A tree climber's union?

Just a note on detroit. It is the best city in the country as far as I can see. The things happening here have no rival.Sometimes I am glad the people who left when the did because the 700,000 people who stayed really accomplished a lot of great things with the resources available. It's bankrupt so what. A lot of the greatest people in history were bankrupt half the time. Anyway when people talk of the decline of detroit I sort of laugh because even in "decline" it pulls way above its weight.
 
Bankruptcy is just another tool for business. A mechanism for resolving the debt issue and restart.

TL, what you'll come to see is that there is the ideal communism and then the reality which arose from the leadership thus, Marxism, Stalinism, Maoism. Each a bastardization of the ideal which became dictatorships. One of the easiest reads on the topic is the allegory, Animal Farm, a Fairy Story, by George Orwell. It's a satire reflecting on the rise of stalinism out of the Russian revolution.

"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others"
 
WOW what an epic derail!

Just read the Co-op article in TCIA mag, reminded me of this thread, sounds like a more workable solution.

But it sounds like you guys already have it all figured out so I won't bring it up again.
 
I just read that article too. I felt like it didn't really explain it very well. I couldn't tell if it was a cooperative of business owners or a cooperative of employees.
 
Raven said:
WOW what an epic derail!

Just read the Co-op article in TCIA mag, reminded me of this thread, sounds like a more workable solution.
Click to expand...

Saying Co-op are you talking about cooperative enterprises ?
I don't know how it works in USA but here it can be an awsome way. It's a bit like a local union without link with national craps where each union member/worker/partner/direction concil member (they are everything at same time) don't mess around because they know numbers and they know how difficult it is to make a profit. They are responsable of themselves and took decision together. Here this kind of enterprise is a little more solid in front of the crisis. And that's a big thing because they are usually enterprises tooked by employees after their bankruptcy so it's really fragile ones.

I don't know about owners cooperatives, i'd be glad to hear about that.

I'm sorry to have participated to the derail but i don't feel it that epic. Union is highly politic, talking about it, being into it, is allways made of derails because allmost everything is politic. ^^'
 
No derail here. Unsafe and non profiting workers turned into communism. Happens. It's scattered, who is your leader?
 
Sorry for my last post, I was rushing out the door. Meant to say, "who is your leader"... you need to organize to start a union. The drift of this thread is really a good lesson at to what happens when workers (or people) become unhappy with the life situation. Communism comes knocking at the door.

So the idea would be to elect someone as a leader and use that person to try to start organizing better work conditions. Imo that is what the ISA is for but I do see the need to take this further. Or ask someone in the higher echelons of the ISA if this could happen within the ISA.

I hope this thread didn't die cause I really think more could be done to protect the "tree worker". Tree worker injury stories are really bad and really too too frequent.
 
One of the things that I most admire about the union system--say the Electricians Union in a large City--is that they typically have a developed apprenticeship program which allows young workers to be trained with a set curriculum and to be given apprenticeship rotations such that they might experience the business from many different job sites and many different employers, each adhering to the union criteria and guidelines for advancement and education. While good companies train from within, I think there is an important need here for getting people into our industry and well trained on a larger scale. It doesn't have to be a union, though. It could be a consortium of employers in a region or municipality who meet certain criteria and agree to take on workers and train them on a schedule, having them come and work for a period now at this employer now at that one. By offering this kind of broad experience and training, with a steady advancement towards 'journeyman' grade, this might be a very good way to bring in talented people to the industry. And--I think this is important too--the workplace takes on an educative function and senior climbers would be required for training purposes. This kind of coordinated system would be greatly aided by the union and its organizational structure and power. But I think this kind of system could be achieved even by something less than a union, such as through a voluntary consortium.
 
I went through the apprenticeship program in Ontario. It's a volunteer program and requires the employer to ensure the employee has completed all the pertinent experience in the field. This is still a work in progress but could serve as an industry wide model.
 
treehumper said:
I went through the apprenticeship program in Ontario. It's a volunteer program and requires the employer to ensure the employee has completed all the pertinent experience in the field. This is still a work in progress but could serve as an industry wide model.
Click to expand...

http://www.collegeoftrades.ca/
Arborist
http://www.collegeoftrades.ca/wp-content/uploads/TS-Arborist_444A_EN.pdf Curriculum
http://www.collegeoftrades.ca/wp-content/uploads/CTS-UTILITY_ARBORIST_444B_CC_L1L2_EN.pdf Training Standard
http://www.collegeoftrades.ca/wp-content/uploads/M_Arborist444A_EN_TS.pdf Competency Analysis
Utility Arborist
http://www.collegeoftrades.ca/wp-content/uploads/CTS-UTILITY_ARBORIST_444B_CC_L1L2_EN.pdf Curriculum
http://www.collegeoftrades.ca/wp-content/uploads/UTILITY-ARBORIST-444B-TS-ENGLISH.dec-9th.pdf Training Standard
http://www.collegeoftrades.ca/wp-content/uploads/UTILITY-ARBORIST-444B-CAP-ENGLISH.dec-9th.pdf Competency Analysis
 
Dammed Canucks! Thanks for the example because that is really quite close to what I had in mind. I have seen similar type of programs (The ACRT (a JobCorps) program comes to mind (a fine program btw)), but nothing as explicit as this. I see that they require 5,400 man hours to complete it--about 2.5 years of employment. Is there a starting pay and an end pay (journeyman) rate that it is established?

I remember being interested in becoming an electrician and was impressed by the progressive payscale for the prospect as well. As part of the Electricians Union the applicant started at $12/hr and ended at $25/hr Union Journeyman after 2 years of service.These were competitive positions too. Acceptance of about 1: 25 applicants, something like that.
 
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