Unions are (not!) destroying America
(Editor’s Note: The following is text
from Oregon Congressman Earl Blu-
menauer’s Sept. 14 speech on the floor
of the U.S. House.)
By U.S. REP.
EARL BLUMENAUER
It is unfortunate that we are seeing
an attempt in Congress to scapegoat
America’s unions for the economic
problems that beset us.
After all, it was not America’s gro-
cery clerks, nurses, teachers, postal
workers, and electricians that nearly
caused the meltdown of the economy.
It wasn’t America’s labor unions that
were pushing for tax loopholes that
made our revenue system a hopeless,
inefficient mess. It wasn’t unions that
pushed for shortcuts for worker safety
that produced the tragedies that we have
seen in our mines. America’s working
men and women didn’t engineer poor
loans, cheat consumers, and transform
financial institutions into giant casinos.
No doubt there are some consumers
who took unfair advantage of the sys-
tem, as well as others who were not as
vigilant as they should have been be-
fore the meltdown, but the truth is that
they were part of an unprecedented
economic scheme that played on those
weaknesses, gullibility and often greed,
turning it into a vast industry.
Are there some areas where unions
have been too effective in securing ben-
efits for their members? It probably de-
pends on who you ask about the give
and take of the collective bargaining
process. The leadership structures of
unions are in fact much more demo-
cratic than their corporate counterparts.
Officials are routinely challenged for
reelection, and there are insurgents in
even the most powerful and entrenched
unions — something one seldom sees
in a corporate boardroom. How many
of those directors are defeated? It’s not
easy to even have opposing nominees
through today’s shareholder democ-
racy. It’s much less democratic than
what happens with unions.
There is a very direct remedy in the
negotiation process. I’ve been on both
sides of this issue and I’ve had ups and
downs with some of my friends in or-
ganized labor. For 18 years I was a local
elected official, part of that time re-
sponsible for the collective bargaining
program. I like to think that I bargained
tough and fair. But the point is that I
bargained. I’ve supported collective bar-
gaining rights for public employees
from my first session in the Oregon
Legislature and still believe that honest,
tough, principled negotiation will lead
to the best results. Having somebody
dictate working conditions is not calcu-
lated to enhance productivity. It matters
how people are treated and how they
feel. Employee-owned corporations,
particularly those that also have unions,
illustrate this principle in spades.
One of the best-performing
economies in the world is Germany,
where they still manufacture and have a
huge export market for high-value
products. Germans work hard to inte-
grate labor and business with govern-
ment in the decision-making process,
something that is all too rare in the
United States.
Unions are not the answer for every
employee and every company, but every
employee and every company deserves
to make that choice. The fact is that
even nonunion companies benefit from
the strength of collective bargaining in
our economy. I have had executives at
successful manufacturing companies
candidly tell me that they treat their em-
ployees right because they don’t want
them to unionize. Even these nonunion
companies’ employees benefit from
higher wages, better benefits and a sys-
tem that respects the worker because it
is a strong part of our culture.
Yet, instead of treating employees
fairly by allowing them to organize, far
too many corporations have chosen in-
stead to attack the fundamentals of col-
lective bargaining. It is an art form to
stall, delay, intimidate, and even to fla-
grantly violate the laws of collective
bargaining in this country, weak and in-
effectively enforced as they are. Col-
lective bargaining has been under sys-
tematic attack from my Republican
colleagues in Congress, and Republi-
can administrations have sought to
transform the National Labor Relations
Board into a toothless, passive entity
that is unable or unwilling to protect the
rights of employees to organize. This is
not calculated to produce a spirit of co-
operation, and it is not clear that peo-
ple need to cheat the system in order to
avoid any excesses of collective bar-
gaining.
I would argue the opposite is true. It
is not just workers who benefit from
unionization — it is society as a whole.
It was organized labor that spearheaded
efforts for a 40-hour work week, and it
To The Editor:
Thank you to the NW Labor Press
for Associate Editor Don McIntosh’s
excellent article on prison bread in Ore-
gon and Washington school districts.
What the article didn’t say was that
Don’s 10-month investigation was
most likely a main reason all school
districts in Oregon, and several school
districts in Washington, stopped the use
of prison bread in their school districts,
thus returning that work back to our
Bakers Union members.
Don was repeatedly stonewalled in
response to his information requests.
But I am sure his requests stirred up a
hornets’ nest of concern behind the
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scene. And as a result of Don’s work,
and our Local’s letters, was the return
of work for our members, as school
districts became wary of the public be-
coming aware that they were feeding
their school children food made in a
prison.
Information is power, and I am very
grateful we have the NW Labor Press
where working family/union informa-
tion gets us working family/union
power!
Terry W. Lansing
Secretary Treasurer
Bakers Local 114
Portland
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NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
is not just rhetoric when people say that
unions were the ones who brought you
the weekend. Unions have played a key
role in extending health security to mil-
lions of Americans, workplace safety
to millions of employees, and con-
sumer and environmental protections to
our families.
I don’t pretend that unions are per-
fect, and I’ve had some differences
with them over the years. But make no
mistake: unions are amongst the few
who stand up for justice in the work-
place, protecting the unorganized, and
fighting for a livable minimum wage.
It’s important to reflect upon our col-
lective bargaining system. I’m all for
fine-tuning, but I am adamantly op-
posed to gutting the rights and protec-
tions of workers. We all should start by
acknowledging the debt we owe to
unions, and work to stop this wholesale
assault on the American worker.
Labor Press information has power
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