As for the union influence on the auto industry, do any of you commenting on this work in that industry or have relatives that do? I can tell you growing up in the Midwest with my father heavily involved in that industry his whole life that there is absolutely no question at all that the unions have ruined the us automakers. Study the Monday car syndrome on the web. We actaully had one of these, it is true.

Analyze which car makers have done the best and you will see that they are union free companies. You can argue that it was bad decision making by management but they were being held hostage. Also study the foreign manufacturers like Mercedes that make some of their cars in the US and some overseas. You will see that the US made ones especially in Alabama ( spartanburg, not exactly sure what city their SUV plant is in ) have had the worst quality ratings, and low and behold, it is a unionized plant.

Unions had their purpose originally but have morphed into another self entitlement skit for lazy americans. Terrible quality at a higher price, some business model. Whenever given a choice of doing business with a unionized and non unionized company, I always give my business to the non-unionized one even if it means paying more to do so. The UPS strike was a perfect example, they caused me some serious problems, now I use their competition and gladly pay more for more reliability.