FedEx continued its “Brown Bailout” disinformation campaign on Friday with an email claiming the Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce has taken its side on the issue of leveling the playing field with UPS by subjecting FedEx Express’ package delivery drivers to the same labor laws as UPS’ package delivery drivers.
“The Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce, one of New Mexico’s leading business organizations, yesterday came out in support of FedEx’s efforts to preserve its labor regulation and opposed UPS’ attempt to receive a legislative bailout,” FedEx ghost-wrote in the new “Brown Bailout” email. “The Chamber agrees that Congress should leave what is working well alone as FedEx Express continues to promote ‘cost-effective and quality service.’”
Couple of problems here:
1.) FedEx provided no proof in the email that the Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce had taken their side on this issue. There is no copy of a letter or statement or so much as a direct quote from someone representing the Chamber. FedEx expects us to just take their word for it.
Sorry, Charlie. Considering all the sneaky, underhanded tactics FedEx has already deployed in their disingenuous campaign over the last several months, we aren’t prepared to read their lips on anything like this. Maybe the Chamber did somehow indicate their support on this issue on Thursday, but without proof, we ain’t buying it.
2.) As has been said ad nauseum, the proposed law change would simply put FedEx and UPS express delivery drivers under the same law. To suggest that this amounts to the same kind of government bailout extended to banks and auto dealers is absurd. Actually, since it’s intention, let’s call it what it really is….a lie.
3.) Of course things are “working well” under the existing system….for FedEx. The inequity in the law gives FedEx a government-imposed competitive advantage they wouldn’t otherwise enjoy in the free marketplace without this corporate welfare assistance.
4.) FedEx does, indeed, provide “cost effective and quality service.” The part they gloss over, however, is that their competitor, UPS, also provides cost effective and quality service. The difference is that UPS, unlike FedEx, provides such cost effective quality service while its employees are covered under the same labor law as almost every other employee in the country today. The mere fact that FedEx provides cost effective and quality service is no excuse for treating its workforce differently from every other company’s workforce.
FedEx’s latest “sky-is-falling” missive also included this:
“Any disruption to the national delivery system could wreak havoc on the national and local economies…”
Poppycock.
The proposed change in the law wouldn’t affect FedEx’s “national delivery system,” nor would it necessarily result in any kind “disruption” whatsoever, let alone a national one. That’s a boogey man FedEx keeps hauling out of the closet to scare those who only look at the surface of this issue.
FedEx’s “national delivery system” consists of moving its packages by air from city to city. The proposed law change wouldn’t touch that aspect of their operation at all.
In reality, the law change would affect only the local drivers who pick up and deliver packages to and from the local airport. So the only way the law change could possibly be even remotely construed as potentially affecting FedEx’s “national delivery system” would be if FedEx was landing a plane outside of your home or office to deliver your package.
And that just ain’t how it’s done.
What FedEx isn’t telling everyone is that the law change would allow FedEx drivers to join a union in individual cities/municipalities rather than forcing its entire workforce to join a union nationally. And what FedEx is trying to claim is that IF this law is passed, and IF a local union goes on strike, then such a strike will bring the nation’s ENTIRE express delivery service to its knees.
Oh, puh-lease.
1.) Just because the law would allow FedEx Express drivers in individual cities to unionize doesn’t mean any would. Indeed, none of the employees of FedEx Express’s other divisions belong to a union.
2.) Even if some FedEx Express drivers unionized, that doesn’t mean there’d ever be a strike. By continuing to take good care of its employees, FedEx Express would still be able to keep the Big Bad Union wolf outside the door.
3.) And even if there was a strike, it doesn’t exactly take a degree in nuclear physics to drive a package from the airport to your home or business. Replacing pilots who go out on strike would be problematic, which is why they are covered under a different labor law. But replacing local van and truck drivers? Come on. Anyone with a driver’s license could do that. Even me!
4.) Fortunately, IF FedEx Express drivers unionized, and IF they ever went out on strike, and IF FedEx Express couldn’t find me to deliver its packages, we would still have UPS and others who can and would pick up the slack to make sure the “national delivery system” wasn’t shut down. Hurray for private sector competition!
FedEx’s success in gaining support from business groups such as (possibly) the Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce is due almost entirely to scaring the bejeepers out of them with this doomsday scenario which is very unlikely to ever happen – in addition to capitalizing on an understandable inherent hostility on the part of businesses to organized labor.
But that’s no reason to treat the employees of two different companies doing the same job differently under the law. FedEx is wrong to be capitalizing on this inequity in the law, and doubly wrong for using deceptive tactics and misleading arguments in their fight no matter how many groups or individuals they fool into believing them.
(Chuck Muth is president of Citizen Outreach)