XPO | Xpo Union Thread.

[highspeeds]

Since I have knowledge in and have done both machine shop work and know people in the welding trade, I disagree with what you say about the trades. CNC machines are not "all set up by one guy". If it's a big shop, there are many people and many operators. "Peanuts" is what the trucking companies are paying people that have had NO training. All they have is a CDL that can be revoked. Without that they are unemployed and unemployable. No other skills. Depends on where you live, but manufacturing and machining jobs pay over $20 - $25 hr. Good welding (manual not robots) jobs pay about the same - much more on pipeline projects.
AND they pay overtime over 40 hrs, have good benefits and home every day, no bad weather or slick roads to deal with in shop. Pipeline work is a different matter, but the pay is much higher to compensate for it. An idependent pipeline welder with his own welding truck I talked to in Texas, told me he was 2nd year out of welding school. Truck was paid for. He was earning $80 hr straight time with all the work he could handle. OT after 40, Double time on Sunday, even more on Holiday if required to work.
Something most trucking companies nowadays can't match or even come close to except on pipeline projects.

The CNC shops I have delivered around here pay a foreman to run the floor and set up the machines. Everyone else makes less than you would to work the window at Wendy's to stand there and watch the machine do it's thing until it's time to take the part out and put in a new piece of material. And sure if you are talking about deep sea welding I guess that pays pretty good. But how many people are doing that and with what risks ?

There are plenty of guys out there that own their own truck and make a damn good income. I know a few I work with that even had 10-20 trucks at one time. And then diesel went up and rates went down and they ended up losing everything. A few still dabble. Run a truck or two while they still are working for someone else themselves. There are outliers that can be very successful for a period of time, does that mean that everyone in that trade is so fortunate ?

 

[highspeeds]

No one ever talks about them steelworkers that use to litter the lands. Don't get one of them started on the benefits of the union lifestyle. Welding? Enjoy your Parkinson's.

My father was one of them. A steelworker. A millwright. A jack of all trades industrial mechanic. Welding. Pipefitting. What ever needed to be done to keep the line up and running. He was constantly being laid off and then wound up unemployable before he was 50. Company filed bankruptcy and stole the pension. He's got nothing to show for any of it.

 

[WiggleWagondrvr]

Anyone run to Gary, IN? Did the shop there go union or not? I had heard a rumor that they voted in the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers union but never got a confirmation.

Isn't Aurora's vote today?

New Jersey voted for union. ( BOO ) Two shops I'm Illinois's declined the union. ( YEA )

 

[highspeeds]

Speak of the devil, they are hanging out here in the driveway again. Quite a few guys here know these asshats from past work experience. I hope it storms. Let's see them run and hide just from getting wet. I know this from personal experience. As soon as things get tough for THEM, you won't be able to find them or hear from them.

What did you helpless little trolls do for the drivers at CF ? What are you going to do for the drivers at YRC ? What can you actually offer ? Not just rhetoric. Anyone can talk. What can you actually do ?

 

[icuicp]

Speak of the devil, they are hanging out here in the driveway again. Quite a few guys here know these asshats from past work experience. I hope it storms. Let's see them run and hide just from getting wet. I know this from personal experience. As soon as things get tough for THEM, you won't be able to find them or hear from them.

What did you helpless little trolls do for the drivers at CF ? What are you going to do for the drivers at YRC ? What can you actually offer ? Not just rhetoric. Anyone can talk. What can you actually do ?

I'm just around the corner from you and the last time they ( the union ) was outside our barn , someone told the terminal manager and he went outside to say hi and ask what's up - friendly like - and they TOOK OFF!!! Like he had a gun or something ( he just went out to speak and make sure they weren't on the property )

Doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

 

[henry j]

The CNC shops I have delivered around here pay a foreman to run the floor and set up the machines. Everyone else makes less than you would to work the window at Wendy's to stand there and watch the machine do it's thing until it's time to take the part out and put in a new piece of material. And sure if you are talking about deep sea welding I guess that pays pretty good. But how many people are doing that and with what risks ?

