Boeing’s Fight with Unions Spills into Obama Administration and Senate

[The Straight Story]

Boeing’s Fight with Unions Spills into Obama Administration and Senate

Frustrated over repeated strikes by its workers in Seattle, Boeing has sought to build a new airliner production line to South Carolina, an anti-union state. But the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has ruled the manufacturer must have the assembly line in Washington, because the relocation amounts to retaliation against organized labor for exercising its lawful rights to strike, a motivation that is prohibited by the 1935 National Labor Relations Act.

Companies have been moving from union to non-union states for a long time, but they have usually refrained from saying publically that unions were a factor in their moves. What makes Boeing’s case different is that the NLRB has cited internal company documents and Boeing officials’ interviews with local newspapers as proof that Boeing’s relocation of a new 787 Dreamliner assembly plant was driven by a desire to punish workers and discourage future labor walkouts.

Boeing’s position would appear to be that strikes are disruptions to production schedules; thus avoiding them is an investment decision unrelated to labor laws.

South Carolina’s Republican U.S. senators, Jim DeMint and Lindsey Graham, were incensed by the NLRB ruling. “The administration, I believe, is acting like thugs that you might see in a third-world country, trying to bully and intimidate employers,” DeMint said on the Senate floor.

http://www.allgov.com/Controversies/ViewNews/Boeings_Fight_with_Unions_Spills_into_Obama_Administration_and_Senate_110509

[Gman]

1. The meme is to say the word "thug" along with "union"

and coming from two of the biggest thugs in the country.

[Turbineguy]

2. Thug and Union may be a meme

but their problems with the 787 make "idiot" and "management" go together well.