The Rand Formula

[maplesyrup]

If companies cannot pay a decent wage to their employees they should leave Canada , or at least get out of the business they are in. We don't need that type of regressive entreprenneur in Canada.

It would be great to have an environment leading up to our Olympics in 2010, similiar to the one that created the Sydney Olympics. Unfortunately we will never see that kind of situation with the current union-bashing BC government. Time to throw the bums out!

[Hjalmar]

What has the minimum wage for new employees in BC been dropped to, with our brilliant Premier Gordon Campbell - is it $6. per hour?

What was it under the NDP? $8. or $8.50 an hour?

So everything else in the world goes up in price, except wages with Gordo. No wonder he will be turfed soon!

The minimum wage in BC remains the same as it was under the previous NDP government [$8.00/hr] -- the only thing that was changed, as Willy correctly stated, was that employers are now allowed to hire trainees at $6.50/hr for the first 200 hours. If you want to state facts then try to get them straight please.

So Gordo is going to be turfed soon??? If memory serves me correctly you predicted that the NDP and your pal, Jack Layton, were going to win the last Federal election. You later started to amend that to approx 50 seats. What was the final result MS? The NDP gained a mere 6 seats over what they had before. They remain a rump party.

[Hjalmar]

Try living, or purchasing a home in Vancouver earning $15. or even $20. an hour. These conditions remind one of the Charles Dickens era, where there was absolutely no hope for low wage earners

I lived quite comfortably on $1.63/hr as a city transit bus driver for 5 1/2 years -- bought a new house and raised a family of 3 children. I took out a loan at the transit credit union, bought a new truck complete with Brantford box and hoist and hired a driver for 25% of the take and I drove it myself on my days off. Of course that was before labour unions raised the cost of everything twenty - fold. Oh, by the way, that was a union job. Pay was $1.63/hr when I started and was still $1.63/hr. when I left 5 1/2 years later. Labour unions were tame then. Today they try to run our country

[Stoker]

Of course there is much more safety in a unionized environment. It is just basic common sense. If workers have the power of the union to back them up, they will speak out about safety concerns, if not, they won't say anything for fear of losing their job.

One don't need statistics for a basic given. If you want stats go to any WCB in the country and get educated.

If it's basic given and the WCB has the proof/statistics, then you or Cartman should have no problem providing a link........the onus isn't on myself to provide proof.

Obviously the union worker, who is making $8-10/hr more than his non-union counterpart for the same work, is doing better. I'm still struggling to see how you can point to higher union wages as a bad thing for workers?

I guess you have not been reading the threads WRT the shipbuilding industry in British Columbia.......

With the bad thing being, the Union worker isn't working right now, were as the none union bloke is.

So let me get this straight. If I offer you some statistics on this matter demonstrating my point, you will accept the results wholeheartedly?

It would depend on the source..........be it a bipartisan source, then most likely yes.......be it Comrade Organizer's agit prop site or in any way afflited with a union.....

"78-79 percent of unionized workplaces reported high compliance with health and safety legislation while only 54-61 per cent of non-unionized workplaces reported such compliance." Report, Ontario Workplace Health and Safety Agency.

"In workplaces with full union recognition and a joint management-union safety committee serious accident rates were less than half those at firms with no union recognition and non joint committee." Barry Reilly, Peirella Paci and Peter Hall. Unions, Safety committees and workplace injuries. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 33, 2, June 1995.

Unionized workplaces were three times as likely to have a health and safety committee, and twice as likely to have undergone a management occupational health and safety audit in the preceding 12 months. Paraphrasing of Workplace Relations Survey,1990-1995, Australia.

"Effective strategies for involving workers appear to be conditional on a number of variables, most importantly on worker activism and the effective use of formal negotiations." Michelle Ochsner and Michael Greenberg, Factors which support effective worker participation in health and safety: A survey of New Jersey, Industrial and Hygienists and Safety Engineers. Journal of Public Health Policy, volume 19, No 3, 1998.