There are plenty of guys out there that own their own truck and make a damn good income. I know a few I work with that even had 10-20 trucks at one time. And then diesel went up and rates went down and they ended up losing everything. A few still dabble. Run a truck or two while they still are working for someone else themselves. There are outliers that can be very successful for a period of time, does that mean that everyone in that trade is so fortunate ?

Deep sea welding? You don't get around much, do you? There are plenty of welding jobs around here manufacturing farm equip., truck trailers, tanks for liquid ammonia, milk, gasoline, racks for UTV's, specialty parts for Caterpillar, special racks and loaders for logging trucks, skid loaders (at the manufacturer) and after market add-on equip. for those skid loaders, high impact specialty bumpers for off-road pickups, a full variety of smaller trailers to haul ATV's, UTV's, boats and snowmobiles, two companies that build recycling auto crushers, just to name a few that need welders and DO NOT use "robot welders" like you seem to think. There is a gear manufacturer not far from here that pays CNC trainees over $20 hr - set-up men over $30 hr.... Yes, robotics are used in auto plants and also in production lines that make small products, but there is a real need for those that know how to do MIG and TIG welding. There are good paying jobs waiting for people who come out of trade schools, not liberal colleges that are more concerned with political correctness than actually teaching young people how to work with their hands.
There is also a need for plumbers, electricians, certified mechanics, none of which are taught in the 4 year colleges that pump out people with "degrees" that only get them a job as a McDonald's manager or shoe store manager making less than $18,000 a year. Maybe that explains why there are quite a few college grads driving trucks because it pays more. The $100,000 to $150,000 Mommy and Daddy spent on them to go to college didn't get them much did it? A much better investment would have been a 1 or 2 year trade school. But then, little Johnny or Jane didn't want to get dirty or WORK so they passed on the blue collar training. Definition of a "waste". = A planeload of lawyers crashing with one empty seat. Hopefully the pilot had a parachute. (Incidentally, both the airplane and the parachute were made by blue collar workers, not robots)

 

[icuicp]

Deep sea welding? You don't get around much, do you? There are plenty of welding jobs around here manufacturing farm equip., truck trailers, tanks for liquid ammonia, milk, gasoline, racks for UTV's, specialty parts for Caterpillar, special racks and loaders for logging trucks, skid loaders (at the manufacturer) and after market add-on equip. for those skid loaders, high impact specialty bumpers for off-road pickups, a full variety of smaller trailers to haul ATV's, UTV's, boats and snowmobiles, two companies that build recycling auto crushers, just to name a few that need welders and DO NOT use "robot welders" like you seem to think. There is a gear manufacturer not far from here that pays CNC trainees over $20 hr - set-up men over $30 hr.... Yes, robotics are used in auto plants and also in production lines that make small products, but there is a real need for those that know how to do MIG and TIG welding. There are good paying jobs waiting for people who come out of trade schools, not liberal colleges that are more concerned with political correctness than actually teaching young people how to work with their hands.
There is also a need for plumbers, electricians, certified mechanics, none of which are taught in the 4 year colleges that pump out people with "degrees" that only get them a job as a McDonald's manager or shoe store manager making less than $18,000 a year. Maybe that explains why there are quite a few college grads driving trucks because it pays more. The $100,000 to $150,000 Mommy and Daddy spent on them to go to college didn't get them much did it? A much better investment would have been a 1 or 2 year trade school. But then, little Johnny or Jane didn't want to get dirty or WORK so they passed on the blue collar training. Definition of a "waste". = A planeload of lawyers crashing with one empty seat. Hopefully the pilot had a parachute. (Incidentally, both the airplane and the parachute were made by blue collar workers, not robots)

You said "around here" Henry J. Are you in the same part of the country as Highspeeds? It may be the reason for some of the differences in how you two see things. ( If you are from different parts of the country )

 

