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The Right to Work Shot Heard Around the World Won’t End Well for Conservatives
The people calling themselves ‘conservatives’ are full of glee over what Americans for Prosperity (the same Koch-funded group behind Walker’s assault on workers) is calling the “shot heard around the world” – also known as the Michigan Republicans shoving an ALEC/ Koch funded kill unions bill down the people’s throats in the heart of the American union.
They gloat. It’s what they do. But what they don’t see the long-term impact of what they’re doing.
The unions have been dying for years. The orchestrated ALEC-based hits on collective bargaining in Republican-led states was no doubt meant to be the deathblow.
But instead, it has sparked ongoing debate about the point of unions. Many Americans who never had a reason to think about unions before are now aware of the issue. So while it pains me personally that Republicans did this in my home state, taking aim at all my Grandfather worked for his entire life just weeks after he passed away, I see an opportunity here.
This is the time to talk to your friends and neighbors about why the union was started, what collective bargaining rights have to do with human rights around the globe (collective bargaining is recognized internationally as a basic human right), and how the union isn’t Big Boss, but rather teacher Dad and line-worker Mom and electrican Brother, etc, and how unions actually help the market self-regulate.
Worker-friendly states (those without “right to work” laws) have higher incomes on average and better working conditions. An NEA study concluded, “Eleven of the 15 states with the highest poverty rates are RTW, while nine of the 11 states with the lowest poverty rates are worker-friendly.” If that doesn’t get it, how about a discussion regarding productivity? An analysis of gross domestic product per capita shows that worker friendly states “appear to be significantly ‘more productive’ than the RTW states.” Furthermore, “12 of the 14 most productive states are worker-friendly states, while five of the six least productive states are RTW states. The median GDP per capita for the worker-friendly states is $41,529.50, compared to $38,745.50 in RTW states.”
The premise of unions is very simple. When there are two sides negotiating something, the side with the most power does not have to give. Who has the power in corporate America? The boss. Sometimes the boss is a nice person, sometimes not. But depending upon the benevolence of a person is a fickle business.
Even worse, depending upon the benevolence of an entity with no heart and an obligation to shareholders with no moral core is a fool’s game. Hence, by coming together as a group, workers around the world have found a way to have a seat at the table. They hardly have equal power, and what little power they have is clearly resented by the Elite, but with solidarity comes enough power to matter; enough to bargain for a decent wage and retirement — the things CEOs get (though in much greater amounts seemingly due to their inherent “worthiness”) without question. Retention fees, if you will. Or, as a good businessperson might see it, ways to motivate employees and increase morale and output. In fact, “right-to-work” laws may be a detriment when a business is considering moving to a state:
“Right to work is not high on employers’ things to consider when they move to a state,” Dale Belman, a professor at Michigan State University’s School of Human Resources and Labor Relations, said Thursday. “For existing employers it doesn’t provide a benefit and may be a detriment,” he said, because of worsening labor relations in right-to-work states.
Some businesses are run with the idea that good business means less turnover, and less turnover means treating employees as valued commodity. So, certainly not all corporations are greedy vultures. But by design, the market is supposed to temper their greed with their reputations, among other non-monetary assets. This is why you see conservatives trying to sell the idea that greed is good. If, for example, we stop holding corporations responsible for looting their employees’ pension funds, there is no balancing act to the greed.
It’s ironic, but the modern day conservative movement is not conservative at all. They are rigging the market to have no power to self-regulate, in order to feed the greedy hands of the corporations at the top who stand to benefit from a skewed market.
By destroying the very function of the capitalism they claim to not only stand for, but love, conservatives are tolling their own ideological death bell. It’s not unions that wanted to kill capitalism. Unions are a part of capitalism; they are one of the self-regulating forces that can serve to keep “too-big-to-fail” at bay. They are a check, if you will, on absolute power.
No, it’s not unions that are killing American capitalism. It’s the greedy corporations masquerading as conservatives that are killing capitalism – destroying competition from smarter and leaner mom and pops, rigging the market with government subsidies and bailouts, and killing all measures of self-regulation. The public is slowly waking up to this reality — a fact that will not serve the alleged “conservative” cause well. It’s called backlash, and yes, it requires patience and diligence, but it’s real.
Republicans don’t stand for business. They don’t stand for conservatism. They don’t stand for capitalism. They stand for the greed of corporations who seek absolute power with no free market to regulate them.
Unions are part of the free market. Unions are a global part of freedom. Unions, working as a measure of corporate reputation, are a part of what conservatives claim makes capitalism work — self-regulation. What will the market bear, they ask.
