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How Labor Unions Work · Stuff You Should Know

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  Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to you stuff you should
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: know from House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: is Charles W. Chuck Bryant, which makes this stuff you
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: should know. Heck no, we won't go. Heck no, we
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: won't record. That's more along the lines of what we're
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: talking about better paper podcasters. Yeah, as a matter of fact,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: we could get together with like Adam Curry and um
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Joe Rogan and maybe even Ira and form like some
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: sort of local He would be our Jimmy Hoffa. Ira
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: would be Is it a threat? No? Are you threatening?
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: I glad I know he would be our Jimmy. He
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  Speaker 1: would make things happen. James P. Hoff Uh, the one
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  Speaker 1: that the current team's church president. Either one I'm not
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: saying get rid of him burying a giant stadium from saying,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: IRA would make it happen. He would break legs. It
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  Speaker 1: need be. There's a leg breaking goon. Um. So for
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: those of you who have already seen the title of
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  Speaker 1: this you are you are you understand the banter? I
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  Speaker 1: guess if you have no idea what we're talking about,
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  Speaker 1: I'll bet you guessed by now that we're talking about
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  Speaker 1: labor unions. It's a good one man, that we had
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: this request a lot last year from when the whole
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  Speaker 1: Wisconsin Scott Walker things, I know, and we're just now
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: getting to it because the Scott Walker thing is like
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  Speaker 1: my intro. Well, let's hear it. So do you remember
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: last year in Wisconsin. Yes, there was this big hubbub
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: that was going on. A lot of people were wondering
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: if this is going to be like the beginning of
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: the Arab Spring in the United States. This is going
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: to be the flash point for it because Governor Scott
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: Walker was accused of trying to deunionize the public sector
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  Speaker 1: employees State Employees UM through a little bit of legislation
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  Speaker 1: that he was trying to introduce. That is very true,
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  Speaker 1: and it caused quite a stir like thousands of protesters. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: there was some serious protests going on UM and at
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  Speaker 1: the heart of this whole thing was some legislation where
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  Speaker 1: he was trying to get the public sector employees unions
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  Speaker 1: UM to get their union members e g. The public
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: or i e. The public sector employees I E means
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: that is e g is for example. But I realized
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: that uh, to basically pay in half of their pensions, UM,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: to give up some other concessions like um, if they
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: were going to get a raise, it had to be
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  Speaker 1: through public referendum. Yeah, anything over the rate of inflation,
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  Speaker 1: I think yeah, UM. But probably the biggest one was
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  Speaker 1: that they were stripped of their ability to collectively bargain.
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  Speaker 1: And it worked, it got pushed through, and now if
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  Speaker 1: you are a state employee union member in Wisconsin, you
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  Speaker 1: can't collectively bargain anymore, which means you are effectively neutered
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  Speaker 1: as a union member. In a lot of ways. That
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  Speaker 1: is one of the hallmarks of the unions. And depending
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  Speaker 1: on where you come from, what you believe who raised you,
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  Speaker 1: whether or not your grandpa was still alive when you
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: were old enough to understand what he was talking about,
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: UM that. I think that largely depends on how you
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: feel about unions. A lot of people think they're a
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  Speaker 1: good thing. A lot of people think they're bad. A
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  Speaker 1: lot of people think they're necessary, A lot of people
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  Speaker 1: think they're evil. A lot of people think they're necessary evil,
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: and in fact they're kind of America as it stands
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: as kind of split down the middle these days. A
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: pew pole that was taken during this whole bub in Wisconsin,
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: UM showed that of Americans had a positive view of
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: organized labor, which I found surprising. You thought that was high, Yeah,
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: I was. I was surprised because the the decline of
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  Speaker 1: union has also been attended by a change in perception
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  Speaker 1: towards them, you know, like they're kind of bad, or
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  Speaker 1: that they hamstring business is another big one. UM. But
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  Speaker 1: they also found that still believe unions are needed to
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  Speaker 1: improve working people's lives so necessary. Evil. I nailed it,
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: you did, And unsurprisingly, a lot of times your feelings
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: on unions are drawn along political lines these days. They're
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: often expecially of being like the an organizing backbone for
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: the Democratic Party. Sure, but that's not always true, Like
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: very frequently unions throw their waiting their support behind Republicans
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  Speaker 1: as well. At any rate, let's get to the bottom
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: of what all this is. Are our unions good? We're
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: probably going to avoid this kind of qualitative descriptor and
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  Speaker 1: instead just kind of stick to the facts and let
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: the people decide. Power to the people to decide whether
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: unions are good or not. I think that's a good move. Josh. Uh,
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: So we got stats. We'll get to those later unions josh. Uh.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: Industrial revolution is kind of where actually we go back further,
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: which we will with what medieval times. Yeah, the the
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  Speaker 1: trade guilds. Trade guilds sort of where the beginnings seeds
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  Speaker 1: of unions and uh. They originally sort of came about
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: though just too uh swap techniques and recipes and uh.
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  Speaker 1: Then that sort of evolved a bit into hey, why
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  Speaker 1: don't we get together and also share aside from our knowledge,
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  Speaker 1: get together and maybe share expertise on how to how
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  Speaker 1: to do things better and get better wages maybe or
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  Speaker 1: fixed prices. That's one before they figured out that that
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: was um, immoral. This is medieval Europe a long time ago. Yeah. Uh.
