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  • #16
    Originally posted by gunnut View Post
    Bottom line, government employees should not be able to form a union. That entity directly affects the people it negotiates contracts with by election. As much as I dislike labor unions, at least UAW does not have a member sitting on the board of GM due to conflict of interest. This is not the case in government employee unions. They pump money to get "their" guys elected into public office. Then negotiate with them about pension and pay raises and job security. Sounds like a blatant conflict of interest to me. California is going through this right now.
    There's a thing called freedom of assemby.....I actually agree Unions shouldn't be allowed to donate to political parties, but every worker should have the option to form a Union.

    No compulsion, but the option, if desired.
    Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative.
    - John Stuart Mill.

    Comment


    • #17
      Greece bailout goes forward (provided they can meet the preconditions); Portugal, Spain, Italy and Ireland slide closer to similar debt crises.

      LONDON—Growing fears over potential aid requests from other euro-zone economies following Greece's bailout package drove up the cost of insuring peripheral euro-zone nations' sovereign debt against default on Tuesday.

      The five-year sovereign credit default swaps for Spain widened 0.29 percentage point to 1.87 percentage points, while Portugal widened 0.36 percentage point to 3.12 points, Italy widened 0.14 point to 1.49 points and Ireland widened 0.23 to 2.01 percentage points, according to CMA DataVision.

      Meanwhile, Greek five-year sovereign CDS, after initially moving tighter in early trading Tuesday to reach 6.50 percentage points subsequently widened to 6.83 percentage points in the afternoon.

      Following news of Greece's €110 billion ($145.13 billion) bailout package, attention has turned to the risks posed by other euro-zone members.

      "There is still no systemic liquidity backstop for other nations, and our concern is that other peripheral European countries will enter the spotlight over the summer," Barclays Capital strategists said Tuesday.

      Gary Jenkins, head of fixed-income research at Evolution Securities, said the success of the bailout package won't be measured by the reaction of Greek longer-dated debt, but by the ability of countries like Portugal and Spain to tap the markets at yield levels that aren't penal.

      Sovereign-debt concerns also weighed on the broader credit markets Tuesday, with spreads on European corporate credit derivatives indexes widening.

      The Markit iTraxx Crossover index, which measures the cost of insuring the debt of 50 mostly sub-investment-grade European corporate borrowers against default, was quoted at 4.44 to 4.48 percentage points, wider compared with Monday's close of 4.28 percentage points.

      The Europe index of 125 investment-grade borrowers was also wider at 0. 93 to 0.94 percentage point, compared with Monday's close of 0.88 percentage point.


      Meanwhile, Greek unions announce a general strike.

      Air, sea and rail transport will grind to a halt and the doors to schools, ministries and municipalities will stay padlocked on May 5 as Greece’s largest unions command a general strike in protest against draft legislation outlining austerity measures.

      The 24-hour strike by private sector union GSEE and labour union PAME links up with a 48-hour strike by civil servants’ union ADEDY to bring the country to a standstill until the morning of May 6.

      Travel chaos is expected as air traffic controllers walk off the job, closing Greek airspace and cancelling all flights into and out of the country; ferries will remain in ports; trains will be out of action, and bus and metro drivers will stage an extensive work stoppage. All public services, including ministries, municipalities, pension funds and utilities, will be closed, rubbish will remain uncollected, and hospitals will operate with minimum staff.

      Further, schools, kindergartens and universities will be closed as teachers and professors join the strike; TV and radio casters will be silenced and newspapers out of circulation; courts and most shops will be closed.

      As soon as ministers return to work, they will be voting on the controversial legislation, which is aimed at addressing Greece’s escalating debt problems. Cost-cutting and money-making proposals in the draft law include slashing civil servants’ salaries, increasing VAT to 23%, and raising taxes on alcohol, cigarettes, fuel and cars.

      Mass demonstrations in the centre of Athens are planned by strikers to protest the measures, which the labour union says will lead to job losses. The proposals are opposed by the Communist Party and the Coalition of the Radical Left; main opposition party New Democracy has not taken a stance.

