With "workers rights" floating around in the national dialogue with the recent attention that has been focused on the on going situation in Wisconsin and other states(Iowa, Indiana, Ohio for example) I thought I would take this opportunity to mention some of my work experience that will shed some light on a couple of the mantras coming from the pro-union crowd.

First of all I have never been a part of or belonged to a union of any kind.  Although at one point in my working life I did have an option.  On the same day I was given two different job offers, one was to work seasonal part-time at the UPS hub at the Rockford(Illinois) Airport and have a portion of my very small pay taken out in union dues for the teamsters, I also would have automatically been forced into that organization regardless of whether I wanted to be a part of them or not.

Well, in that instance where were my rights to not be forced into an organization I wanted no part of.  Where was my right to not have a portion of my pay confiscated to support the teamsters an organization diametrically opposed to everything I believe in.  Had I accepted that job a portion of what I earned would have inexorably ended up into the campaign coffers of Democrat politicians.  I have never voted for any Democrat for any elected office and have certainly not given them money.  Had I been forced to give money to the teamsters I would have had no say whatsoever in how that money was used or to what political candidates.

Where was my right to simply work for UPS, keep my income(minus taxes), do my job to the best of my abilities and support financially or otherwise the political party and candidate of my choice?

Thankfully that same day I was also offered another job by another company, which was full-time and at a higher hourly wage that what UPS was offering.  I took that second better job offer without question or hesitation.

The defenders of the government sector unions of Wisconsin have been fond of saying that it is because of unions and collective bargaining that the American worker has an 8 hour work day.  If all you want to do is work an 8 hour shift that is fine by me, but in the 2 years I worked for that other company I got very used to working 10 hour days(even did a 13 hour day once).  I personally would much rather be working 10 hours than 8 hours.  The more I work, the more I earn, the more I earn the easier it is for me to pay my expenses and the easier it is to have some extra money to put towards the ends I find most productive.  More work and more income also means I pay more in taxes, hence my support of the flat tax and for the eventual repeal of the 16th amendment and adoption of the Fair Tax.

The supporters of the unions also say that the unions and collective bargaining are necessary to protect the employee form the ills and evils that can be inflected by their employer and management.  Well, if you don't like you working conditions or anything else related to ones job there is a solution to that should management/employer not make appropriate changes, leave and go to work for someone else.  I used to work for an employer that did not care that I and my coworkers were spending all our time finishing the task that our 3rd shift was supposed to be doing and not accomplishing any of the task we(on 1st/2nd shift) were assigned to do.  This same employer was more concerned about holding everyone to their limited hours(they had cut my hours back to 60 for a whole month) then they were about use getting caught up on our work, my manager would also admonish me about my coming in early, on my own accord, to attempt to get caught up.  Due to us being constantly behind because of our 3rd shift and management's inability to make any changes to the 3rd shift(like putting on more people to finish the job so we didn't have to or cutting back on our inbound deliveries), my managers insistence that getting the work done was not the most important thing, the complete lack of hours, the low pay and some other factors this job was highly stressful when it didn't have to be.  So on the third complaint from my manager about me coming in early to attempt to get just a little bit more of our backlog taken care of, when another manager refused to increase my hours and yet another day when 3rd shift left us a whole days worth of their work for me to finish, I quite and went to go look for another job some place else which I did at a higher pay and at full-time to boot with 500 times less stress to top it off.

So the next time a union thug(some video to be included at the bottom to support that assertion) talks about "workers rights" and that unions have a right to collectively bargain, especially for government sector unions, remember what nationally syndicated talk radio host Mark Levin said to a caller on February 25, 2011.  "These aren't rights.  Let me explain something to you.  Rights are in the Declaration of Independence, Rights are God given.  These are bargaining issues, these are not rights.  You don't have the right to destroy your community by draining all the resources out of it."

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