BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey

07 Feb 11 - 05:28 PM (#3090714)
Subject: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Big Ballad Singer

1300 workers at a grocery distribution center in New Jersey, USA lost their jobs recently when Pathmark Stores' parent company, A&P, closed the center. Distribution was moved to a location in Pennsylvania, not only costing the NJ workers their jobs but undercutting their union-mandated wages by hiring non-union, and in many cases even illegal, workers for the new facility.

Teamsters representatives have been out at stores owned by A&P, distributing literature and asking consumers to take their business elsewhere.

I, for one, am a former UFCW member and this latest grab for profit at the expense of people just reminded me of the large-scale strike that took place among the UFCW employees at Foodtown when I worked there about 20 years ago.

I left the Pathmark store and vowed not to spend my money at any A&P stores again until the matter of the job loss of these employees is settled.

I'm posting this because it's just these kinds of things that made the labor movement of the 30s and 40s so effective. The greed of the major corporations in the US especially is finally hitting the WORKING man and woman at the bottom of the food chain. For a long time, profit-driven atrocities really only seemed to affect people in terms of raised prices or lowered wages.

Now that these outfits are actually being run into the ground by the uncaring leeches at the top, they are trying to save their sinking ships by throwing their "ballast" overboard - the people that actually make their stores work.

How about some new labor protest songs?

I'm getting to work on some, for sure... this crap is starting to affect not only the stores near me, but people who live and work in the same social and economic bracket as me. We're now not only the ones WATCHING the damage that started to happen, we're the ones being damaged ourselves.

Just FYI.

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07 Feb 11 - 06:14 PM (#3090744)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Bobert

Screw the Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company...

I hate the union bustin' that we've seen over the last 30 some years... Tell yaq' what, if labor ever gets the upper hand it needs to take Boss Hog out back and shoot the sumabich...

Seriously...

And here we gotta put up with all this Ronnie Reagan worwshiping... Ronnie Reagan did more to cripple the unions in the US than any thug-goon in American history...

Screw him too and this tribute to his life... He was a goon/scab union busting liar/crook...

Sorry to each and every one of ya'll 1300 people...

BTW, before anyone comes in and says that union busting is the right thing to do think about what it has done3 to the working class... 30 years of stagnated wages and now upwards of 25% unemployment & underemployment...

Thank you Ronnie "Never-met-a-scab-I-didn't-like" Reagan and A & P...

Screw both of ya'lls...

B~

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07 Feb 11 - 09:55 PM (#3090867)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: ChanteyLass

Big, I'm sorry, too. I'd boycott A & P and Pathmark, but neither are in my area. I'll try to remember this if I travel to an area that has those stores, but that won't be soon.

Bobert, I'm with you on Reagan.

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07 Feb 11 - 10:00 PM (#3090868)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Rapparee

It's greed, pure and simple, greed with a capital G-R-E-E-D.

What's always bothered me is the Labor and Management can't exist without each other. Even employee-owned businesses have bosses. But there IS hope -- Polartec, in Malden, MA, for instance, formerly Malden Mills, is one such.

However, for most of the industries -- Viva IWW!!

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07 Feb 11 - 11:54 PM (#3090909)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: EBarnacle

I'll go the extra mile and avoid A&P and Pathmark. I also avoid Wall Wart and Target for their labor policies as well as their manipulation of their suppliers. West Marine [for you boat owners out there] is also very predatory to their suppliers, as well as shipping manufacturing jobs to China.

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08 Feb 11 - 02:00 PM (#3091223)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: GUEST,999

Please add Canadian Tire to EBarnacle`s list.

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08 Feb 11 - 05:59 PM (#3091377)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: gnu

999... Crappy Tire... you mean Chinese Tire. See the distribution centre they built in TO... not one human touches the stuff from the time it is boxed in China until it gets put on the shelves up the street from me to go on sale Friday morning. It`s all computers and robots. They don`t need people. I expect they will soon do the same thing as the grocery stores... you check yourself out. No need for humans unless it`s to pay the money.

Big job cut announced here today. I guess there aren`t enough humans with money to support the machines.

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08 Feb 11 - 08:16 PM (#3091471)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Rapparee

Suppose someone gave a job fair and nobody came because everyone was employed?

