French-Canadian labor letup: natural transition to sector-wide (collective-collective) bargaining here/

French-Canadian labor setup: natural transition to sector-wide (collective-collective) bargaining here?

Checking out of my national-chain supermarket the other night, the bagger took no notice of multiple requests to double bag heavy items and not place heavy 12-packs on the underside of the cart. A young employee finally informed me that the bagger could not speak a word of English. Have supermarket pay scales dropped so low -- Wal-Mart's entry into the retail food business having forced two-tiered contracts upon new employees -- that (middle-class career seeking) Americans need not apply?

American supermarket employees (especially in California and Illinois by personal observations) would kill to negotiate contracts on a sector-wide basis.

The streamlined version of sector-wide labor agreements -- the French/French-Canadian practice requiring non-union firms to operate under agreements worked out by unionized firms -- is ready and waiting for America's seamless transition to a fair and balanced labor marketplace. Economies from South America to South East Asia use mixes of mostly unionized to mostly non-unionized sector-wide rules -- some confined to certain industries (sector - sector-wide) -- there's all ways to do it.

Adopting French-blueprint sector-wide here would not require -- on the run -- building a broader union base than we ever built before (as going German style, full-out unionized could). And, the French-Canadian example will always be right next store for our convenient perusal -- in an economy we can reasonably fathom.

*****************

If we could have predicted to 1968-Americans that 25% of 2007-Americans would get by below a realistically set poverty line (based on a varied market basket instead of a single-factor formula*) -- further, that 25% of Americans' wages would sink below LBJ's ($9.50/hr adjusted) minimum wage -- what could they have guessed: that a mini ice age, a limited nuclear exchange followed by a mini ice age (nuclear winter), or multiple depressions or even tsunamis would bring American (not European) employees low?

Average income actually doubled since -- as real world 1968-Americans might have anticipated. 2007-working Americans -- if and when somebody troubles to fill them in on their missed prosperity (50 to 90 percentile incomes could mostly have done significantly better; 25 to 50 percentile incomes mostly held plus a little) -- will have one culprit to mostly contemplate: the race of under-powered (ultimately because under-informed?) labor to the bottom.

[ * 12.5% of American incomes are officially reported below today's, decades irrelevant, federal poverty standard: three times the price of the cheapest emergency diet -- dried beans only please, no canned! -- try the 2002 book Raise the Floor for realistic poverty parameters. ]

The latest on British pay pulling ahead of US: http://www.theglobalist.com/StoryId.aspx?StoryId=6369

Change Timex (Easy Reader) Watch Battery -- How to

--First; to open the watch, look around the edge of the case (back) for a very lightly etched triangle shape – which points to the not very large slot into which to insert the point of a pen knife (thick enough, but not too thick) to pop it open. You will likely find the point at one o’clock, if the stem is nine o’clock – probably adjacent to one of the wrist band holding arms. This is because the opening for the knife point is so insubstantial that you really need to lean the back of the knife against one of the band arms for leverage to pop the watch open.

(Try to remember to line the insert slot – triangle point – up against one of the arms when you pop the watch back closed -- so you can open it again.)

--Second; closing the watch back up; the big problem.

If you try squeezing the back into the case from both sides you will end up in eternal see-saw with one side popping out when the other pops in.

The trick is to start with both thumbs together on one side and gradually work them around the back in opposite directions – without letting either side come up (this takes fierce pressure) until both thumbs meet again on the opposite side, at which point that side will pop in without the opposite side popping out.

This takes so much pressure that I faced the crystal down on a paperback book (to give the crystal a little protection from the little bit of give on the part of the book) and used the weight of my body to keep both thumb points fully pressed in as I worked my way around to the other side.

