Unions and Unemployment: The Battle Over the Employee Free Choice Act Gets Ugly
In Washington, money talks. And we all know that the folks opposed to the Employee Free Choice Act have lots of money. That means that they are doing lots of talking. And, they are saying some pretty strange things.
Recently, they have sought to promote the argument that unions lead to higher unemployment. To help push this case they have been circulating a study that examines differences in unionization rates and unemployment among Canadian provinces. [Chris Kromm has more on the funding of the study.] This study purports to find that a 3 percentage point increase in unionization rates leads to a 1 percentage point increase in unemployment. Based on this study, the opponents of the Employee Free Choice Act argue that any resulting increase in unionization will cost millions of jobs.
Of course the immediate response might be to ask, if this study's findings are accurate, why Canada's unemployment rate isn't 7 percentage points higher than the U.S. rate? Canada's unionization rate is about 20 percentage points higher than in the U.S., yet its unemployment rate is somewhat lower.
More substantively, there is a large body of research on this topic. While some of the research does find a correlation between unemployment and unionization rates, much of more recent research finds no link between unemployment and unionization rates.
In 2006, the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) did an exhaustive analysis of the research on this topic and concluded that there was no link between unionization rates and unemployment. It is easy to find examples of countries with very high unionization rates and low levels of unemployment. For example Norway and Denmark have unionization rates near 80 percent. Before the current crisis their unemployment rate was under 3.0 percent.
Of course we don't have to go overseas to prove the case that unions don't lead to unemployment. If we go back 40 years, the unionization rate was over 30 percent. Presently, it is just over 12 percent. In the 60s, the unemployment rate fell as low as 3.0 percent and was below 5.0 percent for most of the decade.
It is possible for economists to produce studies that tie unions to unemployment just as industry funded studies have tied the minimum wage to unemployment, even though a large body of academic research shows the opposite. For this reason, the OECD has performed an extremely valuable service with its careful analysis of the data. Until someone can show cause to question this OECD analysis, there is no reason to accept the employer claims that the Employee Free Choice Act will cost jobs.
In fact, two of your main arguments are invalid. Economic studies, like any other scientific study, need valid controls. You can't compare the US and Canada, since there may be other factors contributing to Canada's lower unemployment rate. You also can't compare a previous generation with this one, since again there may other factors contributing do the difference.
The study you quoted uses an extremely reasonable methodology - a comparison within one country (Canada) and within one era (our own) which suggests that unionization may contribute to unemployment (when measured by province) and quantifies the effect. On the surface, this would suggest that the same may be true in the US, all other thing being equal. This is also the conventional wisdom for a large segment of the American public. If we progressives are to combat such attitudes, we need to grapple with studies such as this one in a methodologically honest and accurate way, as we would expect our opponents to do. And the fact that some studies don't find the effect may not be enough - we need to explain why some studies DO find it.
March 13, 2009 11:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Anyone who knows diddly-squat about statistics can tell you that studies like this one are BS. There are so many other differences in the employment picture between provinces that it's impossible to attribute differences in unemployment to a single cause. It's like comparing Michigan's high unemployment with the low unemployment in Wyoming and concluding that the difference is due to higher unionization in Michigan.
March 13, 2009 11:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
Such studies generally control for the differences that you're describing using statistical techniques. But it has to involve close conditions, which is why cross-country or cross-era surveys wouldn't be valid.
We progressives use such studies all the time for our purposes (to oppose the death penalty, for example).
We have to expect them to be used against us in the same way, and be ready for them.
Anyway, my comment about Dean's statistical errors still stands.
March 13, 2009 2:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
LOL!
"grapple with studies such as this one in a methodologically honest and accurate way, as we would expect our opponents to do"
You would expect Republicans to use data and results honestly and accurately???
Really, did you mean that as a convoluted sarcastic snark? Your comment is rather muddled to this naive reader. If you're trying to be serious, could you restate your two points without using one to deflate the other?
March 13, 2009 6:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, besides your incredibly reductive logic here, it seems despite your rhetorical claimant to "reasonable" and "valid" methodology, you did not read the study. I did.
Accordingly, the study extrapolates from three provinces; a very small sampling set that allows for cherrypicking. Its akin to selecting portions of the deep south and industrial midwest and using them to create a uniform American economic comparison.
