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So you finally decided that maybe, just maybe you might want to be cautious about accessing WiFi Hot Spots well here are Things That Go Knock in your Life
25 Forgotten Survival Lessons From The Pioneers Worth Finding And Learning
by Bioprepper
Pioneer life has a special meaning in America. In less than 300 years, civilization spread across a vast continental wilderness.
From the first landings in Virginia and Massachusetts in the early 1600’s, American settlers kept pushing westward behind an ever moving frontier. Into wild country went hunters, trappers, fur traders, miners, frontier soldiers, surveyors, and pioneer farmers. The farmers tamed the land and made it productive.
Every part of America had its pioneers. Whatever their surroundings, the pioneers had to depend on themselves and on the land. Self-reliance was a frontier requirement. Game provided food and leather clothing. New settlers gathered wild fruits, nuts, and berries. For salt they boiled the water of saline springs. Maple sugar was made by tapping maple trees in early spring and boiling the sap until it thickened into a tasty sweetening. Substitutes for tea and coffee were provided by boiling sassafras root and brewing parched corn and barley. With an ax and adze for cutting tools, the pioneers made beds, tables, benches, and stools. They split logs into rails to make the zigzag fence that enclosed their clearings.
25 Forgotten Pioneer Survival Lessons Worth Finding And Learning
Soap Making
The pioneers used to make soap themselves using the copious amount of wood ashes, a natural result of their homesteading activities, with also a plentiful supply of animal fat from the butchering of the animals they used for food. Soap with some work and luck could be made for free. Soap making was performed as a yearly or semiannual event on the homesteads of the early settlers. As the butchering of animals took place in the fall, soap was made at that time on many homesteads and farms to utilize the large supply of tallow and lard that resulted. On the homes or farms where butchering was not done, soap was generally made in the spring using the ashes from the winter fires and the waste cooking grease, that had accumulated throughout the year. Soap making takes three basic steps.
- Making of the wood ash lye.
- Rendering or cleaning the fats.
- Mixing the fats and lye solution together and boiling the mixture to make the soap.
Food Preservation
The food preservation played a very important role in a pioneer’s life. Not having a refrigerator his only way to maintain the food edible was to preserve it. The most used process to preserve the meat was smoking. I’m going to share with you an old recipe for curing and smoking hams. The process of smoking is still used by a few die-hards, but most folks take a shorter route to preservation – canning, freezing or diluted methods using “smoked” chemicals applied directly to the meat.
Old-timer Everet Starcher of Sinking Springs gave his directions to smoking hams in 1976. He was in his 80s when he shared his recipe.
Put your hams on a table or flat surface where mice or nothing can get on them. Rub Morton Salt Sugar Cure liberally over the cut surface of the hams.
There is a place in the hams where you can put your finger in, so be sure that you fill that cavity with the sugar cure.
Let your hams “cure” on the flat surface for a month or month and a half.
For your smoke, use hickory, sassafras or corn cobs. Smoke about four days. Some people smoke them for up to two weeks.
You can tell how brown the hams are getting.
The fire is for smoke only, a very small fire. You might use an old iron pot placed inside another heavy metal surface so it doesn’t burn the floor.
All you want is a trail of smoke coming up toward the hams which will be hung by placing a heavy wire through the shank and securing the hams to a rafter or ceiling of your smoke house.
After you have finished smoking the hams, run them liberally with black pepper. Use plenty. Then wrap the hams in an old sheet or something and put each ham in something like a muslin bag or cotton feed sack.
Canning was also a very familiar preservation method. If you are familiar with canning fruits and vegetables then you’ll know how to can meat too. All you have to do is make sure that you take the meat’s temperature high enough to kill all bacteria before sealing the jars.
Cooking Over Open Fire
Cooking over open fire differs substantially from kitchen-based cooking, the most obvious difference being lack of an easily defined kitchen area. As a result, campers and backpackers have developed a significant body of techniques and specialized equipment for preparing food in outdoors environments. Such techniques have traditionally been associated with the Plains Indians and pioneers of North America, and have been carried down and refined in modern times for use during recreational outdoors pursuits. Closely associated with the American Old West, the Dutch oven of tradition is a heavy cast iron pot, traditionally made with three short legs and a concave cover for holding hot coals on top. While such pots are generally considered too heavy for backpackers, Dutch ovens are often used in group camp-outs and cookouts.
