Union Picket Line Outsourcing; Are Pilots Next?

There’s an interesting union story floating around that seemed worth sharing although it honestly made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. Maybe some of you can add something to it.

A story made the wires last night about a carpenter’s union picket line strung around a job site near Washington DC.

What made the story important was not the picket line itself, but the makeup of the picketers.

Most were not union carpenters.

Almost all were people down on their luck – OK, homeless – who needed the work. For eight bucks an hour, the union hired theses folks to yell and scream while they marched the job site with picket signs. The picketers looked about the way you might expect someone to look who had been living on the street too. Not exactly the folks any union might want in front of the TV cameras on the 6 PM news.

I thought this was some kind of joke until I spoke with a business agent from another union who confirmed that this is one of those dirty little union secrets that happens much more than any of us realize.

It’s hard to imagine pilots, flight attendants or mechanics – certainly not air traffic controllers (yes I know … if you could) outsourcing their passion for an issue so they could potato out on a couch with a beer in time for the game.

Doesn’t anyone else thing that outsourcing a picket like might extinguish the credibility of the union, or the entire labor movement itself, as if it needs any help right now?

The entire process seems so disingenuous that you’d think the rank and file would be up in arms … when they’re not out doing other things of course.

What do you think?