NLRB: Grad students in private universities lose the right to unionize!

[Az]

Btw, I don't know, but don't you people have a students' union, and a pupils' union in school?

[David Floyd]

Ramo, etc., I'll make you a deal. I'll grant you that ANY WORKER, even grad students, have the right to unionize, if you grant that any company has the right to hire and fire at will, and, in the case of grad students, admit and expel at will. So, for example, if a bunch of grocery store clerks go on strike, the grocery store can fire them all and bring in new ones, and if a bunch of grad students go on strike, then the university can expel them.

I have no argument with unions, my argument is with laws preventing companies from hiring and firing at will.

[Ramo]

I didn't realize that you were in the NLRB, Dave.

Anyways, I've always believed that the state is ultimately a noose on organized labor, and that it ought to butt out altogether in management-labor relations. After all, I am an anarchist.

[Ted Striker]

You guys make it sound like being an assistant is the only job on the face of the entire earth that is available to work at while doing a grad degree.

I'm sure there are lots of students that applied for them that didn't get them that would be grateful to have them.

Don't like the hours or pay, get another job, as simple as that. The school doesn't have to offer them in the first place.

[Ramo]

You make it sound like we're being done a favor by being offered a research or teaching assistant position. Our services are offered for money so we can eat and pay rent. It's not a favor, it's a job. It's hard, typically underpaid work. Work that certainly warrants employees being treated with common decency, and being allowed to collectively bargain.

If grad students were as worthless in assisting research (or teaching) as you make them out to be (which begs loin's question, why are there post-docs?), unions wouldn't have any effect at all. So where's your objection?

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Ramo
You make it sound like we're being done a favor by being offered a research or teaching assistant position.

Yes, you are. Why do so many students apply for these jobs if they are so unbearable?

Our services are offered for money so we can eat and pay rent.

So, if you need money to eat and pay rent, there are other jobs, and loans. Why not go to one of those jobs where the pay is better and so are the conditions?

It's not a favor, it's a job. It's hard, typically underpaid work. Work that certainly warrants employees being treated with common decency, and being allowed to collectively bargain.

Come on! This isn't coal mining! Welcome to the real world. You are getting access to experience most in the field don't get. It's a privilege.

I'll point you to the occupation of architecture in which the architects work for pennies yet work 3 times harder than anybody else.

If grad students were as worthless in assisting research (or teaching) as you make them out to be (which begs loin's question, why are there post-docs?), unions wouldn't have any effect at all. So where's your objection?

Because these positions are coveted ones that are a privilege to have. Save the union for occupations where the workers are REALLY being oppressed. Secondly unions suck, and often do their members more harm than good. What are you guys going to do when you go on strike? There are plenty of other students waiting to get the job who are just as qualified so it's pretty much useless.

They could easily spend the money on something else. Or maybe get rid of the paid positions and just use a bunch of student volunteers in their place. I've seen that before.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Ramo
You make it sound like we're being done a favor by being offered a research or teaching assistant position.

Yes you are. I paid to be tought by a professor, not you.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Ted Striker
Save the union for occupations where the workers are REALLY being oppressed.

Like, f'rinstance, occupations where the management can cancel a worker's visa on a whim?

[Az]

Re: unions.

a) as soon as there are no unions, the workers get to be REALLY opressed.
b) unions are the major force in enforcing labor laws.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Don't they need to get a new student visa when they take time off from school and go back home?

I know that it can get complicated -- f'rinstance, the Bengali guy kept having his return delayed because Bangladesh was (probably still is) on the State Department's "country full of terrorists" list. Vikram said that he was going to head back to India for his sister's wedding, except that it would have been a major hassle to get back into the US in a reasonable amount of time (and, AFAIK, India is not on the State Department's "country full of terrorists" list).

[Agathon]

Most graduate students receive financial assistance in the form of scholarships or TAships or a mixture of both.

While most professors that employ TAs are nice people, a few will try to exploit them and overwork them.

