[Benn]

andyt andyt:

Benn Benn:

Have the violins stopped playing that sad tune yet?

As OntheIce said, they know what they are signing up for and choose to do it, only a tool actually gets hired then turns around and bitches about what they agreed to do.

Also, just because someone is part time casual and has crappy hours does not mean they should get paid more. Pay should have nothing to do with the fact you get few hours and are PT or full time.

Yep, just be a serf and accept whatever your employer chooses to give you. Practice tugging your forelock too, it helps.

Most of us are serfs anyhow, what the posties need to accept is reality.

[andyt]

Benn Benn:

andyt andyt:

Benn Benn:

Have the violins stopped playing that sad tune yet?

As OntheIce said, they know what they are signing up for and choose to do it, only a tool actually gets hired then turns around and bitches about what they agreed to do.

Also, just because someone is part time casual and has crappy hours does not mean they should get paid more. Pay should have nothing to do with the fact you get few hours and are PT or full time.

Yep, just be a serf and accept whatever your employer chooses to give you. Practice tugging your forelock too, it helps.

Most of us are serfs anyhow, what the posties need to accept is reality.

Yep, let's just pull each other down instead of help each other up. Sure they need to accept that they don't have as much bargaining power as they used to. Doesn't mean just throw in the towel and don't try to boost your wages as much as you can given circumstances. That's not whining, that's just what we all do. Except many people consider it whining when the next guy does it, but just their entitlement when they do it.

While most of us have always been wage slaves, at one time there was a lot less servility to it - the unions helped many working people become middle class. I wonder how long the middle class is going to keep taking it in the ass before they recognize they have to organize again?

[Benn]

Never said they did not have the right to try to get more. As for the whining it was the other poster who tried to make us all feel bad for them due to having to work part time casual, as if that meant they should make more just due to that fact. Those starting at my work are part time casual as-if-and-when needed basis for 2 - 3 years, they take the job knowing that and suck it up.

[andyt]

Benn Benn:

Never said they did not have the right to try to get more. As for the whining it was the other poster who tried to make us all feel bad for them due to having to work part time casual, as if that meant they should make more just due to that fact. Those starting at my work are part time casual as-if-and-when needed basis for 2 - 3 years, they take the job knowing that and suck it up.

He actually sounds like a long term postie, so he wasn't whining for himself, or whining at all. He was pointing out to OTI that it's not all gravy for a beginning postie, as OTI had claimed. Nothing wrong with that. They might get $23 an hour to start, but since they get few hours it sounds like it's a struggle to last long enough to become full time. If you get say 2 shifts a week: 8x2x23= 368/week - that's not living large.

[Proculation]

andyt andyt:

Benn Benn:

Never said they did not have the right to try to get more. As for the whining it was the other poster who tried to make us all feel bad for them due to having to work part time casual, as if that meant they should make more just due to that fact. Those starting at my work are part time casual as-if-and-when needed basis for 2 - 3 years, they take the job knowing that and suck it up.

He actually sounds like a long term postie, so he wasn't whining for himself, or whining at all. He was pointing out to OTI that it's not all gravy for a beginning postie, as OTI had claimed. Nothing wrong with that. They might get $23 an hour to start, but since they get few hours it sounds like it's a struggle to last long enough to become full time. If you get say 2 shifts a week: 8x2x23= 368/week - that's not living large.

If they only get 2 shifts, that means they are too many: lay off some.

[andyt]

Proculation Proculation:

If they only get 2 shifts, that means they are too many: lay off some.

Don't be an idiot. Those shifts are to fill in for sick/vacation etc. Would you rather the employer pays ot to full time workers to cover that?

The posties have a very rich sick day benefit - 15 days a year that can be banked indefinitely. One woman has 400 sick days accumulated. Seems like a good place for some pruning.

[Lemmy]

Proculation Proculation:

If they only get 2 shifts, that means they are too many: lay off some.

It's better to have more, part-timers. You don't have to pay part-timers the same benefits. It's a major cost savings to the tax payers to have part-timers over full-timers.

andyandy andyandy:

The posties have a very rich sick day benefit - 15 days a year that can be banked indefinitely. One woman has 400 sick days accumulated. Seems like a good place for some pruning.

Nope. Bankable sick days are sick days that aren't used. It's smoke and mirrors. Bankable sick days don't cost a thing.

[Brenda]

The hospital here works the same way, the Tech Cominco works the same way, Walmart works the same way, EVERY company works the same way. They hire casual/relief. Nothing more and nothing less.
You'd think with the shortage of medical personnel they would offer a decent job, with decent hours that you can live off, buy a house from. They offer casual/relief.

[smorgdonkey]

Benn Benn:

Have the violins stopped playing that sad tune yet?

As OntheIce said, they know what they are signing up for and choose to do it, only a tool actually gets hired then turns around and bitches about what they agreed to do.

First of all...you know NOTHING of the job before you start and you are misled to think it is something that it is not. So, I completely agree that "only a tool actually gets hired then turns around and bitches about what they agreed to do".
That just happens to be not the case.

Benn Benn:

Also, just because someone is part time casual and has crappy hours does not mean they should get paid more. Pay should have nothing to do with the fact you get few hours and are PT or full time.

I didn't say that they deserve more - I am saying that they DON'T deserve less. The corporation is saying that they do deserve less.