Dutch ovens were traditionally specially designed for camping, and such pots (often with legs and a handle, both for suspending the pot over a fire) are still widely available, though sometimes at a premium over flat-bottomed stove-top models. The oven is placed in a bed of hot coals, often from a keyhole fire with additional coals placed on top of the lid, which in camp ovens usually has a raised rim to keep the coals from falling off. Dutch ovens are convenient for cooking dishes that take a long time such as stews, joints of meat and baked goods. They are not the only option for baking on a campout as devices for baking on portable stoves exist and clay ovens can be constructed at longer encampments.
A pot hanging over the fire, although picturesque, may spill, and the rigging may be difficult to construct from found wood. Generally this is done with metal rigging, much of it identical to that historically used in home fireplaces before the invention of stoves. Two vertical iron bars with an iron cross-piece allow pots to be hung at various heights or over different temperatures of fire. Griddles, grills and skewers can also be hung over the fire. When working with wood, one may use two tripods, lashed with tripod lashings, but the rope will be liable to melt or burn. Dovetail joints are more secure, but difficult to carve.
Tracking
Our ancestors used many skills to survive. They used their tracking skills to find and hunt the animals used for food, clothing, and tools. They had to make the bows and arrows, traps and snares, clubs and tomahawks used in hunting. While hunting, they had to know what plants, or parts of plants, were edible and how to prepare them. They also knew what plants were used for medicinal purposes, and how to prepare the medicines. They knew how to find their way through forests, mountains, and unfamiliar terrain without the aid of compasses and maps.
Our ancestors had many skills essential to survival. We should never forget these skills or how to use them.
Tracking is identifying an animal by the footprints the animal left on the ground, by its scat, and by the environment surrounding those footprints. By identifying the animal in question, a person can know whether to pursue the animal or evade it. Such things as gait, along with the distance between prints, can tell you if the animal is running or walking. Becoming familiar with the footprints of an animal is just the beginning of understanding tracking. The size and depth of the print can help tell you the size of the animal.
Butchering
Raising an animal is one thing, butchering it is another. Few hunters even know how to properly butcher an animal, as most take them to a butcher for cutting up and packaging. Yet, an animal which is not properly cleaned and butchered can cause disease. You can also waste a lot of good meat by not doing it correctly. The pioneers knew how to butcher an animal the right way and never wasted anything. Every part of the animal had a use.
Tanning
This is the first step in tanning hides and making leather the old fashioned way. Sometimes called brain tan, smoke tan, Indian tan or home tan. Watch this demonstrator scrap the hair and grain from the hide.
Sewing
Sewing can seem like such and olden thing, but it’s really not! Being able to patch up holes in clothing and tarpaulin among many other things can useful in survival. It’s not a skill that should be left to the Grandmothers of the world it’s one that should be passed on down the generations.
We’ve just mentioned some of the obvious uses for sewing so far, being clothing and tarpaulin, but what if you need to sew up a wound? This may seem simple, but if you’ve never sewn before you having nothing to base this assumption on.
Weaving
In a post crisis world, not only will it be impossible to buy clothes, you may also find it just as hard to buy material, patterns, and tools for making your own clothes and shoes. As someone that learned how to knit, crochet, weave, and hand sew by the age of nine, I can safely say there is far more to good quality, long lasting clothes than what you see in the stores. Our ancestors readily turned cotton, wool, hemp, and other plant based goods into textiles by using spinning wheels and looms. By the same token, stretching and tanning animal hides (including brain tanning) also offers a source of fabric from just about any animal you take for food. When it comes to bugging out or preparing for a crisis, you will eventually realize that it does not make much sense to stockpile clothes. Even though modern fabrics are convenient, they can easily be replaced later on using materials that you grow or hunt.
Well Drilling
Having your own well on your property is a good idea even if you just want fresh, clean water that isn’t full of fluoride and chlorine like city water is. If SHTF, you’ll have one major problem already solved. Even if it doesn’t come to a survival scenario, having your own water supply means that you’re basically off the grid. You’re not dependent upon third parties and that’s awesome in my book. All these things considered, learning how to dig a well is a good lesson that every prepper should master.
Gardening
I’ve found that I increasingly prefer old fashioned gardening techniques (or at least those that I think of as “old fashioned”). I’m not saying they’re the best. I think my preference has something to do with my personality–but also that I’m gardening in a harsh subtropical environment where these techniques really work for me.
