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America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

wsj.com

21–30 of 63 posts

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#21

"Unions have been pushing companies to improve on-the-job conditions. After lobbying for it last year, major freight railroads have started offering short-term paid sick leave—in some cases for the first time—to union workers to ensure ample staffing and service levels." Haha, surreal, wall street journal is now telling me that "unions are the institution by which people (in the richest country in the world) are begi…

The WSJ's journalism side isn't its editorial board. They're the same youngish college grads and old lifers as everywhere else.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#22
post #4

> Lynn Kelley, a business consultant who recently published a book, said she was worried about a possible UPS strike affecting the book’s distribution, including large bulk shipments for some upcoming events. “There might have been some delays,” said Kelley, adding that her book is on Amazon, which handles shipping. “My concern is even if Amazon does use an alternative to UPS, everything will be slow because there’s…

It does read strangely, but she's just declaring her potential conflict of interest.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#23

"Unions have been pushing companies to improve on-the-job conditions. After lobbying for it last year, major freight railroads have started offering short-term paid sick leave—in some cases for the first time—to union workers to ensure ample staffing and service levels." Haha, surreal, wall street journal is now telling me that "unions are the institution by which people (in the richest country in the world) are begi…

USA really is a hellscape. The more I learn about the world, the happier I am, I'm not born there but in Europe.

[flagged]

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#24
post #5

"Unions have been pushing companies to improve on-the-job conditions. After lobbying for it last year, major freight railroads have started offering short-term paid sick leave—in some cases for the first time—to union workers to ensure ample staffing and service levels." Haha, surreal, wall street journal is now telling me that "unions are the institution by which people (in the richest country in the world) are begi…

I don't normally engage with these kinds of comments but today I guess I'm extra curious: why is "paid sick leave" a "basic human right."? I don't disagree that it's a good and moral thing to offer, I'm just curious about where these universally agreed upon "basic human rights" come from?

I would say that it comes from the basic right to Justice, in where you are penalized baseed on your actions, not on things out of your control. In this case being sick is out of folks control. The business should take into account and be able to handle a given percentage of its employees being sick at a given time.

As for the right to Justice, we have these rights to allow us to live together as independent sovereign entities. A society that does not acknowledge basic rights of individuals is one where those with more power or resources will dominate those with fewer. There may not be some intrinsic physical law that requires that we have these rights, but I for one would not want to live or participate in society that does not espouse them and strive to adhere to them.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#25
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't normally engage with these kinds of comments but today I guess I'm extra curious: why is "paid sick leave" a "basic human right."? I don't disagree that it's a good and moral thing to offer, I'm just curious about where these universally agreed upon "basic human rights" come from?

If you don’t get paid when you are sick, you are in essence being punished for being sick. Not being punished for being sick is a basic human right. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights entered into force in 1976. The human rights that the Covenant seeks to promote and protect include: the right to work in just and favourable conditions; the right to social protection, to an adequate sta…

> If you don’t get paid when you are sick, you are in essence being punished for being sick.

On counter side, you'll be punished for not being sick.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#26
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't normally engage with these kinds of comments but today I guess I'm extra curious: why is "paid sick leave" a "basic human right."? I don't disagree that it's a good and moral thing to offer, I'm just curious about where these universally agreed upon "basic human rights" come from?

See articles 24 and 25: https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-huma... Threatening a person's livelihood if they want to take a couple days off to go to the doctor is denying them "a standard of living adequate for [their] health and well-being". Additionally, if you force your workers to come to work sick, you also threaten everyone else's standard of healthy living by unnecessarily exposing them to…

"Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay."

The with pay term feels oddly specific and overly prescriptive. (If your society had UBI is this implying the employer still must pay you for holidays?)

I'd feel the minimum requirement to not threaten livelihood when a potentially coercive relationship exists is unpaid leave should be allowed (things like the FMLA). Though even that seems nuanced with contracting/business owners.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#27
post #5

"Unions have been pushing companies to improve on-the-job conditions. After lobbying for it last year, major freight railroads have started offering short-term paid sick leave—in some cases for the first time—to union workers to ensure ample staffing and service levels." Haha, surreal, wall street journal is now telling me that "unions are the institution by which people (in the richest country in the world) are begi…

I don't normally engage with these kinds of comments but today I guess I'm extra curious: why is "paid sick leave" a "basic human right."? I don't disagree that it's a good and moral thing to offer, I'm just curious about where these universally agreed upon "basic human rights" come from?

Because rights have functionally become a prestige concept. If you want your position on something to be treated as "holy" or unassailable, you reframe it in the context of a right. You can see this across the political spectrum and on various issues that otherwise have no relation to the traditional political concept of a right.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

USA really is a hellscape. The more I learn about the world, the happier I am, I'm not born there but in Europe.

[flagged]

You think THAT is the price ? That would be a considerable discount. My country and friends plundered the world for centuries. That’s the price.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don’t get paid when you are sick, you are in essence being punished for being sick. Not being punished for being sick is a basic human right. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights entered into force in 1976. The human rights that the Covenant seeks to promote and protect include: the right to work in just and favourable conditions; the right to social protection, to an adequate sta…

Note that no actual citizens voted on this supposed covenant.

Appreciate the distinction between representative democracy (a mechanism for choosing/changing the government), and the rule of law (a set of statutes and/or common law laying out how society should function). The covenant was agreed by (mostly) governments chosen through representative democracy, and signed into law (or at least given a nod in various legislation, policy etc).

Ideas like 'the will of the people' overriding established good and just law is the preserve of populists, and in extreme, of fascists. The Brexit referendum being a good case in point.

Re: America’s Truckers, Cargo Pilots and Package Carriers Are Fed Up

#30
post #5

"Unions have been pushing companies to improve on-the-job conditions. After lobbying for it last year, major freight railroads have started offering short-term paid sick leave—in some cases for the first time—to union workers to ensure ample staffing and service levels." Haha, surreal, wall street journal is now telling me that "unions are the institution by which people (in the richest country in the world) are begi…

I don't normally engage with these kinds of comments but today I guess I'm extra curious: why is "paid sick leave" a "basic human right."? I don't disagree that it's a good and moral thing to offer, I'm just curious about where these universally agreed upon "basic human rights" come from?

Forget basic human right. Think basic public health.

If we incentive workers to come to work when sick, they are more likely to spread illness, worsen their conditions where they need more expensive care (which we will provide in most cases one way or another — letting sick people die in the streets leads to revolution and John Q Public type hostage taking), and of course can disrupt unemployment which has many wripple effects for something out of workers control.

All of society benefits from paid sick leave, not just the human rights of workers.

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