Thread: salary as a construction worker in union

Originally Posted by KelJu

No man, that isn't at all what is happening here. I think the truth about it all comes down to us vs them mentality: blue collar vs white collar. Then add a bunch of ego on top, and you get stupid debates like this.

First, neither job is easier than the other. You are comparing apples and oranges.

I have done both. I was blue collar from the age of 15 to 26. I have been white collar for the past two years. For the most part, I made way more money as a blue collar worker. The work sucked most of the time, but it was stress free. You do your 40 or 50 hours and the rest of the time is yours. It cost relatively little to nothing to start a blue collar career. You can start it right out of high school or sooner.

With white collar work, you stay stressed the fuck out much of the time. Your brain is hyperactive just trying to keep up. Stop paying attention for a second, and you fall behind. Lose your drive to excel, and you become obsolete. White collar work usually involves a lot of personal sacrifice to get ahead: years lost going to school, money and time spent obtaining experience and certifications. You might lose 6 years of your life only to start out at the bottom in a ton of debt and a long battle ahead of you.

White collar work has a massive spectrum for pay. White collar work can pay anywhere from 25,000 to billions of dollars a year. Depends on how good you are at what you do, how well you placed yourself to be in demand, how good your networking skills are, and what family connections you were born into.

The anger about who should make what isn't so much about white collar people thinking they should make more than blue collar. The anger is about unions strangling American industry to death. I would rather pay an illegal Alien to lay my tile, than to pay some union turd $30 an hour to do something I could learn to do in a few days. I will not buy domestic cars, because union work is much more expensive and is sub par to foreign automobile work.

Impressive. A well thought out line of reasoning for not liking unions that isn't expletive laden.

Keep this in mind: I am NOT a union worker. Haven't been for nearly 20 years when I belonged to a meat cutting union for holiday work when going to university. Also have a bachelor of science degree in business management.

Since graduating I've been a blue collar worker in a niche field: Automotive testing. Nothing glamorous and I'm not going to be immensely wealthy, either. But I will live comfortably which is all I need, I'm not greedy or jealous of the other guy.

My current employer, a major automotive supplier, has eliminated nearly all their hourly union employees while sending all the work outside the US with the goal being to totally eliminate manufacturing in the US. Currently we have two US plants and nearly a dozen outside the US. Since the middle of last year it has been the two US plants providing the profit to offset the global losses and netting a total profit well into eight figures. Profit, not revenue. With the value of the dollar versus other currencies it is cheaper to manufacture in the US than it is to do so overseas. Much cheaper.

At the same time we are having major warranty issues with the products being made outside the US. To the point where management is sweating bullets because warranty costs will be shifted to us from the OEM over the next few years. Also threatening the beloved six sigma qualification. The products made in the US aren't having that problem.

Conclusion? The economy is the stranglehold on US businesses, not the workers. Blaming the workers for poor business practices or bad economic forces is just plain silly.

Originally Posted by TheGreatSatan

I HATE FUCKING UNIONS.....
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but if I could get in, I'd rape the hell out of the opportunity. I guess you have to have family already in or something....? It's like the mob

Why do you hate them?

Because they get paid waaaay too much and then strike cuz it's still not enough. And they have a stupid amount of gov't power even though unions only represent like 12% of the workforce....

Walmart probably has more employees. Then they try to take over stores that don't have unions by turning their employees against the company. Even those who choose not to join still HAVE to pay union fees.