Some of these techniques are:
Set thin plants to the maximum recommended distances (or more) for good air circulation, increased drought tolerance.
Cultivate (with a good sharp hoe)to keep down weeds and improve water penetration
Rotate crops and leave a bed fallow every few seasons
Amend soils with finished compost
Level the planting area (a gardening book tip that I’ve learned the hard way and extremely important in sandy soil)
Basic Carpentry and Shelter Building
The pioneers were very good carpenters. On every new frontier the pioneers made homes for themselves, using what the wild land provided. In the great forests of the Ohio and Mississippi valleys the land provided timber. Here the pioneers’ essential tool was the ax. The ax would clear the forest for the plow. But its first task was to shape a pioneer shelter.
When a family of settlers arrived at the spot where they planned to make their home, they began chopping saplings and trimming poles to build a lean-to. Between two forked trees they laid a crosspole. With the help of oxen or horses they rolled up a log, which was banked with dirt to form a low back wall. Then they laid poles, slanted upward, from the back log to the crosspole. The sloping roof was covered with bark and branches. The ends of the lean-to were walled with shorter poles and pickets. This was the pioneers’ “half-faced camp.” It always faced south, away from wind and rain. In front of the open side they dug a fire pit. Logs smoldered there day and night, giving warmth and protection.
Trading
The concept of private barter and alternative economies has been so far removed from our daily existence here in America that the very idea of participating in commerce without the use of dollars seems almost outlandish to many people.
One thing is certain, though: in the aftermath of a widespread disaster or the collapse of civil society as we know it, you’ll want to have useful skills and items that you can barter or trade with. Once society collapses, bartering will become a business. Individuals will have items they can barter with, but in most cases, a person would not be able to afford to part with the items they do have. Anyone not prepared will have nothing to barter with, so looters will be active as well as desperate. Real trading will be based On ‘long term’ items. Seeds, not food. Arrows, not ammo. Tools, not filters. See, once the ‘short duration expendables’ are consumed, you won’t be re-supplying, you’ll be making your own or doing without. From turning your own arrow shafts, to cutting arrowheads from old license plates; from building filtration weirs to filter water, to needing copper tubing to make ‘wood-fired-water-heaters’. Knowledge and durable supplies (axes, hammers, spoke shaves, saw blades, etc.) will be the real money. He who has stocked dozens of saw blades will be king. He who sits on a case of toilet paper will be sad he didn’t learn how to replace it with what they used 200 years ago, instead (FYI, toilet paper is only about a 100-year old concept – ask yourself, what did they use before then, and get a real clue – because THAT is VERY valuable in the long term!)
So, forget stocking for that 2-week event, it’s not that difficult. The hard part is stocking for the total paradigm shift, that few remember how to do much of. You won’t be making your own saw blades anytime soon. Now, ask yourself, what else will you NOT be making, that you need to learn how to make, or replace with older technology, before you need it (or need to trade it)?
Navigation
Being able to read a compass and a map is maybe one of the most important skills that will make the difference between life and death. Imagine the pioneers that had to make huge journeys to the old west from Independence Missouri to Oregon City. They were able to orientate by the stars and by the sun. Nowadays is easier to use a GPS but if SHTF and the GPS won’t work no more the old ways will come handy.
Trapping
Having the skill of trapping small game for food will be a great advantage. Knowing how to set multiple types of traps for different animals will ensure your survival and the survival of your loved ones. Here’s a great article on trapping:
SIX PRIMITIVE TRAPS FOR CATCHING FOOD IN THE WOODS
Saving Seeds
Saving seeds is maybe a known skill but it is vitally important to the survival of your garden. By saving seeds you ensure the continuity of your food supply over the years. Start by saving your seeds and planting them in spring to practice this skill.
Start A Fire Without Matches
There’s a primal link between man and fire. Every prepper should know how to start a fire with the resources around them, even if that means creating fire without a match or lighter. This is an essential survival skill as you never know when you’ll find yourself in a situation where you’ll need a fire, but you don’t have matches. Maybe your single engine plane goes down while you’re flying over the Alaskan wilderness, like the kid in Hatchet. Or perhaps you’re out camping and you lose your pack. It need not be something as dramatic at these situations-even extremely windy or wet conditions can render matches virtually useless. And whether or not you ever need to call upon these skills, it’s nice to know you can start a fire, whenever and wherever you are.
