----- Original Message ----- From: "Roger Baker" <rcbaker at eden.infohwy.com> To: <post-grns-usa-forum at greens.org> Sent: Wednesday, March 28, 2001 12:00 PM Subject: Class struggle in Seattle
> The following is the introduction to an interesting piece on Seattle
> labor relations that may be be found complete at:
>
> http://www.billparish.com/20010322boeingandmsft.html
>
>
> *************************************
>
>
> Back to Parish & Company Home Page March 22, 2001 6:00 am Eastern Time
>
> Copyrighted. This material may not be used without written permission.
>
> SOURCE: Parish & Company
>
> Microsoft Financial Pyramid Costs Seattle Its Largest Employer, the
> Boeing Corporation, and Destabilizes Government Tax Revenues
>
> This week the Boeing Corporation stunned the Seattle community by
> announcing that it would move its corporate headquarters to another
> state. Boeing's stated goal is to reduce costs or, more importantly,
> contain future costs. Generally this is a sound business decision yet
> Parish & Company believes that Boeing made this decision due to an
> inability to compete for capital with a financial pyramid scheme at
> the Microsoft Corporation.
>
> Microsoft has indeed erected a financial pyramid that has
> destabilized the global economy, is now destabilizing the U.S. stock
> market and could indeed destabilize the overall U.S. economy, as
> evidenced by Boeing's actions. The link to this copyrighted report
> provides background information on the specifics of this scheme.
> http://www.billparish.com/msftfraudfacts.html
> How the Microsoft Financial Pyramid Scheme Impacts the Boeing Corporation
> Boeing is a cost intensive highly unionized organization and its
> workers in the Seattle area are falling behind due to wage increases
> not keeping up with the area's true inflation rate. This has
> resulted in intense labor conflicts with management. In the last
> bargaining session management asked that workers accept more wages in
> stock options rather than cash wages yet this is a tough sell to
> Boeing's workers. Management is clearly attempting to join a pyramid
> scheme initiated by Microsoft yet being denied access by its workers
> who want real cash wages.
>
> Further complicating the negotiating process is that wage increases
> at Boeing are heavily influenced by government wage inflation rates
> yet these official wage inflation rates for the Seattle/Tacoma area
> do not include stock option wages. Such stock option wages in some
> years have accounted for almost 75 percent of total compensation at
> the Microsoft Corporation. After being converted to cash, these
> stock option gains have been deployed to dramatically increase the
> cost of housing, goods and services in the area. As a result, Boeing
> and all other workers with collective bargaining agreements
> influenced by wage inflation statistics, in particular teachers and
> nurses, are losing ground to what Parish & Company calls "false
> inflation."...
>
>
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