The U.S. House of Representatives will vote Thursday on the Employee Free Choice Act – the most important legislation in 70 years to ensure workers’ freedom to bargain for better wages, benefits and working conditions.
Most people have no idea how a union get’s started or what workers go through to form one. The majority of current members got hired by their employer and happily found themselves with all the benefits that come from being united in a union.
Organizing a union isn’t very complicated – but it’s not something you can do alone. It starts when a few people decide they want to stick together to improve their wages and working conditions.
They form a group to educate themselves about the advantages of having a real voice at work through collective bargaining. Over time, the group recruits people from each department and shift to serve on a union committee.
The hardest part is for the union committee to unite a majority of their co-workers behind the basic idea that we’re better off “sticking together” in a union rather than working alone.
That job is made even more difficult when management gets involved by aggressively interfering in the workers’ decision about forming a union.
Although current labor laws protect workers’ right to form unions, employers use both legal and illegal anti-union tactics to persuade workers that it is not in their interests to “stick together.”
Over the last 50 years, pro-management courts have weakened the law so much that union elections are now totally stacked against workers. For example, thirty percent of employers fire pro-union workers during a union campaign. More than half coerce workers into opposing unions with bribery or favoritism.
With such weak labor laws allowing these practices, workers are finding that it’s better to have an agreement with management before the campaign allowing the union committee to gain collective bargaining rights by having an impartial authority check signed membership cards proving the union has majority support.
Once majority support is positively established, then management meets with an elected committee of co-workers to begin negotiating their first contract!
A proposed change in U.S. labor law, the Employee Free Choice Act (H.R. 800) would make it easier for workers to use the “card check” approach outlined above and also win better first contracts. Learn more about it at: www.aflcio.org/joinaunion/voiceatwork/efca or contact me by email at rwilson@local201iuecwa.org
Is it true that under the “card check” system, the identity of the card checkers is known to the organizers (the employee stands there with someone waving the card in his/her face)? I would be concerned that the new law is just cover for organizers to bully the workers they are trying to organize. Secret ballot, please.
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Also, it sounds like you include campaigning by management be “aggressively interfering” with the organizing effort, as if it were itself an intimidation technique.
Simply indefensible. There’s not a single good argument for card check.
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You mean arguments against, other than it allows others to infringe on the individual’s right to privacy when that individual votes. That pretty much sums it up.
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Would you want the head of your county’s Political Party collecting and reading your election ballot?
Besides the fact that most people would take one if they could get one, Krugman and some other pointy-heads make a compelling case that from and economic perspective, unions are good.
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http://blog.aflcio.o…
The only rationalization for ‘card check’ is unions = good, even if a democratic secret ballot might conclude otherwise.
Do you really think a union organizer is going to be able to intimidate their fellow employees more than their supervisors and corporate owners? “On the Waterfront” was over 50 years ago and it wasn’t even true then. How could some newly political hotel maid intimidate her fellow employees more than the boss that threatens to fire everybody who supports a union? Aggressive campaigning by the ownership isn’t simply a matter of competing points of view- its two radically different levels of power- one side is the union who only has the powers of argument and persuasion and the other side is the owners who have the power to take away the employees livelihood.
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I mean thats the whole point of card check- that union organizing can take place quietly without the company going into full bore union squashing mode. Wal-Mart even has a special corporate team they fly into areas where there are rumors of union organizing, I think they even have a manual on fighting unions that they give out to store managers.
And to think, that the unions have no organizational strategies! How unfair!
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The “employer intimidation” angle — frame?– seems to be perpetually stuck in 1933, where every job, no matter how awful, had 50 wild-eyed people desparate to do it, and the employer could flick them in and out at whim.
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But this economy ceased to exist decades ago. Indeed, the manufacturing economy, where the investment in labor was very low relative to capital infrastructure, is gone. In the service industry, even at low skill services like Wal Mart, it isn’t so easy to replace people en masse without destroying your own business.
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We must all be thankful for the labor movement– the bumper sticker “the folks who brought you the weekend” is more true than most people believe– but trade unions have been dinosaurs thrashing in the tar pits for some time now. Emphasis on seniority as a proxy for merit and asinine and confining work rules are obsolete, and most people know this.
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This legislation sure looks to me like labor’s version of Digital Copyright Protection– the desparate attempt of an obsolete industry to preserve itself through legislation.
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Unions need to find some way to adapt to the modern economy if they are to survive. This legislation is just an escape from that reality.
and you might think you were in a 1920s manufacturing mill.
