EMPLOYEE FREE CHOICE ACT

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EMPLOYEE FREE CHOICE ACT

• CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES

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Program Goals

• Putting the Employee Free Choice Act Into Context
• Introduction to Current Labor Law
• Employee Free Choice Act what it does and why
• What do business and labor have to say
• Advocacy Techniques, Tips Practice
• Opportunity making Employee Free Choice work

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Employee Free Choice Act

• Three main provisions
• Majority sign up for union representation
• First contract mediation and arbitration
• New penalties for employer violations of labor
  law

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Employee Free Choice in Context

• US is facing most serious economic downturn since
  Great Depression
• Economic Recovery Lessons of the New Deal
• Rebuild the social contract
• Create public policy and social programs that
  serve families and build communities
• Promote economic recovery through economic
  stimulus that invests in infrastructure and jobs
• Rebuild the middle class

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Income Inequality

• 59 of all income growth since 1989 accrued to
  the upper 1 of households and about 35 accrued
  to the upper tenth of that 1
• The shift of income to the upper 1 since 1979
  (their income share rising from 10 to 22.9)
  represents an additional one trillion dollars of
  income for that group
• Between 2000-2006 productivity expanded 20 while
  wages stagnated
• In 2005 almost ¼ of all workers earned
  poverty-level hourly wages more than in 2001
  despite 4 years of overall economic gains

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• At the same time that income inequality has risen
  union membership declined from a high of 35 in
  the mid-1950s to about 12 today. One study found
  1/3 of the difference in the rise in earnings
  inequality between the US and Canada is
  attributable to the much faster rate of
  unionization decline in US.
• Unions tend to shift income to the middle class,
  and low-wage workers enhancing purchasing power
  for a broader group of consumers who would buy
  the products and services they produce.

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Union Advantage

• One study found union workers earn 14.7 more
  than nonunion workers
• Women in unions have 31 higher median earnings
  than nonunion women
• Earnings advantage for African American workers
  is 35
• For Latino workers it is 46
• For Asian American workers it is 8

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• Unions provide other benefits such as health
  care, job safety, retirement benefits, job
  security, workplace voice, and fairness through
  just cause language, and grievance procedures
• Most nonunion workers have none of these benefits
  or protections

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Global Competitiveness

• Most of our global competitors have higher
  unionization rates.
• Of the 20 richest countries, the US ranks 17th in
  hourly pay for production workers in
  manufacturing (BLS). These same trading partners
  account for almost ½ of total US trade flows.
• The key difference is not unionization but the
  burden on businesses and corporations of health
  care costs.

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• US needs to compete not on wages (low road) but
  on innovation, high value-added, high quality and
  high productivity.
• Unions increase productivity through lowering
  turnover increasing skills and experience
  incentivizing employers to invest in new
  technology (labor-saving).
• Union firms with good labor-management
  relationships show greater productivity (less
  labor strife, more worker involvement).
• Current system of unionization is conflict-laden
  with an election process that poisons the
  relationship and if the union is certified spills
  over into the bargaining process.

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Union Membership

• Union membership declined from a high of 35 in
  the mid-1950s to about 12 today at the same time
  that income inequality has risen. This is not
  just coincidence. One study found 1/3 of the
  difference in the rise in earnings inequality
  between the US and Canada is attributable to the
  much faster rate of unionization decline in US.
• Union decline is in large part the result not of
  worker lack of interest, but because of a hostile
  political climate and aggressive Corporate
  anti-union strategies abetted by weak labor laws
  that fail to protect employees as promised.
• Hart Research Associates poll of adults(December
  2008) found
• 75 support legislation that allows majority sign
  union certification
• 64 support stronger penalties for employers who
  intimidate employees who try to form a union
• 61 support binding arbitration to settle first
  contracts.

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• Alan Greenspan (2005) a free market democratic
  society is ill-served by an economy in which the
  rewards of that economy are distributed in a
  way which too many of our population do not feel
  is appropriate .