Unions do worker training better

President Hoffa lauded CDL program grads earlier this year at Fort Sill, Okla.

We've written extensively about the importance of unions in American life -- how unions provide a pathway to the middle class by paying $200 a week more than non-union jobs as well as offering good health care and other benefits.

One thing that is often overlooked, however, is how unions provide skilled workers to American companies. For decades, trained labor professionals have taken up important roles in many different sectors of society. The Teamsters, for example, have been at the forefront of providing qualified truckers to businesses so they can safety transport cargo along the highways of this nation.

But increasingly, the corporate class has taken the cheap way out. And they are paying the price for that, as a Washington Post story states:

Although it has historically constructed high-quality educational pipelines to well-paying jobs in cooperation with employers, labor has lost ground over the years. In the absence of union training programs, businesses in vast sectors of the economy are scrambling to meet their workforce needs through other means, like piecemeal job training programs and partnerships with community colleges, with few solutions that have really broad reach.

Some have attempted to go around the union model and form apprenticeships. But as the article states, in many cases that can "lead to a proliferation of low-quality programs." Imitators often can't provide the same skills that unions have.

The Teamsters haven't stopped trying to improve the skills of hardworking Americans. In fact, it is a integral part of our core mission. Earlier this year, the union announced it was teaming with the U.S. Army and ABF Freight to provide commercial driver's license (CDL) training to veterans transitioning to civilian life. It's just the latest effort of the Teamster Military Assistance Program.

In addressing the first graduating class of drivers at Fort Sill, Okla. in March, Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa said the union was providing a service that he hoped would be expanded:

The men and women who defend and protect our country deserve good, full-time jobs when they return home. I am proud that our union is working in this great partnership to honor our military veterans and help them transition to a rewarding civilian career.

If America wants to compete in an increasingly global economy, it needs to do more to succeed. Better worker training means better services and safety for all Americans. Labor unions like the Teamsters make it happen every day.

A college degree is not the answer for all workers. It should be the goal of lawmakers across the political spectrum to encourage youth not pursuing post-secondary academic studies to obtain training in a skill area that will provide them with the opportunity to earn a living wage and give them a career track that will ultimately give them a foothold in the middle class.

Increasing worker training, particularly through labor unions like the Teamsters, will ensure that will happen. That's good for workers and good for America.

Today's Teamster News 02.03.14

Rethinking Economics: From the UK, a Global Student Movement Takes Shape  truthout   ...When the financial crisis hit in 2007, economics students at respected institutions around the world found that theories handed down in classrooms failed to explain the reality outside, and an international movement began to demand a change in the way economics is taught...
Maryland Joins Continent-Wide Protests Against the Trans-Pacific Partnership and Unjust Trade  The Real News   ...More than 50 cities across the U.S., Mexico and Canada participated...
Globalists Panic; New Details on 'One World' Trade Deal  American Free Press   ...In a clear sign that populist nationalism is a growing force in the western world, United Kingdom (UK) Chancellor George Osborne gave an important address in mid-January in which he called for major European Union (EU) reforms to safeguard member nations’ sovereignty and revive their lackluster economies...
Fast track stopped, but is it dead?  Trade Reform   ...Since 1992, imported goods have been growing three times faster than exports...
Tariff disagreement with U.S. stands in way of TPP  The Japan Times   ...Amari admitted Friday the two allies remain at odds over Japan’s tariffs on five “sacred” farm product categories, including rice. The U.S. is pushing for full removal...
Hated on the Left, the TPP Draws Conservative Foes  In These Times   ...the American Jobs Alliance and the United States Business and Industry Council—pro-business groups wary of trade’s impact on America’s national interests—joined with Tea Party Nation and the socially conservative Eagle Forum to rail against the TPP...
Coming to a Post Office Near You: Loans You Can Trust? (opinion)  The Huffington Post   ...In the same remarkable report this week, the OIG explored the possibility of the USPS offering basic banking services -- bill paying, check cashing, small loans -- to its customers. With post offices and postal workers already on the ground, USPS could partner with banks to make a critical difference for millions of Americans who don't have basic banking services because there are almost no banks or bank branches in their neighborhoods....
After crash, call for closer oversight of truckers  Associated Press   ...A deadly crash in Illinois involving a truck driver accused of staying at the wheel for more than 35 hours without a long enough break prompted a call Thursday for tougher oversight of drivers and trucking companies...
Old idea for new rail safety problem: slow down trains carrying crude  McClatchy   ...The Federal Railroad Administration proposed in October 1970 that trains carrying flammable cargo in tank cars slow to 25 mph through incorporated communities. The proposal was never adopted as a rule...
The "Skills Gap" Is a Convenient Myth  truthout   ...“If there’s a skills shortage, there has to be rises in wages [for skilled workers]. It’s basic economics.” Yet wages in manufacturing—even for skilled workers—are stagnant at best...
The Rise of 'Insourcing' Gives Internet Companies a New Way to Exploit Workers  The Next New Deal   ...These new “insourced” workers are individuals who contract with large Internet-based companies like Uber and Taskrabbit to perform services here in the United States, either at a rate set by the larger company or in a free-for-all bidding war. As contractors, these workers receive very little protection in terms of minimum wage laws or unions, let alone benefits or insurance for the work they do. And their ranks are growing fast...
How Putin's cronies seized control of Russia's Facebook  The Verge   ... In 2011, the oligarch fired two senior managers for publishing anti-Putin photos in an online newspaper that he owns...
Corruption across EU 'breathtaking' - EU Commission  BBC News   ... in some countries public procurement procedures were vulnerable to fraud, while in others party financing was the main problem, or municipal bodies were badly affected. And in some countries patients have to pay bribes in order to get adequate medical care...
Right to Work bad for state  Springfield News-Leader   ...It is not hard to figure out, however, who would benefit from these efforts. The answer is Republican politicians, who believe that unions provide too much support to Democrats, and their own bankrolling supporters — business interests...

