Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Holds Meeting With Retail Staff to Discuss Recent Unionization Activities
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Denmark = all of Europe? It’s generally a good practice NOT to assume all European countries are the same.
It’s fine if you don’t think retail employees are worth it, a lot of people don’t. But, I say, if a union can negotiate that wage, more power to them!
No, YOU were the one that offered “restaurants can’t seat people anymore” as akin to an Apple Store that’s short staffed AND still doing incredible sales per square foot as folks walk in, grab the thing they’re looking for and walk out. Retail is simply different from foodservice, a shortage of foodservice workers materially affects how much business they can do, so they’re in a really good position for unionization if they’d like to. A shortage of retail workers only marginally affects how much they’re able to sell. While it’s nice to have a plethora of employees milling about, all an Apple Store REALLY needs to be profitable are folks that can unload the delivery, stock it in the storeroom and on the shelves, and at least 1 cashier. That’s not the case with foodservice.
Yes. The unions become very powerful and put their employers at risk of losing the business. It happened to General Motors.
The dues are part of the problem. If you work in a company with a mandatory union and pay your dues just to keep your job, your dues will go to whatever the union leadership wants to spend them on. It's nevery spent on anything entrepreneurial, that's for sure. As #3 below indicates, that could be to support a political party or candidate that you'd rather NOT contribute to.
Your dues can also go to support social practices that you don't like, or that outright strike you as an offense to humanity or to God. Many people in the world think that supporting abortion is a sin. Even if you don't get an abortion yourself, if your dues goes to support abortion and you don't fight it, then you can be seen as committing a sin, or at least supporting it. Whether or not you'll have to explain yourself to God on your judgment day is something each of us will find out whenever our time comes.
But here on planet Earth, nobody should be forced to pay into something that they think is wrong. And yet unions do this all the time. You don't get a vote on this; you already voted to be in the union, so you give them whatever they want and you don't ask questions.
I worked in a union shop once. I was low man on the totem pole and you're right, it's only based on seniority, not on your hard work and the skills you've developed by way of that hard work.
Well, it was like high school. I had to put up with crap from 2 or 3 individuals to the point where I had just had all I could take. Shortly after the beginning of one swing shift, with 6 hours to go, I'd just had it. I looked my antagonist in the eye, dropped my piecework on the table in front of me, and walked to the locker room. Now the guy who was harassing me that day was forced to...
A) ...take over at my station and keep up with the machine. With me gone, he was now low-man on the totem pole. Surprise! And NOBODY was going to slow down the machine for a more senior person...because now he's the least senior person on the shop floor. Surprise!
B) ...explain to the foreman why the college kid just walked off after he was just seen by the whole crew making fun and playing practical jokes on said college kid. A college kid who was always on time getting to work and coming back from lunch, never tried to game the system with sick time or holiday time, NEVER said no to a shift, never said no to any request, even to crawl into the worst, filthiest places to clean around the machinery and soak up all the grease all over the floor, never complained about how fast they ran the machines, and never made any problems.
As I was doffing my filthy work clothes, the foreman came into the locker room, sat down and cool as a cucumber, told me that nobody on any shift was ever going to give me crap again, and in fact they would respect me more now. He even went so far as to tell me that I was making something of myself, going to college for computers and all, and he really respected me for that. He said at least 2 of the guys on the floor right now just spend all their free time smoking pot, but I'm making something of myself and one day I'll have everything I ever dreamed of, just because of good decision making.
Now, you might thinkg that reporting the guy to the company or the union would have magically gotten the guy a talking-to and fixed all my problems. But unions do not fix interpersonal issues between members, and it's more likely that taking such an action would've just gotten me flat tires in the parking lot, or maybe got my brake lines cut. Because that's the culture that unions promulgate. But LEAVING THE JOB sent the signal clear as a bell. Don't antagonize the low-man so much that he quits; because then you'll have to do his crappy job AND your own, and no the union won't go after the company for paying you extra!