One of the provinces, Newfoundland, was a depressed market -significantly below other provinces - and during the time frame measured saw a huge bust in its large industries. If you are familiar, the oil industry was reeling at the time and, more significantly, the entire fishing industry (a gigantic sector) collapsed due to overfishing. None of these problems were the result of increased unionization.
And in another province, the labor laws changed multiple times, a variable the author does not even adjust for.
Do your homework. The piece was shoddy and your glib response may be even weaker. More informed commenters, please.
March 13, 2009 8:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
yes management had the wrong plan but when they tried to fix it the unions were not willing to help very much they still want to retire at 45 with full pension and all the other benefits that are killing the auto industries of america
March 14, 2009 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
If this is the study that the rightwing is touting, it doesn't point out the effects of NAFTA and outsourcing our manufacturing base (which was encouraged by Bush's DOL Secretary and love muffing of Mitch McConnell, Elaine Chao).
So, if you have a political plan which you are carryint out to destroy the highly unionized manufacturing base, obviously there will be a higher correlation between unionization and unemployment.
So, conservatives set up a system to destroy unions. Yet, there economic policies destroy the economy. So, blame it on the unions!!!
It's just like Ronald Reagan's 9 scariest words, "I'm from the government and I'm here to help." Because the conservatives want to destroy government, they make a shitty government and then say, "See how terrible government is?"
March 16, 2009 8:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
There are good reasons to think that unionization creates unemployment (and there are better reasons than high unemployment to think that unions are a bad idea for society as a whole; but that's a different argument).
Of course, the best argument against the Employee Free Choice Act is that it curtails the freedom of employee choices. It's a way to evade the secret ballot, and make it easier unions to coerce employees into joining a union, or a particular union.
March 13, 2009 3:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
Uh, no.
"Card check" exists under current law. It's just that, under current law, the employer can veto the card check result and demand a NLRB election. Not the employees, the employer. This is what El Presidente calls "freedom of employee choices" which EFCA would, supposedly, "curtail." What EFCA does is put that decision back in the hands of employees, rather than the employer. El Presidente can do his best to try to spin that as a "curtailment" of employee choice, but he knows that what's actually going on is a "curtailment" of an employer's veto power over the employees' choice.
Next Republican talking point, please.
March 16, 2009 4:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
Folks,
The comparisons of unionization and unemployment rates between Canada and the U.S. and the U.S. now and the U.S. 40 years ago were of course just examples to show that higher rates of unionization are not always associated with higher unemployment. We have done careful analysis showing that there is no correlation when other factors are accurately controlled for http://www.cepr.net/index.php/publications/reports/are-protective-labor-market-institutions-really-at-the-root-of-unemployment-a-critical-perspective/
More importantly, the OECD found the same result in a thorough analysis of the issue. The point is that this is not a new research topic, nor does this paper find any especially original way to examine the issue. It would be very foolish to accept the results of this one study over a large body of research by neutral parties that finds the opposite.
March 13, 2009 4:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Dean, these people are just anti-labor and anti-union. There's no point talking sense to them.
March 14, 2009 2:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
well I don't know about the studies but a good example of what unions can do is the auto industries. they are union right
March 13, 2009 8:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
but a good example of what unions can do is the auto industries
What exactly did unions do there?
The Big 3 had a business plan that worked under two conditions - a gallon of 87-octane under $3, and people buying SUVs - and only in America. Even with the federal tax code allowing owners of small businesses to depreciate almost the entire value of a SUV, the Big 3's business plan couldn't survive gas at $3.01+. The union didn't get to tell management that they were fucking stupid to yield much of the rest of the world to foreign competition, and to build cars that would be small and extremely fuel-efficient for Chinese and Japanese urban centers. Management decides what to build and when.
The Big 3 should fire a lot of their employees, but the ones that should go wear suits and ties to work.
March 14, 2009 12:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, it's great example for sure.
Ya know, when the UAW started designing the cars and making all the management decisions everything went south for the American auto industry didn't it? What utter, uninformed bullshit. Sorry, but that's what it is.