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  Speaker 1: And the trade guilds, um, we're definitely the origin of unions.
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  Speaker 1: It's just a bunch of workers getting together and figuring
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  Speaker 1: out because it is essentially what a union is that
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: they have um more strength than numbers, um. And it's
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: also an indication of workers understanding their value in the
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  Speaker 1: production process that what they're essentially doing in return for
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  Speaker 1: their salary was producing a profit. For business. Do you
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: have labor in business? Right? And UM, that gives them
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  Speaker 1: a certain sense of value, whereas UH, and a lot
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  Speaker 1: of situations, workers feel like, you know, they're very grateful
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  Speaker 1: for their job and they don't want to make any
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: waves or anything like that, and they're not fully aware
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: of their value UM and unions. One of the roles
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: that unions plays to point out to a worker, Hey,
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  Speaker 1: you're doing something in return. This isn't some sort of
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: welfare situation that you're involved in. You're producing labor and
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: that has value and certain rights as well. Exactly. All right,
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: So flash forward a bit to the Industrial Revolution nineteenth century. Uh,
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: things moved away a little bit from agriculture. UH, and
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  Speaker 1: agricultural jobs moved into the factories, as we all know,
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  Speaker 1: and kind of right off the bat, factories weren't a
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  Speaker 1: good scene for fair wages and safe conditions and kids
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  Speaker 1: working in factories and women and children not being paid
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  Speaker 1: as much as men. Um. Triangle shirtwaist fire. That was
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: a big turning point. What was the triangle shirtwaist company
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: fire where the working conditions were really really dangerous? That
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: it was a clothing company, clothing manufacturer, I think in
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: Chicago or New York, I can't remember. Um, and it
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  Speaker 1: caught fire, the factory did because there was all this
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  Speaker 1: fabric in the air and it just ignited in the
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  Speaker 1: whole place went up and all of these women had
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  Speaker 1: to jump to their deaths. And UM, that kind of
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  Speaker 1: brought in, brought working conditions into a limelight and help
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  Speaker 1: the union. Um sentiment. I guess a flash point if
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: you will, exactly from your favorite Mr Cladwell the heath
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  Speaker 1: flash point, tipping point, tipping point, good lord, get it together, Chuck, okay,
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: I've got it together now, tipping point. I had to
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: take a little break. Uh. In the nineteenth century, they
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  Speaker 1: would do things called striking. Yeah, they still do today,
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: but back then it was a more uh contentious and
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  Speaker 1: violent affair than it is today. Like people died, bombs
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  Speaker 1: went off, guns were shot. There was and it was
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  Speaker 1: on both sides too, I mean, like the workers were striking.
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  Speaker 1: The point was the whole was the same, where we're
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  Speaker 1: not working anymore and you're not going to make any
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  Speaker 1: money because we're not producing the product that you need
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  Speaker 1: to go sell. Right. Um. But during these times, like
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  Speaker 1: the National Guard would show up, or um, the cops
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  Speaker 1: would show up, or maybe the Pinkerton Detective Agency would
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  Speaker 1: show up and just start beating the tar out of
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  Speaker 1: the striking workers in order to scare them back into working. Uh.
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  Speaker 1: Workers also would um defend themselves. Uh. There was this one.
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  Speaker 1: I can't remember what strik it was. I just read
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  Speaker 1: about it, where like the workers managed to like chase
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  Speaker 1: the cops off because they were they were shooting two
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: pound hinges in these oversized sling shots like at the cops.
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  Speaker 1: And I can imagine getting hit by a two pound hinge.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: Was a hinge factory, I had to have them. But yeah,
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  Speaker 1: so the strikes were very violent. People like you said,
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  Speaker 1: would die and the cops like why couldn't the cotton
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: ball factory had been Uh but not funny though, because
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: people did die. Uh, not making light of it. Like
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: at the Haymarket riot for incidents for incidents, that was
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  Speaker 1: a big one for instance. That was a turning point,
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  Speaker 1: a flash point, if you will. It was early May, um,
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  Speaker 1: there was a nationwide strike saying we only want to
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  Speaker 1: work eight hours a day. Um, And in Chicago's Haymarket
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  Speaker 1: there was a violent protest. UM. Not a lot of
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: people were there because the weather, thank goodness, because someone
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: threw a bomb into the crowd. Yeah, went off, and
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: shots were fired by the cops, maybe by the protesters.
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  Speaker 1: Probably they were not just striking labors, but they were
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: anarchists there, and uh, you know this anarchist their trouble. Well, Um,
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: this is one of the places where in the public
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  Speaker 1: imagination at least that anarchists and socialists became married to
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  Speaker 1: labor like pro labor. Um, and it's always kind of
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  Speaker 1: haunted labor unions. Is that idea? But it was born
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  Speaker 1: out of this era, if not this riot, I'm sure. Uh.
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  Speaker 1: In the end, eight people were charged and convicted. Um.