I went back to the line. My antagonizer mouthed the word "sorry" (the environment was very loud and we all wore ear-pro except during a machine make-ready, so you get good at reading lips), then he left my station and never bothered me again. And neither did anybody else on any other shift. No flat tires or cut brake lines either, so apparently the word got out.
Yes. And in some cases, like the city of Stockton, California, they renege on those gold-plated pension payments after you've retired.
So let's get this straight: You work your whole life for the city and now you're an old guy just minding your own business, and what happens? Your pension checks STOP COMING. There's no money! WTF? What are you going to do now, go work as a Walmart Greeter? In your 80s?
This might be more difficult for the union "brotherhood" to get away with in 2022, since everybody and their company has security cameras everywhere now. But you can still get flat tires in the parking lot. Or broken windows. Or they'll approach you and tell you all kinds of details about your kids in school, or your wife in the grocery store. What they were wearing, whether their hair was up or down, and oh wouldn't it be terrible, just terrible if something bad were to happen to your adorable family?
Unions did this. It's how they keep people in line. It's how they ensure compliance without complaint. So do mobsters, drug dealers, and loan sharks, so now you know what kind of company the unions keep.
A company might not even help you pay for your college degree or help you pay for any professional certifications, because all of those things might make you marketable and lose you to another company. So if it's not in the union contract, it ain't happening. But my company helped pay for my master's degree some years ago and all I had to do was keep working for them for a few years after getting my diploma.
And to your point about negotiations: When you're in a union, here's how it REALLY works with regards to your pay: The company you work for has negotiated to get the most workers FOR THE LEAST PAY. Otherwise, what's the point of employing any union workers?
Oh, and if you're in a union, you can just forget about doing a good job or going the extra mile to impress your boss or be considered for advancement. I know people who were pulled aside by their union coworkers and were told flat out that "you're working too hard and you need to tone it down".
In some cases, you're not allowed to do somebody else's job. You can't unlock that door to put the new box of parts in the room; that's Johnny's job. He's the only one who's qualified to unlock that door. Because union! He's the official door unlocker in chief.
You can't move that palette of finished components to the loading dock, even though you have a license to drive the forklift...no no no, we have union rules, and only Tom is allowed to drive the forklift because he has been with the company the longest. It doesn't matter that Tom is out "sick" (which means he's downtown at a ball game, but taking a sick day) and it doesn't matter that Tom, being drunk or high while on the job, has had a lot of accidents with that forklift.
Unions, dumbing down the work and making the workplace MORE dangerous.
Want to know what New York City does with its teachers who have been found guilty of crimes such as sexual offenses? Nope, they don't fire them, not even after investigating the accusations! They have them "come to work" to a location where they just sit at tables all day and do...wait for it...NO TEACHING. They can read, write, do their bills, or just lay their head down and sleep. And they get paid their normal salary, just as if they were teaching in a classroom all day.
I was in a management training session some years ago and some of my peers had union employees working for them. The difference between my employees and their employees was shocking. Mine were all go-getters, except for one that we might call a "slacker". He represented less than 5% of my whole workforce. The peers with union employees had more than half as slackers who would only do the bare-minimum on their jobs. Plus, they knew the rules well enough to game the system and call in sick when they were not sick. They had union protection and they got really really good at not only NOT WORKING, but they got good at not being fired while not working. Union protection. Dumbing down the workplace, dumbing down the product.
We still have employment law. I can't just fire somebody because they looked at me wrong. I would never do such a thing anyway, but even if I was evil in that way, employment and labor law and lawsuits from being a scumbag manager could cost my company a crap-ton of money in lost legal cases. And better benefits is not always what you get with unions. With unions, you're just a number. Only now you're a number to the company AND to your union representative.
I count myself fortunate that I don't have to please unions in my current role. My teams seem to be pretty happy, but I respect them and I don't work them to death.
Yes. There are surely exceptions but paid time off and health insurance etc is common.
Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, UK, Norway etc…
Well profitability is how they earn those bonuses. Heck, even keep their job. I say put everyone on a performance based pay system. Don’t perform don’t get paid. Unionize that.
Stop moving the goal posts. Indeed if a union can negotiate that, good for them, though I don’t see that as likely. However you claimed it’s what would be required for a living wage in some areas.