Today's Teamster News 01.05.14

Welcome to the New America: Low-Wage Nation  Common Dreams   ...More and more, Americans are trapped in the uncertainty and injustice that immigrant workers know all too well, whether they’re here on temporary work visas cleaning luxury condos or undocumented and scrambling for daily construction jobs. Increasingly, from an economic standpoint, office parks and store aisles in America are coming to resemble the street corners where day laborers gather and the labor camps where guest workers are trapped...
The Strange Case of American Inequality  Project Syndicate   ...unless something – and it will need to be something major – returns the US to its pre-2008 growth trajectory, future economic historians will not regard the Great Depression as the worst business-cycle disaster of the industrial age. It is we who are living in their worst case...
The Skills Shortage Myth: A Public Relations Tool for Bad Corporate Citizens  Economic Policy Institute   ...the existence of skill shortages ...  exists mostly in the minds of those wanting access to low-wage, indentured servants or public subsidy for the training that firms should be doing themselves...
NSA statement does not deny 'spying' on members of Congress  The Guardian   ...The National Security Agency on Saturday released a statement in answer to questions from a senator about whether it “has spied, or is … currently spying, on members of Congress or other American elected officials”, in which it did not deny collecting communications from legislators of the US Congress to whom it says it is accountable...
Bankruptcy Filings Fall 13% in 2013  Credit Slips   ...The monthly decline continues a long-term trend of falling bankruptcy filing rates. Filings are currently running around 3.3 per 1,000 persons...
Manufacturing Growth to Help Propel U.S. Expansion: Economy  Bloomberg   ...Factory purchasing managers said orders were the strongest since April 2010, helping explain why companies such as General Motors Co. (GM) and Ford Motor Co. (F) are taking on more workers in response to rising sales...
Forget Mega-Corporations, Here’s The Mega-Network  TechCrunch   ...Corporations are arguably more powerful today than ever before. But the economy isn’t dominated by a handful of megalithic conglomerates. it consists of hundreds or thousands of smaller, more specialized firms...
The Secrets of White Collar Prisons  DuJour   ...Bernie Kerik, Jack Abramoff and Dennis Kozlowski—three of the most high-profile men to be on the inside—smash the perception that prison life is anything like "Club Fed"...
Brother, Can You Spare $91.44 Billion?  Economic Populist   ...Wall Street got $91.44 billion in bonuses for 2013.  The 98% of us want those bonuses paid back to the victims of the financial crisis...
Outsourcing Pays Big to Private Companies While Americans Suffer  Economic Populist   ...These same contractors obtaining overpriced contracts through privatization pay their workers little.  There are now two contract workers per federal employee and that ratio is getting worse. ... Privatization of government is creating a nation of wage slaves...
An Error Message for the Poor  New York Times   ...students of anti-poverty programs remember a litany of automation and contracting meltdowns — some of them prolonged, even epic. Florida, 1992-93. Michigan, 1998-99. Colorado, 1998-2002. Texas, 2006-7. Indiana, 2007-9. The Colorado Benefits Management System is particularly memorable: When first implemented, it reportedly refused food stamps to anyone who did not have a driver’s license from Guam...
OP-ED: NAFTA’s 20 Years of Unfulfilled Promises  Inter Press Service   ...Under NAFTA, cheap subsidised corn from the United States flooded Mexico, making it impossible for millions of Mexican farmers to compete. Government support previously given to small farmers was withdrawn and directed to big agricultural exporting corporations instead...
Boeing machinists approve contract securing 777X jet  Reuters  ...Boeing's machinists on Friday narrowly approved a crucial labor contract that secured thousands of jobs and billions of dollars of economic activity for Washington state but will cost workers their pensions...
Housing tear-downs on the rise as real estate rebounds  Los Angeles Times   ...The rebounding housing market has sparked the demolitions. In November, the median price for a home in Southern California was $385,000, up nearly 20% compared with the same month a year earlier, according to research firm DataQuick...