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  Speaker 1: The labor leaders tried to get them out, saying this
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  Speaker 1: is not fair. One of the people committed suicide by
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: placing a stick of dynamite in his mouth in prison,
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: and uh. In the end, in a few years later,
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: the governor of Illinois granted a full pardon to the
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: remaining three convicted, and that ended up leading to an
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: observance of May Day or Labor Day in other countries. Right,
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: May first, it is supposed to be labor Day. Um.
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  Speaker 1: This whole affair, though, you left out that four of
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: the guys who were convicted were hanged, and then one
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: guy committed suicide, and then three were but they were
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: charged with like basically agitating violence. Um. This was back
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: when free speech wasn't protected quite as much as it
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: is out right. Um. But the they and they were
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: pardoned and as a result, this whole Mayday thing, this
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Labor Day thing, came up about in May one. But
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: then within like five years Grover Cleveland was like, well,
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: this is kind of a sordid, like scary association with labor.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: Let's just celebrate labor and I'm going to move it to.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: Um the first Saturday, now, the first Monday, Monday in September,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: it was Saturday, be no good, wouldn't get off work? Exactly? Uh?
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: Did he move it to to disassociate from that? Interesting specifically,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: So that's why you can't wear white after September September exactly.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: That's exactly the origin of that. All right, So maybe
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: let's talk about some of the basics of a labor union, josh. Um.
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  Speaker 1: There's many different kinds, and like you said, it's all
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: about strength and numbers to get together to form what's
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: called a bargaining unit um with an elected leader to
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: deal with the employer right, because I mean, think about it.
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  Speaker 1: If you are, if you have somebody who's advocating for
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: your success, for your rights, higher wages, better conditions, whatever
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  Speaker 1: it might be. Um, you are removing yourself to a
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  Speaker 1: certain extent from that negotiation. So it's a little less
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  Speaker 1: sticky for you because you're not talking to your employer.
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  Speaker 1: You're not saying, I really want some more money. Somebody
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  Speaker 1: else is going These guys are making a bunch of
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  Speaker 1: money for you, and you need to share it a
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  Speaker 1: little better like an agent exactly right in a way.
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  Speaker 1: And at the same time, you also have that element
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  Speaker 1: of that bargaining unit being a collective bargaining unit, meaning
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  Speaker 1: there's that strengthen numbers, so it's a bunch of people
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  Speaker 1: becoming satisfied at the same time. And implied in there
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  Speaker 1: is if you don't do this, then you're gonna lose
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  Speaker 1: a bunch of people all at once and you're gonna
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: have some trouble. Right And Uh, they do this uh
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  Speaker 1: agreement in the form of the c b A collective
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: bardying Agreement, and any fan of any professional sports will
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: understand what a c b A is and how tinuous
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: they can be. Uh. Once you have negotiated this agreement,
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: and everyone on the employer sizes, you know, we can
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: live with these terms. And everyone on the employee side said, yeah,
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: we can live with this. We both give a little bit.
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  Speaker 1: They sign it, and uh, it is set for a
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: certain period of time and you cannot break the c
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  Speaker 1: BA on either side without there being legal action or
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: grievance is filed, which usually means an arbitrator will come
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: in and say, you know, let me get involved. UM.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: You I feel like just hit the nail on the head. Though,
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: for an ideal union presence in business, everyone give a
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: little you know, you can't have UM too much for
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: on one side or the other. But I think that
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: that's kind of the history of UM. The presence of
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: unions in business in America, it's been If you look
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: over time, it's maybe even down, but if you look
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: at in any specific decade, it's more on one side
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: than the other as far as who's in the beneficial
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: position or who's asking more, who's extracting more? Like UM.
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: Samuel Gompers, who who got together the American Federation of Labor,
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: I think when he was asked what the a f
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: L wanted, his answer was more. Yeah. Yeah, but at
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: the same time you have to say, well, business isn't
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: gonna just say just give it away. Very rarely do they. Um.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: The whole presence of unions is to extract that. At
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: least that was the original idea of them. Yeah, you know. Uh, unions,
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  Speaker 1: like any organization, costs a little money to run. Um,
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: so you have to pay dues. It's a membership thing. Um.
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: If I was in the Screen Actors Guilled, which I'm not,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: I would pay dues to the Screen Actors Guilled every
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: year to keep my membership current and then they would
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: go fight for me and they would have a staff
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: that gets paid out of that money. Um. I love
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: in here that this is dues vary, but many are
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: around fifty dollars a month. What a deal? Yeah, I
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: think it's it's completely varies depending on what union you're in.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: I don't know that you can put an average number,
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: or maybe you can if you average it, well, if
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: you counted them all up. And I don't think that's
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: what they did here. Um, it was fifty dollars a month. Um.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: Act Now. Uh. They're also supposed to be democracies with
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: elected officials, elected leaders who UM take action based on
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: referendums and votes and basically just using UM voting to
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: take the pulse of the union members to see what
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: they want to do. Ideally, that's how it works. Yeah,
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: I get the feeling that doesn't always work that way
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: throughout history. Yeah, especially once the mob got involved, which
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: we'll get to UM a lot of times. You can
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: be uh local union member, which is sort of like
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: being a fraternity member of a larger national charter. Uh.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: And if you're a local union, that means that you
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: maybe work in that same business sector, but you're employed
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: by a different company. But it's like, hey, I'm in
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: the and I keep going back to film business stuff
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: because they were lousy with unions still are like hey,
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: I'm I work in the art department. I'm a prop
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: sky so I'm a member of the local I can't
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: remember the number union here in Atlanta, but it's a
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: national charter probably pushed out of l A, not mistaken.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: It's like UM, a chapter of a fraternity or a sorority. Yeah,
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: which is what I said. Yeah, did you say fraternity
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: a sorority? No, you didn't, that's a fraternity. You didn't.