Announcing "ON TODAY'S PAGE"

Announcing "ON TODAY'S PAGE": to make my responses to other blogs more generally available (assuming anybody cares -- makes it easier for me anyway), from now on I will drop a copy at http://www.ontodayspage.blogspot.com -- along with other random ideas I may deem interesting but not worth overloading "ON SAME PAGE" with; for instance:
**********************************
I got the bright idea that if Adam Smith had been born 50 years later and lived to observe the industrial era he would have added an easy to understand delineation of the "race to the bottom" to his insights -- the race to the bottom being the chief difference between his era of more or less natural perfect competition among small entrepreneurs and skilled artisans, and the industrial era of 100 times more productive but interchangeable workers who are solely dependent on big entrepreneurs for the tools of their trade (e.g., steam looms).

I hope to come up with a simple delineation to serve in Smith's missed out on place -- not that I am any big brain; I just suspect that, from what I have seen so far of unfettered- free market misconceptions, untangling the economic truth may not be too un-simple. Anybody who wants to try, please have at it.
***************************
Typical Republican economic fairy tales: Newt Gingrich on Hannity the other night (same as Mailer broadcast) attacked the card check as depriving workers of the right to free unionizing elections which right he claims 90-95% of Americans support. Of course, the "Catch 22" election that Newt is talking about is the election that labor cannot get because of the gauntlet set for labor to run by current so called-labor law and super-bean counter management -- which is why labor is going for the card check in the first place, Newty baby. I assert that 90-95% of Americans might support a union election in EVERY work place (you don't have to run an obstacle course to vote for mayor), periodically, or that unionizing elections may be triggered by a 10% card check (the same percentage that triggers political party participation in nationwide presidential debates (e.g., Ross) and could plausibly be used to trigger public campaign matching funds -- or some equivalent of easy access unionizing elections.

Hillary's (and Edward"s) unworkable mandate v. Medicare's working coverage

A syllogism:
a) Hillary's (and Edward's) plan can work only with a mandate.
b) A mandate is likely unworkable (see below) and is almost certainly unacceptable to Americans who don't like be told what to do (who like it less than Canadians and Europeans in any case). And, guess what: Hillary herself says she does not forsee any penalty to enforce the necessary mandate -- has so far, as far as I know, only come up with some "Brave New World" speculation about a future in which we may be forced to show proof of health insurance to get a job.
c) Ergo, Hillary's (and Edward's) plan cannot work.

Quoted from:
The Gaping Holes in Massachuesetts' Health Care Plan
Mass Failure
By Dr. STEFFIE WOOLHANDLER
and Dr. DAVID HIMMELSTEIN
http://www.counterpunch.org/woolhandler09212007.html

And 244,000 of Massachusetts uninsured get zero assistance--just a stiff fine if they don't buy coverage. A couple in their late 50s faces a minimum premium of $8,638 annually, for a policy with no drug coverage at all and a $2,000 deductible per person before insurance even kicks in. Such skimpy yet costly coverage is, in many cases, worse than no coverage at all. Illness will still bring crippling medical bills--but the $8,638 annual premium will empty their bank accounts even before the bills start arriving. Little wonder that barely 2 percent of those required to buy such coverage have thus far signed up.

***************************

(Let me try to sort this out.)

Our Dem heroes got licked last time out (1993) because the Republicans could get away with calling PRIVATE based health coverage "socialism".

But this time out our Dem heroes are afraid to propose PUBLIC based Medicare-for-all -- which ironically is the only plan Repubs CANNOT GET AWAY WITH calling "socialism" because everybody knows what Medicare is -- because our Dem heros are now that the "very industry" that (together with Repubs) knocked out private-based universal care the last time will oppose Medicare this time.

(Am I making any sense?)

**************************

Medicare is ready to go now -- no need for years of phasing in.

Medicare is almost too easy to sell to the American public.

Medicare may need to take over from Medicade -- the difference in fee payout can be so exaggerated (as much as 8X lower in N.Y. state) that it defeats LBJs original purpose which was to get care to the poor -- which is where we supposedly came into this movie. (Between Medicade's partial erasure and the 1968 minimum wage -- $9.50/hr adjusted CPI-U -- diving almost in half by the time average income doubled, LBJ must be spinning up a storm.) http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/17/nyregion/nyregionspecial4/17clinic.html

*******************

Next to last gasp on Medicare-for-all:
Leaving universal coverage in the private hands leaves our industries competing with foreign counterparts who don't have to include -- ever more unaffordable -- employee medical coverage in their price structures.

