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Permalink Reply by Benny the Icepick on November 9, 2011 at 8:35am

You'll find your answers amidst some very feisty commentary here:

http://www.dukecityfix.com/forum/topics/sunflower-market-labor-dispute

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Permalink Reply by Constant Weeder on November 9, 2011 at 8:49am

Thanks, that was helpful. I knew this would be the place to ask. So now I guess the best thing to do is go ask one of the banner holders on the corner of Central and Carlisle and see what their issue is and then decide. And yes, very fiesty commentary! Nothing better than lots of fingers typing away fueled with righteousness on both sides of an issue.

 

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Permalink Reply by Benny the Icepick on November 9, 2011 at 9:15am

The thing is, the people holding the banners have no say.  They're not even union members.  The unions hired these non-unionized workers to protest the fact that these other businesses hired non-unionized workers.  Personally, I think it's a huge PR issue for the unions, and it can only serve to bite them in the ass.

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Permalink Reply by Constant Weeder on November 9, 2011 at 9:31am

I wonder about that as well. One reason that I find it confusing, it seems that the banners I have been seeing appear after  the construction has taken place. It is almost like "crying wolf" -- that if a serious labor issue were to take place, no one would pay any attention. And when people say "unions" is there a specific union doing this? In the discussion you pointed me to it seemed that most comments were "the union" not a specific union. Ideas? I used to work in an underground coal mine that was non-union. We tried for a very long time to be unionized, but during my time there it never happened. The company stopped the attempt each time by raising wages, and who can argue with that?

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Permalink Reply by Phil_0 on November 9, 2011 at 11:22am

I am very pro-union in general, but in my book this particular strategy amounts to crying wolf at best and a clumsy attempt at extortion at worst.To be clear, this isn't "the unions," it is one specific union: the carpenters union that just built that huge headquarters building at Montgomery and I-25.

 

In most cases it's not even the hiring practices of the business being picketed the carpenters object to, but the fact that the general contractor hired a sub-contractor or sub-sub-contractor that used non-union employees. At least one of the small, non-union local firms the union objects to has publically demonstrated several times that their employees make more and have better benefits than the union workers do.(They certainly make more than the hourly temps the union hires to hold the sign).

 

Finally, as you mention, they keep up the picketing long after the project is over: they were still out in front of Sunflower Market over a year after it opened. I agree with Benny - its' a clumsy and mean-spirited tactic that makes unions as a whole look bad.

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Permalink Reply by Craig Collins on November 9, 2011 at 5:26pm

Let Me get this right the Union hires NON union people to protest that Non union people were hired to work? My head is spinning

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Permalink Reply by Lebowski on November 10, 2011 at 8:49am

I know...its totally weird. It never occured to me that the union might just be some evil machine that extorts workers and companies for money and power. Really?

Im just glad these guys are operating in plain sight. They disgust me...

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Permalink Reply by Mike Horrell on November 10, 2011 at 10:43am

About 18 months ago, they were picketing a church on Montanyo. When interviewed,

the minister had absolutely no idea why they were there and had never received any

communication from the Union. Eventually they disbursed and it was speculated that

the hired picketers had been given the wrong address.

 

Many news stories, blogs etc. have covered these "pickets" and it seems almost

certain that these are mostly economic shakedowns.

 

 

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Permalink Reply by John Baptist 2nd on November 10, 2011 at 10:45am

Such a life on such a planet.

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Permalink Reply by Charles R. McCurdy on November 11, 2011 at 4:02am

Labor, sadly, is dead in this country.  Work is a four letter word.  This is a country of 'easy money," and risky business, lots of toys, no compassion or empathy-we want everything now and no sweat.  Everybody is a bum, except...SHOW ME THE MONEY!  Follow the money-who benefits the most?  What have you done for me, lately  We all have opinions and that is all they are: for what that's worth.

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Permalink Reply by Samara on November 11, 2011 at 2:16pm

when those guys were outside sunflower market last year, i asked a cashier, and she said that group had nothing to do with sunflower employees.  i'm not sure what it's about, but i don't think it's a legit labor dispute

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Permalink Reply by Charles R. McCurdy on November 15, 2011 at 8:46pm

Very few people know what a legitimate labor dispute is these days.  What is evident in our society is that people are afraid of the rapid changes that are occurring and the lack of knowledge and resources to effect any meaningful resolution.  Krishnamurti, once said {and i'm paraphrasing}  people are not afraid of the unknown, but rather of losing the known.  I have a feeling most of us don't know what's going on and are too quick to come up with easy and suspicious answers-or so it seems to me at this point in time

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