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GC employees unionizing...

#61
Unrepresented said:
A limited amount of commodities is a naturally occurring situation. This market is not. It is no more or less "natural" than any other socially organized means of reconciling that scarcity throughout human history and prehistory.
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i am not sure what you are trying to say...BUT, you have not disagreed about the law of supply and demand...so i'll take it that we agree on that one

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#63
MatticusMania said:
Come now, people were homesteading in parts of the US as late as the 1930s & 40s.
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and they had jobs...admittedly, homesteaders were farmers, but if you think farming is not a job....well, it is....matter of fact, those farmers had more in common with the entrepreneurs than they do with wage earners....

they took risks every day they woke up, and they were risking it all....there was no bankruptcy to speak of....you either succeeded or you and your family went hungry

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#64
Lonesomedave said:
maybe it's not about working harder...maybe it's about working SMARTER
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^^^ This

I have a big sign hanging over my desk that was given to me by my SCORE sponsor when I first opened my business. It reads,

Work Smarter NOT Harder

I have tried to live by that every day I have been in business.

That doesn't mean that I do not work 60-80 hours a week. It means I have to be productive while I work.
 
#66
Lonesomedave said:
and they had jobs...admittedly, homesteaders were farmers, but if you think farming is not a job....well, it is....matter of fact, those farmers had more in common with the entrepreneurs than they do with wage earners....

they took risks every day they woke up, and they were risking it all....there was no bankruptcy to speak of....you either succeeded or you and your family went hungry
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Im not disagreeing with that at all. I didnt say they did not have jobs to do, as I said "living our lives was our work".
I know very well that farming is a job, as its one I do myself, on top of earning a wage.
 
#67
LiquidMidnight, you are correct of course, except for the exceptions. In construction (which falls under the (8) (f) exception), the entire site can be a 'union shop' where the callout rules of the local require that all dispatches be members and remain members, effectively creating a 'closed shop'.

And yeah, terminations that run afoul of a worker's civil rights are unlawful in any state. But....CBA's can and do pierce the employment-at-will doctrine. That is...if the union rep knows what to do and does it. And if the NLRB does it's job. A longshot in today's society, it seems.
 
#68
MatticusMania said:
Im not disagreeing with that at all. I didnt say they did not have jobs to do, as I said "living our lives was our work".
I know very well that farming is a job, as its one I do myself, on top of earning a wage.
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Reminds me of the ad for "Mountain Men" where the one guy says "People ask me what I do for a livin. I live for a livin."
 
#70
LiquidMidnight said:
Almost +1. Closed shops and agency shops are illegal via Taft-Hartley, regardless if a state has right-to-work laws. However, a non-right-to-work state may have a union shop.

This is also further complicated in that employees on a federal enclave are not subject to right-to-work laws; therefore, a federal enclave in say, Alabama, can still have a union security agreement in its CBA.

Non-union members are still covered under the CBA if they are part of the bargaining unit and the union is still required under the NLRA to fairly represent these employees (Disclaimer: None of this is legal advice).

As far as implications, in general, right-to-work states are generally less union-friendly. It's been a while since I've looked at the stats, but unions generally win less elections in right-to-work states.
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I think Liquid has jumped ship. This is why the TBOT union fell apart.
 
#72
guy n. cognito said:
Retail employees in a large retail sales environment like GC (or Wal Mart) are typically unskilled. You don't hire experienced employees to sell Ibanez to high schoolers.
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High school kids looking to buy mid level basses aren't the only people who frequent GC. If they did, we wouldn't see the stores carrying high end basses like EBMM, Fender, Lakland, Warwick, Rickenbacker, and high end amplifiers like Aguilar, Eden, Ampeg, Mesa (at least til recently) etc... And while anecdotal, I've spent MUCH more money at GC as an adult than as a teenager. I have more disposable income, and I know I'm dedicated towards music so I see purchases as worthy investments. What I quoted from you is exactly my point. GC needs to consider repositioning their brand and their value package towards consumers.
 
#73
sloasdaylight said:
I haven't been inside a Guitar Center in at least 2 years, and the only reason I was in there the last time was because I had a $50 gift certificate, and didn't want it to go to waste. If their workers end up unionizing, maybe the people who still go there will get some better customer service from the floor staff, but I don't think I'll be one of them. I'm much happier giving my money to companies like Sam Ash than I am giving it to Guitar Center.
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And why is that? Because stores like Sam Ash and Sweetwater provide superior customer service to Guitar Center. When price is no longer the leading differentiator between companies customer service quickly takes its place.
 