Barry Hirsch ("Workers Compensation Recipiency in Union and Non-union Workplaces," Industrial and Labour Relations Review, Vol. 50, No.2 January 1997, p.p. 213-235) concluded that in cases where workers do get injured on the job or develop work-related illnesses, it’s also advantageous to be a union member. Studies in the United States and Canada show that union members are more likely to receive WCB Benefits when they are injured on the job than non-union members. This is attributed to the fact that union members can go to their union representative for help navigating the WCB’s bureaucratic maze. Non-union workers are on their own."

Call me a skeptic, but could you provide links for your "reports"?

Try living, or purchasing a home in Vancouver earning $15. or even $20. an hour. These conditions remind one of the Charles Dickens era, where there was absolutely no hope for low wage earners.

If your not happy with what you earn, better yourself, be it a better education then a better paying job or bloody well move out into the outlaying regions of the city.

[Hjalmar]

Here's one for you to digest .... sort of par for the course with labour unions here in Canada.

A ship has just arrived and the port needs 10 additional workers. This of course is the Longshoremans Union and the employer must hire through the union hiring hall. They send 10 workers immediately but one of them is stone drunk and hardly able to stand on his feet. They carried on until noon, then paid the drunk who had done absolutely no work, and told him to leave. The other 9 union workers down tools and leave with him. The employer phones back to the union hall, explains the situation, and requests another 10 workers. Within half an hour 10 men were there.... the same 10 that were there before, including the drunk.

Not hard to read the message there.... When you have union workers you must hire and pay 10 to get 9.

[maplesyrup]

Here's one for you to digest .... sort of par for the course with  labour unions here in Canada.

A ship has just arrived and the port needs 10 additional workers. This of course is the Longshoremans Union and the employer must hire through the union hiring hall. They send 10 workers immediately but one of them is stone drunk and hardly able to stand on his feet. They carried on until noon, then paid the drunk who had done absolutely no work, and told him to leave. The other 9 union workers down tools and leave with him. The employer phones back to the union hall, explains the situation, and requests another 10 workers. Within half an hour 10 men were there.... the same 10 that were there before, including the drunk.

Not hard to read the message there.... When you have union workers you must hire and pay 10 to get 9.

There are always going to extraordinary situations, but that is very misleading. In 99% of cases it would not play out that way.

Yes, shop stewards, or the union business agents, or whoever can be a pain in the ass sometimes, but are there not ever abuses by management? Let's live in the real world, not this fantasy one you keep dreaming about.

I just don't get the union-bashing, anti-worker mentality eminating from posters here. What better way to create a hostile work environment? Did it ever occur to you that the conciliatory approach might be more productive for all concerned? And you say we don't need unions anymore. Trust me, with your mentality, we need them now, more than ever.

[Stoker]

I just don't get the union-bashing, anti-worker mentality eminating from posters here. What better way to create a hostile work environment. Did it ever occur to you that the conciliatory approach might be more productive for all concerned? And you say we don't need unions anymore. Trust me, with your mentality, we need them now, more than ever.

If unions are such a necessity, then why are only 25% of the working population in one?

[Guest eureka]

I wrote of the Walmart concept, not Walmart directly. However, let's just stick with Walmart for a moment.

Walmart does have minimum wage employees: many, many tens of thousands of them. Walmart is said to be responsible for ten percent of all American imports from China - Walmart prospers on "slave labour; it is the biggest user of sweat shops around the world.

Walmart has been successful against KMart and against Zellers not for any intrinsic marketing superiority. It has been successful because those others were saddled with older stores in locations whose character was changing. Their customer base shifted to newer areas where Walmart, as a newcomer, was able to build without the costs of obsolete stores.

Walmart uses its economic power to drive competitors out of business. It uses, as loss leaders, the prime products of smaller, more specialized competitors in order not to meet customer demands but to destroy competition. It is a classical monopoly strategy and gives cause to wonder what will happen to Walmart prices when the competition is gone.

Walmart has many lawsuits against it in the US from employees forced to work overtime without pay or, where it has to pay, without overtime rates. Walmart is the worst major employer in the US. Walmart is the leader in outsourcing and overseas purcahing of shoddy goods. The cost, to employees of themselves and suppliers, is wages and benefits.