March 14, 2009 2:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
As a former UAW member, I have mixed feelings about all of this. I'm a Class B Machine Tool operator, and in the 1980's, I worked for a company that made parts for many of the big auto companies. The job I was doing at the time--operating lathes, chuckers, drill presses, etc.--was hardly what I would call skilled labor. And yet I was being paid as if it was. My high wages and the wages of my fellow employees helped to drive the cost of American-made automobiles up for everyone. Meanwhile, Japan was driving down the cost of their automobiles and driving up the quality by automating line processes wherever they could. In the U.S., the UAW prevented much of this automation, thus delaying a desperately-needed modernization of the U.S. auto industry. Which, of course, was a contributing factor in the rapid rise of the Japanese auto industry, as American buyers turned to cheaper, higher-quality cars manufactured in Asia. Since those days the Japanese have seen import tariffs level the playing field, but who's driving Congress to impose those tariffs? I'll give you a clue: sometimes the UAW and the Big Three like to share a bed.
I'm oversimplifying of course, but so is Mr. Baker. This stuff ain't so easy. Employment is one factor we need to consider. But the influence of other equally important factors is felt over decades and over generations. We need trade unions when we need them. But I'm personally convinced that most of the time we don't need them.
Flame on.
March 14, 2009 8:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
Actually...
Some of what you say is unambiguously true. But you leave out maybe the single largest factor in the destruction of the US auto: high interest rates and too strong of a dollar.
When Paul Volcker and Ronald Reagan used high interest rates to quell the '80-81 recession, they raised interest rates to roughly 20 percent, which in turn made the dollar a high and american products too expensive. Imports became incredibly cheap and the US trade deficit and its exports (e.g. cars) were no longer competitive. The exchange rates were too high for the US to compete.
So, lest we forget, public policy played a significant role - as usual.
March 14, 2009 12:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
And what's the current excuse? :)
Please refer to the battle between the unions and non-union automakers for an example of what I'm talking about. Workers need unions when workers are being abused. But these days, American businesses don't need to abuse American workers, because there are plenty of workers overseas who are only too happy to receive the abuse (and the paycheck).
The problem for America is this: we want high wages AND cheap goods. There's a disconnect there that most Americans would simply prefer to ignore. You don't get paid 35 bucks an hour to make 150 dollar television sets. You get your cake, or you get to eat cake. Not both.
March 14, 2009 1:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
So one day a worker wakes up, realizes he/she is being abused and forms a union?
You haven't worked much have ya? The nature of capitalism is to abuse workers and the evidence of the previous 30-40 years makes that abundantly clear. As the influence of unions has waned the wages and income of all workers have stagnated and/or declined. Why? Because capitalism unrestrained does that. Unions are always necessary and benefit our country. The protect the interests of workers and prevent abuse of workers from the natural inclincation of management to overwork and underpay them.
March 14, 2009 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
What? You had a summer job and you thought you were overpaid?
March 14, 2009 2:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
I would note that just because I may be making more money than a prison worker in Myanmar doesn't necessarily mean that I'm overpaid.
What an insulting argument it is when we are told that we, as workers, must be willing to settle for the lowest level of pay offered on the global market in order for our economy to be "competitive." The best response I can manage for such a suggestion is to invite the "free market capitalists" to "Pogues Mahone!"
In the interest of stability in markets, If the multi-nationals wish to ship manufacturing jobs overseas then don't try to sell those products back into this market. Use that domestic labor instead to build that economy by selling the products to them, just as it was done in building our own economy. They can't afford it, you say? Then you should be charged with colonial abuse of the most un-patriotic (and I'd say criminal) kind for failing to provide a sustainable wage.
hrbendorf DOES have a legitimate point regarding the contradiction of wanting both union scale wages and Wal-Mart prices. Here, again, it is the Unions who have always taken the lead on the "Buy American" issue.
Finally, as regards "We need trade unions when we need them" one needs only look at the trends the last thirty years, wherein the middle class standard of living has regressed proportional to the decline in union membership. This is no accident, and says all you need to know about "needing unions when we need them."
Solidarity! It sure beats standing with hat in hand expecting the boss to grant me three wishes. At best, you may get "trickled down" upon, as if by an elderly gent with a prostate problem. At worst, you can watch your job go overseas to the lowest bidder and the economy eventually grind to a halt as too many consumers are converted into little more than indentured servants.
Now, don't get me started! :O)
March 14, 2009 2:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
All hail SleepinJeezus!!!!!
March 14, 2009 3:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
"one needs only look at the trends the last thirty years, wherein the middle class standard of living has regressed proportional to the decline in union membership."