#74
Not that it really matters in this debate, but giving credit where credit's due - the GC that I usually go to in PA has always seemed to have excellent customer service. I never had a single problem with them. In fact, none of them (I have 3 within an hour's drive of me) have been outright bad.
Not to dispute anyone's experiences with GC, I'm sure they've had their moments but sometimes I feel like things may be getting overblown. I could be wrong.
 
#77
Old Fart said:
LiquidMidnight, you are correct of course, except for the exceptions. In construction (which falls under the (8) (f) exception), the entire site can be a 'union shop' where the callout rules of the local require that all dispatches be members and remain members, effectively creating a 'closed shop'.
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Ahh thank you for the clarification. The construction industry is an interesting entity when it comes to labor relations.

But....CBA's can and do pierce the employment-at-will doctrine.
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Very true, which is why I always have to chuckle when someone pulls out the "Unions were great at one time, but they're obsolete now" argument. Anything that modifies the default doctrine of employment at will is not obsolete. With that said, terminating someone under a CBA becomes a contractual issue rather than a civil rights issue, which is why it's settled in arbitration rather than court. I would say the exception would be if the discharge were a ULP, but even that could be deferred under Collyer or Dubo, which then makes it a CBA issue.

And if the NLRB does it's job.
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If you're interested in this stuff, read James A. Gross's three books on the history of the NLRA and NLRB. I'm currently writing a doctoral dissertation that is a policy analysis of the NLRA. Basically, Taft-Hartley introduced ambiguity into the policy purpose of the NLRA, which can be used by any administration to push a pro- or anti-labor agenda through their appointed Board members and General Counsel.

I can say as a former field examiner, that at the Regional level, most of the agents really want to do good and make sure that the everyday workingman or woman doesn't get screwed. However, they're constrained by certain bodies of case law. While the Board itself doesn't have to adhere to stare decisis (unless it's a case decided by the courts), the Regions do. Things like Wright Line are ultimately (IMHO) contradictory to the spirit and purpose of the NLRA, Taft-Hartley or not; but the field examiners and field attorneys still have to abide by those cases, whether they agree with them or not. The job of the Regional Directors is to make sure that the Regions are keeping inline with established Board precedent (or whatever the current precedent is of that particular Board).

Of course, it doesn't help that the sanctions for ULPs are really just a slap on the wrist and aren't real deterrents - something that the failed Employee Free Choice Act attempted to remedy.
 
#79
guy n. cognito said:
Just a little math:

Wal-mart has 1.4 million employees. If we assume that those employees worked an average of 20 hours a week, and Walmart gave all of those employees a $1 per hour bonus, it would cost the company $1.456 billion

According to Morningstar, 2013 compensation for the executive level at Walmart is approximately $63 million, or slightly more than 4% of the amount needed for that $1 raise.
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Or you could cut down the number of part timers, revert some of them back to full time employees, and pay those guys a living wage.

Here's the thing, Walmart cut down the number of full time employees to intentionally avoid having to provide healthcare coverage to those workers. If they were full time they would have to provide those benefits due to new laws. Walmart said they didn't want to take on those costs so they made everyone part time. People can argue and say that this will allow them (Walmart) to continuing providing low cost goods to consumers.

Here's the catch, though. Most people working at Walmart and fast food chains are people in the career stage of their lives. These are people with families, mortgages, heating bills, medical bills, etc... These aren't high school or college aged kids (by and large) anymore. These are people who need a living wage. If they can't get full time with medical coverage then they are forced to work a second job part time and still receive no coverage because companies are trying tooth and nail to avoid these costs.

Due to these jobs paying starvation wages, the majority of these people will be able to claim welfare benefits from the state. Now who do you think is paying those costs? Walmart or you and I (the tax payers)? Walmart skimping on covering those costs forces them onto middle class Americans, so we're not saving any money on the goods we buy from Walmart despite what they might be saying. Even if you're a person who never even buys from Walmart you're still picking up their part of the bill. It's corporate welfare at the cost of the American people.

I could go on, but these videos sum up my thoughts on all of this well enough that I don't have to:

 
#80
Shoddy business practices by upper management shouldn't be taken out on the employees. The company is a mess, and the threat of unionization of employees may be the kick in the ass that GC needs. They have way too many stores...too generous of a return policy...and unfortunately they also have a few employees that are circumventing process by allowing the use of discounts on items that should not be discounted. Get rid of the dead weight, treat the decent productive employees well, and hopefully things begin to improve. I have 2 very good older friends that work for GC...I hear their complaints all the time. The entire business model is a failure. A union won't do much but lead to store closures in right to work states.
 

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