Bad Policy, Bad Politics

by Tita Freeman

Over the Labor Day weekend, in an op/ed which ran around the country, U.S. Chamber President and CEO Tom Donohue explained the danger posed by card check legislation.  Running opposite Donohue's column, in many papers, was an editorial in favor of card check by Mark Weisbrot from the Center for Economic and Policy Research.  Many of Weisbrot's points were echoed in the Wall Street Journal yesterday by Thomas Frank and were subsequently debunked by the Chamber's Steven Law; but one statement which Weisbrot made has kind of slipped through the cracks of the card check debate:

This law likely would change Americans' lives more than any legislation since the New Deal brought us Social Security. The political influence of millions of new union members would also bring us closer to such basic reforms as universal health care. It's all long overdue.

I think that this statement, more than anything else explains why "Big Labor has one big hope (and $385 million to sell it)". Now no-one is denying that unions are in trouble, as Sally Powless, regional director of American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees Council 8 based in Toledo, puts it:

"Our members are hurting. Our numbers are down. We're organizing just to stay where we were," she said. "We want everyone to be able to organize."

Unions like to claim that the decline can be attributed solely to employer intimidation and a broken election system managed by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).  But even if that were true, if it is broken; why not fix it?  That is the prescription put forth in Slate by William Gould, former chairman of the National Labor Relations Board, and one-time attorney for the United Auto Workers.

Secret ballots to resolve union representation rights are the way to go, and Obama should meet the Republicans halfway by saying so—and then add this all-important coda: Elections should continue only if the law ensures that voting is conducted expeditiously—for instance, within one or two weeks of the filing of a union's petition seeking recognition. This is the case in Canada, whereas in the United States, the resolution of union drives currently takes months and sometimes years.

Union drives may take years - having little to offer requires a lot of selling - but if by "resolution" Gould means "elections", we prefer the facts. And as far as our neighbors to the north, this headline says it all: "Canadians losing their appetite for unions". But casting aside those two points, indeed, secret ballots are the way to go.

American's of both parties will go to the polls in November and vote privately, by secret ballot, for candidates from both parties who they believe can best lead the country.  And yet one party is overwhelmingly in favor of removing this privacy protection from people who want to lead their lives, which in turn leads us back to Weisbrot's comment above.

Does Big Labor view card check as a way to create an entire generation of political leaders who are beholden to them and will support every element of their agenda: more regulation, higher taxes, universal health care and the isolation of our economy from the world?  If so, this isn't a cry for justice, it is a play for power.  In the words of one card check supporter it is a step toward:

the creation and institutionalization of 'positive feedback loops' that will make America a more progressive place, and thus make all other progressive policy more likely to be enacted.

We need more power, workers' rights be damned is an incredibly cynical argument, and ultimately bad policy for bad politics, Clive Cook at The Atlantic explains (my bold at the end):

A secret ballot protects workers who want union recognition as well as those who do not. That is why opposing it arouses suspicion. Membership has fallen at least partly because workers themselves doubt that unions best serve their interests, and with reason. Opposition to secret ballots does not reassure them. It is a self-serving demand, and plays badly with the centrists the Democrats need to bring in. It is bad politics, therefore, as well as bad law.

A broader question is whether weak unions are part of what ails the middle-income workforce. Their decline probably explains some of the wage slowdown--although the most striking aspect of the country's growing inequality is the astonishing growth in the very highest incomes, an unrelated issue. The right kind of unionism can raise wages and advance workers' interests while improving a company's competitiveness. The wrong kind, as the UK knows only too well, can cripple industries and indeed whole economies.

The secret of success, arguably, is a culture of accommodation and non-confrontation. Unions can make it easier for firms to work in closer partnership with their employees, to their mutual advantage. But if the relationship is framed as nothing but a contest over rents--a zero-sum game, with no holds barred--the drawbacks seem likely to predominate. What may concern centrist voters is that Democrats are apt to press the unions' case in precisely this spirit of confrontation. Anti-business sentiment is a dominant note at the convention. EFCA's most enthusiastic advocates would like nothing better than to grind the faces of the bosses. You do not have to be a boss to be wary of that.

Comments

[lauran]

It is a really very nice and interesting article.In my opinion bad policy and bad politics are proportionally related to each other.
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lauran

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