[henry j]

You said "around here" Henry J. Are you in the same part of the country as Highspeeds? It may be the reason for some of the differences in how you two see things. ( If you are from different parts of the country )

I don't know. I only know what is happening here in the midwest where a lot of heavy machinery and big farm equip. is made (by real people, not "robots" like HIGHSPEEDS seems to think). It's obvious he's been watching too many "Transformers" cartoons. We are up to our eyeballs in college grads that are willing to work for peanuts because they find out just how little their 4 year degree is worth in the "real world". They come out of that expensive 4 or 6 year college with a piece of paper to hang on the wall and no skills. In the meantime the $100,000 to $200,000 school loan still needs to be paid by somebody. Most are still hoping that Mommy and Daddy will pay it or some Democrat like Hillary or Bernie Sanders will "forgive" the debt. Hey, they've still got that piece of paper.
I think HIGHSPEEDS is from the part of the country that was decimated by the collapsing steel industry. That was allowed to happen by the government who did nothing while China, Japan and others dumped cheap steel, that cost more to produce and hip to the US than they were selling it for on the US market intending to destroy our steel industry. They did it while our government said they didn't want to be known as being "protectionists", instead wanting worldwide "free trade" instead of "fair trade".
This is something Trump is trying to turn around before it happens in other industries, too. I hope it works. He was at Snap-On Tools in Wisconsin promoting "Made in America - Buy American" and encouraging more people to take pride in the blue collar jobs and workers of America.
Not everybody can afford to go to a college or University that costs over $40,000 per year to attend. Trade schools offer more for far less money.
Trucking was once a good job for the lower educated. Now it's become a dead end job with no future. The CEO's and their executives in all these companies (both union and non-union) will eat their employees alive, knowing they have an unlimited supply of replacements available to replace those that are fired or quit. Their goal now is to destroy the competition - the union and the union companies. After that, it will be open season on their own employees, their pay and their benefits. They are watching YRCW very closely to see just how it's done..

 

[henry j]

unemployable before he was 50.

Unemployable before he was 50? Really? With all those skills? Are you sure those unemployment checks were just more preferable than actually going to work in some other company that needed welders, mechanics or pipe fitters (enhanced plumbers). I guess with him it was either work at a steel mill or nothing. Why didn't he take advantage of some re-training to fit his skills into a company other than a steel mill. The unions here (not only Teamsters) offer free re-training and free tools to fit THAT job to those that are displaced by company closings. Steelworkers didn't? Seems strange.
Moving to another city or another part of the country is always an option for people with skills, especially licenced skills like pipefitter and welder. I did. I went where the work was. Sometimes it's just easier to take the free money and stay put.

 

[icuicp]

I don't know. I only know what is happening here in the midwest where a lot of heavy machinery and big farm equip. is made (by real people, not "robots" like HIGHSPEEDS seems to think). It's obvious he's been watching too many "Transformers" cartoons. We are up to our eyeballs in college grads that are willing to work for peanuts because they find out just how little their 4 year degree is worth in the "real world". They come out of that expensive 4 or 6 year college with a piece of paper to hang on the wall and no skills. In the meantime the $100,000 to $200,000 school loan still needs to be paid by somebody. Most are still hoping that Mommy and Daddy will pay it or some Democrat like Hillary or Bernie Sanders will "forgive" the debt. Hey, they've still got that piece of paper.
I think HIGHSPEEDS is from the part of the country that was decimated by the collapsing steel industry. That was allowed to happen by the government who did nothing while China, Japan and others dumped cheap steel, that cost more to produce and hip to the US than they were selling it for on the US market intending to destroy our steel industry. They did it while our government said they didn't want to be known as being "protectionists", instead wanting worldwide "free trade" instead of "fair trade".
This is something Trump is trying to turn around before it happens in other industries, too. I hope it works. He was at Snap-On Tools in Wisconsin promoting "Made in America - Buy American" and encouraging more people to take pride in the blue collar jobs and workers of America.
Not everybody can afford to go to a college or University that costs over $40,000 per year to attend. Trade schools offer more for far less money.
Trucking was once a good job for the lower educated. Now it's become a dead end job with no future. The CEO's and their executives in all these companies (both union and non-union) will eat their employees alive, knowing they have an unlimited supply of replacements available to replace those that are fired or quit. Their goal now is to destroy the competition - the union and the union companies. After that, it will be open season on their own employees, their pay and their benefits. They are watching YRCW very closely to see just how it's done..

