# IBEW out of touch



## VELOCI3 (Aug 15, 2019)

I live in a city within this local’s territory that is doing 5 billion dollars in new construction and 0% of it is union. To make matters worse, the Democrats have been the party in control for decades here yet every Election Day my union endorses Democrats.

The membership (if you ever visit any job site) do not support these Democrats.

Wake up.













Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## Navyguy (Mar 15, 2010)

Is that your address on the newspaper?

Cheers
John


----------



## Switched (Dec 23, 2012)

I like that you think the Union is only out of touch with politics...

😂😂

The irony being the large non union shops like Berg and Helix are staunch republicans... much like you say the membership is.

My guess... it’s way more complicated.


----------



## eddy current (Feb 28, 2009)

VELOCI3 said:


> I live in a city within this local’s territory that is doing 5 billion dollars in new construction and 0% of it is union. To make matters worse, the Democrats have been the party in control for decades here yet every Election Day my union endorses Democrats.
> 
> The membership (if you ever visit any job site) do not support these Democrats.
> 
> ...


I don’t know much about politics in the US, but if the past 4 years have been run by the republicans federally, and there is no union work right now, how will voting for them again this election help the union work situation?


----------



## splatz (May 23, 2015)

eddy current said:


> I don’t know much about politics in the US, but if the past 4 years have been run by the republicans federally, and there is no union work right now, how will voting for them again this election help the union work situation?


The truth is neither republicans nor democrats have done much for organized labor at the state, county, munipal, or federal level for a long time. 

The problem is organized labor keeps rewarding this non-support with blind endorsements for democrats at all levels year after year. By doing so, labor squanders its political capital. 

It's not hard for me to see why, in this political climate, this would be especially hard for the membership to swallow: the local's leadership are issuing an endorsement for a candidate the majority of the members strongly oppose. 

Good thing they have those curtains at the polls, the members can pull the lever for who ever they want.


----------



## Dennis Alwon (May 9, 2009)

I removed the address


----------



## FaultCurrent (May 13, 2014)

Republicans have never been for the working man. They have always been anti-union, merit shop, right to work advocates. Plain to see that moving industry to cheap labor anti-union states makes money for Wall St but hurts the working man. Look at Sen Richard Shelby and what he has done. Used his position to get billions in Government contracts and subsidies. Problem is the Democrats do nothing but talk and make promises. NY State rejected Amazon, right or wrong, but what did it accomplish, they just built it somewhere else. The IBEW needs to put it's money where it will get action, not lip service. Maybe a change is needed.


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

Too many old men running the locals is the problem. Get some young blood in there with fresh ideas and enthusiasm and less concern about tradition.


----------



## VELOCI3 (Aug 15, 2019)

Dennis Alwon said:


> I removed the address


Thank you 


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


----------



## VELOCI3 (Aug 15, 2019)

I live just outside of the Bronx, NY. My city has 5 billion in new construction for 2019-2022. A lot of high rises. None of which is union. Local government has been all democrat for decades.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


----------



## HertzHound (Jan 22, 2019)

I saw this on Reddit. It might not be the place to repost it, but I thought it was funny.


----------



## Dan the electricman (Jan 2, 2011)

I don't understand why politicians would have any influence over local construction, unless tax dollars are being used to finance it. 

Neither Democrats, nor Republicans, control private business. It's up to the union reps to win that business.


----------



## farmantenna (Nov 22, 2012)

I'm confused. I'm in Massachusetts and State financed construction work I think is awarded to the lowest qualified bidder. No one can control if union or non union companies get the job. How do politicians control who gets the work? I don't think Democrats are helping the situation when they advocate for non citizens.


----------



## MHElectric (Oct 14, 2011)

Dan the electricman said:


> I don't understand why politicians would have any influence over local construction, unless tax dollars are being used to finance it.
> 
> Neither Democrats, nor Republicans, control private business. It's up to the union reps to win that business.


Makes you wonder, doesn't it?


----------



## Southeast Power (Jan 18, 2009)

We have projects going up in town. They advertise for electricians guys go in and find out it’s $12 per hour. The contractor makes a case to bring in foreign labor using H1_B. Trump hires Haitians using H1-B for seasonal workers at his properties claiming he can’t find people that speak French.


----------



## MHElectric (Oct 14, 2011)

A couple years ago, the local union was advertising in CL for $19-21 an hour. 

Non-union was paying more than that.


----------



## splatz (May 23, 2015)

Dan the electricman said:


> I don't understand why politicians would have any influence over local construction, unless tax dollars are being used to finance it.
> 
> Neither Democrats, nor Republicans, control private business. It's up to the union reps to win that business.





farmantenna said:


> I'm confused. I'm in Massachusetts and State financed construction work I think is awarded to the lowest qualified bidder. No one can control if union or non union companies get the job. How do politicians control who gets the work? I don't think Democrats are helping the situation when they advocate for non citizens.