I ask, who is the market? The market is the American people. What will you bear?
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16 Responses to The Right to Work Shot Heard Around the World Won’t End Well for Conservatives
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Josh Rachlis
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 2:40 pm
Thanks for the eloquent explanation of the reason for unions. It applies nicely to the current dispute between teachers and provincial government up here in Ontario.
djchefron
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 2:43 pm
I would like to beleive but when you have 40% of your members voting like the chicken asking KFC whats for dinner?Well, you can see why the rethugs are laughing their asses off.
DownriverDem
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 3:34 pm
Gov Snyder is a bold face liar. As recent as last week he said RTW is divisive and not on his agenda. I am literally sick to my stomach over this. Too many folks don’t see how this will affect them. When those making $10 per hour are cut back to $7 per hour, then maybe they will get it. My beautiful State of Michigan died today.
Melanmoney
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 3:36 pm
Very well put, Sarah. Thank you so much.
I’m a former resident of Michigan and a former member (and steward) of both AFSCME and the UAW. I’m absolutely sickened by all of this.
xenubarb
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 4:18 pm
It almost sounds like you don’t think the work teachers do is important enough to fund.
“Extort funds?” Dude, your kids are already morons from underfunded schools, and half of them believe some Magic Sky Dude created a 6000 year old earth.
You get what you pay for, fellow. If you want your kids to be able to apply to a decent college, like Stanford, a half-assed public education is not the way to go about it.
A Walkaway
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 8:42 pm
Underfunded, yes, but the public schools are the solution and not the problem.
The private schools and the homeschoolers are where you’ll find the creationism and crap like that taught. We have to deal with the fallout every year at my school… undergraduates who go into tizzy fits because they hear the bogeywords “Evolution” and “Darwin”, or that science absolutely disproves a literal interpretation of the Bible.
We usually learn after the fact that they’d been homeschooled except for just enough to apply for college, or that they’d gone to a “Good Christian” private school.
(Many of those same students end up appreciating being taught about it, when it’s done right. We tell them (for instance) that you can be Christian and accept that evolution is reality. For the most part the private schools and homeschool texts teach them it’s binary – accept evolution and be atheist, or accept the Bible in a literal sense and be Christian.
Sharon
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 4:39 pm
I voted for Right to Work in OK — our legislature only passed putting it on the ballot. No state legislature should be allowed to pass this bill without a vote of the people of the state. But then the GOP Gov in MI along with the legislature passed a bill that would allow someone appointed to take over elected government in cities, counties, schools, etc. The MI Gov needs to see the unemployment line in 2014. Talk about heavy handed government — MI comes to mind.
I was not a supporter of unions until recently and still don’t support striking for money but frankly the way some business owners are acting, I can understand unions much more today. Koch Brothers at work to union bust in order to pay less wages and benefits IMHO!
A Walkaway
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 8:28 pm
I live in a “right to work” state and when people ask why I support unions, all I have to do is point to the scar on my upper lip and tell them “A boss in a non-union shop did that to me and the church I was attending had me too brainwashed to do anything about it” (official church doctrine – you never sue another “Good Christian in the church).
A major homeless shelter in the region actually teaches their “clients” to accept whatever abuse comes their way in order to keep a job. The caseworker ranted about “pride getting in the way”. When I pointed out the scar and told the caseworker how I’d gotten it, the caseworker started yelling, almost to the point of screaming. She was outraged that someone would actually disagree with her regarding the sort of abuse that people regularly face – or that there are limits to what employers can do.
They don’t like the truth told about the employers. They also don’t want working people to think they have any rights. In fact, business owners go to seminars (by invitation only) on how to help destroy unions and keep people from thinking they have rights in your business. (For instance, they say NEVER to hire someone with a Ph.D. and if they find out that they had, to find some excuse to fire the person immediately because the person had learned to think for his or her self and might get the other employees to think). When I had my business, I was regularly pressured to attend a couple (the other was literally “How to not hire minorities and get away with it).
That’s why everyone should oppose “Right to Work”, because it isn’t, and because if you don’t force business owners to treat you like a human being, they won’t.
Striking for better pay also makes sense when the employer is getting 100-500 times what you make and not only cuts your pay, but sits on his or her ass doing nothing all day, day in day out.