Walmart is an abomination that is due for a comeuppance. It may meet its Waterloo, in Canada, when its strategies to cripple Loblaws and Canadian Tire come back to haunt it as those two organizations with the brains and the customer recognition hit back - as they are doing.

[Hjalmar]

In the early twentieth century, American workers began to develop the reputation for superior quality work that had previously been associated with the English. Observers in London cast an envious eye toward the United States, where workers were credited with "superior technical education", and greater flexibility than their British counterparts. Meanwhile, Americans widely believed that the British decline was directly connected to the introduction of the dole, which created perverse incentives to shirk work.

Britain seemed to display a lack of vigor when compared to the USA., a condition which was worsened, as many North Americans believed, by national welfare policies. U.S. newspapers reported the despair of unemployed British families existing on dole payments and contrasted their lot with American citizens who had no such public benefits to erode their initiative

[Guest eureka]

It is amusing but sad, to read the old "unions running the country" pieces. Never has there been a greater need for enhanced union power since the early days of the twentieth century.

The large majority of workers in North America are not unionized as the working class, generally, has been silenced and driven into meek compliance with the resurgence and power of the neo-liberal ethic of the past few decades. Wages in both Canada and the USA have made no gains in many years and benefits have been reduced. Job security is a thing of the past and loyalty in both directions has disappeared with the fear that now attends most employment.

How many are aware that there has been little or no gain in financial status by employees in both the US and Canada for more than twenty five years? In the US, for example, in the Bush recession of 2001/2002 average family income declined by 9.2% while the incomes of the CEO's of the top 500 corporations increased by 20%. This while the stock market was in freefall and corporate profits were shrinking.

The "working man" does not know much of this as a compliant media convinces him, on behalf of its plutocratic owners that he is being protected from even worse fates by a benevolent economic dictatorship.

There'll be blood in the streets when they do wake up.

[Hjalmar]

There are always going to extraordinary situations, but that is very misleading. In 99% of cases it would not play out that way.

Would you mind telling me how it would normally play out?

Did it ever occur to you that the conciliatory approach might be more productive for all concerned?

That's a laugh -- a union supporter talking about the conciliatory approach!!!!

Job security is a thing of the past and loyalty in both directions has disappeared with the fear that now attends most employment.

Get used to it.  Jobs for life with benefits and pension plan has indeed become a thing of the past.  In the years ahead, jobs, as we have come to know them, will become mere tasks.  There will be no locked in contracts as people adjust to our changing world of today.  As a matter of fact, it has been predicted that by the year 2025 blue collar jobs will have virtually disappeared altogether -- down to about 2%.

How many are aware that there has been little or no gain in financial status by employees in both the US and Canada for more than twenty five years?

That is absolutely true with the exception of union workers. All the rest of society has been going downhill.

Sort of sad in a way that this one group in our society has been vested with such powers as to diminish the standard of living for everyone in the country except themselves. Union employees have of course shielded themselves from their own wage driven inflation through their own inflationary pay and benefit increases.

[Guest eureka]

You manage an awful lot of nonsense in a short space. Why should the whole of society "get used to it?" 95% of the people do not get used to being subservient to the 5% who have hoarded 95% of the wealth. I thought that the whole idea of progress and democracy was to bring about the sharing in the good of society by the whole of society. Please let me know if that is not true and that the whole workforce has regressed into being the slaves of the economic machine that it was in the 19th. century.

You are quite wrong about union workers being the only sector of society that has not been battered by the forces of the neo-libs. Union workers have suffered like any others. They have suffered because they no longer have the power to fight for a fair and just society. It really does not matter that society no longer has benefits and security. We need the reenergization of the union movement to win back those necessary factors in a civilized existence.

You appear to have swallowed the unrelenting propaganda of the extreme right: you appear to believe the nonsense that we must revert to the days of inhumanity. There is no such requirement. Globalization is no new thing and it was globalization and the exploitation of cheap labour elsewhere that fuelled the past injustice and brought the inevitable reaction that earned us a prosperous and relatively decent society. The reaction will happen again.

