RACE AND LABOR UNIONS IN THE WORK PLACE

Race in the work place is a difficult subject for me to write about because what I write is easily misunderstood but also easily twisted for nefarious purposes. However, some things have to be said. Several of my family members and friends have told me and within the body of my own experiences, I know that some people use their race as a shield to protect laziness and/or incompetence. A person telling co-workers they cannot fire me because, “I am black, Latino, or Native American” is wrong and everyone knows it. The same paradigm applies to union membership. The supervisor can and should fire people for laziness and incompetence with the understanding that affirmative action often involves hiring a person to allow that person to gain competence. Obviously, a person should never be fired because of race or union membership and such cases should be vigorously be prosecuted. The process may not always be neat and tidy and results may not always be top notch, some people may not be hired, and some may lose their jobs, but everyone involved should understand what happened and why it happened; therefore, end up feeling good about it.

It seems trite to have to give examples because the practice is so prevalent, and we have it codified into law. A quota requiring a percentage of minority employees is a classic example of a misused codification of justice. A person saying you cannot fire me because I am a minority is a person saying I am depending on you being a good citizen and following the law. It is not just minority status because Union membership can lead to the same thing—you cannot fire me because I am a union member. There is only one solution. Minorities and union members, to protect themselves, will have to police themselves. If a company executive encounters a non-productive, lazy or incompetent employee and fires him or her, everyone but especially the minorities should support the action. If a union carpenter is working with an incompetent carpenters that person should be fired without complaints from fellow carpenters. Like mothers often tell their children, “do what I tell you for your own good”.

I had the wonderful experience of working in a society for almost 20 years where I was in the minority and where there were no such things as unions. Work place standards were upheld by general agreement; everyone understood that incompetent and lazy people lost their jobs. In addition, in that society, when a person claimed he of she was a carpenter, the only option was to hire them and find out for yourself if he or she was or was not a carpenter; often a costly exercise. In the Untied States, at least in union states, you ask if the person was a union member; if the answer was yes, the chances were good that a person was in fact a good carpenter. I should add that in the war refugee situation in which I found myself (at the time the neighboring country was undergoing a civil war) I exercised a certain degree of empathy and hired people to help build my house who were incompetent but surprising few were lazy. The results were not always of high standards but I ended up felling good about it—the final point; everyone was a minority but me.   

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