KatzKids
Dec. 12th, 2012 at 8:25 am
The Unions do so much more than strike for money although that’s what the Koch’s want you to believe. Without them, workers wouldn’t have labor laws to protect them, worker safety regulations, getting the correct equipment to do the job safely & efficiently, fair & equitable wages, holiday’s, weekends, vacations, sick leave, maternity leave, the ability to pay into their own pensions & health insurance, and so much more.
People who say “yes, unions used to be good but their time has passed,” don’t have a clue that unions have to fight every day to KEEP workers benefits.
The Corporations are more determined than ever to return us to the days of the Robber Barons, which was what led us to form unions in the first place.
Without the unions, there were no child labor laws & children were forced into working for pennies to help their families survive. Eighteen hour work days – 7 days a week for slave labor wages were common. There was no job security. They could lose their jobs for no other reason than the employer wanted to give it someone else – frequently in their own families or they didn’t smile or bow down enough to their boss. Being a good & hard worker didn’t matter. Safety regulations were non-existent & workers were injured & died every day on the job because of the miserable & unsafe environments they were forced to work in. Starvation, illness, & death were their rewards. Anyone thinking those conditions are not what the Kochs want to bring back is delusional. It’s why they love outsourcing, they have those conditions in the slave labor of other Countries. They want to bring it here because even out-sourcing has it’s costs.
Maranon
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 5:03 pm
Az is a right to work for less money state.
The younger workers are not aware that the
work 8hr day/ 40 hr weeks, was negotiated by the unions long time back, the people also do not seem to recollect the child law protecting minors from working long hours in dangerous situations E.g. the mines.
Ignorance of the struggle of the workers in the past has gone unrecognized and it was what had created a middle class of factory workers.
In Az the only unions are the police and the sheriff dept (no surprise there) and the fire dept.
and nobdy ever talks about dismantling that.
(the bus drivers have one but is toothless)
Yet, unions and fair wages for anyone else, no way…
Terri
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 5:22 pm
That study was more than fair but obviously you didn’t read it. You just attacked the source, which is all you Fox watchers ever do because you don’t understand facts.
What’s the problem with the study itself? They were beyond fair and it wasn’t the only study in the article either, so FAIL.
Thinker
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 6:24 pm
The rights like to gloat? Did you see what happened after Obama was re-elected? Your blue side gloated even though it was not a landslide win.
Unions good? No I hardly think so. The original idea was very sound. However it has degraded into politics and strangling employers to death.
Until unions are as they were intended, not bullies but actually standing on the side of their labourers then why should anyone believe that their downfall is bad?
Shiva (Moderator)
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 6:45 pm
Great cliche speech. However when Rove predicted Romney would win with much the same figures it was a landslide according to him.
You got your talking points in, pointless as they are
harris stein
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 8:28 pm
Talk about gloating, the multi billionaire Koch Roach brothers gloat every time their Americans for Prosperity scam hosts all expense paid duck hunting trips for supreme court justices Scalia and Thomas. Do you suppose they are doing that to put food on the table? Do they donate their game to the local food bank? So I think gloating over President Obama’s reelection is appropriate. He will appoint supreme court justices who won’t engage in conflicts of interest.
So do you think the multi billionaire Koch Roach brothers are justified in smashing unions to bits? If all the corporatists were like the Koch Roach brothers then politics, bullying, and strangulating their corporations is appropriate. Corporatists like the Koch Roach brothers have destroyed the capitalist ethic. Their take no prisoners approach to employee relations and union busting is what has pushed wages down and sent millions of high wage jobs to China and India all in the name of profits. Their desire to repeal wage and hour laws while pushing a philosophy of a free labor market, which incidentally was the way things were done in this country up until 1932 and obviously didn’t work which was why wage and hour laws were passed during the 1930′s, will lead to widespread poverty and is a perversion of the capitalist ethic that Adam Smith put forth in his book The Wealth of Nations. I suggest you study up on neo liberal economics instead of watching Fox News all the time,
The commodification of labor has caused untold suffering here in this country and around the world. Only unions have the clout to force corporatists to respect working people everywhere. Not just in this country but all over the world.
William Taylor
Dec. 11th, 2012 at 10:50 pm
This is one of the best articles I’ve read in a long time.
Bogie Bog
Dec. 12th, 2012 at 12:33 pm
Does anyone not realize that the Kochs and these other assholes deliberately want to trash the United States economy and lower living standards? Eliminating unions are one segment of their plans. They think on a global scale. Raising living standards in India, China and elsewhere in the third world while lowering living standards in Europe and the US will result in easier control of populations when combined with more authoritarian governments who will do the corporate bidding.