All due respect you're being naive here.


----------



## em158 (Jul 7, 2016)

30+ year IBEW member. Personally I have never voted Democrat beyond the County level. Most of the blue collar people that I work with (union and non) on a daily basis vote Republican. Tradesmen with decent pay and benefits have much more to lose under Democrat high taxes and environmental policies than service workers. We make our real money on fossil energy and construction projects. The "Green New Deal" alone will kill the economy long after my, and my grandchildren's expected life time.


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

The green new deal will bring insane growth like we've never seen since the guaranteed jobs program after the new deal was passed and we had 8-10% growth. 

We almost hit 3% growth under Trump.

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


----------



## splatz (May 23, 2015)

TGGT said:


> The green new deal will bring insane growth like we've never seen since the guaranteed jobs program after the new deal was passed and we had 8-10% growth.
> 
> We almost hit 3% growth under Trump.
> 
> Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


Historians and economists argue about the New Deal's actual role in recovery from the depression from 1933 to 1939, the extent to which it really sped the recovery. I know some of those New Deal projects, like for example the Hoover Dam - completed on time, under budget, an engineering masterpiece, paid for itself many times over - I sure wouldn't mind seeing more done like that. I just don't see it happening in today's world. The economy, the government, and the nation are so much different I would not draw any conclusions based on the effects of the New Deal. Deflation versus inflation the corporate influence on government, I just really don't think it will end well. 

I think we really have to get our house in order with citizens united, anti-monopoly / anti-trust laws, basic regulation, before you can have confidence in the government running things like this successfully.


----------



## micromind (Aug 11, 2007)

splatz said:


> Historians and economists argue about the New Deal's actual role in recovery from the depression from 1933 to 1939, the extent to which it really sped the recovery. I know some of those New Deal projects, like for example the Hoover Dam - completed on time, under budget, an engineering masterpiece, paid for itself many times over - I sure wouldn't mind seeing more done like that. I just don't see it happening in today's world. The economy, the government, and the nation are so much different I would not draw any conclusions based on the effects of the New Deal. Deflation versus inflation the corporate influence on government, I just really don't think it will end well.
> 
> I think we really have to get our house in order with citizens united, anti-monopoly / anti-trust laws, basic regulation, before you can have confidence in the government running things like this successfully.


I agree, it's different now.

After the depression, there was actual leadership, both government and corporate. True leadership will unite people. 

These days, there's no leadership at all, it's all greed. With no leadership, people will be divided; every man for himself.


----------



## VELOCI3 (Aug 15, 2019)

This represents about 90% of us and that’s a conservative number.










Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

VELOCI3 said:


> This represents about 90% of us and that’s a conservative number.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I guess if you're in favor of making NY right to work, he's your guy. You could make $31 an hour like us down South!


----------



## VELOCI3 (Aug 15, 2019)

TGGT said:


> I guess if you're in favor of making NY right to work, he's your guy. You could make $31 an hour like us down South!


He used union electricians on all his work. I spent a year and a half on 1 high rise. 


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

VELOCI3 said:


> He used union electricians on all his work. I spent a year and a half on 1 high rise.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


He said he'd sign a national right to work bill should it ever get to his desk.

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


----------



## HertzHound (Jan 22, 2019)

VELOCI3 said:


> He used union electricians on all his work. I spent a year and a half on 1 high rise.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


He only uses Union Labor when he has to. Anyplace he can get away without it, he will and has. It’s only a matter of time before he stops using Union Labor in NYC. Especially if that’s the trend with the other developers.

Our hall had a poll they asked us all to fill out online. It was 60/40 for Trump. I guess they wanted to see if if they were backing the candidate that was representing the majority of the local.
I updated my voter registration this year so I would get a ballot. I haven’t voted since Ross Perot. I did it because I was going to vote for Trump. At this point I just can’t do it. The more I see him on TV, the more I think he’s a big buffoon. And I can’t bring myself to vote for Biden. So I’m done beating my self up over it. I’m good with whatever everybody decides. I mean these are the best candidates from both parties. How bad could it get!


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

Biden would sign the PRO act if president. Almost every republican but 2 in the house voted against it. It needs to get through the senate next.