There was a job fair here recently -- 500 applicants for 100 jobs. Some people came from as far away as Denver and El Paso.

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08 Feb 11 - 08:37 PM (#3091489)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Bobert

Be carefull, Rap... 500 apps fir 100 jobs is gonna get a lot of folks movin' into yer neighborhood... Round these parts it more like 500 apps for 10 jobs...

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08 Feb 11 - 08:43 PM (#3091492)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: The Fooles Troupe

"I expect they will soon do the same thing as the grocery stores... you check yourself out. "

That has already been done in Woolies here in Oz - but most people still go thru the checkouts to give people jobs. Only a few people use the auto checkouts, and usually only for a very few items. Of course, if you have a problem like a scanner error, you are stuck, till someone arrives to help ...

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08 Feb 11 - 11:15 PM (#3091537)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: EBarnacle

The self service aisles are another try by the bosses to save money at the expense of the workers. If you can get one employee supervising 4 scanners, that's three jobs lost.

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09 Feb 11 - 12:36 AM (#3091559)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: The Fooles Troupe

Of course, I'm one of those people who refuse to carry their dirty plate etc to the spot they want you too in eating malls - I don't want to do someone out of a job ... :-)

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09 Feb 11 - 06:36 AM (#3091649)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Dharmabum

"Lost in New Jersey"
Now THERE'S a concept I can relate to.

Here's some Christy Moore that seems appropriate;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsmAMKUIXbE

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09 Feb 11 - 12:00 PM (#3091830)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: EBarnacle

I find it interesting that the GoogleAds around this discussion are for both A&P and Broadpoint.

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09 Feb 11 - 02:56 PM (#3091957)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

Larger grocers here have self-service checkouts here (Calgary) and they receive regular use. Many shoppers prefer them, since they can see if the items are properly entered.

Face it- many jobs have gone in industry as well as in retailing, replaced by automation and multitasking. Finding employment will be problematical until some means of providing for surplus workers is found.

Companies that stick with large numbers of unnecessary employees will sink, so shopping at them is no solution.

A revolution of a sort is in progress. I forsee factories with an engineer or two at the top supervising robot processes.

Finding means of supporting no longer needed humans will be some time in coming.

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09 Feb 11 - 03:27 PM (#3091984)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: GUEST,999

Too true, Q. Like those old sci-fi books that we thought were too far fetched to happen. And ding, here we are.

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09 Feb 11 - 08:19 PM (#3092155)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

All this ranting over a corporate corpse.

A&P once had 3100 stores, but couldn't evolve fast enough to keep up with the competition. Down to about 400 and under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Hadn't heard of them for some time (they sold what they had left in Canada to Metro). A short article (obituary) in Canadian Business this month briefly discusses the downhill slide.

The workers in Pennsy. probably will be out too by year-end.
R. I. P.

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10 Feb 11 - 07:24 AM (#3092367)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Big Ballad Singer

Q, true enough. A&P was once a true corporate giant.

My point from the beginning has been to point out that it's no longer just the employees of the corporation itself (i.e. the office workers and such) who are getting shafted. The push to grab for more money is getting all the way down to the people who stock the shelves now.

Sure, it's happened before, but now we have the added frustration of cheap, low-quality imported products in the food stores COMBINED with the hiring (or at least the use) of illegal immigrants to do honest, legal Americans' jobs.

What amazes me is that there isn't a populist, street-level labor-song movement these days.

We're living in times when the American government is (AGAIN) cozying up to big corporations. In their rush to get as much work for as little money out of people as possible, our leaders are allowing these CEOs to run their businesses into the ground Stateside while freely encouraging trade with, and outsourcing to, third-world dunghills. They then have the nerve to collect all the money from people who found non-profit organizations in order to protest the abuse of people in those other countries.

We're seeing American "foreign policy" (so-called) get us all wrapped up, once again, in wars we aren't able to win. The gov't then freely allows just about anyone from wherever to come into our country and lets them flout our immigration and citizenship laws in the bargain! Here they are, spending billions in tax-payer money to promote "freedom" and "democracy" in these other places while they won't even bother honoring the principles they are supposedly championing elsewhere!