Maintaining Proper Hygiene
Maintaining a proper hygiene one of your top priorities because sickness can and will cause you problems. After SHTF water will be scarce and showers may not work so people must take in consideration this aspect when prepping. Bathing on a regular basis is necessary to avoid illness due to bacteria building up on your skin and causing health problems. You should take in consideration sponge baths as an option.
Knowing Herbal Remedies
For medicines the pioneers had to provide for themselves. Women soon learned the use of herbs for healing. They used boneset for fever, pennyroyal to purify the blood, horehound for coughs, and ginseng for tonic. Syrups and salves were made from cherry root, horseradish, and witch hazel. Wild mustard, poplar root, and red sumac root went into teas, poultices, and powders. The standard cure for a chest cold was to rub the chest with goose grease and apply a mustard plaster.
Some frontier remedies were based more on superstition than science. Among these were potions of walnut bark “peeled upward,” boiled nettles, and “nanny tea,” made from sheep dung.
Foraging
From all the skills mentioned here, this is probably the most well known. However, we’ve seen that many people either focus on the ability to hunt, or the ability to forge. In order to give you the best chances of survival, knowledge of both skills is extremely necessary. Developing on from that you’ll also want to think about clothing, because those really nice winter jackets you’ve brought probably won’t last forever. Skills like skinning will come into their own here.
Making Alcohol From Fruits And Grains
Back in the old days making alcohol was a common thing amongst the pioneers. Alcohol is a great disinfectant, great for entertaining and a very valuable trade item. Knowing how to make alcohol will give the ability to trade both alcohol and the skill itself which will be in great demand. Here’s a great article on how to make alcohol at home:
Basic Firearm Repair
Back in the old west guns were something vital. Everybody had one. So the demand for this skill was very big and everyone knew the basics to repair their gun and had some basic spare parts around. I bet you think you got everything you’ll need, right? Covered all the basics didn’t you?
Bet you forgot one critical thing that will keep you alive more than a weapon or cleaning kit…
What is it? FIRST AID KIT for your primary weapons.
Yea I thought so. Firing pins, extractors, detents springs. Places won’t be around to get parts. They are small and don’t weigh much. Pass this on…
Raising Livestock
The ranchers went west to raise cattle. The open plains were ideal for grazing huge herds, and the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869 made it possible to ship the cattle to market in large and profitable numbers. Cattle ranching was a tough business that gave the West its cowboys. Cowboys tended the herds while they were grazing, branded them when they were of age, fought off cattle thieves, and managed the long drives of thousands of cattle over hundreds of miles of open prairie to the railroads. They followed well-known trails, like the Chisholm Trail, that have become a part of the landscape of U.S. folklore.
Hunting
Hunting requires spending a lot of energy, and there’s a reason that settled humans moved from hunting to cultivation in the form of growing food and rearing livestock. The ability to grow fruits and vegetables not only saves you from having to hunt as much, but it also provides nutrients for your diet that you might not otherwise obtain, especially when attempting to survive in the longer term. There are illnesses that can be brought on simply by not getting enough nutrition like Scurvy. This is something avoidable. The rearing of livestock would be a harder task but not unimaginably so. This will not only yield food, but it’s also a good way of keeping busy especially if you’re trying to survive in an environment far from the general population
Blacksmithing
The mighty smith of folklore was the blacksmith, who worked with iron and steel and whose hammer wielded more force than his fellow craftsmen, the tinsmith and the whitesmith, who worked in lighter metals. The word “smith” derives its meaning from the word “smite,” transformed over time to mean “a man who strikes.” Blacksmiths were valuable in every frontier community because they could make tools: crowbars, axles, axes, plows, and other implements. They also produced fine metal parts like hinges, hoops for wooden barrels, nails, and pots. The blacksmith ranked with the cobbler as a rural philosopher, and his shop, with doors open during the summer and comfortably warm in the winter, offered men a receptive place for gathering and gossip. The craft was passed on from master blacksmiths to young apprentices, who were usually just boys when they began learning. Today many people associate blacksmithing with one who makes horseshoes, but those specialists are more properly known as farriers.
This article was originally published at BioPrepper.com
What is it about CASH that Govt Doesn’t Like
Actually the bottom line is all about control. So, now that we established that as the basis for Governments to be against CASH, let’s work forward.
