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I'm a libertarian/conservative who believes the first precept of good government should be "Do no harm!" That said I recognize that, as distasteful as it is, sometimes government is necessary and can do good. I'll be talking mainly about national politics, with the occasional odd foray into local issue.

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The Employee Free Choice Act?

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Contributed by: John Newman on 6/24/2007

The Senate started debate last week on a bill that has already been passed by the House called the Employee Free Choice Act. This is something that the unions demanded be a high priority in the new Democratic controlled Congress that they helped elect last fall.

In the interest of full disclosure, I am adamantly against unions for a number of reasons. First of all, a union uses part of the dues it collects to support a complete infrastructure of union officers, negotiators and who knows what else. These people live off of workers dues, and the average union worker has no way of controlling, who, how many, and how much these parasites are paid. Secondly, unions routinely donate money and spend money promoting political viewpoints. All of this money comes out of the pockets of it's workers in the form of dues, and is spent regardless of whether each worker agrees with the political objectives of the union. Also, you think a fight to unionize a shop is a battle? Try to de-unionize one. Getting rid of a union is worse than getting rid of a heroin habit. They may have totally outlived their usefulness, may have driven the industry into the dirt, may even be hopelessly corrupt and controlled by organized crime, but it is downright impossible to get out from underneath their thumbs once you or your predecessors have agreed to let them represent you.

And call me an optimist, but ultimately I believe a company needs to have common goals across all levels and all functions of its organization if it is to successfully compete. Unions, with their adversarial approach to any issue, totally get in the way of that aim. Union rules destroyed the passenger train system, union rules are destroying American car manufacturing. They destroyed the American steel industry. And unions are destroying public education. Unionize a shop, and you'll soon be arguing over whether you have to call a certified electrician to plug a computer into a power outlet.

And for all of unions' bluster about protecting their workers, take one look at a heavily unionized, heavily protected domestic industry who's jobs are impossible to be outsourced and look at how successfully unions have been about protecting their employee's jobs, pay and benefits. I give you the airline industry. All unions have been able to do to the airline industry is to drive companies into bankruptcy or out of existence. In the case of bankruptcy, judges void union contracts and allow companies to knock 30 or 40% off of what they were paying. In the case of liquidation all the jobs are gone, only to be taken over by some non-union startup that pays less than half what the old unionized behometh used to pay.

But what is the Employee Free Choice Act and why is it so paramount to shoot this thing down in it's tracks? The key provision of the Act is to allow union certification to represent a group of employees if it can gather signed authorization cards for a majority of employees working at the shop.

Don't they have to do that now? No, now a union has to present signed authorization cards from 30% of the employees in the shop as a petition for a secret ballot election. In other words, if the union can convince enough people to ask for an election, they get to hold an election in which a majority vote in favor of union representation is required before the union is certified to represent the employees, and among other things, can start collecting dues in the form of payroll deductions.

The Employee Free Choice Act, bypasses the election entirely. All the union has to do is collect signed authorization cards from a majority of the employees and boom, they are certified to start collecting dues. And once they are certified, they are virtually impossible to get de-certified.

So unions being the paragons of morality that they are, it would be unseemly to argue that they wouldn't somehow take advantage of the loosening of the rules situation. Far be it from me to suggest that an overzealous union organizer might simply resort to forgery to obtain some of his signed authorization cards. Or that union organizers might not exactly explain that signing the card means that the employee has permanently and irrevocably voted for union membership. Or that organizers might call or visit employees at all hours of the day and night constantly wheedling them to just sign the damn card.

And why exactly do we need this law?

Well, the AFL/CIO will tell you that one in five people that attempt to organize for a union are fired. Isn't that illegal? Why yes it is, and it has been since 1936. Um well, says the AFL/CIO, the penalties for it aren't harsh enough to keep companies from firing workers who attempt to organize. Ok, fine, make the penalties for reprehensible practices like this tougher. But don't totally change the rules of ensuring that a majority of employees really want union representation to make up for the fact that some penalties for breaking existing laws may need to be updated.