I'd need to see your proof on that one. First, I'd need to see the data that shows how the middle class standard of living has regressed. Then I'd need you to explain how you came to the sure conclusion that a decline in union membership was absolutely the cause of any hardship among the middle class. Because the way I'm reading it, what you're saying looks a lot like folk logic to me. I'm pretty sure I could come up with an equally convincing set of stats to prove that the decline in union membership was caused by the shift of manufacturing jobs to other countries. And that, of course, has nothing to do with unions.
March 14, 2009 4:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
From Bureau of Labor Statistics
In 1983, the first year for which comparable union data are available, the union membership rate was 20.1 percent, and there were 17.7 million union workers.
This points out the decline in Union membership over the last 25 years, both in terms of percentage of workers and in actual numbers. I will post the stats on income growth and inequalities later as I access them.
But I can grant your point when you say "the decline in union membership was caused by the shift of manufacturing jobs to other countries. And that, of course, has nothing to do with unions."
It is my point as well. Sending jobs offshore to gain lower wages, to then turn around and try to sell the product into this market is not sustainable. You cannot support a consumer economy without producers AND consumers. The cheap labor route strongly undermines the latter.
March 14, 2009 4:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Sending jobs offshore to gain lower wages, to then turn around and try to sell the product into this market is not sustainable. You cannot support a consumer economy without producers AND consumers."
If that's true, then we're doomed. America's days as a producer of goods are, for the most part, over. Globalization has seen to that. Just try to convince most Americans to buy an American-made television set (there aren't any, but for the sake of argument, let's pretend there are) at two or three times the price of one produced in Taiwan. Ain't gonna happen. You can put American flags all over the thing, tell the consumer that they're helping to create jobs, hire a marching band--whatever. If the price is too high, the product won't sell. We want our wages high and our products cheap. And that IS unsustainable. Unless we're effectively hiring slave labor to produce our goods. And, of course, we've got to find other ways to make our living.
Sooner or later, American business will run out of poor economies to exploit. The pattern repeats over and over again. We've used America up. The southern states are still a possible source of domestic cheap labor, but it's getting tougher all the time. Japan? They're mostly done. Korea? Same story. Now we're into Singapore, China, India. Soon we'll be building factories in Nigeria and Ecuador. But the one thing we won't be doing is building factories in America. Not unless American consumers become willing to pay more or American workers become willing to earn less. There's no other way. The days when unions were important are drawing to a close.
Q: How many teamsters does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A. Thirty-seven. You gotta f**kin' problem with that?
March 14, 2009 4:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
A link to an article that illustrates both sides of the issue fairly well:
http://www.chicagoteamsters.org/news/2005/0616_marina179.html
"We were underpaid and underappreciated. This was a job that no one wanted before the union came in," said Jacquez. "This job used to start at $6.50, and when we got the first Teamster contract the wages jumped. We are now making $16 an hour. I’m sure people can understand why we love the Teamsters just for that reason alone."
And I'm sure your customers, who are undoubtedly paying triple what they were paying, love the Teamsters too.
March 14, 2009 5:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
BS. Median income (thats smack dab in the middle of the middle class) rose just over 20% in constant dollars from 1976 to 2006.
2006 median income was $48,201
1976 median income was $39,961
Both figures in 2006 dollars.
Actually, the rise in middle class income is proportional to decline in private sector unionization.
Source:
http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/histinc/h06ar.html
March 16, 2009 11:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
The forces opposed to unions have always been lying, cheating, greedy scum. It's that simple. You can't trust a word they say.
In the face of their lies I suggest the whole nation chant the following:
U.S.A.!
U.S.A.!
U.S.A.!
U.S.A.!
Unions Strengthn America!
March 14, 2009 11:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
Nice. Thanks oleeb!
March 14, 2009 12:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, right. Try the musician's union sometime. Try to figure out precisely what benefit you're receiving from paying your dues to those hoods. Or better yet, try playing in a union venue without showing the union goons your card. Do you know anything at all about the Teamsters or the Longshoremen's union? Apparently not. You make it sound like they're noble organizations or something.
March 14, 2009 1:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
They are, in fact, noble and with all due respect, I don't think the musicians union is very representative of either a typical labor union or the sort of worker that is represented by them.
If the members of the musicians union wanted to change how it operates they could do so. That they might run it like an old time craft union is a choice made by the members. For those who are members who treat the union as something done to them instead of participating in it's governance I don't have much, if any sympathy. You never see them refusing union wages or benefits. Typically, those are the people you find whining about everything in life and always being the naysayers.