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: You didn't add sorority. No, no, good point authorities as well, chuck, Um,
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: what's the point of all this? I think we've kind
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: of touched on a little bit of it, like and
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: especially in the strength and numbers thing. But there's other
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: benefit it's too being in a union. Correct. Yeah. Um,
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: should we throw out some stats here? I think this
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: is high time for stats. Your wages, For one, your
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: median weekly income, it's gonna be as a union member,
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: about nine hundred and forty dollars. Uh, it's gonna be
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: about seven hundred and thirty dollars if you're non union. UM,
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: let me see her. You've got some about healthcare? Correct? Oh? Yeah,
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: So eight eight percent of union workers and this is
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: from the Department of Labor. This isn't like from the
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: A F L C, I O or anything. UM percent
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: of UM union workers have health coverage. Of non union
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: workers don't do. UM. It's the same with dental plans
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: and the disparities even more pent of non union workers
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: have dental plans, where something like sixty six percent have
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: a dental plan. If you're a member of a union, UM,
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: half of union jobs have vision yeah coverage, and only
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: about a quarter of non union jobs, UH have it,
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: which in reading this also I was kind of like, man,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: we have pretty good benefits here Discovery. Yeah, we do.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: You know, Uh, if you're a minority, if you're a woman,
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: African American or Latino, you're gonna make more money. Women
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: earn about nine thousand more a year if you're in
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: a union, African Americans eight thousand more year, and Latinos
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: close to twelve thousand more year if you're a union member.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: So aside from uh, safe working conditions and health insurance
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: and things like that, which are great, wages are really
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: the big deal, right Wages benefits UM pensions are another
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: huge um and they're also there to um protect workers
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: from being unjustly fired. So like we're non union and
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: we could if somebody could come in here and say,
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: you know what, I didn't the way that you looked
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: at your boss. I saw you scowling. You're fired. You're fired,
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: you're fired, you're fired. And we'd be like, you can't
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: do that, and they'd be like, oh, yes we can,
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: and that would be that right. Um. There was like
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: a big hubbub in Florida about some uh some workers
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: that all wore orange either depending on who you ask
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: because they were all going happy already together that night,
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: or because they were um simulating a prisoner garb to
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: um protest the working conditions at this law firm, which
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: is really what they were doing, and like twelve of
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: them were fired. They were just taking into a conference
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: room and the guy was like, you're all fired and
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: that's that. And they're like, you can't fire us for
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: wearing an orange shirt, and actually, yes, very much so.
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: The since it's a work right to work state or
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: an at will work state right to work um, the
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: the the the employer very much can fire you for
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: wearing something that's seemingly arbitrary, is wearing orange. If you're
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: a union member, that is not the case. The union
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: protects you from unjust dismissal and basically you if you
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: feel like you've been fired for wearing orange, you can
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: go to your union rep and a big stink comes about.
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: That's another big one is protecting them. But I also
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: feel like here is a good point to mention a
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: lot of the criticisms of unions because that same protection
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: from unjust dismissal um Unions are frequently criticized for that
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: extending to workers who perform poorly, if like, it's part
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: of that give I think with unions among labor to say, okay,
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: yes we're gonna protect you, but you have to be productive,
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: or you have to be good at your job or whatever. Right,
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: don't hide under the shield of the union just to
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: go phone in your your job every day and collect
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: your paycheck exactly and you know, flaunt that protect action.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: That's not what it's there for. UM. Another big criticism
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: is that union, just the presence of unions in any
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: country harms economic progress on the whole by hamstringing business
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: and making it less competitive among countries that don't have unions. UM.
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: And so for states that have state employee unions, a
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: big one is that UM, state employee pensions can be
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: a drain on UM tight state economies. Uh. That's another
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: big one too. So there's criticisms of unions that are
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: very legitimate true, But again I think it comes down to,
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: like where your political affiliation is. Well, yeah, I mean
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: these days, UH, Republicans are more likely to not be
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: in favor of unions, and they have consistently been called
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: the backbone of the Democratic Party. That wasn't always the case, though,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: UM in nineteen fifties, h Republican President Dwight Eisenhower UM
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: said that you and to have a secure place in
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: our industrial life. Only a handful of reactionaries harbor the
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: ugly thought of breaking unions and depriving working men and
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: women of the right to join the union of their choice.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: And also throughout history, unions have kind of dabbled outside
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: their own labor negotiations and protection to fight for things
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: like UH medicare, social security, civil rights. Civil rights is
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: a big one. UM. I think Missouri Congressman Richard Boeling
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: said quote, we would have never passed the Civil Rights
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: Act without labor. They had the muscle. The other civil
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: rights groups did not. So there, you know, you don't
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: want to see anyone's strong arm, but there is certainly
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: something to be said for strength and numbers, especially when
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: it comes to something like the Civil Rights Act. UM.
