Political Quotes

“Madam Chairwoman, recently, members of the United Auto Workers went on strike at General Motors for 40 days. There was no leader who made them do this, and I have never seen a strike, in fact in my life, that was dictated by someone from on high. The workers voted, in that case way over 90 percent, to go on strike. When I repeatedly visited picket lines at various workplaces throughout my district in Michigan, I was amazed that a lot of the veteran workers were out there striking; not for themselves. They were striking for workers forced to be temporary workers, and not having full-time status and regularized status for months and years at a time. These veteran workers, some of whom had worked there 10, 20, 30 years said it just felt wrong to work side by side doing the same job with someone who was denied the pay and benefits due to workers at that workplace. All of this talk about union bosses disgusts me, Madam Chairwoman. Unions are organizations that workers build themselves to advocate for their interests. They are nonprofits. They are not businesses. In an economy where the real bosses are making 300 and 400 times what the regular workers make, that is something that would be an obscenity to the people in the manufacturing sector, to CEOs in the manufacturing sector, decades ago. The CEO of General Motors, then the biggest company in the land, made 80 times or 50 times--I forget, something like that--what the workers made, which is nothing like what happens today.…”