We are unionized. It means that you cannot be overworked (which is important when you are trying to get your dissertation done) unless you agree to do so. It makes it harder for the university to cut your pay by increasing tuition (which is a trick they tried here).

Basically it means that TAs and Graduate Instructors have someone to go to for advice and support when they are being mistreated by their employer.

We've only been on strike once, and that was the university's fault since they were trying to give us a massive pay cut by stealth. In the end the university got a new President who fixed the problem and there has been no trouble since (nearly 5 years now).

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Ted Striker
You guys make it sound like being an assistant is the only job on the face of the entire earth that is available to work at while doing a grad degree.

I'm sure there are lots of students that applied for them that didn't get them that would be grateful to have them.

Don't like the hours or pay, get another job, as simple as that. The school doesn't have to offer them in the first place.

If that kind of thinking prevailed a century ago, we'd still be working twelve-hour days, seven days a week, for just pennies per hour, with no health benefits, no vacations and no sick leave.

[Ramo]

Yes, you are. Why do so many students apply for these jobs if they are so unbearable?

I didn't say that they're unbearable, I said that they're hard. And from what I've seen, most students who get into grad school, get TA and RA positions so it's not so uncommon.

And why should covetted positions be illegal unionize?

So, if you need money to eat and pay rent, there are other jobs, and loans. Why not go to one of those jobs where the pay is better and so are the conditions?

Because I like my work. Should the state remove benefits from your job because there might be ones with better pay/benefits?

Why do you keep bringing this inane logical fallacy up?

Come on! This isn't coal mining! Welcome to the real world. You are getting access to experience most in the field don't get. It's a privilege.

I'll point you to the occupation of architecture in which the architects work for pennies yet work 3 times harder than anybody else.

I never asserted that being a TA/RA is as hard as coal-mining. What I find curious is that you believe that the state should prevent everyone but coal-miners from unionizing. Or are they being given a favor as well?

Because these positions are coveted ones that are a privilege to have.

They are not a privilege, they're work. Not anything else.

Save the union for occupations where the workers are REALLY being oppressed.

Why? Why can't both TA/RA's and coal miners be unionized? And I know you don't really give a damn, but us being unionized makes every other union or strike in the university much stronger. Since we could strike in solidarity with others. There's been a bus drivers' strike over here where some pressure from a grad students' union would've been effective.

Secondly unions suck, and often do their members more harm than good.

That's YOUR opinion. Why shouldn't I and others be free to make our own decisions on the matter?

What are you guys going to do when you go on strike? There are plenty of other students waiting to get the job who are just as qualified so it's pretty much useless.

Except it's not. A school can't purge all it's RA's and TA's at once. Research would come to a grinding halt, and teaching would come to a grinding halt. Meaning the people who fund research or pay tuitions would think twice before giving the school more money.

I doubt it could find so many people who are up to date on the various research projects, etc., to continue without a huge slowdown.

And even if we might fail, how the hell is it your or the state's business to butt in?

They could easily spend the money on something else. Or maybe get rid of the paid positions and just use a bunch of student volunteers in their place. I've seen that before.

Maybe you have, but I haven't heard of any such nonsense in physics.

I think you'll find a dearth of people willing to work 20 or 30 more hours a week (in addition to a part-time job, studying for classes, and doing one's own research) just for experience.

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
WTF is wrong? Next you know, high schoolers would be unionizing and making demands over homework

Just give me a bit of time. It'll happen.

But I'm with Ramo, how can anyone really be denied the right to unionize? Why on earth does that have to be approved? Just don't go to work, en mass, and you're a union. Like the Newsies "even though we ain't got hats or badges, we're a union, something something"

Everyone should be able to unionize, its their labor, they can do with it what they will. Fry cooks, janitors, graduate students, et al. Why not unionize?

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by loinburger
Oh great, I'm agreeing with a communist and an anarchist.

and a libertarian.