Labor Union?

@helenS Trump has made it [b]race[/b] politics. The GOP has been the party of big business and the wealthy, until recently. Trump is still wealthy but the key has been his appeal to "white" workers, whom he’s convinced that groups like undocumented immigrants are trying to steal their jobs (hint: these whites are [b]not[/b] scrubbing anyone’s floors nor working in any fields. They’d go on welfare first.) But they’re voting against their own best interests because GOP politicians like Trump have them convinced that the other party will also help the people they don’t like.

@helenS [quote]Voting for Trump is a white worker's class struggle.[/quote]

White workers do not engage in class struggle in the US which is the problem. They have been divided by hatred for people worse off than them instead of uniting against the real threat against them.
Alienating them further and declaring them the enemy doesn't work. Are many of them uneducated and ignorant idiots? Yes they are
Is it solely their fault? No

@helenS There is nothing that I have said that is a lie and you've completely missed my point.

Does a large section of WWC people vote for Trump? Yes and that is not contentious or in need of statistics to prove. I even mentioned in my post that some working class people have gone to the radical right because of disillusionment with third-way liberalism.

However, what I said about Republican voters being more affluent is also true and the biggest part of Trump's voting block is middle class.

Unionised workers (and union activists on particular) are generally further to the left than other members of their class.

Nothing that I said was in any way wrong.

@originnone that era you pointed to was a big huge problem for the people who actually own the planet and they certainly know not to let voters get that deal ever again. You don't want to see no point noplace if you are really a Dem.

@Roundandroundwego the DemoPublican Oligarchy is a plague on our nation

@Roundandroundwego It's the Republicans who oppose that. The only part of the 1950s they want to bring back is the racism and homophobia.

@CheekyBadger My take is a little simpler. If 100 people work for 1 person, and that 1 person has all the money and power, the 100 people should bargain collectively to avoid being exploited.

@CountScrofula That assumes that the workers have no freedom to take their skills elsewhere - in a truly free market there are fewer barriers to entry and nothing to stop workers from either moving to an employer who will pay more or from forming their own business to compete with that employer. Where we get issues is when the free market isn't actully free and where constraints are placed on the workers or monopolies are created and restrictions put in place to prevent competition.

@CheekyBadger I could argue from Proudhon's perspective that the free market cannot be free unless the enterprises are worker owned.

@TheOneyouwerewarnedabout I disagree. Labor unions preserve rights of workers helping protect their jobs in the presence of possibly corrupt managers and allowing us to "put food on the tables" for our families. I can't speak for other labor unions. But as a member of American Federation of Government Employees I know that we need a union. Federal government jobs are highly politicized, in the sense that workers rights are enforced or violated constantly depending upon whomever is the us president. Congress under the previous president proved that rights could be violated. To protect those rights we need to organize.

For instance, US Department of Veterans Affairs kicked the union office out of our building. AFGE had to sue the government to get our Union office back. We fought that and we won. We sued the VA in federal court. And the court found that the VA illegally threw out the Union. The remedy for this was where the VA had to pay the unions moving expenses to move out and to move in, and the difference in rent that the union had to pay to get offices on the outside of the VA as opposed to having offices in the va. Yes the union does pay rent to the VA for office space.

Rewind back to 2018. The VA accountability Act of 2017 was passed into law. The purpose of the law was to get rid of corrupt managers. However it rolls downhill and only about six corrupt managers got fired. And about 5,000 VA line employees like myself got fired. I got a proposal to be removed. I had to report to the manager's office where he read this proposal to remove me under VA accountability Act of 2017. No due process whatsoever. No chance to bring my shit together and improve my numbers. They would be removing me effective 10 days later. I called the Union and the union went to bat for me. The union, at the local level, negotiated with management to find me a new job at the VA. In the negotiation the Union raise the question on how bad it would look for the VA to fire a disabled military veteran like myself. And management someone agreed. They moved me to a different department where I currently work. I now work in the call center. The Union at the national level sued the VA in federal court over the VA accountability act. And it was the decision that the VA misinterpreted the rules on firing line employees when the law was designed to get rid of corrupt managers at the executive levels. And the VA had to bring back many employees under the course decision and pay them back pay.

You want to cry fuck the union? Keep in mind you left 15 years ago. That was under a different administration. End of bush beginning of Obama where organized labor was not under fire like organized labor is today. And under the previous president, the secretary of the VA was a piece of shit. Current Secretary is much kinder to VA employees and organized labor. But regardless whoever the secretary is I refuse to give up the union. The only way they will remove my dues card is to pry it out of my cold dead hand. Solidarity! ✊️

@TheOneyouwerewarnedabout Yep, Fuck the Union! Never did anything for me........Never stood up for me..........Leaders stole money from the Pension funds and got away with it..........Lazy workers.........and so on............Go support the Demonstrates bullshit...........

@btchstfu Yessss

@BLP11520 AFGE (Local 940) stands in solidarity with you! ✊️

@Prisoner1972 My union gets me better pay...✊

@Crazywaterspring some unions don’t properly represent their members but I threatened to sue mine and it was amazing… not only was I not fired… I was promoted and the time off I had was paid… amazing how misunderstandings are cleared up by a lawyer!

@bijouxbroussard oh wow,

@bijouxbroussard my dad was as well