Honestly... where's an Aunt Molly or another Pete when you need them?

Oh, and while I'm at it, fuck US Social-Security-Disability and all their relatives, too.

I've been living for almost 9 years with a serious and almost totally debilitating disability, and these fuckers told me I could just go get "other work" after being unemployed FOR REASONS OF MY DISABILITY for over a year. The bastards actually MADE UP job titles for work that they think I can just "go get".

I actually worked, against doctors' orders, WITH the condition I have for 7.5 of those nine years. I went to work in pain, sometimes barely able to stand. I finally had to leave a job I shouldn't even have medically been allowed to do, but I needed to provide for my kids and wife and forced myself to work till I couldn't take it anymore. Now that I've finally admitted that the damned health issues have me beat, I'm supposed to just "go get".

Maybe if my name were some unpronounceable foreign blabber and I sneaked in under a damned fence... then maybe they'd lay off an American and give me THEIR job instead!

Now I can't even afford a friggin' guitar so's I can gig! Try supporting a family of five on food stamps when you don't even have the money to gas the car to go GET the damned food!

Sorry I've ranted; got about 1.5 hours of restless sleep last night/this morning.

Anyway, thanks for sharing so far, gang!

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05 Mar 11 - 11:33 AM (#3107481)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Sawzaw

U.S. Department of Justice
Kenneth J. Gonzales
United States Attorney
District of New Mexico
For Immediate Release December 21, 2010

UNION OFFICIAL CHARGED WITH DEFRAUDING UNION

United States Attorney Kenneth J. Gonzales announced that a federal grand jury in Las Cruces has charged Gloria Porter, 64, of Chaparral, New Mexico, with wire fraud, mail fraud and aggravated identity theft offenses in a 107-count indictment.

Porter's arraignment date has yet to be scheduled. According to the indictment, Porter was employed at White Sands Missile Range at the time of the offenses allegedly were committed. The indictment alleges that, from December 20, 2005 through September 2, 2008, Porter executed a scheme to defraud the Army Military Council (AMC), a body comprised of local unions representing members of the National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE) who are employed by the United States Army.

More specifically, the indictment alleges that Porter, who at the time was serving as national vice president for the NFFE, the secretary-treasurer for the AMC, and president of a local union, used a debit card to access an AMC account to fraudulently purchase $13,542.33 in goods and services for her personal use.

The indictment also alleges that Porter forged the signature of the AMC president on a 2006 fiscal disclosure report to conceal the fraud. If convicted of the wire and mail fraud charges in the indictment, Porter could receive a sentence of up to 20 years of imprisonment, a $1 million fine, and up to a five year term of supervised release.

If Porter is convicted of aggravated identity theft, she faces a mandatory minimum sentence of two years of imprisonment.

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05 Mar 11 - 05:30 PM (#3107733)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Thompson

You have to wonder, how much profit would it actually lose companies like Apple and Acer if their goods were made in American factories rather than Chinese.

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05 Mar 11 - 11:46 PM (#3107891)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: The Fooles Troupe

Porter is a dark-coloured style of beer. The history and development of stout and porter are intertwined.[1] The name was first used in the 18th century from its popularity with the street and river porters of London. It is generally brewed with dark malts. The name "stout" for a dark beer is believed to have come about because a strong porter may be called "Extra Porter" or "Double Porter" or "Stout Porter". The term "Stout Porter" would later be shortened to just "Stout". For example, Guinness Extra Stout was originally called "Extra Superior Porter" and was only given the name Extra Stout in 1840.[2]

From wikipedia

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06 Mar 11 - 01:30 PM (#3108214)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: DougR

Three cheers for Ronnie Reagan! Ready Bobert? :>)

DougR

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06 Mar 11 - 03:00 PM (#3108291)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: Q (Frank Staplin)

Foolestroupe, a good reply to a useless digression!

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06 Mar 11 - 03:13 PM (#3108306)
Subject: RE: BS: 1300 Jobs Lost In New Jersey
From: pdq

There has been a mass migration of businesses from "high tax states" such as California, New Jersey and New Your to "low tax states" including Florida, Texas and Nevada, all of which have no state personal income tax. NY's rate sits at about 10%.

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