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: The who was Eisenhower who had that quote about union rights. UM.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: Eisenhower's speaking at a time that was just after the
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: peak of union membership. In ve UM, thirty five of
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: all non agricultural workers, which is like everybody but farmers,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: UM belonged to unions. Now it's down to eleven point
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: eight percent. Yeah, and UM the public sector thirty seven percent.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: But where they're really getting hurt is the private sector.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: Less than seven percent of the private sector is unionized
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: these days. And there's a lot of people that, UH say,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: a lot of the problems that we have in Washington
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: and a lot of the financial troubles we've had in
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: this country have been to a certain degree, UM because
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: of the non unionizing of like the rust belt in
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: the private sector. So UM to sociologist Bruce Western and
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: Jake Rosenfeld actually wrote a paper that said that, UM,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: the decline of organized labor unions UM from the nineteen
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: seventies on can account for as much as a third
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: of them increase in UH income inequality in the US,
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: which has been significant, And they can attribute a third
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: of that increase just to the decline of labor. Well,
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: and I think it also coincided with in the nineteen seventies. UH.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Some say that big business really went hard at Washington
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: for the not for the first time, but in a
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: way that they never had before, and that changed the
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: landscape of the distribution of wealth in this country. Yeah,
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: and that's a really interesting UM point, Chuck, Like we
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: were raised after that period. But so that's just kind
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: of like our you know, we The Secret of My
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: success or, UM American Psycho, you know, all those great
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: movies about the eighties or set in the eighties, Like
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: that's just the way it was, like all these like
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: you just go after money and like you spend that
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: money on cocaine and pinstripe suits, you know, in Maserati's
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: or whatever. Um. And so we were kind of raised
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: with that sentiment. But there was a time prior to
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: the nineteen seventies where it was labor who was running
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: the charge. It was the unions and they were fully
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: in control, and business figured out how to regroup and
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: reassert itself. And that's the age that we're in now. UM.
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: So back to Eisenhower, though when he was talking, he
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: was kind of carrying on a tradition where the U. S.
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: Government figured out that Okay, there is a um, there's
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: a balance of power that has to be struck between
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: labor and business because business is part of this economic engine.
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: Labor helps fuel economic engine. But they really kind of
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: represent two different sectors of the the US, not just
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: economy economy, but the population. And we need to keep
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: them happy. We need to strike this balance. So the
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: federal government got involved starting in ninety five live with
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: the National Labor Relations Act, and they basically said, Okay,
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: we can't have strikes where you guys are shooting two
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: pound hinges at cops, and we can't have strikes where
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: cops are like murdering, uh, striking workers. Let's get to
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: the heart of this matter and figure out how to
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: strike a happy balance between what labor wants and what
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: business wants and progress from there. And it was a
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: really smart thing to do, but they figured out that
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: it was very much like Homer trying to keep pinching
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: lobster alive with the goldfish in that fresh water tank,
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: you know, adding salt, adding water, um. And it's been
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: that was kind of the mark of the twentieth century
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: in an American economic history, was that adding the salt
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: and adding the water over time through legislation. Well, in
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: the nl R A was like you said, the first one.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: And prior to that they companies didn't even have to
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: recognize a union or negotiate with a union leader. So
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: this actually require by law that they not necessarily they
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: give workers what they want. But they had to at
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: least negotiate in good faith and sit down to table
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: with them. Yeah, which effectively said it brought unions out
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: of the dark and legalized them and gave them a
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: legal voice in legal recourse. That's right. And to enforce that,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: they soon passed the National Labor Relations Board to oversee,
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: uh what was going on with n l R A
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: and UM. The article points out here that they accomplished
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: three things. Um. It allowed workers to have elections to
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: you know, elect their own union leaders. UM established laws
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: protecting employees from discrimination based on union activity, so like
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: are you union, well, we don't want to hire you.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: That kind of thing, or even worse, like in the
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: case of Ford Motor Company led Forward Security Wing led
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: by Harry Bennett, a two thousand man strong goon squad.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: They used to like beat up workers, beat up like organizers,
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: beat up union reps um, and do it like on camera.
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: They really were kind of above the law in a
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: lot of ways. But this was definitely target that was
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: targeted at guys like that for the goons. Yeah. Um,
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: and this kind of sneaks by, but important, Uh. An
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: important thing to note here is an l R I
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: also protected collective bargaining even if you're not in a union,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: and the ability to bargain for better conditions for all workers.
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: So I mean it's it's the unions was one of
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: the main things. But it protected everybody, but not everybody.
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: There are a bunch of groups that were left out
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: of this. Agricultural workers UM, domestic service workers UM, federal,
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: state and local government employees, which obviously when when a
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: different way, UM, railroad and airline employees, that one kind
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: of became important. Like we talked about in the air
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: traffic control one UM under Reagan when he fired all
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: the traffic controllers you know who went on strike. Yeah,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: and that's important. UM. I guess was that the TAFT
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: Hartley that ensured yeah, tapped Hartley Act came along in
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: nineteen seven, or the Labor Management Relations Act, and one
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: of the important things it did was said, you know what,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: if there's any strike that's gonna put the public health
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: and danger, then we can issue an eighty day injunction
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: that basically says you cannot strike. And in the case
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: of the I guess was did that put the country
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: in danger? Necessarily, I put the country's economy and danger.
