Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

On Dec 14, 8:59*pm, Boater wrote:
Eisboch wrote:
"Vic Smith" wrote in message
.. .
On Sun, 14 Dec 2008 08:17:37 -0800 (PST),

wrote:

There is no way in the world the American worker of present day works
harder than the guy in my dad's day. I have been victim to being told
to slow down by a union. In all fairness (which we won't expect from
the other side) I was also told to slow down while on piece work at
Standadyne, a non union shop...

Piece work is sort of a special deal. *When I pushed pieces I was
aware that I was in my 20's and strong as a horse.
The guy on the next shift might be 50 and not so healthy or strong.
If I was being timed I had to go slower. *Still worked hard, but
shortened my break times. *Didn't want to screw up the older guys.
They did plenty of work.

--Vic

Many of us have never had the type of work experience where you had to be
conscious of how productive you are compared to your fellow worker. * The
closest I ever came to that I guess is 9 years in the military, but nobody
pressured you to hold back in doing a good job, or even a better job than
others. *The benefit of doing a good job was learning your job code,
advancing in rank and earning more money. *Everyone had the same
opportunity. *Some did, some didn't. *In the military if someone was noticed
to be purposely holding back, he/she would be in a world of hurt.

In my civilian experiences of almost 30 years now, the companies I've worked
for were too small to have a cast of thousands all doing the same kind of
work. *The motivation to do a good job was the fact that your performance
contributed to the overall efforts and if you slacked off, it would be very
noticeable. *Often, I was the only one doing a particular function, so
screwing up, performing well or being lazy had an immediate impact on the
company and was usually noticed by the management.

So, you people with other experiences have to realize that the concept of
"backing off" in performance is totally foreign to some of us.

Eisboch

Doing a "good job," and doing a job quickly are not always compatible,
as I am sure you know. When I worked cleaning and rebuilding the innards
of boilers, I was told to work at a slow, careful pace to make sure I
took enough time to do the job properly. All of the guys I worked with,
guys with many years of experience, worked faster than I did, but they
all worked a different speeds. Slacking off was not a problem. Bad work
that caused the boilers to fail when they were tested was. Rushed work
usually resulted in bad work.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

They wanted you to work slow so there was less to re-do after you were
done.. silver spoon boy...

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

"Boater" wrote in message
...
Eisboch wrote:
"Vic Smith" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 14 Dec 2008 08:17:37 -0800 (PST),

wrote:

There is no way in the world the American worker of present day works
harder than the guy in my dad's day. I have been victim to being told
to slow down by a union. In all fairness (which we won't expect from
the other side) I was also told to slow down while on piece work at
Standadyne, a non union shop...


Piece work is sort of a special deal. When I pushed pieces I was
aware that I was in my 20's and strong as a horse.
The guy on the next shift might be 50 and not so healthy or strong.
If I was being timed I had to go slower. Still worked hard, but
shortened my break times. Didn't want to screw up the older guys.
They did plenty of work.

--Vic


Many of us have never had the type of work experience where you had to be
conscious of how productive you are compared to your fellow worker. The
closest I ever came to that I guess is 9 years in the military, but
nobody pressured you to hold back in doing a good job, or even a better
job than others. The benefit of doing a good job was learning your job
code, advancing in rank and earning more money. Everyone had the same
opportunity. Some did, some didn't. In the military if someone was
noticed to be purposely holding back, he/she would be in a world of hurt.

In my civilian experiences of almost 30 years now, the companies I've
worked for were too small to have a cast of thousands all doing the same
kind of work. The motivation to do a good job was the fact that your
performance contributed to the overall efforts and if you slacked off, it
would be very noticeable. Often, I was the only one doing a particular
function, so screwing up, performing well or being lazy had an immediate
impact on the company and was usually noticed by the management.

So, you people with other experiences have to realize that the concept of
"backing off" in performance is totally foreign to some of us.

Eisboch


Doing a "good job," and doing a job quickly are not always compatible, as
I am sure you know. When I worked cleaning and rebuilding the innards of
boilers, I was told to work at a slow, careful pace to make sure I took
enough time to do the job properly. All of the guys I worked with, guys
with many years of experience, worked faster than I did, but they all
worked a different speeds. Slacking off was not a problem. Bad work that
caused the boilers to fail when they were tested was. Rushed work usually
resulted in bad work.


That's fine Harry, but it's not what this discussion was about.

Eisboch

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

Eisboch wrote:
"Boater" wrote in message
...
Eisboch wrote:
"Vic Smith" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 14 Dec 2008 08:17:37 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

There is no way in the world the American worker of present day works
harder than the guy in my dad's day. I have been victim to being told
to slow down by a union. In all fairness (which we won't expect from
the other side) I was also told to slow down while on piece work at
Standadyne, a non union shop...