For those who are not union members and whine about "union goons" I have no sympathy of any kind and have only this to say: join the union! If it weren't for "union goons", many of whom lost their lives fighting on behalf of all workers including the slackers who complain while enjoying the benefits of their efforts, this country would be much worse off than it is right now and most of the people who call themselves members of the middle class would still be peasants (rural and urban) as their ancestors were a mere 100 years ago. Thank God for "union goons"!
March 14, 2009 2:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
By the way, referring back to the world our grandparents lived in is sort of silly, don't you think? As far as I know, Google and Microsoft have never been union shops, and I don't think their workers have suffered too much.
March 14, 2009 2:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, as a matter of fact. It's as relevant now as ever.
March 14, 2009 3:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
"They are, in fact, noble..."
http://www.google.com/search?q=teamsters+organized+crime
http://www.google.com/search?q=longshoremen's+organized+crime
March 14, 2009 2:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
For every criminal act committed by a union worker on behalf of workers there are ten thousand such acts done by management daily. Your argument is completely bereft of any substance. You're just antiunion. Now go and put your head back up your butt where it's obviously comfortable.
March 14, 2009 3:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
You know what? Re-read this thread. Re-read what I wrote. Then re-read what you wrote. Then ask yourself a question: "Why am I acting like such a frothing jackass?"
I made a few perfectly reasonable observations, based upon my personal life experience. I'm fairly certain that's allowed here. Settle the fuck down, OK?
March 14, 2009 3:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
You know, I asked myself that question and the answer I come up with is that I'm not acting like that. I think you're projecting pussybunny. And it comes from the fact that you just hate unions and won't be honest about it. Anti-union crank.
March 14, 2009 6:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
I was proud to work as a Teamster.
I was also compelled to join Teamsters for a Democratic Society (TDU) in an effort to address some of the corruption within the union.
The newspapers love the old stories 'bout Vegas and mobsters and the Teamsters and all. Makes for some really good copy. And some of it true, too! I was in the neighborhood in Chicago when Allen Dorfmann was shot and killed in broad daylight. Can't say I mourned his loss, either.
But it's interesting to note that as it effects a worker the worst of any corruption was found in the local business agents who were successfully solicited with bribes to work for the company instead of the workers/members. You'll note there are TWO corrupt parties in that transaction, and I'll still prefer standing together to gain our place rather than awaiting trickle down from those who would buy their way out of negotiating a fair contract with me and my union bros. and sisters..
Which side are you on?
March 14, 2009 3:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Are you claiming that the Teamsters are now corruption-free? :)
March 14, 2009 3:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Not at all! Wish it were so!
But even at the height of Teamster corruption, it was far better to be a member of the Teamsters than it would have been to just await the largesse of the trucking companies. That's my point. Even a CORRUPT union serves the workers interest better than no union at all. And if there is corruption, it is up to the membership to deal with it, along with the Feds as necessary. (That was my reference to TDU.)
You seem to scorn history, and that is too bad. If you look at the staus quo ante' to unions (yes, even the Teamsters, Longshoremen, and Musicians Union) you can gain an appreciation of just how important unions have been in fundamentally shifting the power dynamic between employee/employer. Read The Jungle. Read Grapes of Wrath. Read about Reuther, and Darrow, and the Haymarket Riots. You'll see how important the unions have been, and you cannot help but see their relevance today as that dynamic has almost wholly shifted back to the companies in this multi-national economy.
March 14, 2009 3:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree that unions can serve an important function in the workplace. But I've worked plenty of union and non-union jobs, and it hasn't been my experience that union shops necessarily treat their workers better than non-union shops, or that the benefits were better or that anything was better. In many cases, in fact, non-union shops are superior. If they're not, then it's up to the workers to decide whether they want to seek better employment or unionize. The history of unions has been that they tend to protect workers who either don't have the skills to find better employment or who live in communities where there are limited choices. In my case, I chose to quit my UAW job and find something more challenging, even though it meant taking a cut in pay. My UAW job was filthy grunt-work. For which I was overpaid. That's my personal experience.
March 14, 2009 4:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
I appreciate your experience, and I have heard similar arguments all my adult life. Ultimately, we may need to simply agree to disagree.
