M a r k D i l l e y

"Correcting a Detroit Metro Times error

by Jack Fate

The (non-union, but we know a number of good union supporters work there) weekly Detroit Metro Times did it's round up of the years events and wrote the following:
Take-backs! What the hell ya mean, take-backs?

A Detroit Free Press survey found that some 10,000 US and Canadian hourly autoworkers were getting full pay and benefits despite having no jobs to go to. All were on the payrolls of the Big Three and Delphi Corp., who are now trying to figure out how and why Toyota is poised to become the No. 1 automaker in the world and the word 'bankruptcy' has entered a segment of American manufacturing that's rarely used it before.

We're pretty sure what the good people at Metro Times really meant to say (before falling into the 'mainstream media' paradigm of portraying all working class people as 'lazy') is something like this:
Trust corporations! What the hell ya mean, trust 'em?

A Detroit Free Press survey found that some 10,000 US and Canadian autoworkers were receiving unemployment benefits from funds deferred by union contract. Unionized workers still on the job were benefiting from safety programs that protect them from unnecessary injuries and illnesses.

Workers at Toyota, Honda and the other non-union companies are trying to figure out why a third of them are 'temporary' employees making half the wages of the person next to them and why many of them are getting carpal tunnel surgery every two or three years.

Meanwhile Delphi Corporation is taking the profits from US, England, Sweden and other advanced economies and moving work to low wage places with no protections for workers or the environment. Millions of US workers who have given the best years of their lives to US manufacturers are wondering why the word 'bankruptcy' has entered a segment of the American population that's rarely used it before."