      The legislation would implement a three-year savings plan to reduce the country’s deficit by some €30 billion and bring it from 13.6% of gross domestic product to 2.6% by the end of 2013. This is in line with requirements laid out by the International Monetary Fund and the European Union, which recently approved a €110 billion emergency loan to help Greece address its liquidity and sovereign debt problems.

      In an April 20 interview on Greece’s SKAI TV, financier GeorgeGeorge Soros called Prime Minister George Papandreou’s austerity plan “the only practical course” for a country whose budget was “out of control” and “very badly abused by special interests”.
      Last edited by Genosaurer; 04 May 10,, 19:19. Reason: Formatting failure.
      "Nature abhors a moron." - H.L. Mencken

      Comment


      • #18
        Originally posted by crooks View Post
        There's a thing called freedom of assemby.....I actually agree Unions shouldn't be allowed to donate to political parties, but every worker should have the option to form a Union.

        No compulsion, but the option, if desired.
        There's a thing call freedom of speech too, but we draw the line at yelling fire in a crowded theater or inciting violence. There should also be a line in freedom of assembly in that government employees cannot form a labor union due to conflict of interest.

        Labor unions were originally formed to give workers a fighting chance against oppressive businesses for which they work. What does a "government employee" union mean? That the government is an oppressive one? In that case, the tax payers should also be allowed to form a union and refuse to pay oppressive taxes as a mean of negotiation.

        We don't allow corporations to form unions. What about their right of assembly? They should be allowed to get together and fix prices just like labor unions do. They should be allowed to withhold their products and services as a mean of negotiating a higher margin. Why don't we have those?

        There should be a line in labor unions and I draw it at government employees.
        "Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

        Comment


        • #19
          gunnut,

          There's a thing call freedom of speech too, but we draw the line at yelling fire in a crowded theater or inciting violence. There should also be a line in freedom of assembly in that government employees cannot form a labor union due to conflict of interest.
          the Constitution is applicable to every citizen.

          What does a "government employee" union mean? That the government is an oppressive one?
          there have been more than enough times when a government employee will need to deal with an oppressive boss, deal with unfair negotiating practices, or be a whistleblower, etc. in any case, if you look at size of government, it has remained fairly constant measured against the size of the economy/population for the last 50 years, which should be an indicator that the union doesn't have a vise-grip on everything the government does.

          In that case, the tax payers should also be allowed to form a union and refuse to pay oppressive taxes as a mean of negotiation.
          it's called elections. seriously, though, because of the limited monies involved, you'll find that for the most part, the employer-employee relationship doesn't differ from the workings of any other company. teacher unions, by contrast, wield considerably more power.

          We don't allow corporations to form unions. What about their right of assembly? They should be allowed to get together and fix prices just like labor unions do. They should be allowed to withhold their products and services as a mean of negotiating a higher margin. Why don't we have those?
          we did for a while; 1860s-1910s. what we saw was that their ability to manipulate as a means of negotiations far exceeded what the labor unions could do; ie they could easily afford to "break" a union by outlasting them, bringing in scabs, and hiring private armies.

          There should be a line in labor unions and I draw it at government employees.
          i believe that labor unions in general (to include government employees) should be -restricted- in what they can and can't do, but not abolished. they provide balance and strength against a level of organization that any one individual simply cannot match.

          moreover, we've kept business-labor relations in a fairly good relationship by having the government act as a mediator AND threat to -both- sides. it's when this fails (such as in the case of the teachers unions, or the old laissez-faire policies towards corporations) that there's trouble.
          There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

          Comment


          • #20
            All very good points. And I agree with you that labor unions should be restricted in what they could do. However, look at them now. They are not restricted. They exercise monopolistic powers and influence elections. They are as bad as organized corporations that you mentioned. If they could, they would hire their own armies too. This has to stop. Or we all have Greece in our future. Starting with New York and California.
            "Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

            Comment


            • #21
              Acropolis stormed as European stocks dive
              by John Hadoulis John Hadoulis 2 hrs 49 mins ago

              ATHENS (AFP) – Demonstrators stormed the Acropolis in Athens on Tuesday ahead of a general strike against austerity cuts, as the euro plunged and stock markets tumbled on fears that the Greek debt crisis could spread.