One last question, though. If there were no prospect for UAW to unionize the foreign automakers' plants here in the U.S., do you really think they would be paying the high wages they are? Or would they be more in line with the low wages (I call it subsistence wage in many cases) more commonly found to prevail in the manufacturing/labor sector in the regions in which they are located?
I believe any honest answer to this question lays out the impact of unions even on non-union workers, and even stands as an argument in favor of closed shops, which you mentioned earlier.
I'm also curious by what standard you would determine you were overpaid in your UAW job without testing it in the marketplace. It is collective bargaining, after all, that comes the closest to the "free market" method of determining what labor is worth, once rules are in place and enforced to level the playing field and prevent extortion on one hand or exploitation on the other.
March 14, 2009 4:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
"One last question, though. If there were no prospect for UAW to unionize the foreign automakers' plants here in the U.S., do you really think they would be paying the high wages they are?"
I believe manufacturers always pay the lowest wage possible. That only makes sense. The reasons foreign automakers opened plants in the U.S. are complicated. There was the 25% tariff on light trucks (which was expanded to include truck parts when the Japanese began shipping chassis to the U.S. and assembling the trucks here). There was the Clinton 100% tariff on Japanese luxury automobiles. But here's another thing to consider: Japanese workers don't work cheap anymore. They used to. But the success of the Japanese auto industry has driven wages up in that country, which makes it more economical in some cases to pay workers in the American south (where the cost of living is relatively low) to produce autos for the American market. And you can't automatically assume that American trade unions have driven wages higher in non-union shops without also conceding that American trade unions are responsible for higher consumer prices. Which leads to demands from workers for higher wages, etc., etc., etc. It's my contention that consumers are the most powerful driving force in all of this--not the unions. And American consumers want to drive wages down--not up. People who say they support trade unions should never complain about the price of anything, because to support higher wages and better working conditions for workers is to support higher prices in the marketplace. Americans need to choose. But to see the unions as some sort of magical solution is to view things in a really narrow way, in my opinion.
March 14, 2009 5:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
"In my case, I chose to quit my UAW job and find something more challenging, even though it meant taking a cut in pay. My UAW job was filthy grunt-work. For which I was overpaid. That's my personal experience."
Your honesty is refreshing, but your point suffers from it. You also said this:
"As far as I know, Google and Microsoft have never been union shops, and I don't think their workers have suffered too much."
Could it be that you simply see the grass greener on the other side? If you considered your UAW job "filthy gruntwork" but see no possibility of any IT worker suffering at all, how can you say you were overpaid and unchallenged by the job you so badly wanted to avoid and so diametrically the opposite of one you view as pleasant. I apparently wouldn't have to pay you hardly squat to challenge your lilly white hands and brain, but please don't bitch at having to pay union labor rates for stuff that you pretty much admit you think is beneath you. Try driving around in your avatar car, throwing your trash into your computer's recycle bin or getting your next pair of pants teleported to you.
If the people who make laws, run US companies and perform professional services in the US can run up their income through any legal means available to them (you don't have a problem with the US Congress, BAR association, the ADA, the patent or copyright offices or the thousands of trade associations do you?) then please shut up when the friggin' workers who make, move, fix and build the shit we all need and use want a piece of the action as well. BTW by any measure the workers incomes have been going up much slower than non-workers
March 15, 2009 6:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Quite so!
March 14, 2009 6:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Are businessmen corruption free?
March 14, 2009 6:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
"For those who are not union members and whine about "union goons" I have no sympathy of any kind."
And what about for those who ARE union members?
March 14, 2009 2:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Already ansered your queary above but you didn't read it.
March 14, 2009 3:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry pussyrabbit but you're just an anti-union crank. Don't have time for that crap.
March 14, 2009 3:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
I meant for this to be a reply to the whining above. Sorry for the error.
March 14, 2009 3:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Don't have time for that crap."
Are you sure about that? Because you seem to have invested some in convincing me that I'm wrong. I've belonged to three unions in my lifetime. And I didn't join a single one of them by choice. I was forced to join in order to gain employment. That's the way the unions operate. Call me a crank if you like. I might counter that you sound to me like a pollyanna. Unions are a sometimes-necessary evil. There's nothing good about them. They serve a function in the workplace when they're needed. The rest of the time, they serve to enhance the bank accounts of the union bosses. Don't be so naive.
March 14, 2009 3:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep, you're a crank. Anti-union crank.
March 14, 2009 6:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, and I would add you are a very sanctimonious crank indeed. But still, nothing but an anit-union crank.