One thing that Con-way Inc. dropped was tuition reimbursement. Seems like a lot of posters have pointed out that grooming talent from inside improves the environment overall.

Keeping good people and targeting candidates for management positions for education and training seems to be dead. Inquires to the upper management at XPO about tuition reimbursement being restarted have been met with crickets.

 

[vongrimmenstein]

I don't know. I only know what is happening here in the midwest where a lot of heavy machinery and big farm equip. is made (by real people, not "robots" like HIGHSPEEDS seems to think). It's obvious he's been watching too many "Transformers" cartoons. We are up to our eyeballs in college grads that are willing to work for peanuts because they find out just how little their 4 year degree is worth in the "real world". They come out of that expensive 4 or 6 year college with a piece of paper to hang on the wall and no skills. In the meantime the $100,000 to $200,000 school loan still needs to be paid by somebody. Most are still hoping that Mommy and Daddy will pay it or some Democrat like Hillary or Bernie Sanders will "forgive" the debt. Hey, they've still got that piece of paper.
I think HIGHSPEEDS is from the part of the country that was decimated by the collapsing steel industry. That was allowed to happen by the government who did nothing while China, Japan and others dumped cheap steel, that cost more to produce and hip to the US than they were selling it for on the US market intending to destroy our steel industry. They did it while our government said they didn't want to be known as being "protectionists", instead wanting worldwide "free trade" instead of "fair trade".
This is something Trump is trying to turn around before it happens in other industries, too. I hope it works. He was at Snap-On Tools in Wisconsin promoting "Made in America - Buy American" and encouraging more people to take pride in the blue collar jobs and workers of America.
Not everybody can afford to go to a college or University that costs over $40,000 per year to attend. Trade schools offer more for far less money.
Trucking was once a good job for the lower educated. Now it's become a dead end job with no future. The CEO's and their executives in all these companies (both union and non-union) will eat their employees alive, knowing they have an unlimited supply of replacements available to replace those that are fired or quit. Their goal now is to destroy the competition - the union and the union companies. After that, it will be open season on their own employees, their pay and their benefits. They are watching YRCW very closely to see just how it's done..

Ya nailed it again. I have a box full of snap on tools. But, keep in mind, some of the snap on line is made in China. Also, I have purchased Red Wing shoes for years made in Minnesota. But, they have a extensive line of shoes in the show room made in yes, once again, China. And here in Indy Rexnord will be shut down by the fall. Good American made bearings now being made by the citizens of Mexico. Paying 5 or 6 bucks an hour with no benefits & NO EPA breathing down their corporate necks effecting their bank balance. And as to the Carrier Furnace plant in Indy. Some jobs went south some stayed. They are a division of United Technologies a multi billion dollar corporation with some very BIG dollar defense contracts. Ya, Pence & Trump did save some jobs, but only because their parent company has a boat load of defense contract's. Lose the big dollar defense contracts, & Carrier can't pack fast enough for Mexico. Sorry I am venting to much. von.

 

[XCCX]

I'm just around the corner from you and the last time they ( the union ) was outside our barn , someone told the terminal manager and he went outside to say hi and ask what's up - friendly like - and they TOOK OFF!!! Like he had a gun or something ( he just went out to speak and make sure they weren't on the property )

Doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

Just curious of what you would have liked them do? I'm not trying to be a smart ass just curious.