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…open holes with no protective railings
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…working on roofs with no fall protection
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…workers being paid far less than they are owed
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…no unemployment or workers comp paid coverage
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…no overtime
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…immigrant workers SLEEPING ON JOBSITES
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you don’t get it. they don’t have to replace their workforce en masse. the workforce puts up with deteriorating conditions becuase they feel they don’t have a choice. it’s the same most everywhere and the protections that exist aren’t enforced. and if they try to stand up for themselves, they get fired. and protections against that aren’t enforced.
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traditional pensions are gone…because the company can’t afford them.
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401(k) plans are being reduced or eliminated…because the company can’t afford them.
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health care is disappearing…because they company can’t afford them.
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safe working conditions…company can’t afford them.
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real wages (adjusted for inflation) are going down…because the company can’t afford to pay more.
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any tax on business needs to be eliminated…because the company can’t afford them.
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I’m not going to defend every senoirity rule. And a business is not forced to accept every demand of its workers. But collective bargaining is a constructive process that can lead to a more successful, efficient company.
Record profits…CEOs who now earn 43 times their average employee’s pay – or more.
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See: http://www.msnbc.msn…
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Many companies pay 10% or more of their profits in executive compensation.
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It is nothing other than modern day robber barons; only true government regulation or a return of solidarity in union behavior can change this, I think.
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No way. WalMart simply closes unionized stores. Or, if a department within WalMart unionizes, they just close the department like they did to the meat cutters in Jacksonville Texas in 2000 (sorry, I searched for the AP article on a news site, but it’s not around any more).
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The big-box stores have been successful at crushing any union within the store. They’re terrified that if unions got hold, they’d sweep like wildfire. So, they’re willing to do anything to keep them out… close a department, or even close down an entire store. Furthermore, because retail is so fluid, they can usually stall and then stall until some pro-union employees leave, and then replace them with anti-union employees.
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I worked in a big box retailer for a few years, both full time and part time, while between and while in school. I worked hourly, both as an associate and as a department head. As a department head I was trained to be on the lookout for union rumblings and immediately report them to the store manager. The store could have easily shed 60% of its work force in a two or three week span if it “had to”, by hiring, expanding the part-timers hours, and transferring in employees from other stores in the area.
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So, I don’t know if this bill is good or bad, and I don’t know a whole lot about unions. I do know, however, that a big box store has all the leverage, and has enough money and incentive to take a near-term loss on the store to prevent unions from getting a foot hold.
…and, let it be known, Wal-Mart is a massive welfare queen. They negotiate for special local and state tax breaks, including, but not limited to, reduced property taxes and even use of IRBs (tax-advantaged Industrial Revenue Bonds) used to support building of their stores, infrastructure to allow customers to get to their stores, etc., etc., etc. The extent to which Wal-Mart has been given tax monies is absolutely astounding.
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I don’t blame Wal-Mart for taking advantage of taxpayer money that will benefit them–I would, too, if I were in their position. But it is ironic to note that businesses on main street are subsidizing their own demise. Blame government, not Wal-Mart.
…gave up and left Germany after they discovered that they couldn’t avoid unionization.
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Worker protection is much better in Germany than in the US–in a way. Company boards have worker representation, but to some extent that has worked not been as advantageous to the workers as might be expected.
…and demanded a $15 dues increase.
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Gee. Thanks. And it’s all from sticking together, huh?
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Rand – if you have worked for more than 30 days in MA – union or non-union – you are protected from wrongful discharge. Some of the things you cite APPEAR to me national rather than MA issues – appropriate, since this is a Federal bill, but misleading as far as the labor situation in MA is concerned. We have some of the most union protectionist laws in the nation, which is part of why companies are skipping away. Please advise which of your scenarios apply HERE.
does this mean?
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If you’ve been on the job more than 30 days, and the employer fires you, it’s up to THEM to prove that there was rightful cause, you were warned about your problems, you kept doing them, were warned again, kept doing it, and were generally a huge screwup.
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All through documentation that’s dated going back and showing either a clear pattern of screwing up or a few instances of REALLY screwing up. That’s the law, unions or no.
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Now, if in certain cases, the employees with a “they-owe-it-to-us” attitude are the ones forming a union, while the hard workers who are already being rewarded with raises are the ones who’d rather not pay dues when their job is secure to begin with.. guess who’s gonna be being promoted and demoted in that situation? I don’t really call that ‘oppressing the unions’.
Sorry. I hope you find your way back to whatever parallel earth you’re from.
All my experience is anecdotal.
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As far as unions, I’ve found, anecdotally of course, that the laziest employees tend to use the union lawyers the most while the hard workers just do their job and pay the dues that pay for those grievance filings.
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Not that I have a problem with unions, they’re just an institution like corporations, interest groups or the legislature that need to be watched.
…are employees at will. They can be fired absent any cause. The records you describe are maintained mostly to avoid lawsuits and for use at unemployment hearings should the company wish to prove that the dismissal was for cause.
