Creep of the Week - August 9, 1997

Image: UPS Logo

United Parcel Service
"UPS = Unreliable Pinheaded Scumsuckers"
We all operate under The System. Here's how it's supposed to work: Everybody has a job to do. Some of us dig ditches or flip burgers or collect garbage. Others are bankers or lawyers or drug dealers or hookers. A few coach NFL teams and bring loaded .38 handguns through airport metal detectors. Some guys even write weekly diatribes on the Internet. A person can't do all these jobs at once, so we depend on one another. I agree to carry my garbage out to the curb every Monday and the garbage man agrees to collect it and take it to the dump. Then he goes home and reads my web site. The System works!

The fuel that makes this all go around every day is money. We've all decided that the NFL coach is providing a more valuable service (uproarious entertainment) than the burger flipper (basic cholesterol sustenance), so we give the coach a lot more money. If a person doesn't like his place in this grand scheme, he can change jobs or just drop out completely. The System is durable enough to deal with that. But once in a while, individuals band together and stop performing their particular task, taking advantage of the fact that we all depend on each other. Then The System doesn't work anymore. Everyone is inconvenienced or worse. Tempers flare. Time to assign blame.

This week the United Parcel Service went on strike. The UPS truck drivers, represented by the Teamsters union, weren't happy with the contract being offered by the company management and stopped work. The UPS pilots also stopped working in support of the drivers. The strikers are attacking the few drivers that are working with bottle rockets and actually stabbed one of them in Florida. The police union in Houston has been instructed to make up any excuse to pull over UPS trucks driven by scabs. The Teamsters have their usual tools of persuasion, garrotes and cement mixers, waiting on the sidelines. As of this weekend, both sides had walked out on the negotiations in a huff and there is no end to the strike on the horizon. What are the details of the contract negotiations? What does each side want? Give full time jobs to more of the part timers? Increase the health benefits? Improve the profit picture? Change the company's official color from that drab, dung-like brown?

I DON'T CARE!!! I WANT MY PACKAGES DELIVERED!!! MY CAR NEEDS A $70 PART TO PREVENT IT FROM BACKFIRING WITH A LOUD NOISE THAT FREAKS OUT THE OTHER MOTORISTS AND CAUSES ME TO NEED NEW UNDERWEAR WHICH IS ALSO SITTING IN A WAREHOUSE SOMEPLACE INSTEAD OF BEING ON THE SHELF AT K-MART!! I SENT MY RICH UNCLE HENRY HIS ANNUAL BIRTHDAY PRESENT (TIE AND SOCKS) WHICH MUST ARRIVE ON TIME OR I'M OUT OF THE WILL!! AND IF THAT SHIPMENT OF VALIUM DOESN'T GET HERE QUICK, THINGS ARE REALLY GOING TO GET UGLY!!

UPS drivers are supposed to drive. The pilots are supposed to fly. Management is supposed to manage. None of them are doing what they're supposed to do. They're all wrong. No good guys. 100% incompetent idiots who are making the rest of us suffer. We're all in this together, guys. Get over your differences and do your jobs. Donated blood isn't getting to critically ill hospital patients. Small businesses can't get parts to make their products and can't ship what they do make. This sets up a chain reaction which will cause many to go bankrupt.

Any good news? Many companies are realizing that exclusive reliance on UPS is bad for their business and for The System. They'll be spreading their shipping dollars among more than one service. If UPS ever does get back into operation, they will see a permanent loss in business. Good. The System always has the last laugh.

Let me know what you think at montgome@servtech.com

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