Summary
Here are 20 things you need to know as you decide whether you want a union to represent you.
1. SunCoke promotes teamwork, team member participation in
making decisions, flexibility for individual team members, rewards for performance and informal problem-solving. Unions strongly oppose all of those things. Click here for more.
2. Unfortunately, many unions have a long history of corruption where
union officials have stolen money from union members, or threatened and intimidated members. Click here for more.
3. When union leaders are unhappy with some organization, they
expect members to participate in protests – which sometimes involve illegal or unethical activities. Click here for more.
4. Signing a union card can bring in a union without a vote. Union
representatives don't have to tell the truth about cards, and some have been caught forging workers’ signatures. Click here for more.
5. Union representation elections are decided by a majority of the
workers WHO ACTUALLY VOTE, not a majority of those who are eligible to vote. Unions sometimes try to discourage some workers from voting in order to improve their chances of winning. Click here for more.
6. Unions say you can vote them in, give them a try, and then just vote
them out again if you don't like it. The truth is, voting a union out is very complicated and expensive, and unions fight hard to stay and keep collecting dues. Click here for more.
7. Unions say contract bargaining starts with what you already have
and goes up from there. The law says that's not true: you could get more, the same or less than you already have as a result of bargaining. There are no guarantees. Click here for more.
8. Union officers, not union members, decide what offers from
management to accept or reject in contract bargaining. For example, at Boeing in Seattle the union made members vote again when they rejected a contract union officers wanted them to accept. Click here for more.
9. Even with a union, management continues to have the right to
manage its business. Unions only have power over their members; unions don't control the companies where members work. Click here for more.
10. Research studies have found that workers who vote in unions do
not get better raises than workers who vote against unions - but they still pay dues. Click here for more.
11. Having a union contract doesn't protect workers from being laid off
or losing pay & benefits when times are tough. Sometimes, workers need to be protected from their union -- looking out for their own interests, unions sometimes sacrifice members' jobs. Click here for more.
13. Unions hold strike votes in a way that makes you choose between
accepting a contract you may not like, or agreeing to go out on strike and losing your pay & benefits. Click here for more.
14. More and more often, unions are forcing companies to lock out
their workers. This avoids bad publicity for the union, but workers have no say in lockouts and they lose pay & benefits when they go out. Click here for more.
15. Union members pay most than just dues. They also have to pay
any other fees, special assessments and fines the union charges. If you don't pay, the union can take you to court and make you pay the court costs as well. Click here for more.
16. If you took the money you would spend for union dues and
invested it in SunCoke's matching 401(k), after just 5 years you would have nearly $8,000.00. If you paid a union, after 5 years you would have $0. Click here for more.
17. Unions say it's the members who decide how the union spends the
dues members pay. But in reality, it's union officers who decide how the money is spent -- not the members. Click here for more.
20. Unions say it's the members who elect union officers, but it's the
union (and the officers) who control union elections. Because union officers want to keep their high-paid positions, they sometimes do things that violate the law. Click here for more.
THE BOTTOM LINE:
We hope you will think about all of these facts and decide to vote NO against being represented by a union.