PUBLIC FORUM : OPINIONS VARY ON IMPACT OF UPS STRIKE SETTLEMENT.

The settlement of the UPS strike has given the unions a lift in their organizing efforts. There is little doubt this will stimulate organizing in many areas that unions have lost in the past.

I can easily see the reasoning that will bring on this surge. Profits are climbing to new heights, and in the unions' eyes, the workers are entitled to a certain percentage of those profits. In many cases, this may sound reasonable, but until a worker puts in his own money, buys company stock from his own pockets, he truly does not have a say-so.

I know of many companies that do not have union shops, and for a good reason. They provide many benefits, and a return on the profits. But when a company gets into the classic management vs. labor argument, the union can and will make a case for the lack of concern many companies have.

Companies are not alone. Many city, county, state and federal jurisdictions do the same. They, too, have taken the classic stance of pushing their workers into unions.

Unions will be a vital entity for the American worker so long as management insists on putting the worker in a subservient classification.

My father was a large supporter of unions, as he worked in the studios for a long while. There was abuse beyond belief in those days, and the unions were necessary to fight for workers' rights. In many instances, that type of abuse still continues.

I do see a surge for unions, and probably they will be needed soon due to the ever-increasing demands for profits being placed on chief executive officers by stockholders.

- John Adams

Northridge

I see no evidence of the growth in popularity of labor unions because of the UPS strike. The Teamsters knew that UPS delivered 80 percent of the packages in the United States, so the union bosses engineered the strike to hurt the maximum number of people - mostly small-business people and their customers. The evil, price-gouging capitalists of big business, who downsize and export jobs to foreign lands, were not affected.

Two things were clearly demonstrated by this strike:

One company should not be allowed to control 80 percent of anything unless it is a public utility.

Unions should not be in charge of pension funds.

Evidently the Sherman Act of 1911, enacted to assure that no business entity have control of any industry, does not apply to package delivery companies. Congress must act to assure the public so that one entity does not control 80 percent of this vital national service.

UPS performed in an exemplary manner despite its dominant position, but UPS became a ripe plum to be plucked by the union bosses to the detriment of the country. The government should force UPS to downsize to where it has 40 percent or less of the business.

- James Steger

Camarillo

The recent Teamsters strike had nothing to do with a resurgent union movement.

More than 40 percent of the part-timers are students under the age of 25. Most others are part-timers by desire. The addition of new full-time slots will change the proportion of part-timers by less than 2 percent. The percentage of part-time jobs in the economy has been stable for 20 years.

Similarly, the pension issue had to do with the obligations of less-solvent members of multicompany plans, and who would cover their defaults. It had little to do with UPS employees, and less to do with the labor movement.

Teamsters Union President Ron Carey knew that the federal government would not invalidate his election. He also knew that the Teamsters had given enough to the Democratic Party to stave off intervention. He needed the strike to improve his chances of re-election.

If he had let the members vote on the company's offer, there would have been no strike. This is an undemocratic repudiation of true unionism.

A resurgent union movement would deal with issues such as worker-elected directors, control of what to produce, worker shop-floor supervisors and other issues that died during the McCarthy era. Such an agenda would be as threatening to union bureaucrats as it would be to their spiritual brothers in management and government.

The unions' time has passed and we're never going to see it again.

- William S. Pirone

Sherman Oaks

I am a retired union member who spent 44 years of his working life in a union. This is what my union has done for me: I now receive my retirement check each month, with my Social Security check, which I paid into throughout my working life.

When this country was hit in the early 1990s with a recession, greedy chief executive officers went on the rampage with a newly coined phrase called ``downsizing,'' which really should have been called dumping the gray-haired American workers who were ready to retire, and would have become the corporations' financial burden because of accumulated company benefits, which would have to be paid out to the retiring employees.

The greed of these CEOs went so far as to set standards of paying a wage that was just outside the poverty line and let new employees know that you have to do more and you're going to be paid less with no benefits. This was the case of UPS part-time workers getting little or no benefits from UPS.

- Benjamin R. Laufer

Sherman Oaks

I have been a member of the carpenters union for over 25 years and I have come to realize that although unions are an important part of workers' rights and benefits, the leaders are more concerned with their high salaries, expense accounts and cars.

The leaders are not even elected by the members, but rather appointed by the president of the union. The leaders use members for political activities, such as precinct walks, registering voters and fund-raisers that will get politicians into office, and that will get more money into the union leaders' pockets. The leaders donate large quantities of pension money without the approval of the members.

The leaders also manage the pension fund and do not even alert the members of the benefits that they are entitled to. They invest pension money into businesses that are non-union, the same ones that they urge members to boycott.

- Horacio Grana 

Thousand Oaks

Unions are necessary.

With the price of everything going sky high, it's getting harder to live each day.

Working for peanuts is not the answer. By joining a union, you get a fair wage, benefits, a nice pension and vacation with pay.

I retired from the bread drivers union in 1983 after driving for 35 years. Today I live very comfortably, have a nice pension, medical benefits and more.

I do not believe in strikes. The answer is to negotiate. If you negotiate and work you don't lose a thing. As we always said in the bread business ``a half a loaf of bread is better than none.''

As for the Teamsters handling the pensions, I say no. My union has an insurance company take care of ours, and it is doing a good job.

- Eli Moonitz

Encino

The only area where unions are growing is in the public sector. And this is bad news for the average citizen.

The problem with unions is that everything is based on seniority. In addition to there being no incentive to work harder, there is no flexibility in union jobs. Thus you need more people to do the same amount of work.

Having cost thousands of people their jobs in the United States because of increased costs that could not be reduced again when global competition entered the picture, unions are moving into the public sector where lies weak, foolish politicians and the deep pockets of government - our tax money.

All we can look forward to is less work from the public employees and more expenses to keep them happy. That is the reason that they should not be able to strike.

As for corporations, if most of them weren't so greedy and would treat employees with respect, unions would not even be necessary.

The whole country would be better off if companies employed more permanent people at a lesser salary but shared the profits with them.

- R. L. Hutton

Burbank

As a former union member, I think labor unions are growing in popularity, are starting to win victories for workers, but no, I would not want the Teamsters union to manage my pension fund.

Apparently, labor and the unions have forgotten the children's fable of the goose - corporations - that laid the golden eggs.

There are a limited number of golden eggs that can be extracted before the demise of the goose.

- Herb Wiener

Encino

As a Thrifty Drug Store retiree and the widow of a 30-year employee of General Motors, I hate to think where I'd be without our unions.

We both worked hard and were loyal to our companies. Our unions are responsible for our retirement checks going into my account every month, as well as the health insurance and medical care our disabled daughter and I will have for life.

These minimum-wage and part-time jobs of today will do nothing for workers 30 years down the road. We will have a nation of mostly poor, elderly people living in subsidized housing - if they're lucky enough to get it.

- Dorothy Arment

Rosamond

Are unions returning? Let's hope and pray that they are not, though, unfortunately, the United States' mentality seems to be pro-union.

The UPS strike went as does all union extortion. It is the power of the gun aimed at nonunion workers. The settlement that was made with UPS ensured that the consumers will get less of a product at a greater price; that there will be fewer people hired by UPS; that union dues will increase and will further finance the Democratic Party - the party of something for nothing - with ``soft'' and hard money.

In the UPS strike all workers lost, UPS lost and the consumers lost. The head of the union won and our so-called democratic-socialist government won.

In my opinion, the unions are what they have always been: a vicious and fraudulent arm of a socialist government.

- Bob Sharp

Arleta