Why would they be instrumental is wanting and promoting the eliminate CASH? As far as data is concerned, they can not track your interests, know what you buy or identify what kind of profile that you fit into. With their desire to pigeonhole each of us they through the use of credit cartds can track our movements, our interests, our purchases and how much wealth we may or may not have.
Why would they continue to fly by the seat of their pants and ignore the obvious ability to learn more about our likes, dislikes and other factors that could identify our patriotism, allegiance or level of subserviance? Now while there probably will be a number of individuals who will remain contently oblivious to these considerations, there still will be some who will pass this off as conspiracy theory.
So, what will be the end result? Will CASH become a thing of the past or maybe people go back to barter or even using other items of value that are convenient to carry? Any way you look at it, someone wants to controlo you, ya think?
How the World Bank is destroying the US
The IMF’s Latest Move to Kill the U.S. Dollar
As predicted months ago, the IMF officially green-lighted the acceptance of China’s currency – the Yuan – into the IMF’s foreign exchange basket. According to Reuters, this move paves the way for the IMF to place the yuan on a par with the U.S. dollar. This is the latest in a series of global developments that threatens to eliminate the U.S. dollar as the world’s reserve currency. Experts predict this announcement will trigger one of the most profound transfers of wealth in our lifetime. So if you want to protect your savings & retirement, you better get your money out of U.S. dollar investments and into the one asset class that rises as currencies collapse.
The IMF Holds Supreme Power
The International Monetary Fund, or IMF, is one of the most secretive and powerful organizations in the world. They monitor the financial health of more than 185 countries. They establish global money rules and provide “bail-out” assistance to bankrupt nations. Some are warning that any move by the IMF to supplant the U.S. dollar could be catastrophic to American investments.
And now, the IMF has made the first move. As reported by The Wall Street Journal, the IMF officially green-lighted the acceptance of China’s currency – the Yuan – into the IMF’s foreign exchange basket. This marks the first time in history the IMF has expanded the number of currencies in the foreign exchange basket. This means that the Chinese currency will now become a viable global alternative to the U.S. dollar.
According to Juan Zarate, who helped implement financial sanctions while serving in George W. Bush’s Treasury department, “Once the [other currency] becomes an alternative to the dollar, rules of the game begin to change.”
Leong Sing Chiong, Assistant Managing Director at a major central bank, said this dollar alternative “is likely to transform the financial landscape in the next 5-10 years.”
Currency expert Dr. Steve Sjuggerud warned, “I’ve been active in the markets for over two decades now, but I’ve never seen anything that could move so much money, so quickly. The announcement will start a domino effect, that will basically determine who in America gets rich in the years to come, and who struggles.”
Dr. Sjuggerud says if you own any U.S. “paper” assets—and that includes stocks, bonds, or just cash in a bank account–you should be aware of what’s about to happen and know how to prepare. A number of experts believe a recent spike in gold and silver prices is a direct result of the IMF’s action. Precious metals notoriously rise when the U.S. dollar falls.
The Death of the U.S. Dollar in One Frightening Graph
For the last 600 years, there have been six different global reserve currencies controlled by world superpowers. The latest – the U.S. dollar – has dominated world currency for over 80 years. The alarming fact is, global reserve currencies have collapsed every 80-90 years for the last six centuries! What does this mean for America and the dominance of the U.S. dollar? Based on recent evidence and long-standing historical trends, experts predict the imminent collapse of the U.S. dollar! What’s more alarming? Many Americans aren’t yet doing the one thing that will save their savings & retirement from U.S. dollar collapse.
Just take a look at the graph below. It shows the lifespan of dominant currencies going back 600 years. Notice that the U.S. dollar has now been the dominant currency for 88 years, about the same length of time as its predecessors:
It’s obvious why experts say that the U.S. dollar’s days as the world’s reserve currency are coming to a climactic end.
All Fiat Currencies Collapse
“Fiat” currency is paper currency backed by nothing tangible. As opposed to “sound money” which is was backed by gold or some other valuable commodity, a fiat currency is backed by nothing more than faith in the government. The U.S. dollar has been a fiat currency since Nixon closed the gold window in 1971 in what was the greatest heist in American history. The scary fact is, the average life span of a fiat currency is 40 years, and the U.S. dollar has now exceeded 40 years as a fiat currency!