As for violins - you think I'm whining and I think you are whining.

Bottom line: postal workers are hired with a collective agreement in place. The corporation negotiates the contract with the union representatives so it is THEIR contract too. If they didn't TAKE money from the pension fund then they wouldn't be in the shortfall that they are in now. If they didn't borrow way too much money for no good reason then they wouldn't be under financial pressure.

Those who have never done it have absolutely no idea. The oil rig was a picnic compared to letter carrying.

andyt andyt:

He actually sounds like a long term postie, so he wasn't whining for himself, or whining at all. He was pointing out to OTI that it's not all gravy for a beginning postie, as OTI had claimed. Nothing wrong with that. They might get $23 an hour to start, but since they get few hours it sounds like it's a struggle to last long enough to become full time. If you get say 2 shifts a week: 8x2x23= 368/week - that's not living large.

Thanks andyt...you are correct...I have worked for them since 2002. I've seen them come and go. They start thinking "I've got the gravy job that I've always wanted" and then they see the reality which is much different than the public perception and they re-evaluate...however, often they have quit their previous job (hell, I just got the gravy boat at Canada Post - why keep my old job?).

Hardly anybody sits in a chair and pushes letters into slots. Most jobs have physical wear and tear that breaks the body down quicker than an observer would think. When I worked in a corrugated paper factory I used to often move 25000 pounds of product by hand per 8 hour shift...and that was a cream puff compared to letter carrying.

[smorgdonkey]

Yogi Yogi:

The current Canada Post system is the 'horse & buggy' of communication in todays world.
By the unions own admission, " volumes are down in the last few years, so are profits, but we still want more money & benefits".

Time to put 'us' out of their misery. A much better job can/has been done by private contractors.

Where were those words spoken?

I want to check that source because volumes are UP and profits are in the hundreds of millions...furthermore, our union has NOT asked for more money or benefits.

[Yogi]

smorgdonkey smorgdonkey:

Yogi Yogi:

The current Canada Post system is the 'horse & buggy' of communication in todays world.
By the unions own admission, " volumes are down in the last few years, so are profits, but we still want more money & benefits".

Time to put 'us' out of their misery. A much better job can/has been done by private contractors.

Where were those words spoken?

I want to check that source because volumes are UP and profits are in the hundreds of millions...furthermore, our union has NOT asked for more money or benefits.

Can't find the exact article now... but sit back and have a 'good read'!

http://www.cpcstrategicreview-examenstr ... 2-eng.html

Structural and competitive changes in the market have weakened demand for mail products. In 2003, the volume of transaction mail (or lettermail) delivered by Canada Post accounted for almost 50% of the total volumes in its combined business segments delivered in that year (Table 7). The annual average rate of growth of this segment fell to 0.3% over 2004-2007 and the amount of transaction mail delivered actually fell by 1.6% in 2007. The end result was that transaction mail’s share of total volumes fell to just below 46%.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Calculated from 2007 Annual Report
Notwithstanding the lettermail trend, there has been growth in the physical volume of pieces transferred by the corporation in competitive markets. In volume terms, the growth of products delivered peaked in 2006, at a growth rate of 3.7%, and slowed in 2007, when the year-over-year growth rate decelerated to 1.5%. The slowdown in the volume of transaction mail has been offset, to an extent, by acceleration in the growth in other areas, such as direct marketing mail. The number of pieces delivered through direct marketing rose from 47% of the corporation’s combined total deliveries in 2003 to almost 52% in 2007. However, these compensating volumes have not translated into adequate or equivalent compensating revenues. As Canada Post notes, it takes almost two pieces of 35-cent addressed advertising mail, or seven pieces of eight-cent unaddressed advertising mail, to replace one piece of 52-cent regular mail. The structural shifts in the composition of pieces delivered by Canada Post have eroded the corporation’s revenue generating base.

[OnTheIce]

smorgdonkey smorgdonkey:

I want to check that source because volumes are UP and profits are in the hundreds of millions...furthermore, our union has NOT asked for more money or benefits.

Your business is changing so it's time you and the union get your head out of your collective ass and wake up.

Your workforce is bloated and is paid 15-20% more than your private counterparts.

Your pension plan is broke and yet again, another union is using the Canadian people and business as hostages.

[andyt]

Lemmy Lemmy:

andyandy andyandy:

The posties have a very rich sick day benefit - 15 days a year that can be banked indefinitely. One woman has 400 sick days accumulated. Seems like a good place for some pruning.

Nope. Bankable sick days are sick days that aren't used. It's smoke and mirrors. Bankable sick days don't cost a thing.

Until they're used. But if the company was smart, they'd give the posties even more sick days, and use lower paid help to fill in.

[andyt]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

Your pension plan is broke and yet again, another union is using the Canadian people and business as hostages.

OMG, posties = Taliban. Going on strike = holding hostages. It's the end of the world.

[Lemmy]

andyt andyt:

Until they're used.

But they aren't used. They're banked. That's the point. They never get used. That's why management loves to give accumulated sick days.

andyt andyt:

But if the company was smart, they'd give the posties even more sick days, and use lower paid help to fill in.

But you're still paying the postie's wage too. Even if you pay the sub $15/hr, $22/hr < $22/hr + $15/hr.