The PRO Act: Giving workers more bargaining power on the job


Our economy is out of balance. Corporations and CEOs hold too much power and wealth, and working people know it. Workers are mobilizing, organizing, protesting, and striking at a level not seen in decades, and they are winning pay raises and other real change by using their collective voices...




www.epi.org





*Stronger and swifter remedies when employers interfere with workers’ rights*.
*More freedom to organize without employer interference*. 
*Winning first contract agreements when workers organize and protecting fair share agreements. * (prevents bad faith negotiation or delaying first contract)
*Protecting strikes and other protest activity. *(legalizes secondary "sympathy" striking)*
Organizing and bargaining rights for more workers. *(tightens the definitions of independent contractor and supervisor to crack down on misclassification and extend NLRA protections to more workers. )


----------



## splatz (May 23, 2015)

HertzHound said:


> I updated my voter registration this year so I would get a ballot. I haven’t voted since Ross Perot. I did it because I was going to vote for Trump. At this point I just can’t do it. The more I see him on TV, the more I think he’s a big buffoon. And I can’t bring myself to vote for Biden. So I’m done beating my self up over it. I’m good with whatever everybody decides. I mean these are the best candidates from both parties. How bad could it get!


I know exactly what you're talking about, in a lot of situations, if it degenerates to this point, the smart thing to do is don't get involved. The difference here is, you're involved, like it or not. You withdraw, you got beat. Other years I have not bothered to vote because I really didn't figure there was any significant difference between the two candidates. I think that really changed with Obama. I think there's a huge difference what happens on some of our most important issues depending on whether Biden or Trump wins. 

Politics have been more advertising than outcomes for a long time in the US, going back to Nixon, much much more so today with the monstrous campaign funds and the juggernaut media / social media. If you vote based on who's handsome or who's a good speaker or which guy's style you like, you got beat out of your vote by the advertisers / media / social media. If you don't vote because you don't like what's on TV, you got beat too. I'm going to vote based on their actions, my interests, and my values, not my tastes.


----------



## splatz (May 23, 2015)

There was a comic strip called Peanuts when I was a kid, really popular. There was a running gag where every fall Charlie Brown would ask Lucy to hold his football to practice place kicking and Lucy would pull it out at the last second and Charlie Brown would land on his ass. He would at first refuse, Lucy would bullshit him, and year after year he'd fall for it. 

(To the kids - I know what you're thinking, but remember there were only like four channels on TV back then, this was entertainment.) 

Anyway, Charlie Brown is labor, and the Democratic party is Lucy. They keep promising, and labor keeps falling for it. Biden's from Delaware, the corporate whore state. The blue collar roots and love of the working man is a fiction he uses in his campaigns. He's been a senator since he's 30. He didn't work at anything long enough to complete an apprenticeship for ****s sake. He worked for five years or so as a lawyer then bullshit his way into the US Senate and the rest is history.


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

splatz said:


> There was a comic strip called Peanuts when I was a kid, really popular. There was a running gag where every fall Charlie Brown would ask Lucy to hold his football to practice place kicking and Lucy would pull it out at the last second and Charlie Brown would land on his ass. He would at first refuse, Lucy would bullshit him, and year after year he'd fall for it.
> 
> (To the kids - I know what you're thinking, but remember there were only like four channels on TV back then, this was entertainment.)
> 
> Anyway, Charlie Brown is labor, and the Democratic party is Lucy. They keep promising, and labor keeps falling for it. Biden's from Delaware, the corporate whore state. The blue collar roots and love of the working man is a fiction he uses in his campaigns. He's been a senator since he's 30. He didn't work at anything long enough to complete an apprenticeship for ****s sake. He worked for five years or so as a lawyer then bullshit his way into the US Senate and the rest is history.


It's not just about Biden, it's his appointees and gaining control of the senate.

We know what Trump will do to labor which is install anti worker cabinet members into the department of labor and fill the courts with anti union judges. I don't have to speculate that he might do it, he has done it. He'd pass a national right to work bill if he got a Republican house and senate. OSHA investigations are at an all time low and they're ignoring COVID complaints as a workplace issue. 

Hell, I filed a charge against a former employer for wrongful termination and they used a precedent that was similar to my case that ruled in favor of the plaintiff as a reason to rule against me. This is the bizarro DOL under Republican rule.

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


----------



## splatz (May 23, 2015)

TGGT said:


> It's not just about Biden, it's his appointees and gaining control of the senate.
> 
> We know what Trump will do to labor which is install anti worker cabinet members into the department of labor and fill the courts with anti union judges. I don't have to speculate that he might do it, he has done it. He'd pass a national right to work bill if he got a Republican house and senate. OSHA investigations are at an all time low and they're ignoring COVID complaints as a workplace issue.
> 
> Hell, I filed a charge against a former employer for wrongful termination and they used a precedent that was similar to my case that ruled in favor of the plaintiff as a reason to rule against me. This is the bizarro DOL under Republican rule.