Phony skills gap exposed

If job-killer Scott Walker says there's a "skills gap" between workers and jobs, you can be sure there's no such thing. Here's Walker:

We understand the state able to fix the jobs skill gap is the state that will lead the country in economic development.

There is no skills gap in Wisconsin -- a new report says so. The skills gap is a fiction dreamed up by employers to blame workers who refuse to work for slave wages. It also lets companies -- especially high-tech companies -- justify hiring cheap foreign workers through the H1B visa program.

University professor Peter Cappelli has written a book about the skills gap. He concluded it doesn't exist. First, schools are better than they used to be. Secondly, the average American worker is more educated than his job requires.

There’s actually a whole line of research about the excess supply of people being over qualified...

Thirdly, if there were a shortage, you'd expect wages to go up. But that isn't happening. Wages fell faster in the first quarter of 2013 than they have in 65 years.

Cappelli says it is true that some employers can't find the workers they want to fill their jobs. It's partly because they're combining two jobs into one. And it's partly because they aren't training anyone anymore:

...companies got rid of their training departments because there was this big supply of talent on the outside market, and they didn’t have to train anymore. And now they’ve sort of gutted their human resources department so much that recruiting people are gone, training and development people are gone, and it’s probably tricky for them to do anything other than just hire on the outside.

Kay at the Balloon Juice blog asks:

Why do we have to go through this over and over? Wouldn’t it be easier to look at these claims critically right from the start before just blindly repeating them over and over until they become “durable beliefs”?

Good question.

