I don’t know how Ryan Cooper can write this in The Week with a straight face:
But more fundamentally, in terms of positive, pro-labor policy, unions have little to show for their loyalty. Since 1976 Democrats have repeatedly sold out the working class with deliberately vicious recessions, trade deals that led to massive outsourcing and job losses, and weak at best domestic policy. In 2009, when Democrats had super-majorities in both chambers of Congress, they barely even tried to pass a card check law which would have made it easier to organize a workplace. Both moderate Democrats and the Obama administration basically gave up on that without a fight.
Consider the following list of wages paid to union bosses in 2014:
| Union | Salary |
| Independent Pilot Association | $1,132,607 |
| Air Line Pilots Assoc. AFL-CIO | $825,539 |
| Directors Guild Of America Inc | $824,475 |
| Boilermakers AFL-CIO | $697,714 |
| State County & Muni Empls AFL-CIO Local Union 3930 | $680,721 |
| Laborers | $670,403 |
| Boilermakers AFL-CIO | $639,034 |
| SAG-AFTRA | $586,079 |
| Food & Commercial Wkrs Local Union 464 | $579,828 |
| Int’l Brotherhood Of Trade Unions | $574,501 |
| Transportation Communications Union/Iam, AFL-CIO | $564,194 |
| Teachers AFL-CIO | $557,875 |
| National Education Assoc. | $541,632 |
Obviously, these are not union leaders of the stamp of Eugene Debs or even Walter Reuther. Many of them have never really worked as rank and file members. They’re professional union organizers, members of the elite. And it’s equally obvious what they’ve received for consistently supporting Democrats.
One of the things that emerged from the last election was the chasm between union leadership and the rank and file. The union leaders uniformly endorsed Hillary Clinton while union members, even members of the Teachers and NEA, voted for Trump.
Democrats are the party of organized labor. They’re just not the party of the laborers. Given a choice between them and the technocrats, they’ve chosen the technocrats. If there’s a way for them to change course towards being a party of the workers rather than the union bosses, I don’t see any way to pull off that maneuver.
Pay for average CEO in Fortune 500 is $10.5 million. They would hardly get out of bed for those kinds of salaries. Clearly, it is much better to be in management, so I don’t see their salaries as being the reason they supported Hillary. Also, the large majority of teachers continued to support Clinton. Unless you have evidence they were specifically rejecting policy choices, and policy was hardly discussed at all in this election, I think it more likely this was just a referendum on the two candidates. To be sure, I think it also represented unhappiness with the current state of affairs, but is there really evidence that for teachers as a whole, they they are the ones in our economy who are suffering? Don’t think so.
Steve
I was unaware that CEOs were paid from the employees’ dues and that they could not be sued.
I think that big business CEOs are enormously over-compensated and that’s a board of directors problem. But comparing them with union bosses is either poorly informed or stupid.
By listing these salaries and pointing out they supported Hillary, I assume you are trying to point out some quid pro quo here. If it exists, they aren’t getting a lot of money for it, by modern standards. No, I think you need to make the case that some teachers voted for Trump because they are part of the group that is suffering because of the policies espoused by Democrats. Given that teachers do pretty well, as you so often point out, I don’t think they voted for Trump out of policy reasons, or at least economic policy reasons that directly affected them. Not wanting transsexuals in the locker rooms? Ok, then you have a case, but not sure what the salaries of union leaders would have to do with that.
Steve
No. I’m making the point that unions no longer exist for the benefit of their members but of their leaders and the politicians they support.
A corporation’s revenues are derived from the sales of goods and services. A union’s “revenues” are calculated by summing up the wages of all of its members.
Over the period of the last 40 years corporate revenues have skyrocketed. So have stock values. They’re more than 20 times what they were 40 years ago. The compensation of top managers has grown commensurately, largely because they’ve been tied to stock values. 40 years ago a typical big company CEOs compensation was, maybe 15-20 times that of the average employee. Now they’re hundreds of times those of the average employee.
Over the same period union “revenues” have collapsed. In real terms they’re a fraction of what they were because of a) the decline in union membership and b) stagnant or even declining wages. But union leaders’ salaries haven’t stagnated or declined. They’ve grown even as union “revenues” have decreased.
IMO our society is horrifically corrupt now and the corruption extends to all or nearly all of the institutions in the society. That includes large for-profit corporations, not-for-profits, unions, and many, many other institutions. It’s so corrupt that people can’t even recognize corruption any more. It’s just normal.
UH, I’m a teamster driver. I pay about $55/mo. in dues. Our local puts out a newsletter quartarly which is pretty much RAH RAH bullshit.
They endorse Democrats with regularity, but just before the pres. election, their endorsement came with this explanation. ” we know we’re getting nowhere with Democrats in office, and we would endorse a Republican, but we can’t FIND one who will even pay lip service to our issues ”
The unions are hurting badly, bleeding membership, power, and political influence. We had, in 2008, Three branches of gov’t. controlled by Teamster’s endorsed Democrats. They pushed our interests aside and we know now we bet on the wrong horse. Teachers have a secure Govt. pension. We were shoved aside, so yes, I voted Trump, knowing I’ve lost it all so bring those crooked bastards in Wash. down with me.
Revenge is best served cold.
I honestly hope that the teachers lose their pensions as well.