Valid points, but I still think Trump is the better option for labor. Bottom line, I think labor had more power under Trump with a booming economy and low unemployment than they did with Obama in office. 

Biden is going to move so much work to China there won't be much work left here for labor to benefit from. What's left will be Amazon. It will be horrible whether or not they organize.


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

splatz said:


> Valid points, but I still think Trump is the better option for labor. Bottom line, I think labor had more power under Trump with a booming economy and low unemployment than they did with Obama in office.
> 
> Biden is going to move so much work to China there won't be much work left here for labor to benefit from. What's left will be Amazon. It will be horrible whether or not they organize.


I disagree. By conventional economic theory record low unemployment for that long should have dramatically increased wages for workers. It didn't. Maybe not enough individuals pressured for more money? I don't know, but unions are arguably the weakest they've ever been and the federal minimum wage hasn't budged in over a decade.

Now there's whispers from the Republican side about supporting sectoral unions and there are at least a couple giving lip service to increasing union membership, but it's not mainstream yet and I'm not holding my breath.

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


----------



## splatz (May 23, 2015)

TGGT said:


> I disagree. By conventional economic theory record low unemployment for that long should have dramatically increased wages for workers. It didn't. Maybe not enough individuals pressured for more money? I don't know, but unions are arguably the weakest they've ever been and the federal minimum wage hasn't budged in over a decade.
> 
> Now there's whispers from the Republican side about supporting sectoral unions and there are at least a couple giving lip service to increasing union membership, but it's not mainstream yet and I'm not holding my breath.


I don't know why wages didn't rise more. I think at least part of the problem has to be offshoring. Labor / wages like everything else are subject to supply and demand. Low unemployment means short supply of labor _in the US._ Without barriers to offshoring (tariffs, etc.) the high demand and low supply drives growth in China. 

Also keep in mind that although unemployment was of course low 2018 and 2019, the numbers are not quite as good as they look for historic comparison purposes. Central to Obama / Biden's "recovery" was moving the goalposts, changing the definition of unemployment, and lowering those numbers without anybody getting a job. I don't think Trump restored the old criteria for the statistics.


----------



## 460 Delta (May 9, 2018)

splatz said:


> I don't know why wages didn't rise more. I think at least part of the problem has to be offshoring. Labor / wages like everything else are subject to supply and demand. Low unemployment means short supply of labor _in the US._ Without barriers to offshoring (tariffs, etc.) the high demand and low supply drives growth in China.
> 
> Also keep in mind that although unemployment was of course low 2018 and 2019, the numbers are not quite as good as they look for historic comparison purposes. Central to Obama / Biden's "recovery" was moving the goalposts, changing the definition of unemployment, and lowering those numbers without anybody getting a job. I don't think Trump restored the old criteria for the statistics.


I think wages would have started to trend upward had the economy not been shut down for COVID. 
Most employers were initially stuck in the mindset that help was still plentiful and there it is if you want it and if you don’t we’ll hire the guy waiting behind you. Many saw it as an opportunity to stash some cash back from the lean years preceding. Just as the wage jump was getting ready to happen (in my opinion) here comes COVID. 
Again in my opinion a robust economy is the best force to increase wages.


----------



## VELOCI3 (Aug 15, 2019)

I’ve noticed more large jobs in our territory, NYC to Fairfield, CT, are being done by out of state contractors with a few of their electricians and the rest of the workers are “labor source” unskilled workers. Perhaps this is the wave of the future. But just like illegal immigration it will drive down wages and price out professional companies employing electricians. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## brian john (Mar 11, 2007)

TGGT said:


> He said he'd sign a national right to work bill should it ever get to his desk.
> 
> Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


I live in a Right to work state and our scale is way above the 31.00 you claim NY will experience. 

I believe the right to work scare is just that a scare tactic used to get voters out. A strong union with quality workers should prevail.


----------



## oldsparky52 (Feb 25, 2020)

HertzHound said:


> I mean these are the best candidates from both parties. How bad could it get!


Please! Don't temp the gods. LOL


----------



## oldsparky52 (Feb 25, 2020)

splatz said:


> I don't think Trump restored the old criteria for the statistics.


And have the numbers look bad under his watch? No way, and I wouldn't either. 

And I despise trump with every fiber of my existence.


----------



## TGGT (Oct 28, 2012)

As of right now Lonnie Stephenson the President of the IBEW will be on the transition team of a Biden administration.









Unions predict a Great Awakening during a Biden presidency


Joe Biden would institute "the most significant pro-labor, pro-worker administration in a long, long, long time," one labor leader predicts.




www.politico.com





Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


----------