Piece work is sort of a special deal. When I pushed pieces I was
aware that I was in my 20's and strong as a horse.
The guy on the next shift might be 50 and not so healthy or strong.
If I was being timed I had to go slower. Still worked hard, but
shortened my break times. Didn't want to screw up the older guys.
They did plenty of work.

--Vic

Many of us have never had the type of work experience where you had to be
conscious of how productive you are compared to your fellow worker. The
closest I ever came to that I guess is 9 years in the military, but
nobody pressured you to hold back in doing a good job, or even a better
job than others. The benefit of doing a good job was learning your job
code, advancing in rank and earning more money. Everyone had the same
opportunity. Some did, some didn't. In the military if someone was
noticed to be purposely holding back, he/she would be in a world of hurt.

In my civilian experiences of almost 30 years now, the companies I've
worked for were too small to have a cast of thousands all doing the same
kind of work. The motivation to do a good job was the fact that your
performance contributed to the overall efforts and if you slacked off, it
would be very noticeable. Often, I was the only one doing a particular
function, so screwing up, performing well or being lazy had an immediate
impact on the company and was usually noticed by the management.

So, you people with other experiences have to realize that the concept of
"backing off" in performance is totally foreign to some of us.

Eisboch

Doing a "good job," and doing a job quickly are not always compatible, as
I am sure you know. When I worked cleaning and rebuilding the innards of
boilers, I was told to work at a slow, careful pace to make sure I took
enough time to do the job properly. All of the guys I worked with, guys
with many years of experience, worked faster than I did, but they all
worked a different speeds. Slacking off was not a problem. Bad work that
caused the boilers to fail when they were tested was. Rushed work usually
resulted in bad work.


That's fine Harry, but it's not what this discussion was about.

Eisboch




Sure it is. We worked as teams inside boilers, and everyone was
conscious of how productive they were compared to the other workers.

By the end of the first month, my pace had picked up to the point where
I no longer slowing anyone down.

Tough work, working outside on a loading platform in the summer, inside
an old boiler, but the pay was terrific for a summer job.

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

Boater wrote:
Eisboch wrote:
"Boater" wrote in message
...
Eisboch wrote:
"Vic Smith" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 14 Dec 2008 08:17:37 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

There is no way in the world the American worker of present day works
harder than the guy in my dad's day. I have been victim to being told
to slow down by a union. In all fairness (which we won't expect from
the other side) I was also told to slow down while on piece work at
Standadyne, a non union shop...

Piece work is sort of a special deal. When I pushed pieces I was
aware that I was in my 20's and strong as a horse.
The guy on the next shift might be 50 and not so healthy or strong.
If I was being timed I had to go slower. Still worked hard, but
shortened my break times. Didn't want to screw up the older guys.
They did plenty of work.

--Vic

Many of us have never had the type of work experience where you had
to be conscious of how productive you are compared to your fellow
worker. The closest I ever came to that I guess is 9 years in the
military, but nobody pressured you to hold back in doing a good job,
or even a better job than others. The benefit of doing a good job
was learning your job code, advancing in rank and earning more
money. Everyone had the same opportunity. Some did, some didn't.
In the military if someone was noticed to be purposely holding back,
he/she would be in a world of hurt.

In my civilian experiences of almost 30 years now, the companies
I've worked for were too small to have a cast of thousands all doing
the same kind of work. The motivation to do a good job was the fact
that your performance contributed to the overall efforts and if you
slacked off, it would be very noticeable. Often, I was the only one
doing a particular function, so screwing up, performing well or
being lazy had an immediate impact on the company and was usually
noticed by the management.

So, you people with other experiences have to realize that the
concept of "backing off" in performance is totally foreign to some
of us.

Eisboch

Doing a "good job," and doing a job quickly are not always
compatible, as I am sure you know. When I worked cleaning and
rebuilding the innards of boilers, I was told to work at a slow,
careful pace to make sure I took enough time to do the job properly.
All of the guys I worked with, guys with many years of experience,
worked faster than I did, but they all worked a different speeds.
Slacking off was not a problem. Bad work that caused the boilers to
fail when they were tested was. Rushed work usually resulted in bad
work.


That's fine Harry, but it's not what this discussion was about.

Eisboch



Sure it is. We worked as teams inside boilers, and everyone was
conscious of how productive they were compared to the other workers.

By the end of the first month, my pace had picked up to the point where
I no longer slowing anyone down.

Tough work, working outside on a loading platform in the summer, inside
an old boiler, but the pay was terrific for a summer job.


Were you getting paid $12.50 an hour in 1970 for this job too?

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

BAR wrote:



Sure it is. We worked as teams inside boilers, and everyone was
conscious of how productive they were compared to the other workers.