              About 200 protesters broke into the ancient citadel overlooking the Greek capital, chanting slogans against the cuts that Greece is being forced to adopt in order to receive a giant bailout aimed at averting a default on its debts.

              Thousands of workers are to join in a nationwide strike on Wednesday, while the Greek parliament is expected to vote on the deeply unpopular measures on Thursday and European leaders hold a summit to approve the bailout on Friday.

              "We have only one aim, to save Greece, and we are not going to budge," Greek Labour Minister Andreas Loverdos said as the protests mounted.

              Around a thousand demonstrators also massed in front of parliament bearing banners reading "We will not give a penny for the crisis."

              Financial markets fell sharply on fears the 110-billion-euro (145-billion-dollar) bailout for Greece may not be enough and that the crisis could spread to other weak eurozone economies like Ireland, Portugal and Spain.

              On European stock markets, the losses ranged from 2.56 percent in London to 5.41 percent in Madrid, with Milan giving up 4.70 percent, Lisbon 4.21 percent, Dublin 3.97 percent, Paris 3.64 percent and Frankfurt 2.6 percent.

              "The EU/IMF bailout of Greece provides enough funding for the next 12 months or so," commented VTB Capital economist Neil MacKinnon.

              "However, the ability and willingness to bail out another eurozone fiscal miscreant is politically difficult," he added.

              Anxiety over the fallout from the Greek mess also hit the euro, which fell to a one-year low against the dollar at 1.3023. The single currency later traded at 1.3035 dollars against 1.3187 on Monday.

              Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz voiced concern over the terms of the Greek bailout, warning that the severe fiscal austerity measures being adopted in Athens could end up harming the economy.

              "If you cut budgets too excessively the economy gets weaker, tax revenues go down and the improvement in the fiscal position of the country is much less that one would have hoped," he said in an interview with BBC radio.

              Stiglitz, a one-time economic adviser to US president Bill Clinton and a former chief economist at the World Bank, also warned that "the future of the euro may be limited" if there are no major institutional reforms.

              In the first major test of the Greek government's resolve to push through cuts, trade unions have called a general strike with street demonstrations for Wednesday expected to involve hundreds of thousands of people.

              Civil servants began their two-day strike on Tuesday, with at least several hundred members of the 375,000-strong Adedy union demonstrating in Athens.

              "The government is trying to divide the Greek people with lies and giving everything to employers," said Ilias Vrettakos, a senior member of the union, in a speech before the demonstrations got under way.

              The public sector walkout paralysed ministries and municipal offices while hospitals were operating on emergency staff.

              Civil aviation staff also joined the two-day mobilisation, grounding domestic flights on Tuesday and all flights on Wednesday.

              The government aims to cut 30 billion euros from the budget over three years by scrapping annual bonuses for public sector workers and retirees, requiring longer pension contributions and raising sales tax among other measures.

              Eager to keep the Greece debt crisis from spreading to other countries, the European Union and International Monetary agreed the rescue package -- an unprecedented bailout for a eurozone member -- on Sunday.

              The aid still needs an official go-ahead from EU leaders later this week.

              Amid market fears that Spain could be the next to face a fiscal crisis, Spanish Prime Minister Luis Rodriguez Zapatero insisted in Brussels that "any speculation on the eurozone is totally unfounded and irresponsible."

              Germany, which will foot the biggest share of the bailout and was highly reluctant to extend taxpayer cash to Greece, warned the Greek government on Tuesday that loans could be halted if it did not adhere to the austerity plan.

              Austrian Finance Minister Josef Proell also warned Athens that Europe was losing patience with the demonstrations in Greece, urging the government to make protestors understand that there was no alternative to austerity cuts.

              "Regarding the protests in Greece, I, along with the rest of Europe, am near the end of my tether," Proell said, insisting that loans "will be dished out step by step, when (austerity) measures have been carried out."
              Copyright © 2010 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserve
              To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

              Comment


              • #22
                3 dead as anti-austerity riots erupt in Athens
                By DEREK GATOPOULOS and ELENA BECATOROS, Associated Press Writer Derek Gatopoulos And Elena Becatoros, Associated Press Writer 15 mins ago

                ATHENS, Greece – Riots over harsh new austerity measures left three bank workers dead and engulfed the streets of Athens on Wednesday, as angry protesters tried to storm parliament, hurled Molotov cocktails at police and torched buildings. Police responded with barrages of tear gas.

                Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in a nationwide strike to protest new taxes and government spending cuts demanded by the International Monetary Fund and other European nations before heavily indebted Greece gets a euro110 billion ($141 billion) loan package to keep it from defaulting.

                The three bank workers — a man and two women — died after demonstrators set their bank on fire along the main demonstration route in central Athens. As their colleagues sobbed in the street, five other bank workers were rescued from the balcony of the burning building.

                "A demonstration is one thing and murder is quite another!" Prime Minister George Papandreou thundered in Parliament during a session to discuss the spending cuts he announced Sunday — measures even the IMF has called draconian. Lawmakers held a minute of silence for the dead — the first deaths during a protest in Greece since 1991.

                "We are all concerned by Greece's economic and budgetary situation but at this time our thoughts are with the human victims in Athens," European Union President Herman Van Rompuy said in Brussels.

                A senior fire department official said demonstrators prevented firefighters from reaching the burning building, costing them vital time.

                "Several crucial minutes were lost," the official said, visibly upset. "If we had intervened earlier, the loss of life could have been prevented."

                He asked not to be identified pending an official announcement.

                In Berlin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel called the Greek bailout critical for all of Europe.

                "Nothing less than the future of Europe, and with that the future of Germany in Europe, is at stake," Merkel told lawmakers in Berlin, urging them to quickly pass the country's share of the bailout — euro22 billion ($28 billion) over three years — by Friday. "We are at a fork in the road."

                Greece faces a May 19 due date on debt it says it can't repay without the help.

                In Brussels, European Union officials desperately tried to calm market fears that Greece's debt crisis was spreading to the rest of Europe, insisting it was a "unique case" combining profligacy and tampered accounts. Van Rompuy insisted the growing debt problems in Spain and Portugal had "absolutely nothing to do with the situation in Greece."

                "Greece is a unique and particular case in the EU" because of its "precarious debt dynamics" and because it "has cheated with its statistics for years and years," EU Commissioner Olli Rehn said.

                But Moody's Investor Services, a major ratings agency, put Portugal's bond rating on review for possible downgrade Wednesday. Spanish and Portuguese bonds and stocks slumped further on the news, reflecting fears that they may also have trouble repaying their debt and that the eurozone would have to extend even larger bailouts to them.

                On the streets of Athens, demonstrators chanted "Thieves, thieves!" as they attempted to break through a riot police cordon guarding Parliament and chased ceremonial guards away from the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in front of the building.

                Tear gas drifted across the city center as rioters hurled paving stones and fire bombs at police. Firefighters extinguished blazes at least two buildings — the bank and a branch of the Finance Ministry — while protesters set up burning barricades and torched cars and a fire truck.

                Police said 12 people were injured in the riots.

                The marches came amid a 24-hour nationwide general strike that grounded all flights to and from Greece, shut down ports, schools and government services, and left hospitals working with emergency medical staff. The Acropolis and all other ancient sites were closed and journalists also walked off the job, suspending television and radio news broadcasts.

                But media later broke the strike to report on the deaths and the protests.

                Violence also broke out in the northern city of Thessaloniki, where another 20,000 people marched through the city center and some youths smashed store windows.

                Union reaction over austerity measures until now had been relatively muted by Greece's volatile standards, despite several previous strikes. But anger mounted after Papandreou announced cuts in salaries and pensions for civil servants and another round of consumer tax increases.

                Papandreou said he has no choice but to implement the measures if Greece was to avoid bankruptcy.

                "There was only one other solution — for the country to default, taking the citizenry with it. And that would not have affected the rich, it would have affected workers and pensioners," he told Parliament on Wednesday. "That was a real possibility, however nightmarish."

                Under the bailout package, Greece will receive loans over three years from the IMF and the other 15 countries who share the euro currency. The rescue aims to prevent Athens' debt troubles from becoming a wider crisis for the euro.

                But the rioting underlined skepticism that the Greek government could keep up its end of the bargain, helping drive the euro below $1.29 for the first time in over a year.

