Leave the Union -- Get More Pay

The Aviation Safeguards employee association voted last year to break away from Service Employees International United last year.

Now the get paid more.

The notion that workers need union action to protect themselves is losing salience. Unions themselves are losing relevance. Strike actions and collective bargaining have throttled state and private firms for too long, forcing generous payouts. Private firms lose profit, but public institutions loose taxpayer dollars, which could be better spent elsewhere, yet the taxpayers themselves have no say how the money is spent.

For decades, union bosses have trumped up an adversarial relationship between worker and employer, as if the management of a firm can depress the wages he offers his workers to the lowest breaking point possible.

In my own experience, I was seeking employment in two different fields. In both cases I was offered the same job in two different locations, which permitted me not only to choose but to influence the hiring firms to offer me something more.

Generally speaking, an employer who can choose freely from the available labor force will provide the best pay he deems acceptable. The number of workers, greater or fewer, can influence the wage offered. Employees unhappy with one offer can seek work elsewhere. The limitations on available work rests with the worker, who often can exercise the choice that he sees fit to relate.

Unionization limits opportunities. "Union shops", especially in the public sector, force members to join if they want to work at the site. This coercion is immoral and unethical, permitting union leaders to take a portion of the employee's wages as merited dues, which are then contributed to select political interests by union leadership.

Hostess Brand, Inc. has already declared bankruptcy and shut its doors following one more failed attempt at negotiations.
If an employee is willing to offer his skills to an open job market, in a matter of time he will find adequate employment.

William Hutt, a British classical liberal economist, studied the immediate and long0term impact of union force. Along with the findings of Walter Williams and Milton Friedman, Hutt discovered that strike-threats hurt the employee, disrupt the free market, and hurt not only consumers and the hiring firms, but force down the wages of non-unionized employees to take advantage of open positions. Unions are notorious for resorting to physical force, breaking down "scab camps" or destroying means of production in order to limit employment opportunities.

The SEIU has threatened a work action on Thanksgiving Day at LAx, the very day when the volume of travelers increases substantially. Strike actions unjustly harm consumers as well as workers. SEIU will also give off a false pretense of solidarity, bringing out workers from other labor unions who have no connection with the airport or its employee base. This collective fraud should diminish any remaining respect for union power in the LA area. We have lost the Twinkie. I am certain that disgruntled passengers will not want to miss their turkey dinners, either.