Perhaps you are just a lover of literature and would like the social material to surround us that could produce such extraordinary literary works as Dickens and Hood did.

[maplesyrup]

There are always going to extraordinary situations, but that is very misleading. In 99% of cases it would not play out that way.

Would you mind telling me how it would normally play out?

Did it ever occur to you that the conciliatory approach might be more productive for all concerned?

That's a laugh -- a union supporter talking about the conciliatory approach!!!!

Job security is a thing of the past and loyalty in both directions has disappeared with the fear that now attends most employment.

Get used to it.  Jobs for life with benefits and pension plan has indeed become a thing of the past.  In the years ahead, jobs, as we have come to know them, will become mere tasks.  There will be no locked in contracts as people adjust to our changing world of today.  As a matter of fact, it has been predicted that by the year 2025 blue collar jobs will have virtually disappeared altogether -- down to about 2%.

How many are aware that there has been little or no gain in financial status by employees in both the US and Canada for more than twenty five years?

That is absolutely true with the exception of union workers. All the rest of society has been going downhill.

Sort of sad in a way that this one group in our society has been vested with such powers as to diminish the standard of living for everyone in the country except themselves. Union employees have of course shielded themselves from their own wage driven inflation through their own inflationary pay and benefit increases.

Corporate executives' incomes and benefits have gone through the roof.

It seems that you benefited from the perks of the organized labour movement yet all you seem to do is bash it?

What happens when a corporate executive shows up drunk at work?

And pray tell how is the carpentry, plumbing, electrical , welding, etc. work going to get done?

[Hjalmar]

eureka

Why should the whole of society "get used to it?" 95% of the people do not get used to being subservient to the 5% who have hoarded 95% of the wealth. I thought that the whole idea of progress and democracy was to bring about the sharing in the good of society by the whole of society. Please let me know if that is not true and that the whole workforce has regressed into being the slaves of the economic machine that it was in the 19th. century.

You have obviously read some of the writings of Lord William Rees-Mogg and James Dale Davidson as you cited "Blood in the Streets" in a previous post. Here are some more of their writings --

A logical extension, but with different consequences, of the theory of comparative advantage, is found in a group of recent theorists who since the late 1970's have developed a focus on the "new international division of labor" and "the globalization of production." According to these theorists, conditions in the late 20th century have made it possible to realize the rationalization of production on a global scale. Firms can now transfer advanced technology to countries with low labor costs, and simultaneously exploit the advantages of cheap capital in capital-rich countries. As in the theory of comparative advantage, relative production costs determine global patterns of trade.

As a consequence of enhanced global mobility, a new capitalist world economy has emerged. Its main feature is a massive migration of capital from the industrialized countries to low-cost production sites in the third world. Because of capital mobility, capital- rich countries have no economic rationale for producing where the capital is; it is more logical to produce where the well- disciplined, inexpensive labor is.

And some more --

The 9 to 5 workday, with base pay and benefits, promotion, a career-path, and a pension at age 65 is about to be consigned to the dustbin of history. It is predicted that by the year 2025 there will not be any blue-collar workers left anywhere - maybe 2 percent worldwide at most. Machines will be doing the work faster and cheaper than people can. In the meantime, industry and business will be increasingly lured to the Southern Hemisphere by the promise of cheap and plentiful labor. Countries that prosper tomorrow will have low wages, low taxation and high education. The knowledge and entertainment sector will survive however. A kid who sees his future in a rock or country band is no dummy.

And my 2 cents worth -- It is well understood that resistance to change caused by the predominance of special interest groups like labor unions in stable societies is a major contributing factor to economic malfunction. The very thought of an automatic pay increase every year can no longer be sustained in a weakened economy. Who can argue that organized labor still needs to improve their standard of living? A strong government would not allow one group in our society to further erode the nations ability to prosper just because of their selfish greed. Concessions will be the by-word for organized labor for a number of years to come.