                Even with the bailout, many economists think Greece will eventually default on or restructure its debts because its prospects for economic growth are so poor over the next several years, hurting government revenue. Some fear the austerity measures insisted upon by the EU and IMF could make prospects for growth even worse.

                Unions say low-income Greeks will suffer disproportionately from the latest austerity measures, which aim to save euro30 billion ($40 billion) — the country's current budget deficit — through 2012.

                "These people are losing their rights, they are losing their future," said Yiannis Panagopoulos, head of GSEE, one of the two largest unions. "The country cannot surrender without a fight."

                IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn warned that the crisis could spread to other countries despite the rescue package's efforts to contain it.

                "Everyone must remain extremely vigilant" to this risk, Strauss-Kahn said in an interview in French newspaper Le Parisien Wednesday.

                "I completely understand the Greek populations' anger, its incomprehension at the size of the economic catastrophe," Strauss-Kahn said. But, he said, Greeks must also understand that without these measures "the situation would be infinitely more serious."

                The draft bill of the new austerity measures is to be voted on Thursday. Papandreou's Socialists hold a comfortable majority of 160 in the 300-seat Parliament and the bill is expected to pass easily.

                ___

                APTN crews in Athens and Associated Press writers Nicholas Paphitis in Athens, Greg Keller in Paris and Raf Casert and Emma Vandore in Brussels contributed.
                Copyright © 2010 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved
                To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

                Comment


                • #23
                  The Greek bailout it seems, will have ramifications for all countries and their populations who contribute to the IMF.

                  Received in my e-mail a couple of days ago from John Mauldin and his "outside the box" comments.


                  Volume 6 - Issue 20
                  May 3, 2010

                  Let me start this week's Outside the Box by venting a little anger. It now looks like almost 30% of the Greek financing will come from the IMF, rather than just a small portion. And since 40% of the IMF is funded by US taxpayers, and that debt will be JUNIOR to current bond holders (if the rumors are true) I can't tell you how outraged that makes me.

                  What that means is that US (and Canadian and British, etc.) tax payers will be giving money to Greece who will use a lot of it to roll over old bonds, letting European banks and funds reduce their exposure to Greece while tax-payers all over the world who fund the IMF assume that risk. And does anyone really think that Greece will pay that debt back? IMF debt should be senior and no bank should be allowed to roll over debt and reduce their exposure to Greek debt on the back of foreign tax-payers.

                  I don't think I signed on for that duty. Why should my tax money go to help European banks? This is just wrong on so many levels and there is nothing seemingly we can do. Oh, well. Thanks for listening.
                  He is not a happy camper and if this is what the European banks are planning on, what will be the extent of our exposure if Spain and Portugal follow the Greek experience.

                  As if we don't have enough problems paddling our own canoes for a while.

                  Cheers.

                  Comment


                  • #24
                    夫唯不爭,故天下莫能與之爭。

                    Comment


                    • #25
                      Originally posted by astralis View Post
                      ...there have been more than enough times when a government employee will need to deal with an oppressive boss, deal with unfair negotiating practices, or be a whistleblower, etc.
                      So you're saying the labor laws in the US are inadequate to protect a government worker, but they are okay for the private sector worker?

                      Can you give us a specific example of an unfair negotiating practice by the government?
                      "We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008

                      Comment


                      • #26
                        highsea,

                        So you're saying the labor laws in the US are inadequate to protect a government worker, but they are okay for the private sector worker?
                        where did you get that from my quote?

                        Can you give us a specific example of an unfair negotiating practice by the government?
                        not negotiating, but see the results of NSPS implementation.
                        There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

                        Comment


                        • #27
                          Originally posted by captain View Post
                          The Greek bailout it seems, will have ramifications for all countries and their populations who contribute to the IMF.

                          Received in my e-mail a couple of days ago from John Mauldin and his "outside the box" comments.

                          Volume 6 - Issue 20
                          May 3, 2010

                          Let me start this week's Outside the Box by venting a little anger. It now looks like almost 30% of the Greek financing will come from the IMF, rather than just a small portion. And since 40% of the IMF is funded by US taxpayers, and that debt will be JUNIOR to current bond holders (if the rumors are true) I can't tell you how outraged that makes me.

