

Maybe one should consider another word that describes the self-serving knights of social "justice": envy.

I understand the Teamsters settled but the Bakers went on strike. Did the former get a better deal than what was offer the latter?

And I on the other hand have seen instances where employees were going to be terminated unjustly (one happened to be my wife) and the only thing that stopped that was union intervention.
I have also seen instances where without union intervention managers would have simply run roughshod over employees so they could show favor to employees they felt like rewarding vs those they didn't care for on a personal level.
At one point I was a steward and went to bat for an employee who was going to be caught in a problem with her insurance where a very serious illness and subsequent bills were not going to be covered. Not strictly my postion but I did it, the intervention worked and her coverage was upheld without interruption.
I do not consider all union people worthless thugs.

__________________
Joe S.
'12 Concours
'11 DL650
'10 Tiger1050
'01 HD FXD
'09 HD XR1200
'79 BMW R100

Update:

A judge ordered mediation.

__________________
Sent from my Hewlett-Packard 75C, using the Flying Merkel motorcycle app.

Stromin'Nroman NC28729, USA

DL650A K7 (Greywolf Moto Lab's R&D test mule) June 1, 2012 - present
DL650A K7 April 23, 2007 - January 6, 2012, RIP

"Look here brother, who you jivin' with that cosmik debris?" Frank Zappa, 1975

.
We've all seen or heard of the stupidities of Bully-boy Unionists and the heartlessness of Dickensian Capitalists [in which I include the Vulture Capitalists ~ lovely term !! ].
There is little to be gained by quoting the extreme situations of the worst of rampant socialism or of rampant capitalism.

But PURLEEEZ guys . . . quoting extremes does not prove that the opposite extremes are the logical & correct way of managing society.
Only the simple-minded could truly believe that type of argument.

Calm reflection shows that a healthy society requires [among other things] a middle way, where the workers aren't getting screwed and the entrepreneurs aren't getting castrated.

Entrepreneurs [ = creators ] of sufficient genius level (of course) deserve a large reward for effort and risks undertaken.
But I don't include the typical Top Executives in that ~ they are usually little more than a "Plug-and-Play" position in an already existing business. (There are a few, rare, exceptions.)

Vulture Capitalists as such, are indefensible.
Please note : I am not talking about the rational reorganising of a failing / inefficient business ~ which is a sort of inevitable ecological recycling.
I think we all know the sort of activity that distinguishes the Vulture. The original vulture bird swoops down to eat dead animals, in a useful way. OTOH, the Vulture Capitalist swoops on everything . . . dead, dying, or just having a bit of an "off day" . . . and ends up doing the equivalent of the melting down of a famous Rodin statue in order to profit from the scrap metal price of the bronze.

The real question is : how to make the Twinkie cake bigger for everyone.
Or rather, in these days of limited world resources . . . how to make the Twinkie cake better in quality.
.

I am not sure what the defense attorneys will use now to justify homicides, now that theTwinkie defense is no longer available.

These companies only move to RTW states while they are waiting for more third world countries to open their doors. Just one more step to better profits.

Thats correct and if I were to whip out my crystal ball I would predict the following.
There is a time when people will take just about any kind of job for just about any kind of pay. Its survival and understandable. Thats where our country was at prior to the formation of labor unions.
Eventually people get tired of abuses, being fired over nothing, being fired two days before you are vested in your pension, your age (still happens, just not overtly stated), having your pay cut at management discretion, so on.
When people get tired enough they will look to form unions again. It will take a few years but I have no doubt it will happen.
Eventually after the formation of those unions there will be instances of corruption as there are now. A union, much like attorneys, has a self-serving mission of its own in the sense that it stays in business best while there is conflict, thus best while it has an enemy at the gates and keeps its members in that mind set.
The cycle repeats because people are simply self-serving by nature and a goodly number of them cannot deal fairly with one another be they owners, managers or employees.

__________________
Joe S.
'12 Concours
'11 DL650
'10 Tiger1050
'01 HD FXD
'09 HD XR1200
'79 BMW R100