[Hjalmar]

eureka

Will respond to you further --

In the Information Age earning capacity for persons of similar skills will become much more equal, no matter in what jurisdiction they live....and this has already begun to happen. At the same time, income inequality within jurisdictions will rise. Global competition will also tend to increase the income earned by the most talented individuals in each field, wherever they live.....much as it does now with professional athletes. The marginal value generated by superior performance in a global market will be huge. The old labour union mentality that every worker deserves the same pay and seniority is the only criteria for advancement will soon be history.

Jurisdictional advantages that led to widening inequality between rich and poor economies during the industrial period will change dramatically.

[Guest eureka]

"Blood in the Streets" predated those gentlemen by a very long time. It was a rallying cry for the revolutionary brand of Socialism a century ago.

A century ago, also, the movement of global capital was greater than it is today. It slowed and the world prospered. Most of the developing world, as it is euphemistically called now, has found its economic performance deteriorating during the new era of capital movement. If those countries that are powerful from sher size and historic integration the era of globalization has suffered greatly under globalization.

The whole world is actually slowing down over the past twenty years. Growth is lower than for a century. Globalization is not about prosperity but about enhancing the fortunes of oligopolists. It would not be too difficult to reverse that and restore healthy economies in the West and development elsewhere.

What globalization is bringing is the rule of the corporation that is above national law.

Income equality is not happening and will not happen under the economic regime we are experiencing. The only thing that is being equalized is the extent of exploitation of the mass of people worldwide.

[Cartman]

Get used to it.  Jobs for life with benefits and pension plan has indeed become a thing of the past.  In the years ahead, jobs, as we have come to know them, will become mere tasks.  There will be no locked in contracts as people adjust to our changing world of today.  As a matter of fact, it has been predicted that by the year 2025 blue collar jobs will have virtually disappeared altogether -- down to about 2%.

I will be content as a member of a "Professional Faculty Organization" (fancy phrase for a union) where there is such a thing as work for life with benefits etc. It is called tenure and it is locked in until I am old and grey.

Honestly, you didn't actually swallow that stuff about the end of work did you? MS quickly touched on it, but do you really believe that blue collar work will perish? I think that this was a utopian dream.

Maybe we should all just agree to disagree. Those on the left can fight and cooperate for their fair share of the pie and end capitalism as we know it, while those on the right can scrap it out to work for minimum wage without the aid of the welfare state, secure in the knowledge that they are contributing to the health of the Canadian economy.

[maplesyrup]

Hjalmar........just curious. Why did you change or am I missing something? You benefitted from a union situation which helped to provide you with decent work, an opportunity to purchase a home, start up your own small business, etc., and yet you seem so down on the union movement. What has made you so bitter?

[Hjalmar]

MS

There was a time when labour unions served a useful purpose. They started to destroy themselves around the 1970's and have been doing that ever since. Today they have become an albatross around our neck -- their way or the highway. We have a typical example here in Canada today with the Parks dep't workers inconveniencing everybody. Approximately 4500 workers

holding people to ransom. They are costing the government, and by extension taxpayers, $75,000 per day. Why would any government allow this? Take the dockworkers for instance when they shut down the docks on an almost annual basis through their own selfish greed. Have you any idea what that costs the government and economy of our country? Think about the farmers who are struggling to make ends meet and then find themselves unable to ship their grain. Think about all the business that is being lost every year in BC when people switch over to a more reliable server such as the docks in Seattle. These two examples barely touch the surface -- this goes on year round here in Canada.

On to another example of labour union mentality -- Two years ago the nurses in BC were negotiating a new contract. There are ocassions where they must use their own vehicle and I know what the going rate is because my daughter works for a large company and gets 32 cents per km. The nurses at that time were getting 38 cents per km and they were asking for an increase to $1.25 per kilometer. How can anyone take these people seriously? Does anyone wonder why costs [and taxes] are going through the roof.

