Col Rouge,

You're right, "It’s not rocket science." But boy, it seems to be beyond you.

"[P]ayments for service is [sic] made by the employer to the employee, regardless of the unions role in the matter." You don't say? I'm sure everyone on OLO though the unions were the paymasters.

"If there is no contractual agreement between the employee and the union, then there is no obligation (legal or moral) for the employee to reward the union for any efforts the union deploys." You're not kidding?

Or should that be 'kidneying'? After all, you seem to think this thread is about the supply and price of kidneys.

"I would presume the employer agrees with his employees, either collectively or individually, their individual worth and the employer awards a differential or greater amount to the more meritorious emploees, regardless of their union affiliation." I know that in your 'real world' unions never succeed in gaining pay increases for their members because in your 'real world' "... a worker will be paid what they [who?] can “negotiate”... regardless of the amount of “effort” or “Work” involved".

Employers are always so fair and reasonable in your 'real' world.

We're all so pleased you're "talking from personal experience". And so awed to learn that your negotiated rate "tends to be on the high side (I always emphasise the ‘added-value’ an employer gains from my effort)".

Never one to sell yourself short, Col. Now in the real, real world...you'd have to think more logically and express yourself more clearly to earn good money. Unless you're merely breaking rocks or watching others do so.

Its human nature, the I am all right mate syndrome.
It human nature too to blame the victim.
Also to think my side, me have got it right the other is wrong.
Its wrong but its human nature.
My passion for my union is because I understand how much our present day lifestyle is due to yesterdays unionists.
This country has always been partly socialist, even under John Howard.
Our welfare system, medical, schools, once post and telephones are paid for as a safety, an essential services for all thing.
My passion for change in unions is fueled by daily issues like this 33% wage claim.
Never have I hidden from the fact some unions are stuck in the past, must evolve or die.
But every day, unions do unseen unheard of things that never get credited to them.
Like the ACTU wage case for mostly non unionists.
Like spearheading the children over board case or being a big part of the uncovering of the AWB scandal, giving bribes to Saddam to buy guns to kill his people, tell me of a union crime that matches that?
In no way different than any group that is formed to represent its members but much more likely to suffer in the Medea money protects money.
With respect some will never hear good about unions those type do not concern me, they are the reason we exist, they devalue workers and undermine the Aussie fair go.
Unions bosses and workers are here to stay, why do we not hear more about the so many bosses unions and their interference in IR?

Belly “Who looks after the under skilled . . . The fearful ones?”
Sheltered workshops?

How underskilled / fearful is underskilled / fearful?

Unions have never existed solely for the benefit of the “under-skilled” or the fearful and some might reasonably suggest, not even for the benefit of workers at any skill level.

Pretences to unions being run with some altruistic “white-knight” profile is at odds with what unions have been seen to do in terms of blackmail, corruption and in the case of some painters and dockers, even murder.

Too often, unions have existed for the benefit of union shop stewards and officials, the organizing committee and entryists working their own covert agenda.,

“Are we happy to have no equity for them”

If you are talking commercial equity, they get paid, that’s their “share” and entitlement.

If you are talking about “social equity”, that is a myth, a couple of words strung together to describe some nebulous emotional experience, which puts neither food on a table not a roof over someones head.

It is just another way of expressing faux-altruism, emotional hysteria and muddy thinking which invariably accompanies the pseudo-babble of the egalitarianisticly fixated.

“I see a future for moderates, those who talk first and second fight only as a last resort”

Like the second coming of Jesus, I will welcome that day too but will wait until it actually arrives, rather than assume I can see it anywhere on the horizon.

“bargaining is about both sides being up front.”

Always has been and always will be.

“laugh watching a bloke hand out news papers telling of problems in the Cuban country side.”

And Union member fees being used to promote some of the entryist agendas, I mentioned earlier in this thread.

“Unions . . . benefiting by picking up the refugees.”

Lets start with :
Negotiation before strike
standover tactics becoming criminally illegal
Secret ballots
Non-compulsory membership, ie: members only from selling the value benefits of membership.
Respect for employers property.
Civil and criminal liability for all union invoked actions
And laws to regulate against procedural abuses,

Spikey “But boy, it seems to be beyond you.”

sarcasm is the lowest form of wit

And even at that low height, it still seems to be beyond your grasp.

A contract of employment involves an employee and an employer. No legal role for a union, except as some form of ‘agent’ but then only by un-coerced appointment of the employee or employer.

“After all, you seem to think this thread is about the supply and price of kidneys.”

I guess it was too big an ask for you to separate a legal/contractual principle from the examples which illustrate its applicaton… (I hate to think what you will do with the tort of negligence and “Donoghue v Stephenson” :- ) )

“Employers are always so fair and reasonable in your 'real' world.”

Not at all, I always think I am worth more than I am paid and my clients invariably horse-trade rates and payment terms, although I have often kicked myself when they cave too soon and I realize I could have got say an additional $400 a day.

We're all so pleased you're "talking from personal experience".

And I am pleased you are pleased.

Does my pleasure at your pleasure enhance the pleasure you are enjoying?

“Never one to sell yourself short, Col.”

No one else sells me like I sell me. Don’t hide your light under a bushell

“Now in the real, real world...you'd have to think more logically and express yourself more clearly to earn good money.”

The skill is to project ones worth without over-selling it and I guess when I charge 50% more than a lot of folk who claim to do the same as I and still get the job, I must be getting it pretty right or at least right enough to survive in that real world you mention .

“Unless you're merely breaking rocks or watching others do so.”

Frederick Winslow Taylor pioneered the book on that and I also studied his writings…

But that would take a whole new thread..

Maybe we could swap views on Peter Drucker too?

No heat Col no attempt to insult you, you do not however have a clew.
You speak of unions actions decades old, refuse to see things have changed.
Are you aware the only time a union can strike, only time Col is during wage negotiations if they have totally broken down.
Can you not see the laughter in my thread? that Cuban handout from the comrades is constantly bringing me to laugh.
You refresh me, give me renewed energy, so out of touch, so unconcerned about those worse of.
So convinced of your gangster union bosses you can not for a second understand it is very old news, older than most who post here.
in Australia's construction industry the crime, the theft, truly scandalous stuff is servants of prime contractors and shonky contractors, watch as it is uncovered, no union involvement.
Why do we hear nothing about that?
I challenge you to find one single member of my union I ever forced to join, find one who can say that and I will leave and go on the dole.
I here in this thread, highlighted my contempt for those who forced people to join, follow My advice go to that site and read of plenty but not my union not most unions.
Col in your posts, every one of them, I find reason to be proud I am me and not you
regards
union forever proud and strong honest but never weak.

Dear old Col Rouge,

Belly has sussed you out. You're so out of touch.

As for Taylorism, it's 30 years since any management team worth their keep used his theories. I doubt you can find a copy of his book except in an antiquarian bookshop. (It's so old it's available online free of copyright.)

As for Peter Drucker, well at least he acknowledged the importance of managers having respect for workers. He roundly condemned the undue escalation of managers' pay packages often enhanced as a reward for the number of the workers they laid off. Short-term solutions for bottom-line cosmetics but usually leaving the company short of valuable accumulated expertise.

But Drucker was blind to the shortcomings of his management theories which often, for example, led to control becoming an end in itself while creativity was frowned upon.

But you know Col, Belly is spot on. The world has moved on and you've been left behind. Come on down to the contemporary world. It's not all doom and gloom for conservatives. Not when Kevin Rudd is PM.