Fear strikes out: Few takers at anti-union press conference

Big business, fronted by the Louisiana Assocation of Business and Industry, failed to draw a big crowd at a fear-mongering press conference, according to this item in The Daily Report.

The idea was to create an impression of mass resistance to the proposed Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier for employees to win the protections of a collective bargaining agreement.

But the "sparsely attended event" apparently fizzled even as LABI mouthpiece Jim Patterson characterized the proposed law as "a coercion of workers into the union fold."

As Louisiana AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Julie Cherry accurately stated, workplace coercion is generally a function of management, not labor.

Said Cherry about the failed effort to picture workers as bogeymen, “There’s a lot of fear out there about what (employee free choice) means to the employer. We see it as an incentive to sit at the table and bargain reasonably.”

Why Louisiana needs the Employee Free Choice Act

(Hat tip to The Daily Kingfish)

Last year, Louisiana had the fifth lowest median household income of any state in our nation. Not coincidentally, it also had the fifth lowest union density - only 4.6% of the workers in Louisiana are in unions.

Typically, union workers make about 25-30% more than their non-union counterparts. For many hospitality and service sector jobs, the difference between a poverty-level wage and a family-sustaining liveable wage is a union contract. Given these statistics, and the importance of the hospitality and service sector to the economy of New Orleans and the state of Louisiana, it is clear that increasing rates of unionization would lead to a growing shared prosperity - in Louisiana and in our nation.

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Wall Street Journal admission: Employee Free Choice Act doesn't eliminate secret ballots

It must have hurt, but the Wall Street Journal finally admitted that the Employee Free Choice Act now before Congress does not eliminate secret ballot votes in elections for union representation.

Reich: Economy needs unions

Economist Robert Reich has a prescription for what ails the American economy: stronger unions that guarantee decent salaries, health insurance coverage and comfortable retirement for the great middle class.

He makes a compelling case, tracing the decline of middle class incomes - our median income is now less than it was in 2000 - to the decline of private sector union membership.

When unions were at their strongest, in the 1950s, even non-union employers had top pay top wages, Reich writes:

In 1955, more than a third of working Americans belonged to one. Unions gave
them the bargaining leverage they needed to get the paychecks that kept the
economy going. So many Americans were unionized that wage agreements spilled
over to nonunionized workplaces as well. Employers knew they had to match
union wages to compete for workers and to recruit the best ones.

But that was then, and this is now. With union membership at a record low among private sector workers, the median income of most households is lower than it was in the year 2000. And although many workers would like to unionize now, there are serious roadblocks:

Most of the time, employees who want to form a union are threatened and
intimidated by their employers. And all too often, if they don't heed the
warnings, they're fired, even though that's illegal.

For that reason, and for the sake of the economy, Reich supports the Employee Free Choice Act:

The American middle class isn't looking for a bailout or a handout. Most people
just want a chance to share in the success of the companies they help to
prosper. Making it easier for all Americans to form unions would give the middle
class the bargaining power it needs for better wages and benefits. And a strong
and prosperous middle class is necessary if our economy is to
succeed.