Have the hearing, and the company will have to prove it or pay you a settlement – what’s wrong with that?
In Massachusetts, I can fire you just because I think you’re ugly. And admit it, in writing.
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Perfectly legal. There is no hearing. No review. No settlement. No court case. No options. No lawyer would take your case. You’re out. Bye.
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You only have a case if you can prove I fired you because you belong to a protected class, such as a racial minority, a female, someone over 40, etc. Otherwise, no dice.
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Do you understand now?
You get unemployment and can find a new job, one where you don’t work for a jerk.
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I’m not really in opposition to this union bill, or the idea of unions, although I think they act with a self-preservation first, workers second priority a lot of the time.
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I’m just saying holding employers hostage to their employees isn’t really the solution to job security – look at the unemployment rate in France.
Not “fired” — or am I wrong? The way I understood it, that’s the difference between being allowed to collect unemployment or not.
You have to be fired for “willful misconduct,” last time I checked, in order not to be able to collect.
i think i got the second part of that letter once. but it was from my girlfriend.
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there are a few other exceptions which vary by state. one is “public policy” exemption. ie, company can’t tell you to break the law (i.e., to testify falsely to the gov’t) and then fire you for refusing.
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ironically, the case that created this precedent was when a corrupt union — the teamsters union in cali or nevada, can’t recall — told one of their employees to lie in a hearing, he refused, and they canned him.
But then you get unemployment and the company has to chip in
Laws that are ineffectively enforced and therefore ignored by those they govern are meaningless protections.
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Did you get a raise of $5 a month and dues increase of $15 a month? Or was one hourly and the other weekly or monthly?
And that’s $5 total, not per hour.
I’m not sure that your 30 days description is entirely accurate; employees in MA can be canned for any or no reason, other than a select few verboten reasons, such as being black, or Jewish, or gay. I presume that you mean that union organizing is one of those verboten reasons, which would make sense.
I heard what happened is that there were a lot of construction workers doing road jobs. These crews had a flag guy to slow down passing motorists.
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But then everyone thought — wait a minute. Why don’t we pay cops an extra $100,000 a year on top of base salary to sit in their police cruisers instead of having a flag guy?
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That seemed like a good idea, so a union was created to make this a reality.
Each year, something like 20,000 workers are fired for supporting unionization. I’ve seen first-hand the illegal tactics that anti-union employers use in organizing cammpaigns – not all employers, but many. And then the union brings a charge at the NLRB and maybe a year later the union wins and then goes through another campaign where the employer again intimidates scared workers. I must have been a pretty weak bully myself when I was organizing years ago, cuz getting pro-union workers to sign cards was no easy task.
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And Peter P – could you please direct me to that law that protects workers from wrongful discharge after 30 days? I’ve been involved in employment issues for years – for unions, employees, and employers – but that’s the first I’ve ever heard of that.
But wrongful termination is pretty easy to sue for and from what I hear the burden is on the employer to prove that the termination was right, documentation, proof that the employee was informed of the problem and kept doing it, etc
“I didn’t like the trim of his jib” or “His voice was all nasal.” are valid exuses for the employer.
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Now the burden lies with the fired guy claiming wrongful discharge that that his firing was wrongful– that is, because of one of a very select few reasons that are not permitted, among which are because of the employee’s race, sex, creed, or sexual orientation.
Very recently had to pay unemployment benefits to a guy who most CERTAINLY deserved to be fired just because he brought us to a hearing and someone missed the appointment.
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Now, ok, that was just dumb, but I’m pretty sure if you went to that and said “his voice was too nasal” (bad example in this case, inside sales person, let’s go with the jib one, what’s a jib anyways?), anyways my understanding of it is that if you don’t have any documentation whatsoever to back it up, you’re gonna be forced to pay that person unemployment if not severance for screwing it up.
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A friend of mine was fired from I believe comcast because his boss just plain didn’t like him – he took the guy to a hearing and got 3 months’ pay out of it, took the summer off and lived on the beach.
If an employee is fired for willful misconduct, he or she does not collect. If an employee is fired because he or she is just plain incompetent, the former employee probably will be able to collect. That’s how I understand the law.
“I told him to pick up the phone and make some calls, but he surfed the web instead”
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I guess it can be a little different depending on the situation but basically it’s hard for a company to outright “fire” someone, whereas I completely agree with the idea of businesses being able to lay someone off based on the needs of the business. At least for small businesses. Firing someone for union organizing should clearly be illegal but it’s not like the unions are planning on lobbing softballs themselves – they’re a business too.
this is all anecdotal for me, I’m no unemployment expert.
There may be some apples and oranges discussion here. If not, pardon the likely redundant recap:
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Most employees in Mass are at-will, meaning they can be fired for any reason, or no reason whatsoever.