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: But at the same time Reagan didn't have file an
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: injunction through the UM relations Board. He fired work. You're
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: fired man, that guy, I know? Uh? And what else
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: did that? Oh? At the outlawed secondary boycott's the Taft
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: Hartley Labor Act, which was a big deal because the
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: example they use here in this article is really good.
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: Like let's say you're a brewery and you're striking against
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: your employer, or you might have a boycott against the
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: glass company that makes the beer bottles, just to put
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: the strong arm on the company from another direction. And
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: you can't do that. It's called the squeeze. Can't do
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: the squeeze. You can't as a union, but consumers frequently
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: do that kind of It's like UM trying to get
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: like Rush Limbaugh off there boycotted a lot of people
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: boycotted his UM advertisers until they said, you know what, Okay,
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: well we'll stop advertising with him, and then all of
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: a sudden, Russia Limbaugh has the double squeeze on him,
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: same with them. I can't remember. There was some special
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: interest group, some pack that was getting funding from like McDonald's, Wendy's,
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: a bunch of people and UM because of their alleged
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: unfair and um very much pro business only practices. UM,
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: like all of these companies is kind of abandoned them recently.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: Really yeah, alec A l EC, I don't remember what
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: it stands for. No, no, no, no, okay, you sure? Yes? Uh,
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of Josh, what's
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: that all about? Well, this was during a time when um,
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: the winds had really shifted towards not only the unions
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: having the uh, the labor um business under their thumb,
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: they also had their union members under their thumb. The
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: mob was involved the the democracy um where the democratic
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: basis of unions had eroded, and uh, there was a
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: lot of shady stuff going on. Um. This what I
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: thought was cool was rather than the federal government going, oh, well,
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: then we need to re reinvigorate the power given to
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: business under these union laws, instead they went and invested
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: more power in union members. That's right. Yeah, Like you
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: couldn't use union dues anymore to promote one candidate over
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: another in the union. For union, the elections were really
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: pretty heavily monitored from that point on. Uh, every single
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: union member has to be notified by mail at least
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: fifteen days before the election, like you can't sneak an
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: election by them, which probably used to happen in the
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: old days. UM. To to increase transparency in the whole
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: union thing, there was a lot of UM disclosure and
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: reporting requirements that were added, and not just for the
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: unions but for also like employers, consultants. They want to
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: know where the money was going and basically they wanted
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: to see how the MOB was involved as a big one. Well,
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: in speaking of money UM, I don't think we pointed
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: out that a lot of times UM unions will have
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: strike funds and some of the money that you pay
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: into it will actually pay you when you go on
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: strike to keep you from going hungry. It's like Affleck.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: You know that Gilbert Godfrey didn't do that anymore. I
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: don't think I know. And I wonder how ironic would
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: it be if he had Affleck insurance and that it
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: kicked in Whence Affleck fired him. Interesting, why do you
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: I think he got fired because he wanted too much money? No? No,
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: he got fired for making Twitter jokes about UM. The
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: Japanese tsunami like the day of Yeah, I thought it
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: was a money issue. Yeah, I'm worried about the sense
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: of humor in this country in the direction that's going,
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: like there's stand up comedians have always almost always been
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: allowed to some they're exempted from a lot of the
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: standards that average joes are held to, you know, like
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: their stand up comedians that's their job. Sometimes they make
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: tasteless jokes and all that stuff. Yeah, they'll go over
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: the line and they'll just go people go oh, and
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: they'll go what too soon? And then right exactly, and
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: then people will be like, yes, it is um But
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: there seems to be it seems to be open season
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: on comedians well because of platforms that they've never had before,
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: probably like Twitter. I guess all of a sudden, that's
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: like your official statement instead of a joke he made
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: or yeah, and the audience is much much wider and
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: much more um varied and diverse too. So I beg
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: you for god read so pissed off. I would imagine so,
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: because I mean, you've got tell me there's like ten
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: thou people lining up voice actors to go act for
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: a huge page. I think he just made a pretty
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: good argument for yourself that wasn't as good as but
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: but I mean, and the problem is I realize what's
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: at risk is you know, cultural sensitivity, even individual sensitivity
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: towards people who are going to be offended or hurt,
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: but they're also there has to be a balance between
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: that and I mean the other thing that that risk
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: is like our national sense of humor, which is really important.
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: It's one of the things you could be like, well,
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: it's just a stupid joke. No, Like our ability to
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: take a joke is a very vital and important thing
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: about keeping us from like all, you know, killing ourselves
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: and stand One of the roles that stand up comedians provide,
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: or any kind of comedian provides, is to keep that
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: healthy and vital and going agreed, There's nothing more of
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: a turn off to me than when you see a
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: humorless celebrity, like when Ricky Gervais is doing a thing
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: in the Golden Clubes and you see like the people
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: out there that just are offended by this. I'm like,
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: come on, man, yeah, I don't know. I I think
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: for yourself, I can see Ricky Gervais being We'll make
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: him the sacrificial lamp leak over God for you alone.
