This article originally appeared in the January 2009 Elevator Constructor.
Brothers and sisters:
January is a time for resolutions. As I sat here in front of my computer preparing to write this article, I looked over my past articles to see where we started this year and how we ended. December of 2008 leaves us with far greater challenges than December 2007 as a nation, a union and a local.
About 18 months back, one of my major customers lost a major tenant because they were in the sub-prime mortgage business. I happened to be at the building when they were giving out the layoff notices. That was, to me, the beginning of how we got to today.
After taking hundreds of thousands of buyers out of the housing market, home prices fell, equity was lost, balloon payments could not be met and giant financial institutions could no longer buy insurance on their bad loan portfolio. So started the “Foreclosure Crisis.”
Then the banks with the most toxic of loans were thrown a lifeline by the government. Except, notably, Cleveland’s National City Bank which, at this writing, is in the process of being purchased by Pittsburgh’s PNC which will get NCB’s TARP money! Figure that one out. This will run US over $700 billion TO START.
As credit tightened up, even for those individuals and companies with A+ credit, business and personal spending decreases, unemployment creeps up, food banks are empty or very low at best, charitable contributions across the board have fallen off, etc…
In other words, the economy has slowed to a crawl.
Then the Big Three went to Washington with their hands out looking for a meager $25 billion to help them clean up their mess. Once again the Right painted union members as over-paid, lazy, coddled whiners and the good corporate citizens as Shanghaied by our evil, fat-cat, strong-armed Big Labor leaders. As a reminder to the Right, the purpose of a negotiation is to look out for the best interest of your clients. In the case of the corporations, it is the shareholders and in the case of unions, it is the members. There are ALWAYS two signatures on every contract for a reason.
I spent most of my Thanksgiving holiday, and the two days before it, sick in bed. When I was well enough, I checked my email and went to WTAM.COM where they have a gallery of photos from the Great Depression. Many we have seen before: the Hoovervilles, Dust Bowl, homeless living in shanties, WPA projects, etcetera and it reminded me of how we who forget history are doomed to repeat it.
In my mind, this is 1929 all over. We have all of the same indicators as then: a falling stock market, increasing unemployment, foreclosures and repossessions, but his does not have to become 1934, the true heart of the Depression.
The difference is going to be how the new Obama Administration will respond to the Sisyphean fete that awaits them at high noon on January 20. Will they respond like Herbert Hoover who only deepened the despair or FDR who tried to spend us out of trouble but only succeeded when we started supplying war goods to Europe?
The answer has immeasurable consequences for our nation, union and local. To paraphrase my first article from April 2007:
A house divided against its self cannot stand. Neither can a nation when employer and employee are pitted against each other for thirty pieces of silver. If we do not stand together, we will destroy our United States of America and begin the downfall of democracy everywhere. This will prove to be the greatest injustice to all we stand with and those that stood before us in the face of much greater odds. Men and women who literally died for the privilege we have of living in the greatest nation mankind has ever known.
Till next month,
Work safe, work smart and slowdown for safety…
Don
Through the Mill 