March 14, 2009 6:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
I do find it interesting that while having a conversation about something you disagree that you find it perfectly okay to call someone names for disagreeing with you. In a civilized conversation you can agree to disagree without verbaly assaulting someone with whom you do not agree.
You are not a good representation of unions (or maybe you are) as many of us have found that you are the union with which we have had to deal.
I will save you the trouble. I HAVE BECOME AN ANTI UNION CRANK. I will support no effort that strengthens a union as I have found the collective stregth of the union to be a protector of people who do not want to work and a bully of those who dare to question them. Life experience is hard to argue.
March 16, 2009 11:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
You cannot possibly imagine how little I care about your sanctimony. I'm tired of having to listen to you anti-union people who are perfectly happy to allow others to suffer because of your own personal distaste for unions. Whatever the personal reasons for your envious crankiness, you're nothing but allies of injustice in your self-centered, uninformed crankiness.
March 16, 2009 2:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
For those who want some statistics, I've put together a few charts that you can examine.
Does Unionization Matter?
I used the available data across time and across countries. The thing that one can see from examining the charts is that there is a high degree of correlation between the strength of organized labor and the degree of economic equality in a country. There is also a strong connection unionization and wages and earnings.
The anti-union faction in this country likes to predict the end of civilization, but we see things going just fine in other countries despite the strong power of organized labor.
When the data doesn't support your propaganda either ignore it or lie about it.
March 15, 2009 11:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
Great job, Robert! This really needs to be posted as a separate post. Please consider it. Great info and very helpful visuals.
March 15, 2009 11:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
Unionization and the labor movement are issues that were part and parcel of the platforms of early progressives and most Democrats during the late 19th century and the first half or more of the twentieth century.
From the postings about unions here on TPM that immediately find a vocal group of critics among a very liberal/progressive audience, I can only conclude that the anti-union forces have won.
Progressives like to fancy themselves way more like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs than their local union business manager, or welder or electrician.
I admit I am biased. My education was paid for in full by a labor union. I have been a union member for my entire working life and my salary and benefits are much higher than non-union workers in my trade in my area. But honestly, how can you people buy this sh*t?
Here's some anecdotal food for thought about unemployment and unions: I work in an area that is very lightly unionized - 200 to 300 active members working compared to estimates of 3500 to 5000 workers earning a living in our trade in the area.
I often go into supply houses and run into small groups of workers chatting about this or that. Common is the discussion of how a certain task or job was awarded to a union outfit at the building owners discretion and the work was performed slower and/or at a higher expense (in their view) than necessary by the union outfit. I can't help but point out that these guys are complaining about people who are quite willing to pay more for what they have to offer, and the people who are doing it are getting paid more to furnish it. It's a little like hawkers of counterfeit Rolex's getting pissed at the people who want to buy the actual Rolex, and the folks who make and sell actual Rolexes.
Another common rant is that their shop is "the best in the state". When I politely point out that when their wage and benefit packages for a top level "go to" guy is comparable to just the rank and file plain vanilla jouneyman in a union shop where top talent can make considerably more, and somehow the union shops still manage to edge them out and win some jobs, it's inescapably true that either the union shops are more productive or the non-union shops are shaving off more overhead and profit or a combination of the two. Lower wages allows them to win business, but it's rarely the employees who see the benefit of this advantage.
In what is the backwardist, most ironic harp on union shops non union guys say "yeah, but we don't get laid off when work is slow." You see non-union shops know that it's the steady weekly pay check and ANY form of health insurance that most endears the US worker to his employer, not the amount of the pay-check, not the quality of the health coverage, not even the employers adherence to wage and hour laws. When you are paying someone through a bean blower and the competitor who sets the market pays the full freight, you can afford to keep them on the payroll for the 20% of the year you actually don't need any real work out of them. The guy working for a union shop who goes through normal layoffs and rehires in the normal contractor work cycle makes the same money working 80% of the time.
March 15, 2009 5:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
The facts of the matter are that after watching two of my three sets of parents get shafted by unions, it continues today, I wouldn't work for a union unless there was no other choice.
The only one of my parents that didn't work for a union is the only one that has had a retirement that they could count on.
One is in the midst of the car manufacturer's mess now, and none of the talk has been addressing the fact that they worked for a set amount and the union promised a set retirement. That agreemnent was not even lived up for the first year of retirement. The dues that they paid would have been better spent in their bank account, then they would still have that money today.
