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Coalition Concerned About Effect of Pulte-Centex Merger on Homeowners |
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Robert Masciola, deputy director of the AFL-CIO Center for Strategic Research, shares this recent action by workers and their allies at Pulte Homes and Centex Corp. shareholder meetings.
In Pontiac, Mich., and Dallas yesterday, workers, community leaders, homeowners and other supporters of the Building Justice campaign came together to voice their concerns about the merger between Pulte Homes and Centex Corp. The merger will create the largest homebuilding company in the United States.
Building Justice is a partnership of the Painters and Allied Trades union (IUPAT), the Sheet Metal Workers (SMWIA), the AFL-CIO, Pulte homeowners, community members and elected officials to improve conditions at Pulte developments. Members of the coalition staged rallies in Pontiac (Pulte) and Dallas (Centex) to coincide with shareholder meetings in each city to approve the merger.
But in the middle of the recession—tired of foreclosure signs in their neighborhoods and worried about potentially unresponsive leadership from their new corporate neighbors—diverse groups in Texans and Michigan, which included Jobs with Justice, the Detroit Metropolitan AFL-CIO and the Ironworkers, protested the merger and sought answers from Pulte and Centex executives about reports citing poor working conditions at Pulte jobsites and questioned risky lending practices in which both companies have been engaged.
A report released in May documented that Pulte originated many so-called “nontraditional loans” during the housing boom and is not being held accountable for the devastating results. That report came on the heels of another report, “Poorly Built by Pulte,” which compiled survey data, painting an ugly picture of Pulte’s construction, customer service and warranty program.
Victor Griego, organizing director for IUPAT District Council 15 in Las Vegas, who helped lead the action in Dallas, stated:
We came to Dallas to make sure Centex knew what kind of company it was merging with—one in our experience that disregards the interests of workers and homeowners on a regular basis.
But Griego concluded by saying he had hope that Centex executives would move the new company in the right direction:
Building Justice wants a cooperative relationship with Pulte, not confrontational, but we need to start a dialog before that can happen.
1 Comment
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Why is organized labor spending so much time, money and energy trying to reform these evidently corrupt housing industry giants?
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The questionable financial and shoddy construction activities are the reasons why they became so large and profitable. Under the capitalist economic system, companies are not organized to build quality housing or provide low-interest loans on affordable housing to make the consumer happy!
Under the rules of capitalism, the owners and shareholders demand a maximum return on investment or they won’t invest their money! CEOs and top management want to become millionaires ASAP and their salaries and bonuses are tied to maximization of profit. Thus every day decision making by management is focused on profit maximization. Every consideration of financial and construction decisions must be constrained and subordinated to maximize profit.
What to do until the revolution?
The workers and unions involved in this all the aspects of this industry should start thinking about setting up a national non-profit home building construction corporation.
* This worker owned and managed company would be dedicated to building low-cost housing for working people and their families.
* By using educated and experienced union labor to manage the company, the financial management and quality of construction could be assured. Maximization of profit would not be the weight of all decisions.
* By paying the workers union-scale the workers would not be compelled to do shoddy work and could use their training and experience to quality construction.
* Consumers would benefit knowing their hard-earned savings would provide a quality home.
* Investment money would come from home consumers and perhaps from union retirement funds (often lost recently in speculative stock market investments).
* The labor movement would create an alternative strategy for working people to end their exploitation under capitalism.
* A socialist economy is an economy that is dedicated to fulfilling the needs of working people. This would be one small step to promoting a socialist consciousness and a small step
towards ending capitalism.