Tag Archives: Labor Union

News

Are unions to blame for the bankruptcy of A and P groceries?

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From Yahoo News.

Excerpt:

The fall into bankruptcy court by the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. is the culmination of years of decline but creates an opportunity for its competitors and could mean further consolidation in the supermarket industry.

The nation’s oldest grocer filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Sunday after years of struggling with enormous debt, falling sales and rising competition from low-priced peers.

[…]A&P, like most grocers, is struggling with the weak economy, reduced spending by consumers and intense competition. The company said aggressive competition from nontraditional food retailers like warehouse clubs, discount chains such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc., and dollar stores have compounded the problem.

[…]It is also struggling with pension costs, lease costs for store locations it has closed, and a contract with C&S Wholesale Grocers Inc., which provides the majority of its inventory, which it has been unable to negotiate down to lower costs.

[…]A&P also has one of the most heavily unionized work forces in the business, with 95 percent of its workers covered under collective bargaining agreements. It said in its filing it would seek to work with the unions to lower those costs.

I wonder why Wal-mart is doing so well compared to A&P. Oh I know – Wal-mart isn’t 95% unionized. In fact, Wal-mart opposes unions, because employers should not be forced to pay dues to Democrat union bosses in order to keep what they earn by the sweat of their own brow.

News

Union that pushed for Obamacare drops medical coverage of children

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From the Wall Street Journal. (H/T Don Surber via ECM)

Excerpt:

One of the largest union-administered health-insurance funds in New York is dropping coverage for the children of more than 30,000 low-wage home attendants, union officials said. The union blamed financial problems it said were caused by the state’s health department and new national health-insurance requirements.

The fund is administered by 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union. Union officials said the state compelled the fund to start buying coverage from a third party, which increased premiums by 60%. State health officials denied forcing the union fund to make the switch, saying the fund had been struggling financially even before the switch to third-party coverage.

The fund informed its members late last month that their dependents will no longer be covered as of Jan. 1, 2011. Currently about 6,000 children are covered by the benefit fund, some until age 23.

No one ever said that union members were wizards at economics. At least this time they have to face their own ignorance.

News

New Jersey turnpike wasted millions on perks

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From Fox New York.

Excerpt:

Auditors say the New Jersey Turnpike Authority wasted $43 million on unneeded perks and bonuses.  In one case, an employee with a base salary of $73,469 earned $321,985 when all payouts and bonuses were included.

The audit says that toll dollars From the New Jersey Turnpike and the Garden State Parkway were spent on items ranging from an employee bowling league to employee bonuses for working on birthdays and holidays.

It took place as tolls were being increased.

The biggest expense uncovered in the audit was $30 million in unjustified bonuses to employees and management in 2008 and 2009 without consideration of performance.

One example was paying employees overtime for removing snow and working holidays and then giving additional “snow removal bonuses” and “holiday bonuses.”

The Comptroller’s Office audit released Tuesday says taxpayers also paid $430,000 for free E-ZPass transponders for employees to get to work and nearly $90,000 in scholarships for workers’ kids.

The audit shows turnpike authority employees got bonuses and overtime for working their birthdays and holidays.

Comptroller Matt Boxer says tolls are set for another increase in 2012.

[…]Another audit finding was that employees were allowed to cash out a portion of their unused sick and vacation days at the end of the year to circumvent the current $15,000 limit for sick leave payouts upon retirement.  That cost $3.8 million a year.

New Jersey is a hard blue state. Deep, deep blue.

If a private company did something crazy wasting money like this, they would be out of business because their prices would be higher when compared to their competitors. That’s why government is inefficient and wasteful – it has no competitors. We need to keep everything possible in the private sector and have transparency, accountability and whistleblower protections to contain government corruption and fraud.