Would a run off election 'cost to much' for ATU757 to justify

One of the arguments against run off elections in the event none of the candidates receive 50% or more of the vote is "IT WOULD BE TOO EXPENSIVE"

Chris Day has put that issue into the proper context

50+1 Too Expensive?

I have been reading the comments about the cost of 50+1 and most of what I am hearing is that it is too expensive and the only way that could work is if we found a cheaper way to conduct elections. I learned today that last election cost $28,000.00 and if 50+1 would take effect that would most likely double the cost. So lets say if 50+1 did pass and the cost of our election would then be about $60,000.00. Now that does sound expensive doesn't it?

What if I tell you that we pay an average of $373,956.00 to Political Activities and Lobbying? Is that too much to pay for politics?

We are paying six(6) times more for government politics then what we would be paying for our local union election. Is government politics more important then assuring that our union has officers that represent the majority of our membership?

If you are wondering how I came up with these number then here is what I used to figure this information out. For the total cost of elections I used the memorandum presented to the membership from this months meeting and it implies that if 50+1 was implemented the cost could be close to $60k. I then pulled up our unions LM2's for the past ten(10) years(2005 - 2014) and looked up how much we spend on Political Activities and Lobbying each year. The lowest we paid in a year was $103,071.00 and the highest we paid was $163,403.00. The past ten(10) years averaged out to $124,652.00. I then took that total and multiplied it by three(3) to get a total of $373,956.00. So on average the total we pay for three(3) years of politics is $373,956.00 and for our election $60,000.00.

I feel that our members have been conditioned to just except that things are too expensive with out being able to see a larger picture. When you compare the cost of something to something else then you are able to have a better view of where you might want to set your priorities. It is my hope that will get members asking if our priorities are set correctly.