Beating ‘Right to Work (For Less)’

Labor Victory (image by HarryStaab)

The wave of government attacks on unions that has been growing across the country has the ultimate goal of abolishing unions entirely. Unions drive up wages for workers, which is a good thing, but it pisses off bosses to no end. Unions are also major contributors to the Democratic Party, which pisses of Republicans (and a lot of bosses) to no end, too. One of the tactics being used to destroy unions is to enact “Right To Work” legislation, more aptly named “Right To (Work For Less”) because it has the tendency to drive down wages by making it harder for unions to organize and maintain membership and to collect dues from existing members.

In a remarkable victory for workers in 1978, the National Right-To-Work Committee’s Missouri initiative was defeated by a 3-2 margin. Missouri Republicans have been at it again, trying to put together new “Right to Work (For Less)” legislation last year. 12 other states are also threatening to pass similar anti-union and anti-worker legislation.

In a recent piece in Labor Notes, Jerry Tucker, one of the organizers who helped defeat Missouri’s 1978 attempt at Right to Work (For Less), discusses some of the lessons from that campaign. I’ve included just a few excerpts, with my commentary in italics:

“Missouri in 1978 looked like a good target for the “right-to-work” forces. An industrial union stronghold with many characteristics of a Southern state, a RTW victory there could have a domino effect. Missouri would put organized labor’s unity and power to the test. Initial polls showed RTW passing by a 2-1 majority, and even union members were 51 percent in favor. State labor officials favored a legal strategy, and had no plan to reach union members—much less the communities beyond labor. We had to turn that around.”

It is significant that RTW seemed initially to be a done deal. The mainstream union bosses today are much too quick to look at data like this and accept it as a fait accompli, rather than buckling down for the tough fight. The fact that so much of the public today seems to be buying the anti-union rhetoric and jumping onto the anti-public sector worker bandwagon is very similar to the fact that 51% of Missouri’s unionized workers initially supported RTW. When overwhelmed by propaganda from the bosses, it is sometimes difficult see the truth buried underneath.

“The United Labor Committee, a statewide body with representatives from the AFL-CIO, UAW, Teamsters, and Mine Workers, raised $2.5 million to run the campaign against right to work. Twice the committee requested donations from member unions equivalent to 50 cents per member. Some unions asked locals or internationals to cover the donation. Some, like the UAW, went directly to the membership—which had important benefits. Members were educated about the campaign and gained a personal stake once they reached into their own pockets.”

Similar fundraising efforts may need to be replicated today. However, with a much smaller percentage of the workforce currently unionized, this will be much less effective than in 1978. The face to face meetings with members was probably much more significant than the actual money collected as it has the potential to amplify the message each time a member learns the facts and gets inspired to be more active. One of the most efficient uses of limited union funds today is to train and mobilize large cadres of organizers who can go out and meet with workers face to face, including non-unionized workers, whose support is desperately needed in all fights for labor rights, wages and benefits.

“Rank-and-file unionists were the mainstay of the campaign. In fact, some couldn’t seem to do enough, and at the outset thought their leaders weren’t doing enough. While the labor committee was still ramping up, members were acting on their own. They set up meetings, visited the merchants with whom they did business, painted signs on their cars, and worked the polls. . . New member organizing spiked upward for several years afterward.”

The last line here is important. Getting workers excited and motivated is key to winning a campaign. Keeping that energy going after the campaign has ended is always a challenge. People want to go back to their lives. They may feel burned out. They often believe that their activist work is done. Right now, there are so many attacks on workers that it is crucial to build up the excitement and mobilize workers to fight these attacks. The energy is certainly growing, especially in states where Republican governors have made explicit threats (e.g., Wisconsin, Ohio, Idaho, Indiana, Tennessee). These threats are still looming. There have not yet been any decisive victories for workers (except, perhaps in Illinois, where legislation to ban public sector workers from striking was withdrawn). So the struggles must continue.

What if we win? What happens next? Will we allow all that excitement and energy to wane and then wait for the next attacks? A much smarter strategy would be to start making long-term plans and looking at bigger, more impressive goals. The short-term strategy must obviously be to protect our rights to strike and collectively bargain, but it should also include protection of wages and benefit. No more one step forward and two steps back. Medium term goals must include recruiting more workers into unions and building union strength back up to its previous levels (or higher). Once we defeat the local anti-union initiatives, non-union workers will see the power and benefits of being in a union, while those who were active in the struggles will feel empowered and feel motivated to help in the organizing.