How much should union leaders earn? I only know a bit about teamsters since I lived with one for a while. As I recall, in the 70s-80s union leaders back then made in the $500,000-$600,000 range, and had limos and a private jet. A group of drivers got pissed and started publishing salaries and top salaries were cut in half, with a lot of the goodies also going away. By my reckoning, they were a lot more corrupt in the past, though I don’t track them anymore so much since Happy died. But it looks to me as though union leaders have generally made about 10-15 times what rank and file earn, with some variation. The head of the UAW makes about $160k, which is about 5 times average salary and the head of the Food service union makes close to $600k, which is about 28 times average.
Are they worth that? Don’t know. It looks like union jobs still pay more than non-union. Also, I am unaware of any data showing that union dues have been increasing as a percentage of salary. I have looked for this but can’t find any evidence.
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2012/12/17/closer-look-at-union-vs-nonunion-workers-wages/
Steve
They shouldn’t be paid anything. They should be fired and replaced. That’s what would have happened to a Fortune 500 CEO if corporate revenues had collapsed the way union revenues have.
Dave, Jesus, man.
If a ballplayer wants to negotiate a contract, that’s O K with you.
If a man who drives truck wants to negotiate, we are communists.
****you. My entire family depends on the associacions I have made,
the pension I have paid into for 37 years. Do you think for a minute that Teamsters will not fight?
And, the salaries of union leaders are irrelevant, unless you think we should pay more and get better managers
Gray
Dave is pointing out the pay scale differential between rank and file vs Union management, despite the failure of management to bargain better wages on behalf of rank and file. He is also pointing out how union management has chosen to get into bed with the politicians for personal gain.
Shorter: he’s on your side.
I had Teamsters working for me when I ran a small business. Now would be a good time for you to point out, from a real life perspective, that the reality is that work rules are a much greater problem for business than wages. That the work rules are designed to increase headcount, which creates a bigger empire for the union management.
Yup.
Here’s an example of how much union leaders love employees: They spend union money to finance political campaigns to raise the minimum minimum wage. Then they turn around and try to get an exemption for unionized workplaces. Their reasoning is transparent – they want to force businesses to unionize by offering them cheaper labor. The result is unionized employees who get paid less than the legal minimum wage who also have to pay union dues which further reduces their wages.
So unions, even with their monopoly power, cannot compete without using the force of law to artificially raise wages for everyone but themselves. No one wins in such a scheme except union management.
Drew- The WSJ article, remember they are heavily biased towards your side, shows that union employees are making more than non-union. Dave is making assertions without evidence. While Andy’s example might be true, if it were generally true, then you would expect to see the salaries of union workers lower than non-union. That is not the case.
Steve
Gray- I think that you should first decide if you are happy with the return you are getting on your current leadership. You simply don’t get something for nothing. If you want someone with the knowledge and experience to sit down and understand the issues, then negotiate with the management of large corporations, who have entire legal teams, I think you will have to pay people well into the 6 figures. You might get better leaders if you paid more, but who knows. In the business world they claim that is true. I don’t think it is hard and fast rule.
Steve
I think there’s very little actual evidence that you get what you pay for. There’s a lot more evidence that peer pressure results in people who don’t perform being compensated at very much the same level as those who do. The famous management consultant Peter Drucker taught that after a certain point there are other motivators besides money—doing something worthwhile, being part of a group, reputation, esteem, etc.
I think the question is what sort of motivation do you want in the people who serve you? That’s not only true for union leaders. It’s true for corporate managers, heads of non-profits, and politicians as well.
In corporate managers I think that the stockholders, the companies, and the country as a whole would be better off with managers who were a little more motivated to build companies and a little less motivated to goose stock values (stock values are the main drivers of executive compensation in large companies these days).
Let’s turn to the area with which you’re most familiar, Steve. Do you think the best doctors are those who are the most motivated by money?
The way I would look at it is that the people at the bottom of the pay scale are usually the doctors I want to avoid. There is often a reason for that. For those on top, those who are most motivated by money are seldom the best. Sometimes those who are making the most or almost the most, just based on clinical earnings, are actually pretty good. One of the top 3 (4?) orthopedic earners in the state works in our area. I have worked with him in the past. I have access to his results. (The general public also has access in PA to most of them too.) I have talked with him and he is very motivated by money. I would not send anyone to him.
However, the guy doing the most anterior hips in eastern PA is at a hospital close to us. He has great results, which I can confirm from the PA database, and one of my partners is married to a physical therapist who helps manage a large group of physical therapists. They all praise his results. I don’t know if he is motivated by money, but I know he makes a lot just knowing his numbers.
So, I think your motivation part of the question is key. If a doc’s primary motivation is money I would stay away from them. If they happen to be making a lot of money because they are good, that is different. Note that I said money from clinical activities. The docs who make the very most are usually the entrepreneurs, and they are a real mixed bag.
Steve
Here’s what I think. I think that as you rise above median income there’s some slight improvement in the quality of performance as income rises but the returns to scale fall off very quickly. By three or four standard deviations there are no measurable improvements at all.
In other words I think that, although you can hire better people for $100,000 a year than you can for $50,000 a year, you don’t get much more for your money by paying someone $10 million a year than you would by paying someone $5 million a year.
I would agree with that. You don’t always get what you pay for, but you seldom get more than what you pay for. So, in the case of union leaders negotiating for the unions, if you are going to negotiate with $2million/year lawyers and $10million/year CEOs, I don’t think you will do very well when you send in the discount $50k lawyer. However, you probably don’t gain much between $300k and $2 million, so you can probably get by with the cheaper lawyer/negotiator. Unless it goes to court, then you can end up getting screwed as you can be pretty sure the rich lawyer knows the judges and makes sizable contributions to them in some form, as well as the local Congressman, mayor, senator and governor.
Steve