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IAN WELSH, HUFFINGTON POST - Unions in America have been in a decline
for over 60 years. Union membership has dropped from almost 35% of all
workers in 1945 to less than 15% today. In fact, union membership has
declined to almost exactly the same percentage as it was in 1930 before
FDR took power and encouraged the growth of unions. . . The mainline old
unions centered around industrial concerns like GM and Ford have shrunk
to a tiny fraction of their former self; and despite the efforts of the
SEIU unions and others, new economy workers mostly have not been
organized.
The National Labor Relations Board, created by the Wagner Act in 1935 as
independent agency of United States Governments holds the official
mandate to conduct elections for labor union representation and to
investigate and remedy unfair labor practices. Under the Bush
administration, the NLRB has:
- made it impossible for large numbers of workers to join unions;
- potentially reclassified many workers as supervisors (including many
nurses) in order to remove them from unions;
- passed numerous rulings which treat employers in one way, and unions
in another.
The union movement, it is fair to say, is in many respects in its
weakest position in over 60 years.
Another 4 or 8 years of a Republican presidency could doom American
unions, pushing them below 10% and subjecting them to more and more
hostile NLRB rulings, which will cripple what ability they have to
organize. Even a moderate Democratic president who halts the slide at
the NLRB but doesn't reverse it will leave unions in a shaky situation.
. .
Amongst the Democratic candidates it's safe to say that Hilary Clinton,
who has as her main advisor a union buster and whose husband did very
little for unions, would be a largely status quo President. Her board
would be decent, she'd be bad but not awful on trade, and she wouldn't
sink a lot of personal capital into union issues.
As with many things with Obama, it's hard to determine how good or bad
he'd be, but one has to have their doubts about a Democratic candidate
who argued that union advertisements in Iowa were unacceptable, and who
acted as if union money were the equivalent of corporate money.
Certainly there are those who see unions and corporation as little
different--but they aren't friends of unions.
John Edwards has spent the last four years working with unions, walking
their picket lines and making their cause his. He's clearly the most
pro-union of the three remaining candidates; his primary issue is
economic justice and he believes that corporations have too much power.
His campaign, from the very beginning, was predicated on union support.
But unions didn't reciprocate.
Lists of major union endorsements make this clear. AFL-CIO unions
predominantly endorsed Clinton, and in fact more major unions endorsed
Clinton than anyone else, with Edwards coming in second in the
endorsement stakes. Most recently Nevada's largest union, the culinary
union endorsed Obama and is working hard for him in that key swing
state.
Now let's imagine a world in which labor had taken a strong stand and
endorsed the candidate who was most pro-labor, John Edwards. Edwards
came in second in Iowa, behind Obama by 8%. It is hard to believe that
if unions had come in, say 4 months ago, and used their ground machine
(still, even today, probably the best organizing machine in the
Democratic party) that they couldn't have swung the election 8 points. .
.
And here's the thing--neither Clinton nor Obama, should they win now,
will feel a massive debt to Labor. The endorsements were useful and
appreciated, and they helped. But they weren't desperately needed. The
payback will be a slightly better NLRB, but not enough to save American
labor. . .
I can only assume that labor read too many polls and made too many
political calculations. . . The irony here is that if labor had taken a
strong stand and put their own best interests first instead of
triangulating and currying political favor, the strongest pro-labor
candidate would be in the lead today.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ian-welsh/the-glorious-future-that-
_b_82241.html?view=screen
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IAN WELSH, HUFFINGTON POST - Unions in America have been in a decline
for over 60 years. Union membership has dropped from almost 35% of all
workers in 1945 to less than 15% today. In fact, union membership has
declined to almost exactly the same percentage as it was in 1930 before
FDR took power and encouraged the growth of unions. . . The mainline old
unions centered around industrial concerns like GM and Ford have shrunk
to a tiny fraction of their former self; and despite the efforts of the
SEIU unions and others, new economy workers mostly have not been
organized.
The National Labor Relations Board, created by the Wagner Act in 1935 as
independent agency of United States Governments holds the official
mandate to conduct elections for labor union representation and to
investigate and remedy unfair labor practices. Under the Bush
administration, the NLRB has:
- made it impossible for large numbers of workers to join unions;
- potentially reclassified many workers as supervisors (including many
nurses) in order to remove them from unions;
- passed numerous rulings which treat employers in one way, and unions
in another.
The union movement, it is fair to say, is in many respects in its
weakest position in over 60 years.
Another 4 or 8 years of a Republican presidency could doom American
unions, pushing them below 10% and subjecting them to more and more
hostile NLRB rulings, which will cripple what ability they have to
organize. Even a moderate Democratic president who halts the slide at
the NLRB but doesn't reverse it will leave unions in a shaky situation.
. .
Amongst the Democratic candidates it's safe to say that Hilary Clinton,
who has as her main advisor a union buster and whose husband did very
little for unions, would be a largely status quo President. Her board
would be decent, she'd be bad but not awful on trade, and she wouldn't
sink a lot of personal capital into union issues.
As with many things with Obama, it's hard to determine how good or bad
he'd be, but one has to have their doubts about a Democratic candidate
who argued that union advertisements in Iowa were unacceptable, and who
acted as if union money were the equivalent of corporate money.
Certainly there are those who see unions and corporation as little
different--but they aren't friends of unions.
John Edwards has spent the last four years working with unions, walking
their picket lines and making their cause his. He's clearly the most
pro-union of the three remaining candidates; his primary issue is
economic justice and he believes that corporations have too much power.
His campaign, from the very beginning, was predicated on union support.
But unions didn't reciprocate.
Lists of major union endorsements make this clear. AFL-CIO unions
predominantly endorsed Clinton, and in fact more major unions endorsed
Clinton than anyone else, with Edwards coming in second in the
endorsement stakes. Most recently Nevada's largest union, the culinary
union endorsed Obama and is working hard for him in that key swing
state.
Now let's imagine a world in which labor had taken a strong stand and
endorsed the candidate who was most pro-labor, John Edwards. Edwards
came in second in Iowa, behind Obama by 8%. It is hard to believe that
if unions had come in, say 4 months ago, and used their ground machine
(still, even today, probably the best organizing machine in the
Democratic party) that they couldn't have swung the election 8 points. .
.
And here's the thing--neither Clinton nor Obama, should they win now,
will feel a massive debt to Labor. The endorsements were useful and
appreciated, and they helped. But they weren't desperately needed. The
payback will be a slightly better NLRB, but not enough to save American
labor. . .
I can only assume that labor read too many polls and made too many
political calculations. . . The irony here is that if labor had taken a
strong stand and put their own best interests first instead of
triangulating and currying political favor, the strongest pro-labor
candidate would be in the lead today.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ian-welsh/the-glorious-future-that-
_b_82241.html?view=screen
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