Last gasp:
It would shore up the funding of Medicare if the great mass of patients -- who pay its regressive taxes -- were not so badly underpaid in these days of deunionized America, low low minimum wage (2009 version will be at least .50/hr short of 1956 minimum wage in equal purchasing power), etc. The rich don't have more livers and teeth to fix so support for doctor's incomes has to come from the incomes of the great majority.

Last gasp on private medical insurance:
If unnecessary paperwork constitutes 30% of private insurance costs (20% on the part of the insurer, 10% on the part of doctors trying to get paid -- and to not get treatment denied -- by dozens of varied insurance plans), that means that (rounded to the nearest 5%) private insurance ADDS 45% to health insurance prices -- 30% down equal 45% up in 8th grade math.

Magical Free-Market Thinking

The free market is only the "OS" (operating system) of the economy. Believing the free market inherently possesses the necessary checks and balances needed to bring to an end the age old drama of who's going to eat whose lunch -- as people of whatever politics on this side of the Atlantic tend accept on faith -- amounts to magical thinking.

Adam Smith's preindustrial free market consisted largely of skilled artisans and small entrepreneurs, tending much more towards fair play on the part the "hidden hand". The advent of less skilled (if 100 times more productive) workers who depended solely on management for capital changed the default program to the-race-to-the-bottom.

In the better paid world beyond our seas, a non-controversial answer has evolved to the race-to-the-bottom: sector-wide labor agreements or some equivalent (like the French/Quebecan rule that non-union firms must work under conditions contracted by union firms). According to Richard B. Freeman in his new book America Works, such bargaining setups typically reduce management's resistance to unionization in the knowledge that competitors will have to pay out whatever raises they have to pay out, neutralizing competitive disadvantage.

*********************************

It could be surprisingly easy to raise Americans to race-to-the-bottom consciousness with two economic markers that all can the first time they hear them. First, get across a more realistic estimate of Americans in poverty today: 25%? -- based on the more realistic poverty standard of six times the price of an emergency food diet, instead of only three times (the reader should know what I am talking about). http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/papers/hptgssiv.htm

The next simple stat that should amaze all -- if the media ever reported same -- is that the federal minimum wage paid $9.50/hr in 1968 ($1.60/hr, adjusted CPI-U)! Emphasize the point by asking how 1968 Americans might have explained such a catastrophe had someone somehow been able to predict such a "crazy future" to them -- that the federal minimum wage would retreat to 1939 level ($.30/hr, adjusted to $4.50/hr w/no tax) by the time average income doubled. Would 1968 folks have guessed a small nuclear war, multiple depressions, a mini-ice age, plagues?

None of the above are necessary. The race-to-the-bottom will do it accomplish the same thing just as surely.

The perfect fit to 25% of Americans in poverty is 25% of the American workforce -- until early this year -- earning less than that 1968 minimum wage. (This also ties in with 25% of Americans earning less than modern Europe's minimum wage ($9.50/hr at exchange rates -- not counting paid holidays and health. New*).

Would that the progressive media always (!) included the doubling of overall income with the news of the minimum wage dropping almost in half over two generations -- so folks would completely catch on.

Many entitlement programs are triggered at double the official poverty line these days. Everybody in the know knows. Why go on reporting poverty at half the actual rate? Isn't that like reporting half the war (on poverty) casualties? Do progressives want to go out of their way not to get their story across?

************************

I am so afraid that Hillary will get elected (instead of Edwards or Obama) for the same reason I was afraid of Al Gore. I can just see her putting an inflation adjustment on the (by then below Ike era: $7.50/hr) minimum wage, signing the union card signing law and then trying to rock (by then half-awake) American labor back to sleep to make all quiet on her applause meter. I'd almost rather see a Republican get elected to carry on in the fine labor promoting tradition of G.W. Bush: acting as American labor's Pearl Harbor: now that we know the simple answer to labor's woes (sector-wide agreements) and how to sell it (at least I know :-]).

