Posted on 02/09/2005 1:24:57 PM PST by SmithL
NEW YORK, (AP) --
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said Wednesday it will close a Canadian store whose workers are on the verge of becoming the first ever to win a union contract from the world's biggest retailer.
Wal-Mart said it was shuttering the store in Jonquiere, Quebec, in response to unreasonable demands from union negotiators, that would make it impossible for the store to sustain its business. The United Food and Commercial Workers of Canada last week asked Quebec labor officials to appoint a mediator, saying that negotiations had reached an impasse.
"We were hoping it wouldn't come to this," said Andrew Pelletier, a spokesman for Wal-Mart Canada. "Despite nine days of meetings over three months, we've been unable to reach an agreement with the union that in our view will allow the store to operate efficiently and profitably."
Pelletier said the store will close in May. The retailer had first discussed closing the Jonquiere store last October, saying that the store was losing money.
The store in Jonquiere, about 100 miles north of Quebec City, became the first unionized Wal-Mart store in North America last September, after the bargaining unit was certified by provincial labor officials.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
What do I want as a consumer? The highest quality at the lowest price. Nothing more, nothing less. Therefore, I avoid Junk Mart and go to Target instead.
What would I want as a business owner? A cooperative workforce that would treat me with the same respect that I treat them.
Right on! Go Walmart - I didnt used to shop there but now I avoid Target and go to Walmart.
Railroads are supported by the goverment and do not make a profit by themselves.
bump to the top
Anyone opposed to merit pay cannot be considered a conservative. Its one thing for independent collective bargaining for working conditions, quite another when you view any attempt at introducing merit pay as "favoratism."
That is not true. The railroads are solvent because they are supported by us taxpayers.
The railroads have been doing well due to the sheer volume of trade coming into the West Coast out of Asia. You should see all the double-stack cars coming onto to BNSF system out of the ports of Seattle and Tacoma.
Canada unions took their lessons from the Chicago mob. The leaders are basically thugs.
The difference is that the railroads are ALL union...if you had a non-union competitor things would start to change. The unions we were obligated to did nothing about the general contractors hiring non-union subs and of course the non-unions flourished while we died. I think the unions were more interested in pacifying their general contractors since they generally hired more men then we did. We had to threaten to sue the plumber's union to get them to audit a signatory contractor who had paid nothing for years despite working the plumbing jobs. The electrician's union never lifted a finger for us but it was the laborers who eventually broke our back.
Posted by quantim to Sterco
On News/Activism 02/09/2005 2:01:14 PM PST · 47 of 48
The major Railroads are all Union and all are prospering.
That is not true. The railroads are solvent because they are supported by us taxpayers.
OK you show me the major RR that is supported by the taxpayers. Other than AMTRAK. Know what you speak of. Put up or shut up.
1. Unions are often bad for business. If he were still alive, I could introduce you to a relative of mine who was a shop steward in a steel mill in Pennsylvania for 30 years. After he retired he would freely admit that his union destroyed the steel industry in this country . . . his union had everything you could ask for -- extensive paid vacations, paid holidays (including RELIGIOUS holidays), etc. And yet they would still meet in the union hall at the end of every contract and try to figure out "what else" they could get from the company. The rusting, rotting hulks of these mills all over Pennsylvania are a scathing indictment of the unions that destroyed these companies.
2. Their politics are not only idiotic -- they're often counter-productive, too. One of the major reasons for the demise of labor unions in this country is the fact that they have slowly rendered themselves useless by hitching their wagons to Marxist political causes. Once they started convincing governments to implement public health care, guaranteed pensions, mandatory unemployment benefits, etc., the unions were no longer needed to the extent they once were. Organized labor in this country was simply too successful in lobbying governments to mandate things THAT THE UNIONS THEMSELVES USED TO COLLECTIVELY BARGAIN FOR ON BEHALF OF THEIR MEMBERS.
Hey, when I was in a union, the union steward threatened to beat my a-- the first time he met me. My union 'application' had been misplaced in the mail.
It was a mob dominated union. Do you guys still do that or are you nicer to people now adays?
My grandfather was a union man… until they "asked" him to lie under oath.
3 years with Santa Fe. Railroads prosper despite unions, the work rules are nuts. Hey, it wasn't until 1991 that they got rid of the hazardous duty pay in North Dakota. You know what the hazard was? INDIAN ATTACKS. Yeah, a real contribution.
The railroads have been doing well due to the sheer volume of trade coming into the West Coast out of Asia.
IOW's, non-union workers manufacture & ship goods to the US to be unloaded by union longshoremen and hauled by union railroaders and sold in a non-union Wal-Mart. So basically, the union folks would have nothing to do were it not for the non-union stiffs?
Yep, us poor old dumb asses that have been around here long enough to see the democrats go down in flames are just too stupid to understand much of anything.
Best you take your business to another web site, where they're all smart.
Try the DU funnies or maybe even that paragon of slick Dimowitcrap, Barbell, er, uh, Barslop, no, uh, Biffbop, yeah, or is it Batcrap? Bartcop! Yeah, that's it.
Whatever.
In any event, you appear to be in the wrong place.
There's something deeply wrong about that picture... I approve.
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