Prior to 1933 and for well over 100 years, the dollar was backed by gold, and $20 bought you an ounce of gold. But after the government stole all U.S. citizens’ gold in 1933 for a $20 paper certificate, gold was revalued at $35 U.S.D., meaning the dollar was devalued by 43% overnight and all foreign and domestic holders of dollars were effectively robbed.
After Nixon closed the gold window completely in 1971, it took $67 to buy an ounce of gold, devaluing the U.S. dollar by 50% again. Today, it takes well over a thousand U.S. dollars to buy that same ounce of gold. Why? Because the U.S. dollar is now nothing more than a fast-declining Federal Reserve note backed by a corrupt government that is saddled with $18 trillion in unpayable debt — growing by $10 million per minute!
Protect Yourself Before It’s Too Late
This “Paper Money Experiment” has run its course. The Federal Reserve, the U.S. government, and Wall Street crooks have misused their power by mismanaging the dollar, and now there are global repercussions. The debt load sitting on top of the U.S. dollar is unsustainable and will continue to crush the dollar’s purchase power until no one wants to hold U.S. dollars, and they are no longer accepted for global trade. The dollar’s collapse means that every single one of your paper investments that are dollar-backed – stocks, mutual funds, money markets, cash accounts, etc. – will go down right along with the dollar! Meanwhile, the government and the banks will find a way to protect themselves at your expense.
So as we say goodbye to the U.S. dollar’s dominance, it doesn’t have to mean goodbye to your savings & retirement. Remove at least some of your savings & retirement from the dollar-backed, paper-based financial system and protect it with the one asset that has outlasted every fiat currency ever invented for the last 5,000 years: SILVER
What does the Right To Work Law, really mean.
This except was taken from Wikipedia.
Arguments for Proponents of right-to-work laws point to the Constitutional right to freedom of association, as well as the common-law principle of private ownership of property. They argue that workers should be free to join unions and to refrain, and thus sometimes refer to non-right-to-work states as “forced unionism” states.[5]
Some of the most compelling arguments come from analysis of the data. Northwestern University economist Thomas Holmes, now at University of Minnesota, “compared counties close to the border between states with and without right-to-work laws (thereby holding constant an array of factors related to geography and climate). He found that the cumulative growth of employment in manufacturing in the right-to-work states was 26 percentage points greater than that in the non-right-to-work states.” [6]
Some contend that it is unfair that unions can require new and existing employees to become union members and pay costly membership dues for services they may not want or are philosophically opposed to. These contracts that require all employees to be union members are also known as a union security agreement and require all employees to either join the union or pay union dues as a condition of employment.[7] Furthermore, proponents point out that generally forced-union dues are used to support predominantly American-left political causes.[8]
Due to other similarities between states which have passed right-to-work laws, it is difficult to analyze these laws by comparing states; for instance, right-to-work states often have a number strong pro-business policies, making it difficult to disentangle the effect of right-to-work laws.[9] A March 3, 2008 editorial in The Wall Street Journal compared Ohio to Texas and examined why “Texas is prospering while Ohio lags”. According to the editorial, during the previous decade, while Ohio lost 10,400 jobs, Texas gained 1,615,000 new jobs. The opinon piece proposed several possible reasons for the economic expansion in Texas, including the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the absence of a state income tax, and right-to-work laws.[10]
Nobel laureate economist F.A. Hayek endorsed right-to-work laws, writing:
If legislation, jurisdiction, and the tolerance of executive agencies had not created privileges for the unions, the need for special legislation concerning them would probably not have arisen in common-law countries. But, once special privileges have become part of the law of the land, they can be removed only by special legislation. Though there ought to be no need for special ‘right-to-work laws,’ it is difficult to deny that the situation created in the United States by legislation and by the decisions of the Supreme Court may make special legislation the only practicable way of restoring the principles of freedom. Footnote: Such legislation, to be consistent with our principles, should not go beyond declaring certain contracts invalid, which is sufficient for removing all pretext to action to obtain them. It should not, as the title of the ‘right-to-work laws’ may suggest, give individuals a claim to a particular job, or even (as some of the laws in force in certain American states do) confer a right to damages for having denied a particular job, when the denial is not illegal on other grounds. The objections against such provisions are the same as those that apply to ‘fair employment practices’ laws.[11]
[edit] Arguments against Opponents argue right-to-work laws create a free-rider problem,[12][13] in which non-union employees (who are bound by the terms of the union contract even though they are not members of the union) benefit from collective bargaining without paying union dues.[12][14]
The AFL/CIO union argues that because unions are weakened by these laws, wages are lowered[14] and worker safety and health is endangered. For these reasons, the union refers to right-to-work states as “right to work for less” states [15] or “right-to-fire” states, and to non-right-to-work states as “free collective bargaining” states.