EVERYTHING HEREIN IS IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN

* http://www.theglobalist.com/StoryId.aspx?StoryId=6369

If the (crackpot) federal grand jury rule were to spread throughout...

If the exclusive to federal grand juries (crackpot) rule that the Fifth Amendment no longer applies once you answer any question at all on a particular line of inquiry – “once you open the door” – were to somehow propagate throughout all the American court system, state and federal, the immediate result would surely be a national outcry for a constitutional amendment to get our precious Fifth Amendment back.

But as long as it only exists in one (mostly hidden) venue the federal grand jury system gets away with it.

The “once you open the door” silliness could even enter the police station: Miranda (not that I’m in love with Miranda) might no longer be able to protect your right to remain silent: once you answer any police question.

The founders’ Fifth Amendment intention was to prevent torture. Does “opening the door” permit torture?

Who's going to eat whose lunch?

The poverty line in this country is set at three times the cost of an "emergency" diet (wherein you may not purchase a can of beans, only dried beans). I move that the federal government move immediately to a poverty standard of six times an emergency diet which is much more in keeping with 2007 basic needs (eg., $40,000/yr for a family of four).

Market failure implies that markets are for some (as far as I can see) unexplained reason expected to produce "fair" outcomes. The "free market" should be seen as analogous to the operating system of a computer -- as the OS of the economy -- upon which may be imposed any fair or unfair checks and balances program.

The first such "program" imposed by industrialization in nineteenth century England was the race to the bottom. Individual weavers who made a decent living were replaced by 100 (?) times more productive steam loom operators who were reduced to, not just-enough-to-stay-alive income, but the lowest form of just-enough-to-stay-alive income: staying alive on oat cakes three times a day because they could not even afford wheat bread.

The idea that the biggest ongoing drama in human history -- who's going to eat whose lunch -- is going to be automatically fairly resolved by an unfettered free market is what psychiatrists might characterize as "magical thinking".
****************************************

25% of Americans live below a realistic poverty line (double the official line -- see the 2002 book, Raise the Floor). I am willing to admit 25% below without assistance (food stamps, etc.).

This ties in neatly -- until the recent slight increase in the minimum wage -- with 25% of labor earning below the modern European minimum wage level (generally $9.50/hr). Of course in Europe that is accompanied by full medical, 4 weeks paid vacation, etc., etc., etc.

Which fits in with a New story in the "Globalist" : "The OECD recently updated its definition of 'the middle class' " -- now focusing on "the average worker" rather than on "the average production worker" -- the recalculation:

"A British middle class family with two children and two incomes of 100% and 67% of average wages still earns 40% more (in PPP terms, net of taxes) than their U.S. counterparts ($65,000 compared to $45,500). In fact, U.S. families in this category rank only 15th in the OECD."

Which also ties in with -- until the slight increase -- 25% earning less than the 1968 US federal minimum wage.

We have a near 1939 minimum wage ($4.50/hr -- no taxes) -- we have a prohibition (drugs). We have created a new organized crime base -- this time it black and Hispanic rather than Irish, Italian and Jewish.

I read Wilson's 1997 book, When Work Disappears at the same time I read Venkatesh's 2002, American Project. Wilson's study wrapped up (if I remember correctly) while the fed minimum wage was still about $7/hr. At this point the projects which had once been a place of hope (when factory work had yet to disappear and the minimum wage was closer to $10) had become crime ridden but not yet the gang controlled Hell that accompanied the minimum wage drop to $5/hr. Better to make "all of" $10/hr selling drugs.

If work paid in America like it pays in labor controlled Europe (I'm no big lefty, BTW) poverty in America would not exist any more than it does in Europe. (Minority schools would work too if the parents worked; a.k.a., were paid enough to work -- forget worrying about the teacher's union).

A $500/wk minimum wage would add less than 4% to cost of GDP output (going from the $5.15/hr level!) -- about how much we grow per capita every two or three years -- up from $380/wk in 1968; following 100% increase in average income since. All we ever had to end poverty in America, it turns out, was to pay people what we could afford to pay them.