                          What that means is that US (and Canadian and British, etc.) tax payers will be giving money to Greece who will use a lot of it to roll over old bonds, letting European banks and funds reduce their exposure to Greece while tax-payers all over the world who fund the IMF assume that risk. And does anyone really think that Greece will pay that debt back? IMF debt should be senior and no bank should be allowed to roll over debt and reduce their exposure to Greek debt on the back of foreign tax-payers.

                          I don't think I signed on for that duty. Why should my tax money go to help European banks? This is just wrong on so many levels and there is nothing seemingly we can do. Oh, well. Thanks for listening.

                          He is not a happy camper and if this is what the European banks are planning on, what will be the extent of our exposure if Spain and Portugal follow the Greek experience.

                          As if we don't have enough problems paddling our own canoes for a while.

                          Cheers.
                          There is heavy irony in this given the recent Wall Street debacle where even the dear old NZ Reserve Bank needed to pump in over $80billion to help stabilise international markets....
                          In the realm of spirit, seek clarity; in the material world, seek utility.

                          Leibniz

                          Comment


                          • #28
                            Originally posted by astralis View Post
                            highsea,



                            where did you get that from my quote?
                            Well, your explanation to gunnut for public unions was that employees needed protection from oppressive bosses, unfair negotiation practices, or whistleblower protection.

                            Since US labor laws already provide those protections for workers in the private sector, I can only assume you think they are inadequate for public employees, hence the need for public unions.
                            Originally posted by astralis View Post
                            not negotiating, but see the results of NSPS implementation.
                            Unresponsive. I'm not the Amazing Kreskin, you will have to provide specifics if you want me to understand your argument.
                            "We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008

                            Comment


                            • #29
                              highsea,

                              Since US labor laws already provide those protections for workers in the private sector, I can only assume you think they are inadequate for public employees, hence the need for public unions.
                              labor unions tend to spring up as a balance when there's a preponderance of power on the corporate side; they tend to be more -active- when corporate -uses- its power.

                              that's why we also have labor unions in the private sector despite the existence of those protections. note that labor unions generally are a lot less active than they were 100 or 50 years ago, when these protections were non-existent or nascent.

                              Unresponsive. I'm not the Amazing Kreskin, you will have to provide specifics if you want me to understand your argument.
                              DOD implemented the National Security Personnel System as a replacement for the old General Schedule system. the idea at the time (2004-5) was to create a system that was more accountable and incorporated more employer/employee evals on a 1-5 scale as part of the promotion/pay process.

                              sounds good-- only when it actually WAS implemented, it was a mess-- some supervisors played pet favorites, for instance; a later investigation showed that white employees somehow did better than all other ethnicities in terms of performance ratings and bonusses. some branches of DoD did far better than other branches-- the military services tended to grade civilians on a stricter scale than the other branches.

                              this was only brought up because public unions raised a cry and hue.
                              There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

                              Comment


                              • #30
                                Originally posted by astralis View Post
                                labor unions tend to spring up as a balance when there's a preponderance of power on the corporate side; they tend to be more -active- when corporate -uses- its power.

                                that's why we also have labor unions in the private sector despite the existence of those protections. note that labor unions generally are a lot less active than they were 100 or 50 years ago, when these protections were non-existent or nascent.
                                You're giving rationale for unions in the private sector. The union as a counter to the profit motive.

                                Doesn't apply to the public sector.
                                Originally posted by astralis View Post
                                DOD implemented the National Security Personnel System as a replacement for the old General Schedule system. the idea at the time (2004-5) was to create a system that was more accountable and incorporated more employer/employee evals on a 1-5 scale as part of the promotion/pay process.

                                sounds good-- only when it actually WAS implemented, it was a mess-- some supervisors played pet favorites, for instance; a later investigation showed that white employees somehow did better than all other ethnicities in terms of performance ratings and bonusses. some branches of DoD did far better than other branches-- the military services tended to grade civilians on a stricter scale than the other branches.

                                this was only brought up because public unions raised a cry and hue.
                                So is there a GAO report or review that details the things you are referring to? What you seem to be saying is that there is institutionalized racism in the DOD disguised as a pay-for-performance program.
                                "We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008

                                Comment

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