 

[highspeeds]

Unemployable before he was 50? Really? With all those skills? Are you sure those unemployment checks were just more preferable than actually going to work in some other company that needed welders, mechanics or pipe fitters (enhanced plumbers). I guess with him it was either work at a steel mill or nothing. Why didn't he take advantage of some re-training to fit his skills into a company other than a steel mill. The unions here (not only Teamsters) offer free re-training and free tools to fit THAT job to those that are displaced by company closings. Steelworkers didn't? Seems strange.
Moving to another city or another part of the country is always an option for people with skills, especially licenced skills like pipefitter and welder. I did. I went where the work was. Sometimes it's just easier to take the free money and stay put.

The unemployment didn't last very long. And he did take training. Mostly in computers. Also picked up a few more certifications. As he had come up old school. And didn't necessarily have the proper training to be doing some of what he was doing.

I know people don't like to hear it. And since you are here, you are likely a truck driver too, and don't actually " work " for a living. But doing physically demanding and laborious tasks for nearly 30 years takes a toll on you body. As you get closer to 50 people take your application. And even give you an interview. They just never call back.

 

[highspeeds]

Ya nailed it again. I have a box full of snap on tools. But, keep in mind, some of the snap on line is made in China. Also, I have purchased Red Wing shoes for years made in Minnesota. But, they have a extensive line of shoes in the show room made in yes, once again, China. And here in Indy Rexnord will be shut down by the fall. Good American made bearings now being made by the citizens of Mexico. Paying 5 or 6 bucks an hour with no benefits & NO EPA breathing down their corporate necks effecting their bank balance. And as to the Carrier Furnace plant in Indy. Some jobs went south some stayed. They are a division of United Technologies a multi billion dollar corporation with some very BIG dollar defense contracts. Ya, Pence & Trump did save some jobs, but only because their parent company has a boat load of defense contract's. Lose the big dollar defense contracts, & Carrier can't pack fast enough for Mexico. Sorry I am venting to much. von.

It takes a great deal of effort to buy American. And even then you will find out that by American, they mean somewhere in this hemisphere. The " Americas ".

 

[highspeeds]

Just curious of what you would have liked them do? I'm not trying to be a smart ass just curious.

Here's the thing. If they run and hide at the sight of management. How will they behave at negotiations with YOUR FUTURE on table ?

 

[vongrimmenstein]

Here's the thing. If they run and hide at the sight of management. How will they behave at negotiations with YOUR FUTURE on table ?

Good point. von.

 

[icuicp]

Just curious of what you would have liked them do? I'm not trying to be a smart ass just curious.

They had no idea if he was a driver or some other blue collar worker with questions. I don't expect a nasty confrontation or any confrontation at all.

I expected them to do what I've seen them do at other locations: give out information about their side of the debate. Know the rules and follow them as far as passing out literature and speaking to employees. Be smart and be courteous.

I've been in unions before and payed a ton of dues. You want to see someone advancing your cause and putting forth an effort. Not stapling a flyer to a telephone pole and rolling out when someone peeks out and says "hey guys , how are you?"

 

[joes bar and grill]

I'm just around the corner from you and the last time they ( the union ) was outside our barn , someone told the terminal manager and he went outside to say hi and ask what's up - friendly like - and they TOOK OFF!!! Like he had a gun or something ( he just went out to speak and make sure they weren't on the property )

Doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

More to that story than what's being said.

 

[Deleted member 5115]

I've been in unions before and payed a ton of dues. You want to see someone advancing your cause and putting forth an effort.

Unfortunately, the only cause being advanced by the teamsters union today is that of their own administrators. To that end collection of dues from as many members as possible is their goal. Unions have been great for American workers and there just has to be a better union to sign up with than the teamsters.

 

[icuicp]

More to that story than what's being said.

Maybe there's more...on the union side I can't say. From the "guy just going to work" side , this is what happened. It was during some type of drive. There were pictures on the Teamster's website showing more of an effort ( at other locations ) , that effort just didn't happen where I was.