The time is now!
Updated 06/11/09 4:42PM

Journeyman electricians in the State of Michigan are in a position to demand a fair slice of the pie. Contractors need us now more than ever. So why the pay cuts? The reports that we have been getting at the hall are saying that area journeymen are taking $3/hr pay cuts!

It is time for journeymen to stand together and put a stop to the downward spiral of pay and benefits that the contractors have somehow managed to demand at a time when we have the ability to win the most significant raise in recent memory.
I'm not talking specifically about union or non-union electricians or, NECA or non-NECA contractors. I'm talkng about the entire electrical construction industry in Michigan.
We finally won the 1 journeyman to 1 apprentice ratio that we have needed for reasons of safety and training. The greed driven contractors can no longer legally underbid legitimate contractors and stack the jobs with a large majority of apprentices. The fact that it took so long is quite sad and, I beleive, criminal.
What we are finding now is that the large non-union contractors that used to win a large majority of commercial bids using the tactics mentioned, are now being underbid by contractors that they themselves have spawned. If we were to 'let the market fix itself' where would this end? If we journeymen never stand up and put an end to this ourselves what will be the outcome?
It's quite simple and, we have been on this path for several years. Decades in fact. The "winners' will be the journeymen who work cheapest. Period.
Will we be bragging to our friends and neighbors that we are the cheapest electricians in West Michigan! ?How about explaining that to your wife and kids (or husband)? Don't they deserve the best that we can provide?
Letting the market correct itself has NEVER worked. We have tried that since the early seventies.
We journeymen need to control the labor pool. It is that simple. We need to unite.
We live in a country where we have the right to do that and until we do, being a journeyman will continue to slide into a general labor career. If you look at charge out rates for all of the trades in West Michigan do you know where we stand? Electricians are one of the cheapest trades out there! How can such a skilled and dangerous profession be such a low paying career?
Because we are letting it be that way. We have the power. It's time to be strong and reclaim our trade but, we have to do it together. Divided we are falling.

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