Business interests led by the Chamber of Commerce lobbied extensively for right-to-work legislation in the Southern states.[12][16][17][18] Critics from organized labor have argued since the late 1970s[19] that while the National Right to Work Committee purports to engage in grass-roots lobbying on behalf of the “little guy”, the National Right to Work Committee was formed by a group of southern businessmen with the express purpose of fighting unions, and that they “added a few workers for the purpose of public relations”.[20]
The unions also contend that the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation has received millions of dollars in grants from foundations controlled by major U.S. industrialists like the New York-based Olin Foundation, Inc., which grew out of a family manufacturing business,[20][21][22] and other groups.[19]
[edit] U.S. states with right-to-work laws
Right-to-work states shown by the following 22 states are right-to-work states:
Alabama
Arizona †
Arkansas †
Florida †
Georgia
Idaho
Iowa
Kansas
Louisiana
Mississippi †
Nebraska
Nevada
North Carolina
North Dakota
Oklahoma †
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Virginia
Wyoming
In addition, the territory of Guam also has right-to-work laws, and employees of the US Federal Government have the right to choose whether or not to join their respective unions.
† An employee’s right-to-work is established under the state Constitution, not under legislative action.
[edit] See also At-will employment
[edit] References1.^ “Can I be required to be a union member or pay dues to a union?”. National Right To Work. http://www.nrtw.org/a/a_1_p.htm. Retrieved 2011-08-27.
2.^ NFL Collective Bargaining Agreement 2006-2012: Art. V, Sec. 1 (agency shop).
3.^ Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers, Int’l Union v. Mobil Oil Corp., 426 U.S. 407, 414 (1976) (Marshall, J.).
4.^ Orr v. National Football League Players Ass’n, 145 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2224, 1993 WL 604063 (Va.Cir.Ct. 1993).
5.^ StopTeacher Strikes.org “Right-to-Work vs. Forced Unionism”
6.^ Wall Street Journal, Harvard Economist Robert Barro
7.^ Improvement #3: Remove Union Security Clauses Mackinac Center for Public Policy
8.^ Williams, Bob (2002-06-20). “The Use of Mandatory Union Dues for Politics: A Lesson from Washington State” (Pdf). Congressional Testimony. http://republicans.edlabor.house.gov/archive/hearings/107th/wp/uniondues62002/williams.pdf. Retrieved 2009-06-10. [dead link]
9.^ Holmes, Thomas J. (1998). “The Effect of State Policies on the Location of Manufacturing: Evidence from State Borders”. Journal of Political Economy 106 (4): 667–705. doi:10.1086/250026.
10.^ Texas v. Ohio, The Wall Street Journal, March 3, 2008. Accessed July 18, 2008.
11.^ Carney, Timothy (2011-02-23) A strong argument in favor of Right to Work (featuring F.A. Hayek), Washington Examiner
12.^ a b c “The South Carolina Governance Project — Interest Groups in South Carolina,” Center for Governmental Services, Institute for Public Service and Policy Research, University of South Carolina, Accessed July 6, 2007.
13.^ http://www.seacoastonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110114/NEWS/101140396/-1/NEWSMAP retrieved January 14, 2011
14.^ a b Greenhouse, Steven (January 3, 2011). “States Seek Laws to Curb Power of Unions”. The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/04/business/04labor.html?pagewanted=2.
15.^ http://www.aflcio.org/issues/legislativealert/stateissues/work/ retrieved July 22, 2010
16.^ Miller, Berkeley; Canak, William (1991). “From ‘Porkchoppers’ to ‘Lambchoppers’: The Passage of Florida’s Public Employee Relations Act”. Industrial and Labor Relations Review 44 (2): 349–66. doi:10.2307/2524814. JSTOR 2524814.
17.^ Partridge, Dane M. (1997). “Virginia’s New Ban on Public Employee Bargaining: A Case Study of Unions, Business, and Political Competition”. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal 10 (2): 127–39. doi:10.1023/A:1025657412651.
18.^ Canak, William; Miller, Berkeley (1990). “Gumbo Politics: Unions, Business, and Louisiana Right-to-Work Legislation”. Industrial and Labor Relations Review 43 (2): 258–71. doi:10.2307/2523703. JSTOR 2523703.
