I am always surprised by the level of animosity US workers have for unions. Without unions, there would not be a 40 hour work week, safey regulations, child labor laws, vacations or sick leave. The presence of unions positively affects the workplaces of those even not in unions by offering a standard by which people can judge their market value.

Certainly some unions have made stupid mistakes, some have become as elitist as corporations, and some, notably the auto workers' union, have failed to stand up for workers they represent. However, in the balance between corporate responsibility and workers' welfare union members come out far ahead. That top managment is getting 400 times workers' salaries indicates the need for workplace and economic reform.

There's no political will to demand social and financial accountability as long as workers, as citizens are too tired from working too hard for too little to get ahead. Fewer and fewer people can afford their own home; huge numbers of people are mired in debt; 50% of bankrupcies are due to medical bills. Corporations and their bankrolls are protected as individual persons under the law while individual people lack the resources to demand fair treatment.

This is where unions come in. When was the last time a CEO wasn't rewarded for failure? Auto workers aren't responsible for GM's losses, the guys who decided to make SUVs when gas prices were rising were. Yet while laying off thousands and losing money by the bucketload, CEO Waggoner made $5 million in salary and another $5 million in stock options then said it was a reasonable pay cut and a sign of his sympathy with the workers who had made $45,000!

As representatives of a particular group, a union can swing a powerful hammer to shape law and to bang on the doors of politicians who would otherwise be beholden to only the corporate interests - which are not the same as workers' interests. Perhaps the mythology of winning the lottery, like winning American Idol or surviving Survivor, has infiltrated our thought processes. Maybe people think they will get lucky, that they can do it alone, that they won't be the vitims of undue hardship, that anything is better than nothing. Maybe people think that they're going to get rich.

I would suggest reading Paul Krugmans November 30, 2006 essay in Rolling Stone. http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/12699486/paul_krugman_on_the_great_wealth_transfer/print

Or going back to Eugene O'Neill's play, The Hairy Ape. "I ain't on oith and I ain't in Heaven, get me? I'm in de middel tryin' to seperate em, takin all de woist punches from bot' of 'em. Maybe dat's whay dey call Hell, huh?"

It's not the airlines I loathe, it's the lack of professional attitude and service airlines personnel display. It's not only airlines workers, of course; many places have dismissed customer service as part of their product or put their workers in impossible public relations positions. However, when I'm in an airport or on a plane , I'm stuck having to tolerate whatever conditions exist not just because I want to get somewhere, but because I could be arrested for demanding to be treated well.

The pressure inherent in working with the public combined with ridiculous so-called "security measures" is wearing a thin veneer of civility threadbare. Airport and airline workers not only have to deal with the same job pressures the rest of us cope with, but we passengers have to go through hell to get the product we purchased. Complaints after the fact get a nice note from customer service saying, "Sorry, but there's nothing we can do."

I arrive two hours before my five hour flight, drop off unlocked bags that will probably have something stolen from them, watch a TSA agent pour my prescription medicine on a table that had shoes on it seconds before then take away a curling iron because "it look dangerous to have." (sic)I get past security, purchase overpriced food inside the airport, before boarding a dirty aircraft. The tired flight attendant who has no resources, not even free playing cards, to placate frustrated passengers makes it clear that the entire system is way out of whack and there's nothing s/he can do because there's no more bottled water, juice or soda but I could spend $8 for some cookies and a 1/2 cup of warm milk to get a beverage.

Airlines could get a PR campaign started that points out how useless some safety measures are and demands that they get what they and we have to pay for - a system as safe as is reasonably possible and provides some tangible measures of private response to what is essentially large scale public transportation. I understand the complexities of travel, but I don't understand why airlines and the public keep playing the sap for politicians who use them as excuses to make useless laws. It's not about how long it takes to take off after a snowstorm, it's about how much elasticity is in the fabric of daily functioning so it can stretch to cope with a crisis.