Retail may or may not suffer to the same degree from a labor shortage as food service, but employees can still take advantage of the shortage. Apple isn’t staffing stores with more people than they need out in some kind of act of charity. Like you said, they need people to unload the goods, stock the goods, run customer service and device repair, take care of transactions, field general questions from customers, clean up, etc. Apple Store cache is going to take a hit when customers come in and aren’t taken care of the way they’re used to or the store is unorganized and dirty. And really replaceability of individual employees is a bit of a moot point if the stores unionize.
Just as a tip if any of you have a problem with your union being involved in politics. You can ask to drop out and become a "fair share" AKA "agency fee" payer. That's a protected right in all 50 states.
Unions have to keep strictly separate accounting for contract negotiation, administration, grievance etc vs extra things such as social events, politics, etc. Being a fee-payer means that you are still paying for the contract benefits you are enjoying while opting out of everything else.
This is much better than freeriding on the union's contract administration while paying nothing, which is what you can do in right-to-work (RTW) states. The Chamber of Commerce has been running a decades-long misinformation campaign trying to trick workers into believing that you can only opt out of membership in RTW states. That's because they know RTW sets up a prisoners' dilemma that crushes unions, and boy does the Chamber hate unions since they mean better wages, benefits, and conditions for workers.
Unions have to keep strictly separate accounting for contract negotiation, administration, grievance etc vs extra things such as social events, politics, etc. Being a fee-payer means that you are still paying for the contract benefits you are enjoying while opting out of everything else.
This is much better than freeriding on the union's contract administration while paying nothing, which is what you can do in right-to-work (RTW) states. The Chamber of Commerce has been running a decades-long misinformation campaign trying to trick workers into believing that you can only opt out of membership in RTW states. That's because they know RTW sets up a prisoners' dilemma that crushes unions, and boy does the Chamber hate unions since they mean better wages, benefits, and conditions for workers.
Now why would that be? If union representation is so great then I would think that members would happily continue to pay their dues when/if their state offers RTW choice. One should have the right to employment without joining or funding a middle man organization.
Edit: Hell, I just read that some unions have an initiation fee! FFS, What a scam! Now a new hire not only is "encouraged" to join their little club but has to pay up front for the privilege?!?!
Last edited:
They want their cake and to eat it too. Some folks are selfish and take the short-sighted view of "I can get the benefits the union is able to negotiate, but not pay the dues."
I wouldn't work for them if you paid me LOL. It is becoming daily more clear that Apple is nothing more than yet another insidious branch of government control program. They are rolling out every-increasingly George Orwell-esque devices to usher on the 1984-esque Brave New World of total control. I even find it absurd how they have convinced the 'slave' population to pay exorbitant prices for these control devices, which they increasingly ease ever closer to being electronic leashes, with the handlers controlling what appears on the screen and out of the speakers of it. Obey! Chai! Goy!
If the US is such a horrid place then why are millions per year sneaking across the boarder ILLEGALLY to live here?
Reminds me of a Woody Allen line from one of his films.
His father gave him a summer job in his textile business. He organized the workers, formed a union, then the workers went on strike and put his father out of business.
No offense to the immigrants and their homelands, but look where they are coming from and the conditions in those countries. The US initially seems to be the lesser of two evils but if you question some of these folks down the road, some will admit to making a poor judgement.
It’s a prisoners’ dilemma because the union is legally required to give you all the same representation whether you pay an agency fee or not.
As I mentioned before, nowhere in the U.S. are you required to join the union. That has nothing to do with RTW. You are either arguing in bad faith or you were tricked by the Chamber of Commerce. Just look up the Taft-Hartley Act (1947).
This is a lot of BS. I worked for a large multinational company, and spent a lot of time at the company sites in France with coworkers who had essentially the same job I had in the US. THey would pick me up to go out to dinner in a tiny 10 year old car, then when I saw their apartment that I could fit into my living room at home, I was pretty clear that in-spite of their socialized health car, my standard of living was much higher.