Ok, say others, as soon as a company realizes it's a target for a unionization attempt, they start scheduling mandatory meetings for employees to attend where they try to browbeat them into rejecting the union. I'm sorry, that just doesn't wash for me. A company has every right to communicate with their employees about why they think a union would be a bad idea. And every employee has the right to reject the company's argument.

And here's the kicker, those in favor will tell you that only one in five successful petitions for elections result in union certification for the shop. So the whole process just HAS to be rigged against unions, it just HAS TO BE!

I truly find that hard to believe. There are every number of reasons why unions fail 80% of the time in certification elections. I listed a slew of them at the very beginning of this article. If unions are failing so often, they might look in the mirror first and see what they can improve about themselves to be more successful, rather than buying votes and campaigning for candidates that would be willing to change the rules of the game for them.

This bill is totally one-sided in favor of the unions, and there is no reason in a democracy, that on a issue as important as whether to accept union representation or not, that each employee should not have the right to make that decision by him or herself in the privacy of a voting booth.

And if unions don't like that, too bad.

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Showing 1-6 of 6 comments

Submitted By: John Newman

posted on 6/29/2007 @ 4:58:10 PM

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I never said there wasn't a reason for unions in the past, there was. And I do not disagree that there is not a role for unions in the future. There could be. But unions as they exist right now are corrupt, anachronistic dinosaurs, wedded to a 19th century interpretation of the struggle between labor and capital. What I am saying to unions, pure and simple, there's a reason you are losing elections. Look in the mirror and change to make yourselves more acceptable to employees. You will do far better if you do that, than if you change the rules to help you bamboozle people into joining your union.

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Submitted By: Stan Dyer

posted on 6/27/2007 @ 10:18:42 AM

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Well, Mr. Newman, I am sorry to hear you dislike the 40 hour workweek, the 8 hour day, vacations, health care, retirement and so many of the benefits Unions provide and maintain for this country. If you think any of us would have any of this without the influence of Unions, you are sadly mistaken. Just like Democracy, these things did not always exist. And, just like Democracy, we don't all always agree with the way things happen. Yet, just like Democracy, everyone benefits in the long run, even you. Much of your information is biased and incompletely researched. It is as if you did no research at all, but, rather relied on the word-of-mouth from people you trusted. Next time, research better what you believe and be ready to support your claims.

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Submitted By: Chris Rodriguez

posted on 6/26/2007 @ 10:26:50 PM

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Since we're doing full disclosure: union member for 3 decades. My particular union has a separate PAC for political activity and can't use dues for that, which is the way it should be. If you wan't an additional amount taken out for that, great. If not, you should have that choice. Sometimes union vs. management is choosing the lesser of two evils. And it flip flops at times. A closed shop with high dues, and no idea where they go? Not acceptable.

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Submitted By: Bing Van Gorden

posted on 6/26/2007 @ 11:39:23 AM

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Well your guys win John. Your disgusting and repugnant republikan party just denied an up or down vote in the Senate. Hope your happy, another victory for corporations and another blow to workers. And your analysis of unions is way off the mark. Corporations have too much power thanks to people like you too driven by an ideological fantasy in free markets to see common sense solutions for worker's rights.

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Submitted By: John Newman

posted on 6/24/2007 @ 6:04:50 PM

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There was a time for unions. A lot of what they fought for is institutionalized in law now. How many children do you see working today? My point is that just because unions lose a lot of elections, shouldn't mean that we make possible for them to unionize workers without one.

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Submitted By: Bing Van Gorden

posted on 6/24/2007 @ 11:17:22 AM

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Unions and the labor movement fought for a fair wage, 40 hour week and child labor laws. Union jobs raise wages across the board. If we do not remember history we are doomed to repeat it. Unions aren't perfect but neither are CEOs and fat cats who'll lay off hundreds and take home millions.

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Showing 1-6 of 6 comments

CONTRIBUTOR INFORMATION

John Newman

Northglenn , CO

John Newman has posted 8 blog entries and 33 comments since joining on 9/27/2005. John Newman 's average blog rating is 3.64.

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