Today's Teamster News 03.08.13

Senators blast financial regulators over 'prosecution-free zone for large banks'  The Hill   ..."If you're caught with an ounce of cocaine, the chances are good you're going to jail," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) at the Banking Committee hearing. "Evidently, if you launder nearly $1 billion for drug cartels and violate our international sanctions, your company pays a fine and you go home and sleep in your own bed at night."...
Study Demolishes the Myth That U.S. Workers Lack Skills  In These Times   ... “The problem isn’t a malfunctioning ‘talent pipeline.' The problem is a sputtering job-creation machine, in both the quantity and quality of jobs created.”...
 The children going hungry in America  BBC   ...Child poverty in the US has reached record levels, with almost 17 million children now affected. A growing number are also going hungry on a daily basis...
Yes, America’s trade deficit with China just rose AGAIN.  manufacture this   ...the U.S. trade deficit with China jumped 14% from the previous month: ...While not a record, it is 6% larger than last year's historically high average...
Costco CEO: Raise The Minimum Wage To More Than $10 Per Hour  Huffington Post   ...paying employees good wages makes good sense for business," Jelinek said in a statement. "We pay a starting hourly wage of $11.50 in all states where we do business, and we are still able to keep our overhead costs low."...
Europe's recession deepens - ECB  CNN Money   ...The European Central Bank downgraded its forecast for the eurozone economy Thursday but decided against cutting interest rates to a new record low despite tame inflation, record unemployment and political instability in Italy...
Koch Brothers Organize to Stop Medicaid Expansion in Arizona, Nationwide  Blog for Arizona   ...Americans for Prosperity-- the Koch Brothers' astroturf  group-- is organizing the citizenry to fight against their own self interests to defeat Medicaid expansion...
No matter how you spin job numbers, Wisconsin near bottom compared to other states  The Cap Times   ...going back two years, Wisconsin is No. 50 in percentage change, with an actual decline of 15,900 jobs since January 2011...
Kasich, Yost in showdown over JobsOhio  Columbus Dispatch   ...State Auditor Dave Yost issued a subpoena for the financial records of JobsOhio yesterday after Gov. John Kasich’s privatized economic-development agency failed to turn them over...
Snyder's numbers still down in the dumps  Public Policy Polling   ...Rick Snyder's numbers are not recovering yet following the plunge they took in December after he signed the right to work law. Only 37% of voters in the state approve of the job he's doing to 54% who disapprove...
Council votes to appeal Snyder's plan for emergency manager  Detroit Free Press   ...The resolution passed by council this afternoon says the city does indeed have a plan to fix the financial problems that have plagued the city for years...
Mark Dayton envisions minimum wage between $9 and $9.50  Associated Press   ...As Minnesota legislators debate raising the state's minimum wage, Gov. Mark Dayton says he'd be comfortable with hiking the rate to $9 or $9.50 per hour...
Plan for LCB privatization is formally introduced  Philly.com   ...The plan faces a tough fight in the legislature, which for years has been loath to make even minor changes to the state-run liquor model that has been in place since Prohibition ended...
Teachers’ unions fighting restrictions on contract talks in Kansas  Kansas City Star   ...“We are seeing a lot of things that appear to be a direct attack on teachers...”
Flight Attendants Union Coalition Launches Nationwide Opposition to Knives in Cabin  AFA   ...The Flight Attendants Union Coalition, representing nearly 90,000 Flight Attendants at carriers across the county, is coordinating a nationwide legislative and public campaign to reverse yesterday's announcement from the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) that effective April 25, knives would be allowed in the aircraft cabin for the first time since 9/11...

The skills gap is phony. Period.

That skills gap you've been hearing about sounds a lot like the fake truck driver shortage the trucking companies are always flogging.

There's no shortage of skilled American workers. The real shortage is people willing to work for slave wages.

Adam Davidson, writing in the New York Times, looked into the so-called skills gap in advanced manufacturing. He concluded that running the computers that run the machines does require a good deal of technical skill:

Running these machines requires a basic understanding of metallurgy, physics, chemistry, pneumatics, electrical wiring and computer code. It also requires a worker with the ability to figure out what’s going on when the machine isn’t working properly.

Here's the rub (you knew what it was): Employers are only willing to pay burger-flipper wages for jobs requiring that technical skill. Davidson visited a Wisconsin manufacturer, and this is what he found:

Eric Isbister, the C.E.O. of GenMet, a metal-fabricating manufacturer outside Milwaukee, told me that he would hire as many skilled workers as show up at his door. Last year, he received 1,051 applications and found only 25 people who were qualified. He hired all of them, but soon had to fire 15. Part of Isbister’s pickiness, he says, comes from an avoidance of workers with experience in a “union-type job.” Isbister, after all, doesn’t abide by strict work rules and $30-an-hour salaries. At GenMet, the starting pay is $10 an hour. Those with an associate degree can make $15, which can rise to $18 an hour after several years of good performance. From what I understand, a new shift manager at a nearby McDonald’s can earn around $14 an hour. 

Even the management consulting firm Boston Consulting Group concluded that trying to hire highly skilled workers at low wages is not a skills gap.

Commenting on Davidson's article, which was cross-posted on the Trade Reform blog, Will Wilkin wrote there is one kind of skills gap to be concerned about:

If you want a cell phone or an LCD device (from televisions to a Kindle) you will not find one made in USA, despite LCD technology being invented here. LCD being one of hundreds of examples of industrial capacity lost to America, the list is growing every year. 

Look at our trade with China, their #1 export to us is electronics and tech goods and our #1 export to them is scrap metal and other waste. America is losing the ability to make more and more things we use, that is not automation or “productivity gains,” that is offshoring. 

Now that's something to worry about.