By the end of the first month, my pace had picked up to the point
where I no longer slowing anyone down.

Tough work, working outside on a loading platform in the summer,
inside an old boiler, but the pay was terrific for a summer job.


Were you getting paid $12.50 an hour in 1970 for this job too?


I think it was 1964, actually, and I don't remember the rate. But it was
a hell of a lot more than my buddies were making at their summer jobs. I
had three college summers of relatively high-paying jobs because of
unions. It sure as hell was better than joining the Marines.

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

"D K" wrote in message
...
Don White wrote:
"Tom Francis - SWSports" wrote in
message ...
On Sun, 14 Dec 2008 16:12:10 -0600, wrote:

On Sun, 14 Dec 2008 14:03:17 -0500, Tom Francis - SWSports wrote:


http://www.bls.gov/lpc/prodybar.htm
Well, that's kind of the point. What data do you trust?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Fine - but what caused the increase? Something has to change - what
was it?

Who should benefit from the obvious productivity increase - the
company
or the workers?
Historically, when productivity increases, there may be a lag, but
wages
also increase. What's changed?

The answer to that, is far more devastating to this country's long term
economic health, than the middle-class not getting their share.
You raise some important questions and frankly, I don't have an answer
for you - I'll admit it.

Obviously, its far to simplistic to blame the fat cats and corporate
executives. Perhaps there has been a fundamental shift in how money
is distributed, the money supply being managed - there's a whole host
of factors that could explain it, but I'm not an economist although I
do play one on TV. :)

I watch CNBC a lot - in particular the early show Squawk Box or if I'm
out and about, I listen on Sirius. When you watch two opposing sides
take the same sets of data and make them fit their own agendas and
viewpoints, you begin to wonder if anybody really and truly knows
what's going on.

Now for the really oddball opinon. I've often suspected that "real
wages" are being sucked up by government in various ways. I had an
experience Friday that floored me. I was kind of messing around in
the kitchen and I gathered up the bills for the paper pusher to
handle. I just started looking through them - there are more fees,
taxes and "adjustments' on my cable, telephone and wireless bills that
I could shake a stick at - easily adding 3-4% to the cost of the bill
and that's before sales/service taxes which add another - what, 6%?

What are all these fees/taxes/access charges doing to real wages?

What's the measure of productivity he's quoting? Per unit, per hour,
per what? I would think that if a company over 8 years increased it's
productivity by 20% (which is 2.5%/yr by the way) that's not a whole
lot
considering inflation, raw material costs, etc. And if your company
has
a high labor quotient to the cost of production, that's almost
negligible.
If you want to consider inflation, real wages have decreased.
Well, I think the last time I could buy a decent cigar for .75¢ was
about twenty years ago. :)


You should see my water bill. After all the extras like waste water
management and environmental protection fees aew tacked on, the basic
charge and actual usage fees (per cubic meter) triples.
Unbelievable..

What's "aew", dummy? Is that some Canadian thing?

"Aew" this Canadian thing, dummyboy

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

wrote in message
...

Must be something, *after the dim wit has been the resident spell
checker* lately..

************************************************** ****************

Would you like to re-phrase that into common english?

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

"BAR" wrote in message
...

Here in my county you are charged for each gallon of water coming in and
you are charged for that same gallon of water twice going out as waste. So
if you pay .10 cents for the gallon coming in you get charged for .20
cents for the gallon going out in the sewage line. The next logical
question is why am I charged for sewage for watering my garden and lawn?
The answer is you can pay about $1000 to get a meter placed on your sewage
to meter your outgoing flow. The meter costs about $200 and you have to
use the water company's licensed plumbers to install the meter and that
costs about $800. So, the grass turns brown in the summer and the flowers
die.



That's the same as here...buy why are you worried about costs?

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

On Dec 14, 10:53*pm, "Don White" wrote:
wrote in message

...

Must be something, *after the dim wit has been the resident spell
checker* lately..

************************************************** ****************

Would you like to re-phrase that into common english?

Nope, most with even limited education could figure out what I meant,
unless of course they were just dim bulbs or trying to be an idiot....

Bridge loan to nowhere..
 

"Don White" wrote in message
...

"BAR" wrote in message
...

Here in my county you are charged for each gallon of water coming in and
you are charged for that same gallon of water twice going out as waste.
So if you pay .10 cents for the gallon coming in you get charged for .20
cents for the gallon going out in the sewage line. The next logical
question is why am I charged for sewage for watering my garden and lawn?
The answer is you can pay about $1000 to get a meter placed on your
sewage to meter your outgoing flow. The meter costs about $200 and you
have to use the water company's licensed plumbers to install the meter
and that costs about $800. So, the grass turns brown in the summer and
the flowers die.



That's the same as here...*buy* why are you worried about costs?

Should be *but*.