Employee Free Choice Act: From Beltway to Main Street

unions are private sector response to middle class squeeze

Unions are a PRIVATE SECTOR response to the middle class squeeze. They don't involve the government setting wage levels, enforcing benefits, or requiring any thing at all. All they do is enable the employees in a company to negotiate with their own employer over the best terms and conditions of working at that particular company -- the exact opposite of one-size-fits-all solutions or government-imposed terms. Obviously employees usually want more and employers usually want to pay them less, that's what negotiations is about. For business lobbyists to say that they don't even want their employees to have the right to sit at the negotiating table -- and then try to tell us that this is for the benefit of protecting employees' jobs -- is a ridiculous joke. They want to make as much money as they can, and pay as little as they can -- ok, that's what they're supposed to want. But don't tell me that preventing employees from neotiating on their own behalf is some noble public policy. Give me a break!

Gordon of OR @ May 20, 2008 12:32:13 PM

Unions don't go in where they are not needed.

If a SMALL business employer is open and honest with employees about the financial realities of the business, and treats employess with both respect and the rewards that are reasonably possible, you won't find anywhere near 50% of them wanting to sign some card to appoint some third party to negotiate.

I worked at such a privately held place for 21 years. It was a manufacturing company with 300 employees when I started, about 1000 when I left, and situated in a small town. I was their accountant. Management saw to it that employees did not "need" a union, and both sides likewise did not have to pay for one. They were good people and most of the employees trusted them and respected them for trying very hard to always "do right".

When that stuff is missing is when the unions are needed and DESERVED.

Daniel David of NM @ May 20, 2008 12:03:46 PM

Unions don't go in where they are not needed.

If a SMALL business employer is open and honest with employees about the financial realities of the business, and treats employess with both respect and the rewards that are reasonably possible, you won't find anywhere near 50% of them wanting to sign some card to appoint some third party to negotiate.

I worked at such a privately held place for 21 years. It was a manufacturing company with 300 employees when I started, about 1000 when I left, and situated in a small town. I was their accountant. Management saw to it that employees did not "need" a union, and both sides likewise did not have to pay for one. They were good people and most of the employees trusted them and respected them for trying very hard to always "do right".

When that stuff is missing is when the unions are needed and DESERVED.

Daniel David of NM @ May 20, 2008 12:02:12 PM

Compulsory Arbitration

Unfortunately John of CA is failing to see the big picture here. The Employer Report is dead right on this one. Its not about whether people should have the right to organize, its about protecting workers from the coercion from both sides (employer/union) and from the government (mandatory arbitration).

If you are a small biz owner, do YOU want a third party government entity coming in and mandating what you have to pay your staff, benefits, who gets the best parking spot, what the work conditions/hours will be, what functions you can and can't outsource/sub-contract? All these things and more are in the union contract, up to and including the seniority system for employees/union members and what they are entitled to.

Can you imagine what this will do to businesses of all sizes? Do you think that government mediators will have one clue about the market you operate in, who your competitors are, who your customers are and what your margins for profit are?

Imagine it from the employee angle. They were promised higher pay and better benefits and god knows what else by union organizers. Then when the bargainers fail to deliver a contract, the government will. And those employees who signed a card would basically be given a contract with no chance to reject or affirm it by vote.

That government stipulated contract is now binding on the employer and the employees and their union for 2 years under EFCA.

Samuel Gompers, founder of the AFL and the revered father of the labor union movement even argued against compulsory bargaining (and card check). On his statue in Washington, DC is a quote from him:

"No lasting gain has ever come from compulsion. If we seek to force, we but tear apart that which, united, is invincible. There is no way whereby our labor movement may be assured sustained progress in determining its policies and its plan other than sincere democratic deliberation until a unanimous decision is reached. This may seem a cumbrous, slow method to the impatient, but the impatient are more concerned for immediate triumphant than for the education of constructive development."

Adam of AR @ May 20, 2008 11:55:04 AM

Arbitration between two parties

After 120 days two parties, a union and an employer meet with an arbitrator who listens to both sides and makes a compromise happen.

This agreement will not put an employer out of business.

This agreement will not make employees rich.

It is a compromise, that will not satisfy either party completely but will avoid a continued labor-management struggle.

Sometime two sides will never come to terms on their own (Isreal and Palestine, anyone).

Also, it takes two to tangle, but bargaining units require 3. And bargaining units do not relate to the size of a company. Ford could have a small bargaining unit of 3 metalugists who don't want to have a contract with the UAW.

Employer Report gets a D- for making those very wrong points.

John of CA @ May 20, 2008 10:39:54 AM

Too many microbusinesses to worry about it

Um ... yeah, ooookay.

Anyway, I think John of CA is probably right. I checked over at the SBA Office of Advocacy and it appears that there, too, there doesn't seem to be any research on small business and organized labor.

However, what we do know is that over 91% of U.S. firms have fewer than five employees and 77% of them are nonemployers. The average annual receipts of nonemployer businesses is around $45K per year; not sure about the microbusiness employers off the top of my head.

But I think it's fair to say that, for the vast majority of small businesses, they are just too small to have to worry about this issue.

