http://www.kansascity.com/opinion/edito ... 40439.html
How about a different idea? Instead of promoting unions or MBE, allow both but require firms that are involved to include a minimum number of trainee workers new to the industry on their staff? To help fund new teaching positions at schools like the tech college so more people have more options to attend technical skill classes.Decades of unwelcoming and sometimes outright discriminatory behavior by organized labor toward minority- and women-owned firms have left the city in this difficult position. And while unions have an important role to play in the construction of the new KCI terminal, the reality is that this can’t be both an all-union project and include 35 percent minority- and women-owned firms.
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The unions bear the brunt of the responsibility for this intractable quandary. Their past attitudes and behavior toward minority-owned shops have consequences. Today, only about half of the approximately 640 firms certified by the city as women- or minority-owned are union firms.
Because of this:
http://money.cnn.com/2018/01/17/news/ec ... index.html
This isn't a St. Louis problem either. KC has a shortage of people to put up homes too. Our home was easily delayed a month over labor availability.Around St. Louis, building companies have limited ability to put up new homes as they struggle to find workers.