IL unions get offered 14.5% raise, go on strike

[TheSpecialist]

I forgot to mention. I work for a multi billion dollar corporation. We had a contract expire a couple of years ago. Our corporation has many entities or divisions. When I started in this company 18 years ago they funneled profit from our side of the house to another side of the house that wasn't profitable but was an up and coming thing. Now the shoe has reversed a little, our side is not as profitable as it was, but the other side make BILLIONS. We have a product that everyone wants but they refuse to move profit back to us to invest in the new product. They refused to bargain in good faith, in other words they threw out the old contract, and wrote their own new contract. Usually the sides pick some stuff in the contract they want changed and they negotiate back and forth, the company didn't want that, they wanted to write a whole new contract their way. We went on strike, they panicked because they had a ton of work that we do, and no one who could do it. After two weeks they begged us to come back, they would negotiate everything would be great. Most of us wanted to stay out, we had them over a barrel, get the contract done then go back, but we went back reluctantly. It took over a year for a new contract to get done. In the end we all had to pay roughly 40-70 per week more for health insurance, we lost a couple of holidays, we lost a portion of our tuition reimbursement, we got o raise for the first year, no retroactive check for the second partial year and the second year raise didn't go into effect like normal, it went into effect after the contract was ratified. So we ended up losing pay, roughly a dollar an hour, and our medical plan goes up every year, our raises over the 4 years of the contract add up to 12 percent, 3 percent a year, normal for any job out there,union or not. My wife works for a non profit and her raises average 2 1/2 -3 percent so we are reaping in the dough. If we had no union, most of the employees would be gone, and they would have contractors, or $10 an hour workers. Yet this corporation makes Billions of Dollars in profit every year..