Dawn Rivers Baker of NY @ May 20, 2008 10:39:24 AM

Pyramid Schemes Like Capitalism

Ahh, the labor vs. management US/THEM wars, ain't they fun!? How can a region promote business (pyramids) and worker's rights (communes) all at the same time? The two don't mix, as far as I know. See, it all started with the Illuminati/Free Masons, and their "New World Order" pyramid scheme-o-servitude-infestation... with its symbol right there on the back of the USA dollar bill. New World Order/AmWay/American Way inventors are long-ago dead, so there's nobody to Lynch over the con/sham called "the free marketeers" or "the church-o-competing". We Christian socialists have watched the capitalism buy-ins do "join-or-starve" (get a job) felony extortion and forced religion to their 18 yr old children. We see the parental policy reversal from share share share... to fight fight fight... when the kids turn 18. We see the parents throwing their 18 yr olds "out there" into "the great sharktank". We see the widespread Chicago mob-like "pay-up or lose your wellbeing" felony extortion going-on in the capitalism pyramid scheme. Hell, you can even do a Google IMAGE SEARCH for "pyramid of capitalist" and see beautiful pictures of the free marketeer's rat-racing pyramid of inequality. Its pretty easy to see-thru the con called capitalism/AmWay. Maybe its time for a cease and desist order on capitalism, and a complete FBI and Christian clean-out of the inequality and "ordering" going-on within? I'd say so. Time to get Christianity and communes happening again, as criminal pyramiding has done the nation and world NO GOOD WHATSOEVER. Competition is NOT healthy, and never was. Cooperation is healthy. Toybox tug-o-warring over greenstamps (money) and entitles of controlism/ownershipism (AmWay redemption catalog bling)... is killing us all, and the planet. Its time for the brutally-fighting "me me me me me my my my my"-junkied and enjoyments-addicted children... to learn to share. No animals, plants, or bugs... use pricetags, ownership, billings, invoicings, timecardings, money, or nation-borders, so why do humans? Stupidty and immorality, I suspect. Weigh it for yourself. Pyramid schemes are EASY to understand. They are JUST LIKE the farmyard pyramid-o-children we failed-at when we were kids. When using such servitude-infested pyramids, the upper 1/3 are "heads in the clouds" while the kids on the bottom ALWAYS GET HURT from the weight of the world's knees in their backs. Its a simple thing... and The Great Pyramids were built by COMMUNED people... all cooperating, and not by slavery systems. The pyramids are out there to remind us all... that we WILL have a "tendency" to stack ourselves into servitudal pyramids on THIS planet, and that is what we are here to learn NOT to do. Even the USA military supply/survival system uses a full-equality, discriminationless, moneyless, ownerless, pricetagless, luxury-repositoried (shared), commune/socialist operation!!! Why can't the civilians?? The USA public library system is a socialism, and it is maybe THE BEST-OPERATING SYSTEM IN THE WORLD! Wake up, folks. Time to escape the pyramid scheme... nobody to lynch or blame. Just escape. Cease and desist. AmWay should NEVER have been allowed to get "the exclusive" (legal tender) on the TYPE of survival coupons (money) accepted/allowed in supply depots (stores). ANY church... should be allowed to print their own(ed) money, and have it be accepted as legal tender... since AmWay did just that. And since churches are Christians and not capitalists, I suspect that "church money" would be handed-out like leafs falling from trees, and that would be THE END to capitalism's servitude infestation... caused by condoning/promoting inequality (pyramiding).

Larry "Wingnut" Wendlandt

MaStars - Mothers Against Stuff That Ain't Right

(anti-capitalism-ists)

Bessemer MI USA

Wingnut of MI @ May 20, 2008 09:53:37 AM

Unions in Small Businesses

The debate about EFCA seems to center around the card-check provision of the law. However, The second component of EFCA is FAR more dangerous to America's employers and workers: That is the binding arbitration provision that mandates if a company and a union cannot reach a contract within 120 days after the union is certified that a government-imposed arbitrator (not market conditions or economic weapons) will determine what the contract between the employer and the union shall be. And workers will not be able to vote on that, nor will they be allowed to strike. This, in itself, runs counter to America's free-market economy and will be the ultimate job killer. Large companies can outsource, small businesses will just close.

With reference to statstics, nearly all businesses in the private sector with two or more employees can fall victim to unions. Although the stats on whether the business is small or not are unobtainable, another way you can get a sense of the size of the company is the the National Labor Relations Board election statistics. The NLRB does keep track of bargaining unit size.

Also, an area that people don't seem to understand is just how easy it is to get union authorization cards signed. Even today, under current law, union organizers are legally allowed to make workers promises (that they have not power to guarantee) in order to lure workers into signing a card, or voting to unionize. If the worker falls for it and the union later breaks its promise or fails to deliver, there is nothing the worker can do.

At least in today's climate, the employer can at least try to counteract the kool-aid workers are subjected to when signing cards by educating workers prior to a secret-ballot election.

The hallucinogenically-named Employee Free Choice Act is poisonous for small and large business...and their workers.

If you want more information on EFCA, you can check out http://www.EmployerReport.com

EmployerReport.com of NY @ May 20, 2008 09:38:57 AM