More “Bidenomics” vs “Trumpenomics” news…

Trump’s re-election super pac is starting the election year with barely $5 million left after Trump spent $115 million on legal fees, Melania’s hair, his own plane, and who knows what else (like $20k for a fake union rally in a non union shop with actors playing union workers while Biden walked the actual picket lines with actual union workers).
Yes, Trump’s re-election campaign has $5 million left of the $120 million he had last year, and the RNC is completely bankrupt in most states.

Conversely, just one superpac for Biden just ordered $250 million in campaign advertising, the biggest political ad buy in history.

Gonna be a pretty one sided campaign…do you think Trump can beat Biden from his basement like Biden beat Trump from his? 😂

Uh oh…Habba has been caught lying to the judge again, this time claiming she had a high fever and likely covid to get a delay in the current trial, then instead of going home after leaving court she went with Trump campaigning and doing press events for the next 3 days….caught by a massive MAGgot and Jan 6 attacker who took a friendly picture with her and was thrown out of the Trump event without explanation. That photo has now gone public and exposed her lies to the judge. Really dumb to lie to the judge before trial ends….that’s Trump.
Bonus- The UAW president torched Trump during the union’s public endorsement of Biden, reminding everyone how Biden came to the picket lines with the UAW and supported blue collar working Americans while Trump went to a non union shop, hired actors to pretend to be union workers, and trashed the union in his speeches. He’s lost young voters, women, minorities, and union workers, never had educated professionals…who’s left? Uneducated unemployed racist white guys…your people. Probably why he’s saying he intends to give MORE tax cuts to corporations and the .001% but not to average Americans, their taxes will go up again. BTW, those massive deficit exploding tax cuts not only didn’t pay for themselves at all nor did they raise the GDP, they crashed the economy to near depression and the debt skyrocketed faster than ever before.
And Gaetz’s sex trafficking investigation is ramping up, talking to the girls and young women he bragged about sleeping with after paying and shipping them across the country for sex. Where is Greene’s outrage? Completely absent, because it’s all fake outrage.

Yay!

My first time for SOTW.


I'd like to thank the academy, my mom and dad, and all the lazy non-unionized, cement layers living under military dictatorships the world over!

Crap video full of crap. And I've worked in the US myself, and lived most of my life in Canada(being Canadian).

Even up here in Canada, Walmart pays more than the min. wage. Hell it pays more than the average local store, or even larger stores, chain stores, or other bigbox retail stores for PT/FT in terms of wages.

Example in Ontario: Walmart starting wage: 13.25/hr(current min wage 10.25/hr), FT/PT, not counting benefits.
Gas station attendant: 10.55-12.08/hr
Large bigbox store sale clerk: 10.85/hr
L-BB Manager: 13.85-15.80/hr
Mom&pop specialized clerk: 10.85-12.10/hr
Fast food: 10.25-12.10/hr
Non-unionized janitors: 10.25-13/hr
Managers fast food: 13-15/hr
Regional Managers Fast food: 14.25-25.30/hr
Managers Walmart: 16.25-25/hr
Regional managers Walmart 18.80-27.80/hr

And...on top if that here, if you need a hand go to the damned food bank. And stop blowing your money on the latest gadets.

Must be a non-union site

@snoozedoctor, I don't think being a capitalist is a dirty word. It doesn't have to be, at least. I was just trying to talk to you from your own worldview.

As far as not having a choice to go to a non-union shop -- well, tough beans. There are plenty of places where there is no union shop option. So that logic doesn't hold water -- just sounds like whining at not getting your own way exactly the way you want it.

Capitalists don't whine. Capitalists put on their big kid underwear and act.

@snoozedoctor asks: "You shouldn't HAVE to join. Explain why I should HAVE to join."

You clearly are a capitalist who believes in paying for what you get. To get union wages and union benefits, you HAVE TO PAY FOR IT. You don't want an union job or union benefits, then go work for the non-union shop. You have absolute free choice in the matter.

Otherwise, you would be a freeloader, right? Getting something for nothing? Can't have that now, can we?

I cannot speak to the laws in Canada, but in the US companies are required by law to provide as safe a work environment as possible. The unions did help to put these laws into place many years ago, but the laws are there now.

In your example, you clearly show that young, untrained people are able to make almost double the amount you did up until your recent job. In addition to this, they have very good job security and benefits. This is great for them, but as you said, if you don't want to support the union due to your own beliefs, you are going to be forced to work somewhere else. It does not matter if you are more skilled or a harder worker, simply because you are unwilling to join a union.

You also lay the blanket claim that the workers benefiting from these socialistic practices are not affecting the profit of the company in anyway, nor the output to the shareholders. You do not mention the costs passed along to the consumer of the final products, but lets overlook that for a second. You do not have the figures to show that the shareholders are making millions or billions, nor do you appear to have a basic understanding of what profits a shareholder gets from the net profit of a company. Typically the main profit a shareholder gets is the value of the stock increasing, not dividends paid to them from the net profit. Stock can increase in a union-based company, but it typically does so at a slower rate than a non-union company. This can also affect the solvency of the company, as it is harder to get loans or sell more stock when it is such a slow return.

