Op-ed column: Labor needs right to form unions

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.dailygazette.com/news/2009/feb/22/op-ed-column-labor-needs-right-form-unions/

SANDRA McANANY

Nancy Ohanian/Tribune
My brother was recently terminated from his factory position after missing two days of work due to a foot injury. He did not have a year with the employer to be protected by the Family Medical Leave Act and, unfortunately, there was no union at the factory to help protect his interests as an employee. There was nothing to prevent the employer from terminating him or other employees for an absence, even though he had a doctor’s excuse. This same story is repeated daily across the country.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ annual membership data (Jan. 2008), only 17,243,000 (13.3 percent) of workers nationwide are protected by unions. In New York, the percentage is higher: 26 percent, or at 2,146,000 workers. This leaves millions of people in New York and across the country at the mercy of their employers, without any protection from adverse actions, without adequate salaries and benefits and without hope for their economic futures.

Costs to society
There are costs for society as a whole when employers are not unionized.

We pay the price for the 2,130,793 (18 percent) of New York adults, age 19-64, who do not have health insurance. We pay for the health-care costs for the 1,530,564 (32 percent) of New York children enrolled in a Medicaid program. We also pay a price as a society for the 424,798 (9 percent) of New York children with no health insurance coverage at all.

Some 51 million people nationwide and 3.7 million in New York are in households under the federal poverty level. Without adequate income and health insurance, life can quickly become a matter of surviving from paycheck to paycheck. Unions within the workplace could help to change these statistics, which would not only help workers and their families but would also indirectly help every New York taxpayer.

Under current regulations, when employees want to unionize, an employer can call for a separate election for employees to vote on unionization, even if a majority of the employees have signed union authorization cards. This allows employers the opportunity to intimidate their employees, to force them to attend anti-union sessions and to terminate employees who are active with the unionization efforts.

FULL story at link.