Robert Reich: Unions can strengthen America

[babylonsister]

Unions can strengthen America
BY ROBERT B. REICH


Why is this recession so deep, and what can be done to reverse it?

Hint: Go back about 50 years, when America's middle class was expanding and the economy was soaring. Paychecks were big enough to allow us to buy all the goods and services we produced. It was a virtuous circle. Good pay meant more purchases, and more purchases meant more jobs.

At the center of this virtuous circle were unions. 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 that they had to match union wages to compete for workers and to recruit the best ones.

Better wages

Fast forward to a new century. Now, fewer than 8 percent of private-sector workers are unionized. Corporate opponents argue that Americans no longer want unions.

But public opinion surveys, such as a comprehensive poll that Peter D. Hart Research Associates conducted in 2006, suggest that a majority of workers would like to have a union to bargain for better wages, benefits and working conditions. So there must be some other reason for this dramatic decline.

But put that question aside for a moment. One point is clear: Smaller numbers of unionized workers mean less bargaining power, and less bargaining power results in lower wages.

It's no wonder middle-class incomes were dropping even before the recession. As our economy grew between 2001 and the start of 2007, most Americans didn't share in the prosperity. By the time the recession began last year, according to an Economic Policy Institute study, the median income of households headed by those under age 65 was below what it was in 2000.

more...

http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/other-views/v-fullstory/story/892392.html

[baldguy]

1. America is weaker without unions.

America is at a competitive disadvantage without unions.

With unions, the modern industrialized America we need to survive will die, and it will revert to a third-world economy.

[Enthusiast]

2. "will revert to a third-world economy."

And THIS is their aim. Mexican style government looks fine to these "Rulers". The American people have a narrow window to correct this. Sadly, ignorance prevails.

[anonymous171]

7. Yep. The Corporatists want America to become just another bannana republic.

[tavalon]

3. We have an amazingly weak union, but I guess something is better than nothing

I wish we could get a stronger union. I think nurses would benefit from a strong national (likely centered in California) union. But, as I said, at least we have a union, weak though it is.

[bemildred]

4. Unions DID strengthen America, while corporations have gutted it.

Who are you going to trust?

[DanNewman]

5. The 8-hour day and 40-hour week

Reich's books are terrific. Good for him for writing this column.


It's easy to forget the value of unions today, as Studs Terkel points out in this memory:

The bus this day is late in coming. So I said, "I'm going to make conversation with ." So I say, "Labor Day's coming up." That is the worst thing I could possibly have said... He turns to me and he says, "We despise unions."

Suddenly, I fix him with my glittering eye like the ancient mariner, and I say, "How many hours a day do you work?" And he says, "Eight." He's caught! "Eight."

"How come you don't work eighteen hours a day? Your great grandparents . You know why? Because in Chicago, back in 1886, four guys got hanged fighting for the eight-hour day -- it was the Haymarket affair -- for you." And I've got him pinned against the mailbox. The bus , and he's all trembling and she's scared. She drops the Vanity Fair. I pick it up; I'm very gallant. I give her the Vanity Fair.

"How many hours of week do you work?" He says, "Forty." "How come you don't work eighty hours, ninety hours? Because your grandparents , and because men and women got their heads busted fighting for you for the forty-hour week, back in the thirties."

By this time the bus comes; they rush on. I never saw them again. But I'll bet you ... See, they live in the condominium that faces the bus stop. And I'll bet you up on the 25th floor, she's looking out every day, and he says, "Is that old nut still down there?"

[bemildred]

6. "Is that old nut still down there?"

:rofl:
Morans.