Now to go back to the point I mentioned about the passing on of costs, the people primarily subsidizing your example employees are the people buying the products that they produce. Companies prefer to pass on these costs to the consumer if they can, simply because the nature of a corporation is to show a profit. No profit or small profits lead to the situation I mentioned above with the stock price and the desirability of the stock. So customers are paying for these extra wages, and may be forced to do so for some time, UNTIL products come in from non-union companies and undercut the price. Then you have a crashing stock price and or closing of the company, all because of an anachronistic union catering to unskilled or semi-skilled employees.

The simple point is, unions provide job security that should not exist in the type of jobs they typically are involved in. They provide wages and benefits far higher than those type of jobs should generally have. This is great for the people in the union, but not so great for everyone else. Nor is it sustainable in today's global economy, because unless your government closes it's economic borders to imports, there will be another country that will do the work for FAR less and undercut your product.

As I explain above, you don't have to join. Just go to a non-unionized workforce and get a job. Your problem is solved. You will make less money without job security, but you don't have to join anything.
Your welcome.

As for the political spending, I assume the union is going to support the party that is going to do the most to support those workers. It's like a super pack

Also, In Canada, we don't have the corrupt bribing system the US has in place for political parties.

I am not a defender of all unions. There are many unions out there and I can't have the facts on all of them.

I have been in the workforce since I was a teenager in high school. I've worked a lot of jobs. All of them non-union. Not once did I have a wage that kept me above poverty. And these jobs were considered decent jobs. I never had a paycheck more than $12-13/h and Never did I have a job where I felt secure in my future.

My current job is the first job I've ever had that was unionized. I make about $22/h. Not an amazing paycheck for my line of work, definitely lower than in the public sector, but my job feels secure and I have a decent benefits package so I know my job will take care of my family.

I come from a northern town where forestry is the main industry. Mill jobs are all Union and it's a decent living. Most young people who start at the mill never leave because they just can't get that kind of pay anywhere else. To do so is to take a drastic cut in pay. I'm not talking a rich man's paycheck. I'm saying they can buy a house, feed their kids, buy a quad and go camping and fishing in the summer. Not extravagant but nothing to complain about.

Now, those mills like to restructure and cut and skimp and save money left, right and center. They run three shifts a day and they NEVER shut down. (OK, they shut down once a year at run-off but that's when the equipment gets serviced).

These mills make profits in the millions/billions for their shareholders. Don't you think for one second that without the unions, the Mills would cut salaries, skimp on safety and eliminate job security while slashing benefits. Everyone working those mills benefit from the presence of the union. They all pay dues, NO ONE complains and it's never been an issue. Ever.

If you don't want to be a union worker, you get a job in town at 1/3-1/2 the pay and no job security. No one holds a gun to your head and tells you where to work. But if you want to get a job with a pay check you can raise kids on, then let the union stand behind you and defend you.

OK,
They don't force you to join so you can get a job.
If you are going to join a unionized workforce, yes, you need to join, but there is nothing from stopping you from working at a non-union job for less pay down the street.

^ I've been in a union for near twenty years now. I'm sorry the company you worked for was so lax towards their employees and what they expected of them. Mine isn't, and people are hired and fired if they can't cut it. We get excellent medical and dental and earn more than non-union shops in the same industry.

You really like unions, but you support this bill? That's like talking out your mouth and your ass at the same time. You have a problem with lazy people, huh? And your solution is to get rid of unions? There's a guy like you in every shop. Doesn't have the seniority for a choice bid, so he hates all the "lazy" fucks he has to work with that have already put in their time (years) working the shitty bid you're stuck with. The problem isn't unions. It's companies who treat their employees like inmates, and hero co-workers like yourself who nobody wants to work with anyway. You really like unions? You have no fucking clue what they are and what they have done for you and the middle class in this country. You should be thankful they earn enough disposable income to cross the bridge and spend their money up there.

Who decides what is fair working conditions and pay? I draw your attention to the recent Twinkie debacle where the Bakers Union was unwilling to accept a pay cut and benefit decrease to a 25 dollar an hour semi-skilled job. I've worked in a highly skilled computer field for 20+ years and it was at least 10 years before I made that level of pay and benefits, plus my 'pension' was a 409k plan.

In truth, Unions came about to counter practices such as monopolies, anti-competition agreements, and general mistreatment of unskilled to semi-skilled employees during the Industrial Revolution. Since then we have enacted numerous laws, which in all fairness many of which were furthered by the early unions, that have eliminated most of these practices. Unions now are simply a form of Socialism in which unskilled to semi-skilled employees, such as the ones in the aforementioned Baker's Union, are able to manipulate wages to a level that is anti-competitive and prevent non-union workers from replacing them.

In the United States, the outsourcing of labor has been partially driven by increasing costs of union partnership, which gives other countries a comparative advantage in labour, making it more efficient to perform labour-intensive work there. You cannot justify paying extreme wages and benefits to people with minimal skills that can be easily replaced. Corporations have duties to their customers and shareholders that go beyond protecting laborers that can easily be replaced.