19.^ a b http://www.library.gsu.edu/dlib/iam/getBrandedPDF.asp?issue_id=1883%5Bdead link] “Examining the opposition’s tangled web — the who’s who in the right wing” The Machinist, published by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, AFL-CIO/CLC, October 1977; accessed February 4, 2008
20.^ a b http://www.uawlocal3520.org/right%20to%20workfliner.pdf%5Bdead link] “Questions and Answers about the National Right to Work Committee and the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation,” United Auto Workers, Accessed February 3, 2008.
21.^ “National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation,” Media Transparency, Accessed July 24, 2007.
22.^ “John M. Olin Foundation, Inc.”, Media Transparency, Accessed July 24, 2007.
Retrieved from “http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Right-to-work_law&oldid=469345839”
BOTTOM LINE NOTE: Initially, most people will view the “RIGHT TO WORK” as an implied right for employees, however that is a misnomer, as the fact of the matter is that when the concept is applied to Law, the only rights are with the employers, as it grants them a carte blanche privilege to hire and fire anyone without providing any reason. So, support of “the Right to Work Law” is basically an abdication of an employees (ie day in court) opportunity to a reasonable explanation of their job performance and retention. Personally, as an employee I would be against that kind of arbitrary work environment, yet as an employer, if I can hire and fire with impunity, al’s the well! What do you think?
Energy in a nutshell – What happened since the 60’s
The year was 1975 and the Hydrogen Homestead made the news. The homestead project consisted of a two story residence that was heated and cooled using hydrogen, along with hydrogen run kitchen appliances, fireplace, outdoor grill, a dual fueled automobile and farm tractor. Hydrogen for the homestead was produced by solar energy using photovoltaic cells and by electrolysis. What happened??
The first gas crisis in the US since WWII (the winter of 1972-3) sent the US into a panic. That got a lot of people thinking about alternative forms of energy and how to harness it. That’s how innovators like Dr. Billings came onto the scene. When the second gas shortage took place during the summer of 1979, gas prices broke (at least in the Northeast U.S.) $1.00 a gallon for the first time. We now might call those as the good old days, yet a mere twenty years earlier, the price at the gas pump was as low as 19cents a gallon. Fast forward to 2008, when, for many parts of the United States, gasoline topped $4.00 a gallon for the first time, and what was really going on? Profits for the oil industry seemed to be rising daily, while they continued to make us pay at the pumps. That’s where we are still today, 2011.
Despite the fact that we are over 30 years down the road since the last energy crisis, we are still almost totally dependent on petroleum-based fuel. Why is that? We continue to be lulled by the oil companies by them continuing the price cycle, raising the prices as high as they dare to, then dropping the price back a bit claiming it is the diminishing reserves and fuel prices supposedly controlled by the oil cartels. Then repeating that cycle a little higher each year, while they report record profits. Are we consumers that stupid or do we just feel that we have no other alternatives? Electric, natural gas, solar, hydrogen and to a lesser extent ethanol, have failed to make a significant dent in our demand for petroleum-derived gasoline and diesel fuel. One of the main reasons that the oil companies remain as the only game in town, is because they have been so successful at buying up the alternatives or enjoying controlling interests in other technologies, while they tell us that those technologies are not yet out of the laboratory stage and not economically competitive, so we have no choice but to remain their “ENERGY PRISONERS”!! They in our opinion are unscrupulous!
American auto manufacturers that are pursuing alternatives but only because of the pressure of foreign auto manufacturers market competition. Chevy has a dual fuel so called electric hybrid, the VOLT, that they are presently touting, however they also had an all electric, EV1 back in 1990 that had much better range than what they put out today and because it was a lease only, they were able to forcibly recall every one, probably because it was too successful and they destroyed them by crushed everyone of them. Most of the real successful all electric vehicles seem to be from foreign sources except for the TESLA Roadster and Model S. As consumers we need to encourage all-electric, natural gas or hydrogen vehicles on the road, along with alternative-fuel vehicles in some fleets, such as utility company, transit authority and delivery company vehicles. The time has come to help along, for all practical purposes, the demise of gasoline and diesel, in order to remove the strangle hold in our opinion that the oil industry has over our country. That includes routing out those who would continue to hold us as “energy prisoners”!
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