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Mail
Magazine 24...
What
I
Learned About a Free Economy When I Worked as a Union Employee
by Gary
DeMar April 1, 2012
One of my
first jobs as a teenager was a stock boy at the supermarket grocery
chain
Kroger. As with any young person growing up, I was happy to have a job
where
someone paid me for working.
What I did
not know at the time was that Kroger had a union. I didn’t think much
about it
at the time since I didn’t know what a union was. Again, my sights were
on that
pay check at the end of every two weeks. It didn’t take me long to
learn that a
union shop was a pain.
First,
because of union rules, I could not work more than 16 hours per week.
If I
worked one hour over 16 hours, Kroger would have to pay me $3.30 an
hour
instead of $1.65 for the entire 17 hours (this was in 1966–67). Kroger
got
around the union requirement by hiring a lot of part time employees.
They could
hire 3 part timers at $1.65 instead of one 40-hour employee at $3.30.
Someone
might say that this was unfair of Kroger. Nonsense. No one was forced
to work
at Kroger. Who was the union to tell a company how to run its business?
Kroger
was taking all the risks.
Second, I
could not work hard as a union employee. I was told to pace myself. In
addition, I had to take my 15-minute break, and it had to be exactly
15-minutes. If I worked faster than another employee or decided not to
take my
break or shorten my break, Kroger might be able to get along with fewer
employees and save money and then pass those saving s on to stock
holders and
also lower prices for all consumers.
Third,
because of these and other restrictions, it was hard for an employee to
stand
out. How does a manager know who to promote if everybody is working at
a steady
level?
In 1973, I
moved to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, from Pittsburgh. The job market in
the Steel
City was dismal. With $600 in my pocket, no car, and not knowing
anybody, I
ventured out to find a job. The first place I stopped was a grocery
store.
There was a Help Wanted sign in the window. The manager told me that
they were
only looking for part-time help. He then asked me if I had any
experience. I
told him that I had. He hired me on the spot. There was no union!
I could
work as long and hard as I wanted. Some weeks I worked 70 hours. The
money came
rolling in. When it came time to open up another store across town, I
was asked
if I wanted the job as Assistant Manager.
While I did
not take the job (I was planning to enroll in graduate school), I
learned a
great deal about economics without ever having taking a course in
economics.
Unions are about compulsion. The market is about freedom.
Source:
godfatherpolitics.com
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