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: You know, man, that was a sidebar, Yes, it was.
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: Are we talking about labor unions. I don't remember labor
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: unions today, Josh, you mentioned the a f l C
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: I Oh. Um, A lot of people might not know
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: that that is actually a collection to labor federation made
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: up of fifty four member unions ten million strong. That's
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: a lot of people change to win as sort of
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: a new one two thousand five, it was formed, but
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: it isn't also a labor federation encompassing seven unions in
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: six million workers. Yeah. The A f L that was
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: founded by Samuel Gompers who I mentioned earlier, and he
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: got some cigar makers and some other industrial laborers together
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: to form that. And then that was in the late
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: nineteenth century, and I can't remember exactly when, but maybe
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: in the forties of the fifties. Uh. He got together
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: with the c I O to form the a f
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: l C I oh because he loves cigars. U A
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: W is a huge one. Autoworkers. Yeah, they have something
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: like um one point four million members. Uh No, I'm sorry.
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: The Teamsters has one point four million members and they're
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: the ones who are probably the most well known by
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: the average job thanks to one Jimmy Hoffa. Do you
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: know his story? A little bit here there. Um. The
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: whole mob involvement I think with them, with any union
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: was they really is that there's a bunch of guys
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: UM who are sitting on enormous piles of money and
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: let's see how much of that we can steal or
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: get their hands on or used to build ourselves casinos.
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: And Jimmy Hoffa was in with these guys and he
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: just went missing right in. Yeah. I mean, I don't
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: think it's any secret what happened to him, but they
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: definitely don't know exactly what happened. And that's the whole point,
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: Wasn't it was a secret what happened to Well, he
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: was snuffed out. Oh I don't. I don't think he
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: you know, I just had a heart attack while hiking
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: in the wilderness and his body decomposed naturally. Well, he
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: was supposedly going. He was last seen waiting on to
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: mafia associates. It's kind of good giveaway too. But his son,
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: James P. Hoffa Um has really kind of brought the
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: family name back tremendously. He's the head of the Teamsters today.
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: R Yes he is. He's the president of the Teamsters
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: Union UM and is doing a lot of work toward
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: um relegitimizing um unions again country, which is pretty cool. Well,
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: anyone who's ever been on a film set and has
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: seen a two hundred and seventy five pound man eating
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: a doughnut sitting in his truck, you can say I've
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: met a teamster, and they they do great work, and
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: they're basically there's a I can't remember the number, but
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: they're there. If you're an industrial worker, you're basically eligible
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: to be a teamster, and in just about any kind
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: of industry. I'm gonna get hate mail for that. Oh
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: you'll be fine. There's like two guys that you described
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: who listened to this podcast, so you get two pieces
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: of hate mail. If I was a teamster, I would
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: do nothing but listen to this podcast because you're just
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: sitting a rapp That's not true. Teams do great work,
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: but on film sets is sort of the old joke
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: is that like they'll park the truck and then they
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: sit in it until they leave. In the truck, you
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: know them that There was another since reference just came
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: up with them. The one where that film for Radioactive
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: Man comes to town and Homer tries to see who
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: can out lazy, the teamsters, good stuff. That is just
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: a stereotype. Although yeah, but stereotypes are there for a reason, right,
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: has not funny? Isn't that funny? What else? I don't
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: have anything else? You get anything else? Um? No, I
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: guess I think we covered pretty much everything. Yeah, it's
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: a nice broad overview of people can and like you
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: said early on, man, you hit it on the head,
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: my friend, whether or not you are pro union or
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: anti union largely depends on your family's background. Yeah, it's
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: a it's a very tried and true a thing through
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: through families, through generations that you know, people feel very
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: strongly about it that are involved in unions or like
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: my actually my parents were in the teachers union. Oh yeah, yeah,
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: you're a union kid. Huh. Yeah, But that that wasn't
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: like factory stuff, Like I never heard them besides complaining
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: about not making up money, which every teacher should complain about. Um.
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: And if you don't have any kind of passionate feelings
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: about it whatsoever, I would advise you to look into it. Yeah.
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: And if you do have passionate feelings about it, I
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: think a great exercise would be to explore how the
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: other side sees it and see if it changes your
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: mind one way or the other. Look at you. Um,
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: you can do that by reading this fascinating article that
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: we just based this podcast on, Um, how unions work.
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: You can type in the search bar at house tofforce
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: dot com. You can also go into WAPO. There was
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: a pretty cool um editorial. That's the Washington Post. By
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: the way. That's right, Um, the Wisconsin union fight isn't
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: about benefits, it's about labor's influence. From March six eleven.
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: That's a good article. That was a good article too.
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: And I already said search bar, which means it's time
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: for a listener mail. You know, our buddy Joe Garden
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: was he's a scanni. He was really upset last year.
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: You can tell you you can see right through his skin.
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: He's so pale, he's translucent. Vote Joe Garden, big craftwork guy.
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: Oh did he get tickets? No? He did a h
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: He promoted his own craft work. Um, I believe it
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: was a craftwork covers show and he got different bands
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: to come and play craft work. And his big deal
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: for Joe was it was awesome. He wore like white
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: suit and introduced everyone that is sweet. When was that
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: very recently? Did you see footage of her? Were you there? No?
