Nicely written article. The ideas of Harris resonate well with me and I agree that we need to realize that it is time to "break the chains", even though it is hard. We need to realize that we are being played and facebook, google, and everyone else is not acting out of good intention towards us but purely acting in a monetary way. The occupy movement also reached Germany back then with large camps in Frankfurt (business-oriented city) and Berlin. However, it did not reach the same importance because Germany was not that much affected by the global market crisis and the "normal" German citizen did not notice a change in his pocket money. I guess this has to do with the social nature of Germany and other European countries. I really hope that people realize that the whole "communist scare" is just a remnant of the cold war era and look through the fog of bullshit. I still can't believe that country-wide health care, paid sick leave, at least 20 paid holidays etc. are not standard in the US. I get 30 paid holidays and 1 month of paid sick leave as a PhD student on a 65% contract! And can someone explain to me why many Americans think that unions is a bad thing? (Or why unions are a bad thing in the US)
Depends on the union, but they've gone from being perceived as being beneficial to the working man to any combination of weak and ineffective, leeching off the hard work of individuals, bureaucratic systems that just create more obstacles to overcome, old boy networks that protect the old guard and/or provide preferential and protectionist treatment to people who abuse the system and their power in it. I mean, I could keep going on, but you get the idea. Regardless, whether or not that's the reality of the situation, that's how they're often viewed.And can someone explain to me why many Americans think that unions is a bad thing? (Or why unions are a bad thing in the US)
-- The lady at work in a cushy seniority bid position after having life saving surgery for free on the union health plan. I feel like this is another thing that millennials might kill, but the "git 'er done" work ethic in the US is real and deeply ingrained. The NLRB is also structured in a way that weakens unions. We've have a few cases in my local in the past year where the company was clearly violating the contract, but the cases still managed to got sent off to Arbitration. Never heard about them again, so I assume they decided against the union. One of these cases was black and white where the company was selectively handing out extra-contract bonuses to employees. If we'd won that, it would have easily put thousands of dollars in lots and lots and lots of pockets. We've also inflicted a lot of wounds against ourselves. See Hoffa, Hoffa Jr, Ron Carey, etc, ect. I hate the union, they've done nothing for me. It's stupid!
And can someone explain to me why many Americans think that unions is a bad thing? (Or why unions are a bad thing in the US)
I wonder why such problems didn't show up in Germany where unions are generally seen as something good for the people. This story has been interesting to watch, Tesla vs. IG Metall in Germany