There was less motivation at work for them to excel, as excel didn’t really bring you anything.
So if unions level the playing field, then why are the NFL union players not all paid the same wage? Do you think an average punter should make the same as a top QB?
Paying an "agency" fee is akin to joining IMHO so those that work outside of RTW states are extorted into paying for the privilege of working. Those inside a RTW state have the freedom and choice to decide.
I wonder how many foot stompin pro-union members stopped paying dues the second their state went RTW?
A Look at Unions in Michigan, Five Years After Right-to-Work
Most of state’s largest unions have seen a collapse in members and political spending
www.michigancapitolconfidential.com
The above tells me one of two things, either workers felt the union was not providing good service for what they paid in dues so they stopped or these formerly foot stompin, pro-union folks turned into leeches the second they could.
I don’t hear of too many of the illegals sneak back across the boarder out of the US. Many are coming from countries all over the world, and the US is not the first, second or third boarder they are crossing. It must not be as horrible a place as you think it is. You must be free to leave too? Maybe you can find a better place to live.
Don't quite get your question. I do not live in the US nor do I think it is horrible. I am quite content here settled in northern Europe after living in numerous countries due to my career.
I wish. That would mean the suits and management would be making pennies while the low man on the totem would be raking in cash.
How the American system works is the best performers get more work while compensation remains the same. Management and executives get all the money for coming up with stupid ideas that burdens those doing actual work.
That should be policy for management and executives as well. None of that rules for thee but not for me BS.
There would be no need for unions if management treated their workers fairly. None of my co-workers care to unionized because our boss compensates us fairly and treats us like people instead of expendable parts.
I beg to differ. No company is perfect but as I understand things, even from those here at MR that claimed to be Apple retail employees, Apple compensates and treats their retail staff rather well and I have heard similar things in regards to Starbucks. I agree the after hours bag check thing was not well implemented but I'm rather sure Apple didn't implement the policy to harass its employees but to rectify a theft problem.
Bottom line is some people are never happy and always want more, "lets unionize, then we'll make that fatcat executive money!". Some even think that because Apple is so successful they should pay the retail folks $150,000 a year and give them 6 weeks vacation, to start. Sorry, but very, very few retail-ish positions warrant that kind of compensation.
Eventually you reach fair compensation for work performed but unions don't stop there, they keep asking for more under the threat of a strike, which eventually can bury the company or the company ships jobs overseas. Ask the US steel industry... oh wait, you can't.
Last edited:
Have you ever held a real job in America? I have worked for 40 years at several companies, and what you state is not at all what I have experienced. Top performers, and highly motivated people move up, and make more.
The only thing that would make dealing with customers bearable is if employees can fight a customer once a week without reprocussions. 99.44% of the time, dealing with customers is bearable, maybe even pleasant. But there is always that .66% of the time a Karen makes unreasonable demands.
"Oh hail, no lady. The correct quote is 'The customers is always right in matter of taste.' Otherwise people will start demanding iPhones for a buck and expect to get their way, because 🙃'Customer is always right.'🙃"
Yes, I have the misfortune of having only worked in America with our crappy labor laws.
I've experienced both hard work pays off and hard work only earns more hard work. Back when I was a repair tech. Average turn around time for a repair was 2-3 days, while my average was 1-2 days. My lazy, Dilbert's Boss-type boss sat on his (_!_) all day and collected a big bonus thanks to my hard work. Lazy boss fired one of the tech, so I had even more work. Busted my butt and got a whopping $1 an hour raise. After that, all my turn around was 2-3 days as well (1 day to fix and another day or 2 of it just sitting on my shelf. If I finish all the repairs on my ticket list, I still have to sit around with my thumb up my (_!_) because, just because.😣
Now I'm a bean counter and am compensated fairly for my expertise. If I finish my work early, I can leave early. That motivates me to do 8 hours of work in 3-4 hours. It's almost European, my current work/life balance.
You can read all about workers who have had it up to their ears at being exploited in Reedit. There was an /anti-work one a while back.
Sign me up! I don't generally have customers get to that level weekly but a good 2-3 times a year, boo-yah!