Why has the USA smartened up from a unionization rate of 53% in the 50's to a mere 13% today? They have smartened up and Canada has not. Are you aware that over 50% of corporations wishing to expand or relocate will not consider a state that does not have "right to work" laws? Does it not enter your mind that Canada is losing out big time because we don't have one province in Canada that has the foresight to recognize the advantages of these RTW laws? Do you know how much lower the unemployment rate is in the USA in states that have RTW laws as compared to those that do not? I'll tell you why the USA has smartened up -- they recognize the enormity of the damage done to the economy by a high rate of unionization. Why is the USA considered one of the most successful countries in the world today leaving Western Europe and Canada far behind. Why do you think Tony Blair of the Labour Party in Britain has severed all ties to the labour union movement? I believe he recognized that an affiliation with labour unions in this day and age is more of a liability than an asset.

Labour rates in union work places is only part of the problem. Labour unions over the years have managed to make their workplaces so secure that it is virtually impossible to fire them. Therein lies the reason for poor performance and low productivity from union workers. Comparing $20/hr to $10/hr [for non union workers] is only half the problem. Low productivity from union workplaces is the other.

I left a union job because I discovered I could do much better on my own.

[Guest eureka]

There are a number of fundamental errors in your thinking. First is the attribution of "selfish greed" to a union that is on strike. Your suggestion that they should not seek betterment because it inconveniences a lot of others implies that unions should be organizations of masochists who would nobly sacrifice themselves for the enjoyment of others.

Would it not be more to the point to have the employer bargain fairly.

You think that the United States has "smartened up" with Right To Work Laws, but has it? Those laws are the temporary triumph of the neo-lib reaction to social democracy. They are not an indicator of progress and they do not increase productivity or prodperity in any way. Rather, they are the cause of regression in the workplace: of a minimum wage society where the purcasing power of people is eroded and growth is retarded. Check Henry Ford on that and the benefits from paying a fair wage.

Naturally corporations move to those jurisdictions. Why would they not when a corporation exists only to maximize today's profits. The longer term tells another story when the corporation's growth is stunted.

The USA is not one of the world's most successful economies "leaving Canada and Western Europe behind." It is, instead, a relatively low-growth area that is rapidly losing its pre-eminent position to Western Europe. It is mired in a dreary succession of recessions each one of which has left lower standards for the workers and higher unemployment.

The Labour Party in Britain has severed its connection with Unions because it has matured from its representation of the memberships alone. It represents a broader spectrum of the people and, like political parties everwhere, except for such anomalies as the Reform/Alliance, has become more of a centrist party. It still relies on Union support and the support of those who formerly would have been union members but now have the benefits without the responsibilities.

The USA does not have that benefit since it has stifled unions and its workforce. Canada has fallen prey to th same pirate mentality. A revitalization of the union movement is essential for both Canada and the US and, it is inevitable as the lot of the employed worsens year by year and the ranks of the underemployed as well as the unemployed continue to grow throughout North America.

BTW, how are those boxes for references created?

[maplesyrup]

BTW, how are those boxes for references created?

If you mean these boxes, click on "Quote" in the top right corner and then remove the part you don't want. Post your message in the area above. Follow?

[Hjalmar]

Would it not be more to the point to have the employer bargain fairly.

You are suggesting that labour unions always bargain fairly? How can you bargain fairly with a militant gang like a labour union? And who decides what is fair? What would be fair to you? The law of supply and demand dictates. It is never fair to a labour union unless their demands are met to a T. Use of the private sector that is not in any way influenced by unions, nor the public sector, would be a fair model to follow.

Check Henry Ford on that and the benefits from paying a fair wage

That's an old one that has been overplayed to the hilt. What year was that eureka? Do you actually think this still applies in todays world? Not really fair when it only applies to a select few that happen to be union workers. Time to get up to speed.

The longer term tells another story when the corporation's growth is stunted.

Could you elaborate please?

The USA is not one of the world's most successful economies "leaving Canada and Western Europe behind." It is, instead, a relatively low-growth area that is rapidly losing its pre-eminent position to Western Europe.