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If he’s fired for discriminatory reasons: age, sex, religion….then he can sue and win for wrongful discharge and collect back pay.
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If he’s fired for any reason or no reason, he can file and collect unemployment benefits.
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If he’s fired for certain cause (i.e. felonious conduct, larceny of property or services, wilful misconduct, just cause, participation in an illegal strike…) then he can receive no unemployment benefits, although it’s my experience that the Mass rule is that the claimant almost always wins an appeal in these cases.
was what I was getting at.
not getting it.
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The company isn’t paying severance, or a settlement, or any such thing. It’s only paying its share of unemployment insurance benefits. Which is not much.
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That’s all.
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Actually, it is a lot in MA, though whether that is a good or bad thing is something that is worthy of debate.
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But employer’s share of UI is quite high in MA, at least compared to other states.
The employer doesn’t actually pay anything to the dismissed employee; the state does. But the payment may or may not affect the company’s overall UI tax rate, depending on how much it has paid into the system, and how many other people it has recently sacked.
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I used to fire people, now and then.
…when I first clicked onto it, I expected to find out how unions got started. What I found was a description of how workplaces are, or may, become unionized. There’s a difference.
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On various issues raised by the post
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That job is made even more difficult when management gets involved by aggressively interfering in the workers’ decision about forming a union.
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From your bio, it appears that you are a union organizer working at the GE plant in Lynn. I won’t go into the history of GE’s anti-union activity (remember Bulwar?), but one of the ways that GE forestalled expansion of unionization at its plant at Evendale OH (where my father worked before he retired ) was by extending union-negotiated benefits (part of the plant was unionized) to all of the workers at the plant. I suppose that that may be viewed as aggressive interference by some, but I doubt it.
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Over the last 50 years, pro-management courts have weakened the law so much that union elections are now totally stacked against workers.
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Um, not so much. A pro-management and anti-union National Labor Relations Board is the primary culprit. And NLRB commissioners are appointed by the pResident and confirmed by the Senate. In other words, it is the NLRB that has been the primary culprit. And that has been during both Republican AND Democratic administrations, and also while the Democrats could have stopped anti-union NLRB members from being appointed.
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Just wondering.
I’ve seen a number of different numbers thrown around about how many employers fire and how many employees typically get fired (or threatened).
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Here’s one I found with a quick google search that is a little more than a year old.
http://araw.org/pres…
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There’s no reason to believe there’s a huge change in a year. The numbers are inherently difficult to verify in an academic way and honestly, I’m not sure they’re worth much anyway. The existence of this activity is a matter of fact reality for anyone organizing.
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Important points to consider about this specific point:
–companies that get a whiff often threaten and fire workers immediately. therefore, there never is a campaign.
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–if there is a campaign, before firing union supporters employers try to get them out of the voting pool by claiming their job classification puts them outside what the bargaining unit would be. defining the employees that will vote is the first, and often defining, battle in the war.
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–employers only need to fire a worker if they feel the workers have a real chance of winning their campaign. why use the passing game if you’re winning by 30 in the fourth quarter?
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–firing union supporters isn’t always the most effective technique. better to threaten or coerce those on the fence
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–in some industries (like construction) jobsites and employees are inherently temporary. so “firings” can be played as routine layoffs.
by the unions. They’d probably be licking their chops if an employer did this.
The protections you refer to are not effective enough.
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It takes so long to get a wrongful termination or unfair labor practice charge (ulp) through the process that most workers can’t afford to wait it out.
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Employers have money to spend to find out how to not look guilty.
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Company folks, including co-workers, pressure workers to give it up or go away. (Our company, love it or leave it!)
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Responsibilities to families add pressure to just move on with your life.
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True, unions have the willingness and resources to at least fight the fight. Unfortunately, workers often can’t or won’t stick it out. And it’s hard to blame them. And when the workers won’t fight, there’s not much a union can do.
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If you got fired for supporting a union campaign, would you fight it all the way through when the only remedy in the end would be you get back pay and return to a job where they are eagle-eying your every move? And to top it all off, the union campaign fizzled?
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Look around your worksite and count how many of your fellow workers would really be willing to put their jobs on the line to get better wages, working conditions or benefits.
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Surveys say most would like a union. Unfortunately, they can’t or won’t do what it takes to get one.
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All of us know we could go to another job and get higher pay but we like it here.
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I just don’t see the oppression.
I’ve enjoyed the comments and discussion in response to my original posting. Very interesting.
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FYI: Working families scored a major victory on Thursday when the U.S. House passed the Employee Free Choice Act by 241-185! It probably won’t make it past the Senate and it certainly won’t be signed into law by Pres. Bush.
Catch a great video on YouTube showing what a card check certification could look like if the Employee Free Choice Act passed.
http://www.youtube.c…