@renatojj

Church has high interested in religious candidates being elected. Most of the debates going on in politics are based on religious philosophy. Few off the top of my head are abortion, creationism, and women's rights. They've been going against the grain of the Constitution trying to get creationism which is a arguably religion based subject taught in schools. Which in turn possibly gets them more followers, which in turn gets them more tithing and more people in their "group" giving them more power. In fact I would argue they are specifically trying to erode the line between church and state with these arguments, injecting religion based reasons into many of the arguments.

Big media networks push for things like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996 where the reason for the bill is not actually what ends up happening. It was supposed to deregulate and open up the market for competition and instead it allowed them to reconsolidate by buying up competitors. And they largely don't fight with censorship on curse words because generally it drives off their audience, and those networks that don't have to censor curse words charge for the privilege of hearing them and seeing some nudity to boot. And they also support SOPA-like bills which are essential a blanket tool to censor the web....they also support monitoring and traffic shaping on the networks they control...which is another potential avenue for censorship.

You'll have to be more specific on what you're getting at......all these groups are eroding divisions we built through regulation and have been doing so steadily since the 80s at every opportunity across industries.

I've already shown that given the chance, they buy up competition to remain a monopoly. Look at ISPs, look at all the oil companies we USED to have. Look at the media conglomerates that own the majority of your radio stations ( I think there's two major radio networks, but they have like a million different stations under the same banners so it LOOKS like choice). How the record labels and movie industries are all tied together and often even tied into the same parent company that owns your ISP. Cell phone industry, ATT trying to buy T Mobile which would have brought it down to 3 major providers and they did it in the name of "better service" but still haven't announced plans to build out their infrastructure since the deal went through...why? Because it wasn't about better service, it was about buying up a competitor that offered plans at prices people preferred.

When people are unhappy with their ISPs they've tried to form local government run coop non-profit ISPs, and they get sued by the huge companies who refuse to service their area. It's happened multiple times. With regulation, they would have to provide internet to those places in a timely manner instead of preventing people from doing their own thing.

Did GoDaddy pay dearly for supporting SOPA? I heard they lost 30k subscribers at some point, but did they really? You'll have to show me on that. GoDaddy did lots of terrible things before it, yet they were still a huge provider and still are. They cybersquat on domain names people search for and allow you to buy them at "auction" from them when you try to look up if it's taken or not..they snatch it up to sell to you. They also give away people's domain names with no repercussions and a myriad of other things. Sounds like it needs a regulatory body with some teeth on it to make them act right or shut them down.

Unions are actually a really good way to fight monopolies and under the table deals, but they've been systematically villified. And unions aren't monopolies if they aren't mandatory, and most places are not fully unionized anymore. Often times they will have sections with union employees to do government work and non-union to do non-government work. Non-union guys make half the rate of union guys usually, and have less protections in place to keep themselves from getting shafted. But I don't really see how a union is a monopoly when there are lots of unions and lots of individuals in a union who make decisions for themselves and not as a collective like a company would. IE a company has a "head" that directs it and unions are a collective of individuals. Companies are people after all, unions are not (they are made up of people).

There are laws governing behavior usually based roughly on societal standards. Like pot being illegal is kind of against most of the societies beliefs, yet it remains illegal is an example of where it doesn't quite track. But overall we have laws that say you can't write a check that you know won't cash. Drunk driving, trespassing, vandalism, theft.....yelling fire in a crowded building.......setting off the fire alarm for fun.....etc. Giving people the finger isn't against the law....well probably not in most places so that might fall under social pressure. But we see that social pressure fails miserably at stopping bad behavior, so we have laws to enforce behavior...like not stealing and not murdering. This is society and people holding other people to standards, without the law to judge and convict them by the only thing you have left is personal interpretation and meeting out punishment by each individual or vigilante justice.

If you don't regulate business there is nothing stopping them, because nothing about our market is free. You can't have a free market without perfect information. You can't know every possible thing going on, so you will never have perfect information even if it was possible. So you will have swindlers and knock offs, pyramid schemes, etc. And without laws and regulations on these things, you will never be able to punish the company for what they did in a court of law.

Even if they were 100% above the board honest, they'd still be sourcing their materials from overseas and getting inferior materials to what you are paying for. It happens to the military all the time right now. They buy a bunch of nuts and bolts and some of them are chinese knockoffs that fail well after the installation is done and the machine is in operation. They can't catch them because china is basically lawless when it comes to producing goods for knock off purposes. It could just as easily be a US source doing it if we de-regulated everything and made no way for people to sue them into oblivion...because the damage would be done as soon as you buy a knock off and it fries the rest of your stuff.

The definition of "free market" right now means they want to be able to buy stuff cheap as shit from overseas and charge you US built prices for it. And when it comes to financial industry "free market" means they want to have speculation upon speculation to where the financial industry has 10-100x more money leveraged than what actually exists. It's a house of cards if they can just inflate it without any kind of acceptable risks being enforced.