How so? Why has Germany, with one of the most "pro-labour" laws in the world, now become the largest exporter of jobs? Other countries in Western Europe aren't far behind. Is this the model you would like us to follow?

The Labour Party in Britain has severed its connection with Unions because it has matured from its representation of the memberships alone. It represents a broader spectrum of the people and, like political parties everwhere, except for such anomalies as the Reform/Alliance, has become more of a centrist party. It still relies on Union support and the support of those who formerly would have been union members but now have the benefits without the responsibilities.

To me, that is a feeble explanation for a party that has been so closely aligned with labour unions. They severed these ties because public perception of labour unions is rapidly changing and they wanted to align themselves with the mainstream.

A revitalization of the union movement is essential for both Canada and the US and, it is inevitable as the lot of the employed worsens year by year and the ranks of the underemployed as well as the unemployed continue to grow throughout North America.

I wish you luck. I prefer to accept the real world as it exists today. By the way, would you mind explaining how this inevitable occurance will come about? I believe most people are adjusting to the new realities of today.

[Cartman]

It is never fair to a labour union unless their demands are met to a T.

Whatever. Not all unions have the same demands nor do they obtain the same contracts. Teamsters are not the same as the Steelworkers or the CAW. In some sectors of the economy, I think unions are not very helpful, but in others I believe they are essential (primary production).

Hjalmar, I assume that you would not work for minumum wage, so why should others? Really, why? Do you possess some mystical skill known only to magicians from the Lord of the Rings that nobody else can muster? Tell me, what is your secret? Or are you going to tell me some right-wing fairy tale about how one can prosper and send their kids to school on 20 cents an hour? :angry: This is hypocrisy pure and simple.

Tell me, why is it that the third world is not booming? If labour demands sent businesses away, then why do they still exist here? Maybe because worker demands for education and health care have actually contributed to economic growth!

[Hjalmar]

There was a program on TV a few years ago. They interviewed two young men in Iceland who had recently returned there after attending university in Canada. These men were fishermen which is the primary occupation in their country. They were asked the question "what will you do now that the fishing season is over?" Their reply went something like this: " I don't know how you people in Canada expect anyone to work when you pay them for doing nothing". "Why would anyone want to bother with finding work?" They further went on to say that they would carry on with some other form of work until the next season opened.

When you start paying people simply because they are poor this creates a disincentive to prosper and fend for oneself. What is fair about a system where a responsible hard working person who has managed to set aside sufficient funds for a comfortable retirement and then finds the person living around the corner who exercised no such responsibility and drank up most of his spare money now has the same standard of living? This sets a bad example for others to follow suit. When you reward counterproductive behaviour you end up getting more of the same.

There is work for anyone who wants to work. If a person is unemployed it's of his/her own choosing. If you can't find a job, you create your own. If you can't do that then you raise and grow your own food.

The governments in this country have created this dependency in our society. And Canada has now become the country of choice for the less ambitious and freeloaders throughout the world. At the same time the ambitious and go-getters are shunning this country because of our high taxes. As a result the country is becoming innundated with the less desireable citizens .... a bleak picture for the future.

[Black Dog]

Ya know Hjalamar, you're really good at posting random, subjective anecdotes that may or may not have any bearing on the subject of unions' influence. Yet you've beenc ompletely unable to give any hard data to support your claims, despite re[peated requests to do so. If your claims were so self-evidently true, then producing a chart, or some economic data tying , say, union-wages with an increase in the CPI, you'd be on to something. But I suspect I was right before: your argument is ao much ideologicaly-based hot air.

The governments in this country have created this dependency in our society. And Canada has now become the country of choice for the less ambitious and freeloaders throughout the world. At the same time the ambitious and go-getters are shunning this country because of our high taxes. As a result the country is becoming innundated with the less desireable citizens .... a bleak picture for the future.

The numbers make a liar out of you. Canada's GDP has been increasing over the past 5 years and the ecomony is ecxpected to continue to grow at about 3 per cent per year over the next two years. Contrast Canada's relativelty robust economy with that of the U.S., land of free-market opportunity, and your argument falls flat on its face.