UAW PRESIDENT IS OUT OF TOUCH WITH REALITY

Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.” —Ronald Reagan

UAW president, Gettelfinger, had a press conference immediately after the Senate failed to pass the Big 3 bail out package and showed that he is out of touch with reality.
Mr.Ron Gettelfinger, in a press conference Friday morning, blamed Republican senators, who he said resented his organization! He further tried to muddy the swirling waters that are about to bring down the Big 3 with this statement." There is no question that the UAW has demonstrated leadership in this process. There were some in the Senate, who, we felt, resented that.”(bloggers note: he has a strange concept of what leadership his union has?)

If you look at the financial report for a UAW local, you will see that 62% of all dues are sent to the International in the form of a per capita tax. Some of that tax goes into something the UAW calls a Community Action Program (CAP). These CAP’s are mostly used to support liberal Democratic candidates. The biggest UAW CAP in Kentucky reported in 2002 that it had expenses of $79,999 of which $77,785 was for “Other Disbursements” but it doesn’t tell what those other disbursements were. You’ve got to wonder how union members can figure out what the union is doing with their dues when 97% of the money is unaccounted for. In 2003 the US Dept of Labor issued new regulations for union financial disclosure statements to give union members a better idea of what was really happening to their dues. Not surprisingly, the unions opposed these new regulations every step of the way. Why is it that the unions don’t want their members to know about what is being done with THEIR money? Perhaps they don’t want you to know that the UAW owns a radio broadcasting network that lost $3 million in 2002 and a golf course that lost $321,000 in 2002!

In 2001 President Bush issued an executive order which required federal contractors to inform their workers of their Beck rights. The UAW filed a lawsuit against the Bush Administration in an effort to block this Executive Order. The UAW has even FIRED members from their jobs for exercising their Beck rights. Recently a former Colt Manufacturing employee won a judgment against the UAW because of his illegal firing. HIS CASE HAD BEEN CONSOLIDATED WITH DOZENS OF OTHERS IN A NATIONWIDE CASE AGAINST THE UAW. Why doesn’t the UAW want its members to know their rights??? What are they trying to hide???

Gettelfinger also said that since financial workers were not asked to make concessions in the $700 billion bailout, senators were applying a double standard to the UAW".
The point he missed apparently, is the FACT THAT HIS UNIONS SALARY AND BENEFIT STRUCTURE IS SO HIGH THAT THE big 3 HAS TO PRICE THEIR CARS ON AVERAGE 3 TO 5 THOUSAND DOLLARS ABOVE SIMILAR PERFORMING CARS MADE IN THE USA BY FOREIGN MANUFACTURERS THAT PAY THEIR EMPLOYEES 20-30 DOLLARS(salary and benefits) LESS PER HOUR THAN UAW EMPLOYEES.And the foreign car maker employees still make a enviable and credible salary.

This fact is supported by Dan Griswold, director of the Center for Trade Policy Studies at the free market Cato Institute, told CNSNews.com on Friday that the UAW is, in part, to blame.

“UAW contracts have played a big role in pulling automakers into the crisis they now face,” said Griswold. “Those contracts are the single biggest difference between domestic and foreign-owned competitors operating on USA soil". Griswold also said that it was the UAW’s “adversarial attitude” in the bailout negotiations that caused the talks to collapse.
The union claims that their members have a “voice” at the bargaining table. Let’s look at what their “voice” achieved during the September 2003 Big 3/UAW contract talks. They got 50,000 job eliminations, 10+ plant closings, prescription drug co-pays doubled, two tier wages for Delphi, a stricter attendance policy and no raises for the first two years of the contract. Is this what they sent their Bargaining Committee to achieve??? It doesn’t matter what they were sent for the fact remains that this was the result, and Gettlefinger wants Us to believe he was co-operating with those who tried to make a deal for the Big 3?

An important fact o remember is that, "In the last 20 years unions representing workers on private payrolls have LOST 28% of their membership while total employment has grown by 38%. During that same time period, in inflation adjusted dollars, union members’ pay increased by 4% while the pay of non-union workers increased by 17%. Source: UNION MEMBERSHIP EARNINGS and DATA BOOK

The Big 3 will go bankrupt, unless the Democrats and incoming President Obama would rather the USA go bankrupt trying to save the Union!