The health insurance agreement is a total joke and now that the government tells them how much they can earn they are hard pressed to keep up with the increased expense of staying insured. I will be glad when they age out and can choose to work more to keep their standard of living at 72 I am sure that going to work more is a thing they look forward to... At least they still have their health and that is an option they can pursue.
March 16, 2009 10:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Points have been made that economies deteriorate with dropping union membership. Considering the growth in the total economy since 1980 that is obvious nonsense. Just look at revenue to the IRS over time, versus the growth of the population.
In discussing job loss one point that union proponents tend to ignore is productivity. Employment in the steel industry has dropped over 80%, but shipments last year were close to the levels of the 70's. As for the benefit of union membership, four of the main producers in the US, all unionized, went bankrupt less than eight years ago, trying to cover the cost of impossible legacy costs. At the time their non-union competitors were profitable, and paying profit sharing bonuses to the hourly workers. Bethlehem had one employee for every six retirees. Both sides assumed they could pass the benefit expenses on to the consumer because there was no external pressure from non-union shops when the original plans were drawn up. In fact steel prices in constant dollars have dropped off a cliff, compared to the 70's, so they couldn't. once the unrealistic programs went away the jobs came back. Same problems with the auto companies now.
A color TV made by Zenith in suburban Chicago by union labor thirty years ago cost $400. A better set costs $200 now. Want to go back to what we were paid 30 years ago so the Zenith guys could keep their jobs? Of course not.
The US is still the largest manufacturing economy in the world. The percentage of the population needed to do the work has dropped over the decades, since we are also one of the most productive workplaces in the world, so union programs, which were focused on big industry, have been clobbered. In most stable industries I see no benefit for a good worker to be in a union. The main benefit is for the marginal to poor performer, who uses the union to coast at the expense of his/her coworkers. Once upon a time a worker had little choice about jobs, but now, thanks to cars, government programs and the Internet a new job is mostly a matter of getting out and finding one. It's tougher right now, but that will change eventually. Forcing an employer to pay unrealistic compensation for the work is a good way to send more work overseas or buy more robots, or just close the company.
China has two big advantages for now, a cheap labor force and almost no business taxes. The small fact that they are a one-party dictatorship keeps the labor cost down, but the main reason they get a lot of investment is the low taxes. Their long-term political stability is in question now, since a lot of workers have been laid off. The labor riots will be interesting to watch this summer.
If union membership is such a good thing why is it not a single steel minimill company has been organized, and the only auto company to go union is Mazda, which is part of Ford? With most of the bureaucrats at the department of Labor being Democrats, if there was any real evidence of union busting they would have been such fines they would have moved back to Japan.
March 16, 2009 5:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
To champion those hurt most by the "free fall" (to quote Dean Baker elsewhere) in the economy, and to open a major new flank in the battle for the Employee Free Choice Act, labor should launch a coalition to organize and advocate for the unemployed and underemployed:
From last week's story "For a Union of the Unemployed"
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/3/11/133013/148/675/700032
March 16, 2009 5:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's a great idea, having the unemployed force employers to negotiate by withholding their labor!
Truly the inmates have taken over the asylum!
March 16, 2009 6:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
oldsteelmaker says "having the unemployed force employers to negotiate by withholding their labor" - that is not what the linked story is about at all and you know it. Either he didn't read it, or he did and it kind of freaked him out.
March 17, 2009 2:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Unemployment rate continue to surge on many parts of the state since recession starts. The economic situation resulted to many job losses, recessions, and foreclosures. Unemployment rates increased in many parts of the world especially in the USA since the recession begun. Unemployment isn't pleasant to think about, and is very unpleasant to endure. Some people wonder just where unemployment is the worst. Well, I can tell you which cities that unemployment is the highest in the U.S. El Centro, in southern California, has 25.1% unemployment. (To be fair, most work there is seasonal agriculture.) Merced, California, is just over 20%. Yuba City, also California, sits at 19.5%. The only non California city hit with high joblessness is Elkhart-Goshen, Indiana, with 18.8%of people living off credit cards during this recession. California's stats are inflated due to seasonal unemployment, as it revolves around farming. Still, that's a lot of people that can't get payday loans due to unemployment.
May 6, 2009 12:38 AM | Reply | Permalink