Medium-term goals should also include fighting for improvements in living standards. Each year the productivity of American workers increases, while profits soar, yet our living standards have steadily declined and the wealth gap has increased. We should demand higher wages, much higher, combined with higher taxes for the rich, not only to erase the budget deficits, but to turn them into surpluses that can be used to fund education, health and social services.

Long-term goals should include fighting for an end to poverty, and to wealth, as well as an end to bosses and to wage slavery itself. We should be organizing for shorter workdays and longer vacations and weekends. We should be fighting for universal health care, housing and food, an economy that prioritizes human needs, not bosses’ greed.

Mandatory Paid Sick Leave: A Boon to Workers and Bosses

Image by Christian Tae, 11, Clifton, VA

While the ruling elite ratchet up their assault on unions and worker benefits, a new study just came out indicating that mandatory paid sick days benefit workers and bosses. San Francisco passed a Paid Sick Leave Ordinance (PSLO) in 2006 (approved by 61% of voters), the first such law in the country. Under the law, workers in small businesses can earn five paid sick days per year, while those in larger businesses can earn up to nine.

The Institute for Women’s Policy Research issued a report on the ordinance, San Francisco’s Paid Sick Leave Ordinance: Outcomes for Employers and Employees, in which 1,200 employees and more than 700 employers were surveyed. The report showed that there was virtually no impact on the businesses, while there were huge benefits for employees. Two-thirds of the employers surveyed said they now support the PSLO. Virtually none saw any decline in profits and two-thirds said they had no difficulties with implementation of the law.

Contrary to the paranoid rants of bosses, workers do not generally abuse paid sick leave. In the San Francisco study, workers tended to use sick days only when they were really needed, with a median usage of just three days per year, despite having the right to as many as nine days, while 25% of workers did not using any of their sick days.

An employer benefit of paid sick leave is that workers use it to actually take care of their illnesses, before they become serious or life threatening, thus reducing the amount of time away from work. Every day that workers stay home, even without compensation, employers lose productivity and profits.



Despite the benefits of the law, enforcement has been lax, with somewhere between 25% and one-third of San Francisco employers refusing to comply with the law. Some are failing to provide the paid time off. Others are demanding documentation beyond what is required by the law, thus intimidating and bullying employees out of using the benefit. Even so, San Francisco workers are lucky. Most workers do not belong to unions, which fight for basic workplace rights like paid sick leave, or live in liberal cities like San Francisco, where voters support the rights of workers. Only 60% of private-sector workers have paid sick days. Of those who do, millions are not allowed to use the sick leave to care for sick children or family members.

California: Tops in Advanced Placement, Teacher Abuse

California spends 20% less on education per pupil than the national average, ranking 47^th in education spending. Yet more students in California are taking Advanced Placement (AP) exams and more low income students are passing them than in most other states, according to a new report. And the numbers in California have been improving. In 2006, 28.6% of California seniors took one or more AP exams, 27% of whom were low income. Last year, 34% seniors took one or more AP exams, 35% of whom were low income. Nationally, only 21% of low income seniors took an AP test last year.

The first thing that should strike people from this data is that California schools are improving, not getting worse. We have set high expectations for our students and more of them are meeting these expectations. All the hoopla over deteriorating schools and incompetent teachers is a delusion, a bogeyman to justify privatization schemes, not a solution to a real problem. Sadly, these statistics are unlikely to get the Ed Deformers to back off.

Anti-taxation activists might look at this data and say, “We’re getting better results with less money. Our policies are working. Let’s continue to underfund schools.” When examined through a business lens, it appears California is getting greater productivity from its education workers than other states. However, a more honest way to parse this is that teachers, being committed to their students’ wellbeing, are allowing themselves to be squeezed for the sake of their students, working harder and longer despite wage and benefit cuts, furloughs, and overall compensation stagnation over the past three years.

Rather than being proud of this or encouraging it, we should be ashamed and fighting to reverse this trend. Not only is it abusive (or more abusive than in the past), it is not sustainable. More and more teachers are getting out of the profession and fewer are interested in becoming teachers because of the declining conditions and pay, while those who continue to teach are becoming burned out and will eventually max out their productivity or even resist and undermine the increasing demands.