esma

I grew up in a union town and a union family. All my family is AFL-CIO local 195 (Pipe Fitters and Welders). I broke the mold. I didn't want to be in the union or work in the plants. Not that the pay and benefits weren't good, it was the strikes. It seemed like half my life growing up my family was on strike over one thing or another, and I could do the math. Even though they made good money when they worked, they ended up not working half the time, so I really grew up poor!! I was also the only Republican in my family from a young age and unions ruled the local politics in a big way in my home town. What I saw in my family was a blind loyalty to the Democrat party, even though they knew absolutely NOTHING about what Democrats truly stood for. They just blindly followed the marching orders of their union leadership and voted the way they were told to!! I am 52 today and I've never been without a job, never drawn a dime of unemployment and pretty much always made good money throughout my adult life! However, one thing has changed....my family members are all Republicans now, pretty much like the rest of Texas and we haven't had a strike at any of the local plants in over 20 years. I'll never take anything away from the unions for all the good they did back in the day, but then as now they went to extremes which ended up hurting their membership more than helping it. That's why less than 10 percent of the people working in America today belong to a union and most of those people are government workers. Bottom line. America is a country of opportunity and if anything, a unions restricts individuals from capitalizing on those opportunities!!

its true, capitalism rules in this country, Our local is joined with the mill,grain, and tobacco workers...but they are weak and pretty much cant do nothing, unlike the grocery retail union.
If i work for Safeway bakeries, i have to be in the union to work there, the pay is decent and benefits, i cant complain either, my father was a union carpenter also, but i hear you on the propaganda they pitch on you, for voting and shopping.