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: He was just he wouldn't shut up about on Facebook
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: and even admitted like, guys, I know you're tired of
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: hearing about craftwork. That is significant Joe. Um. Yeah. There's
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: also I guess kind of in with the music sampling episode,
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: there's I think a DJ Food or a DJ Shadow
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: I think DJ Food Um craftwork cover mix. Yeah, there's
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: like maybe three volumes of it, and it's like just
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: mixing together all these people who were like sampled craft
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: work for those songs. Yeah. They just did a big
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: thing at the some museum MoMA. Yeah. Yeah, oh my god.
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: We you mean I tried very hard to get those tickets.
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: Did you try? Dude? It was such cluster. I'm not
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: into craftwork and this solidifies it when I saw the
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: reviews of it and it said they did like a
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: twenty one minute of auto ban and I was just like,
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: somebody put a gun to my head. Are you just
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: supposed to zone out and forget where you are for
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: a little bit where I'm not a craf work guy,
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: but I know people are. People don't know I'm not
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: a craft work guy. Either like um, but I will
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: say that like that would have been just a momentous,
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: just a momentous thing to see MoMA in this pretty
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: much Okay, like the Tupac hologram. I'm sure seeing that
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: at coache it was just amazing. Yeah, and a bet
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: way more amazing for some people than others even. All Right,
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: So should I read a listener mail? I guess I'm
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: gonna call this a good cause. We like to promote
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: these and attach it to our Labor Union episode. How appropriate,
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: big big fan, guys, I was just down at south
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: By Southwest where I caught your variety show and shook
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: your surprisingly supple hands. I also, I know I also
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: sat on a panel called Harnessing the Power of the
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: Benevolent Internet, something you guys, seem pretty skilled at yourselves,
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: which is why I thought you might be game to
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: help students across the country learn all sorts of stuff
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: they should know, in many cases, of stuff they need
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: to know. I work for a nonprofit website called donors
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: Choose dot org, where anyone with a dollar can give
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: support to classrooms and need. Teachers from all fifty states
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: post request for resources they feel their students need and
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: kind folks from all over the world help bring those
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: lessons to life. It's cool. It sounds almost really like
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: a Kiva for teachers. I need tickets to craft working well.
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: Since our founding in two thousand, we've delivered over a
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: hundred and ten million dollars of resources directly to public
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: school classrooms, supporting more than six million students. Uh. And
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: if you or my fellow listeners would like to help
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: you or my fellow listeners. You have listeners, fellow listeners. Okay,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: we have listeners. That listener has fellow listens. Check out
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: the page I set up. He set up a page
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: with our name, and I was like, that's cool, you
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: can do that, but we're not, like, we can't officially,
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: like sign on because then it has to go through
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: corporate and all that stuff. Oh oh, I already signed
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: us on officially made T shirts and it didn't. So
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: you can go to donors choose dot org slash stuff
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: kids should know and um let me know if you
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: have any questions. And this is from Zach and he said,
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: by the way, we recently hired a system admin a
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: couple of months back. Drove me crazy for a few weeks.
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: Then I realized he sounds exactly like Josh, and he said,
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: I've enjoyed working with you. Josh. Who is the other
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: voice double for me? There's another person that was some dude. Well,
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: there's a writer that writes about running. He wrote one
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: thing about running one Clark and have been asked five
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: times if it was me? What's ironic? Now? I actually run?
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: You should write your own orgicle. Um, I can't remember.
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: There was some other voice person that did like hike
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: videos or something. I don't remember. Yeah, well, if okay,
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: who is that that was Zach? Donors choose dot org
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: slash kids stuff kids should know. Donors choose dot org
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: slash stuff kids should know. Indeed, Uh, if you have
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: a great charitable organization you want to us to let
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: everybody know about again, We're always happy to do that.
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: And if I sound like somebody, let me know because
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: it's driving me crazy. Who it is. I've heard from
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: like a bunch of people. You sound just like this
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: or whatever? Yeah? Remember? Or I want to hear from
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: people who have um actively been on a worker strike,
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: or if you have been a scab as they called them,
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: and been a strike buster, or if you've ever been
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: beaten up by the cops. We want to hear about
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: that too, Yes, and anarchists, any anarchists out there, We're
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: always interested in hearing from anarchists. I guess I got
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: shipped down by the cops and happens one night. If
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: you get beat up their difference. No, but they like
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: threw me against the wall and like we're kicking my
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: legs out from under me, and yeah, it was weird.
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: And then they had just left. Are you sure there
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: are cops and not just some eternity boys dressed up
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: as appens police in a car me and my three friends.
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: I don't know what they thought we were doing, but
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: they they got out of there really click. I'll say
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: that they must have thought you were somebody else, Kevin Smith,
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: or the reality of their situation hit them and they
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: realized that what they were doing was wrong. Maybe. Uh.
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: You can communicate with Chuck and I electronically via Twitter
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: at s y SK podcast that's our handle, uh, Facebook
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: dot com slash stuff you Should Know, or you can
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: send us an email to Stuff podcast at Discovery dot
• 48:22
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• 48:30
  Speaker 1: Does it how stuff works dot Com brought to you
• 48:40
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• 48:43
  Speaker 1: you