Nov 18. 2010: Paving Daytona

[Diaphone Jim]

Bruce: How very unlike you.
Is it "The(y) do know they're shiit" (they are shit)?
Or "They do know their shit?" (are competent)
Some tender toes on, but interesting pics.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I have no idea what you are talking about.

[Undertoad]

My opinion on unions has changed because of A) xoB's statements in the past and B) I realized that I have been pretty much beat up, seriously taken advantage of, and even outright fired for no cause by shitty managers my entire life in IT, and so has pretty much everyone else in IT. We get ass-reamed for 20 years until we're middle age, and either we become the shitty managers, or we're fucked.

IT is relentlessly anti-union as a principle, but when I step back, it really hasn't worked out like they said it would.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Recent increases in unions have been all in white collar, for that very reason.

[lupin..the..3rd]

NASCAR makes me LOL. Driving in circles? Only turning left? How dull.

Unions are responsible for the modern "amenities" that all workers enjoy today. Things you take for granted, like Five-day work weeks (Saturdays off), were originally Union ideas, as are many of the current worker protection laws.

That said, Unions are obsolete now, what with all the labor laws to protect employees these days. Workers comp, OSHA, Minimum wage, Non-discrimination laws, etc. 100 years ago, we didn't have any of these laws, and people depended on the Unions to provide these worker protections. But that's just not the case any more. IMO Unions don't serve any purpose but to (drastically) inflate the cost of labor. As an example, look at auto workers. The workers at non-union factories, (like the BMW and Mercedes factories here in the US) make more money and have better benefits than their Big-3 Union counterparts. The automakers who employ non-union workers also enjoy lower operating expenses. Lower costs and better employee compensation = a win-win situation. I'll never work for a union - I like the freedom to negotiate my own salary and benefits package, and like the freedom of "at will" employment.

[Lamplighter]

Does that include police unions ?

[Lamplighter]

Originally Posted by lupin..the..3rd

NASCAR makes me LOL. Driving in circles? Only turning left? How dull.

Unions are responsible for the modern "amenities" that all workers enjoy today. Things you take for granted, like Five-day work weeks (Saturdays off), were originally Union ideas, as are many of the current worker protection laws.

That said, Unions are obsolete now, what with all the labor laws to protect employees these days. Workers comp, OSHA, Minimum wage, Non-discrimination laws, etc. 100 years ago, we didn't have any of these laws, and people depended on the Unions to provide these worker protections. But that's just not the case any more. IMO Unions don't serve any purpose but to (drastically) inflate the cost of labor. As an example, look at auto workers. The workers at non-union factories, (like the BMW and Mercedes factories here in the US) make more money and have better benefits than their Big-3 Union counterparts. The automakers who employ non-union workers also enjoy lower operating expenses. Lower costs and better employee compensation = a win-win situation. I'll never work for a union - I like the freedom to negotiate my own salary and benefits package, and like the freedom of "at will" employment.

So everything is right in lupin's world, and won't change.
Management is beneficent and will never take advantage of it's labor force,
and certainly would never coerce or threaten it's work force.

And even if the overpaid automobile workers have to take cuts,
it will never affect other industries, and won't affect me.
I'll never work for a union.
My boss loves me !

Lupin's world-view has now been confirmed by the NYTimes

Unions Yield on Wage Scales to Preserve Jobs
By LOUIS UCHITELLE
Published: November 19, 2010

Organized labor appears to be losing an important battle in the Great Recession.
Even at manufacturing companies that are profitable,
union workers are reluctantly agreeing to tiered contracts that create two levels of pay.

The arrangement was a fairly common means of shrinking labor costs in the recession of the early 1980s.
At the end of the contracts, however, wages generally snapped back up to a single tier.
At G.M., Chrysler, Delphi and Caterpillar, the wages will not be snapping back.

Nor will that happen for workers at three big manufacturers here in southeastern Wisconsin
— where 15 percent of the work force is in manufacturing, a bigger proportion than any other state.
These employers — Harley-Davidson, Mercury Marine and Kohler — have all but succeeded
in the last year or so in erecting two-tier systems that could last well into a recovery.

His [Harley-Davidson] union recently accepted a new contract that freezes wages for existing workers
for most of its seven years, lowers pay for new hires, dilutes benefits
and brings temporary workers to the assembly line at even lower pay and no benefits
whenever there is a rise in demand for Harley’s roaring bikes.

Increasing the pressure, Harley-Davidson and Mercury Marine, a unit of the Brunswick Corporation,
publicly declared that they would move factory operations to lower-cost American cities
— Stillwater, Okla., for example, or Kansas City, Mo. —
if the unions failed to accept the concessions set forth in remarkably similar contracts.

[Pete Zicato]

Different, but still cool, road laying. I suppose this wouldn't work for Daytona, though.

[HungLikeJesus]

Originally Posted by Pete Zicato

Different, but still cool, road laying. I suppose this wouldn't work for Daytona, though.

That must be Indianapolis.

[Lamplighter]

That's the most labor-saving devise I've seen in a very long time.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by Lamplighter

That's the most labor-saving devise I've seen in a very long time.

as proven by the eight guys doing nothing but watching the one guy "work"

[BigV]

Unions make things more expensive (kiss of death for businesses).

But there is such a gigantic imbalance of power between me as an individual with labor (regardless of my collar color) to offer and the business, that unions are a necessary counterbalance. If I'm out of work, or if I need/suggest a change in the operation of the business, I'm without any power to *make* stuff happen. This is not as true for the business side. Especially in my state, Washington, which is an "at will" employment state. It works like no fault divorce. If one party wants to end the relationship, it's ended. No reason required.

What always works best is for both business and labor to work for our common cause, since we both need each other. But often shorter term or more individual goals take precedence and the whole suffers. MY welfare as an individual employee is not the business's highest priority--maximizing profit is. Often the short term gain (of profit) comes at the direct expense of my WHOLE operation--"you're fired". This is a blip to the business, but a calamity to me. Granted, this is a high stakes example, but the same thing happens in tiny ways too--on both sides.

Costs of benefits go up, how will it be shared? Profits rise, how will they be shared? (often not at all; wages are an expense). Risk is involved, how will that be shared? We (business and labor) are both in this together, but not always equally. Unions help equalize much of the power differential.

[HungLikeJesus]

Bruce, I found the pictures to be interesting, but your descriptions made it better.

[xoxoxoBruce]

They didn't come with any explanation, I had to figure out what was going on from experience. The only machine I'm not sure of is #2, between the truck and the conveyor, I think I got it right. The Daytona Race Track website has pictures, but they are tiny and no explanation. If you want to see the other nine, PM me your email and I'll forward them.

[tulzscha]

Item number 2 is called, innovatively enough, a "transfer vehicle." It holds material so that if the next truck gets delayed, the paver can still keep going. Stopping means seams, and seams mean badness.This article has a good summation of the problems and the process, and an annotated photograph (towards the bottom).