Labor Day just is not what it used to be.
Labor
Day is supposed to be the American alternative to May Day--the international
celebration of workers on the anniversary of the 1886 Chicago Haymarket Affair
where violence ripped through a peaceful demonstration for the right to an
eight-hour working day. Labor Day is
supposed to be celebration of American workers and all they have done. It is Aaron Copeland's Fanfare for the Common Man set to the calendar. At one time Labor
Day was also a celebration of and for labor unions. But sadly there is little to celebrate
today. If anything, Labor Day,
especially with so many people who work, now represents the war against unions
and working class Americans.
People
forget why we have unions. The last 150 years of American history is the battle
of workers and unions against corporations. America in the late nineteenth and
early twentieth century was the country of
trusts. It was the emergence of
the railroads, steel, big oil, and monopolies.
It was also the era of sweatshops, child labor, adulterated and unsafe
foods, and the six day, 70 hour+ work weeks.
It was also the era of piecemeal below subsistence wages, poor working
conditions and high injury rates, no health benefits, no retirement benefits,
and no protections against discrimination and harassment. It was the world of Upton Sinclair’s The
Jungle. Unions were illegal, and workers who stood up for their rights were
beat up by the Pinkertons–company hired security–or arrested by the newly
created public police forces which were created to control and brake
unions.
No
one should wax romantically for this era if you care about workers and the
people. The American economically may
have grown exponentially, but it did so unevenly, producing massive fortunes
for a few but significant economic inequalities for the rest. The America of the early nineteenth
century–the one that Alexis De Tocqueville so famously described in his Democracy
in America as one characterized by a general equality of conditions–had
vanished. By the time the stock market
crashed in 1929 the income and wealth gap in America had literally produced two
Americas: One was the country of F.
Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, the other of the depression-era
novel The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck.
The
1935 National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) or the Wagner Act brought relative peace
to the labor market in that it recognized the right of workers to collectively
bargain. The NLRA established a process
for how to unionize, organize workers, hold elections, and bargain for
benefits. It was a victory for workers,
but also for the American people and the economy. The Wagner Act was part of the New Deal, it
was one element in a package of legislation to restructure the economy and fix
the market failures in the economy.
The
NLRA had more than an economic purpose or impact. Many of the economic problems in America are
political. They are produced by
asymmetric political power between corporations, the rich, and rest of the
people. Unions at their best can be what
Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., once called the countervailing power to help limit the
power of businesses and corporations.
The Wagner Act thus reset the political equilibrium in American politics
to help favor the people.
And
it worked. Labor density and
unionization in America dramatically increased in the United States, peaking in
1954 with over 35% of the workforce collectively bargained. But what did unions accomplish? There is powerful evidence first that they
brought tremendous economic benefits to American workers and the economy. They produced the minimum wage, the eight
hours, five day work week. They improved
workplace safety, gave us health insurance, retirements, and workers
compensation. They raised the standard
of living of most Americans, often even those not in unions. They also helped
bring more economic equality to the economy, significantly erasing the
disparities of the Gilded and Robber Barron eras. Unions grew and flourished at a time of significant economic growth, and
there is little hard data to show that they caused rises in unemployment. America's post WW II affluence is tied in
with unions.
But
in addition to the economic benefits that unions bring, there was a political
aspect to them. Unions were part of the
Democratic New Deal coalition. The
strength of the Post World War II Democratic Party dominance was tied to
unions. Unions got out the vote and they
did so to the advantage of Democrats.
But
many employers, conservatives, and Republicans hate unions. Even many workers, especially white collar
professionals, share this animosity, thinking they are better off on their own.
Almost from the day the NLRA was passed opponents sought ways to circumvent the
law. The found ways to fire striking
workers and replace them. They harassed
and fired organizers, they found ways in court to delay or challenge
elections. They claimed unions hurt the
economy or restricted individual freedom and passed right-to-work legislation. Yet unions remained a potent force in
American politics until President Reagan became president and signaled with the
firing of the air traffic controllers in 1981 that it was okay to go to war
against the unions.
It is
bad enough that a war is being fought against unions, but that battle extends
to workers across the board. The current
Supreme Court in cases such as Dukes v.
Walmart has made it harder for workers to sue for sex discrimination or if
one is over 40, to prevail in an age discrimination case. Companies continue to cut benefits, use part
time workers, or engage in other practices to make it difficult for workers to
earn a decent wage.
As
Barry Bluestone and Bennett Harrison tell in The Great U-Turn, the
Reagan era war against unions was part of a strategy along with deregulation
and tax cuts to restructure the economy.
It was also part of a political restructuring of American politics. The strategy has largely worked. Overall, less than 12% of all workers are now
in unions in the United States, with only 7% of the private labor force
collectively bargained.
The
decline of the American income in the last 30 years goes part and parcel with
the decline of unions. In the last thirty years the American economy has seen a
dramatic increase in the gap between the rich and poor such that it now mirrors
that of the 1920s. According to the
United States Census Bureau in 2010 the richest five percent of the population
accounted for 21% of the income, with the top 20% receiving over 50% of the
total income in the country. This
compares to the bottom quintile accounting for about 3% of the total income.
A
second study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in 2010, drawing
upon Congressional Budget Office research, found that income gap between the
top one-percent of the population and everyone else more than tripled since
1973. After-tax income for the top
one-percent increased by 281% between 1973 and 2007, while for middle class or
middle quintile it increased by 25%, for the bottom quintile it was merely
16%. Looking beyond income to wealth,
the maldistribution has not been this bad since the 1920s. According to the Institute for Policy
Studies, in 2007 the top one-percent controls almost 34% of the wealth in the
country, with half of the population possessing less than 3%.
Opposing
unions and workers costs families money.
There is a significant difference in median family incomes in states
that are right to work (RTW) versus those that are not. Using a three years average median family
income for 2009 to 2009, RTW states have a median family income of $46,919, non
RTW it is $53,418Ba difference of $6,499 or 13.9% per year. Testing for the statistical impact of RTW on
median family incomes, the relationship is -0.4. This means there is statistical evidence that
RTW is associated with lower incomesBRTW
depresses wages. If all of this does not
demonstrate a war against unions it definitely does reveal an attack on
workers.
Yet
Americans have been convinced unions and workers' rights are bad. They resent successful unions that pay better
wages than they receive instead of organizing to bring themselves up to that
level. We live in a culture that
worships the Donald Trumps and MBA-led management teams, yet these are the
people who brought us the economic crash of 2008, gross mismanagement of the
economy, and the mass layoffs that frequently dot our workplaces. For many middle class workers, the image of a
surprise visit to your cubicle by a HR person with a box telling you that you
are fired and have one hour to clear out your desk is all too real. Yet despite this, Americans continue to
believe that they are better off without unions and worker protections.
Fixing
the NLRA is a must to yet again reset the economic and political imbalances in
the law. Some claim that unions are no
longer relevant or that their corruption has led to their own demise. There is no question that unions need to
clean up their act and support meaningful government reform, but there is also
evidence that many people do want to organize and want representation in a
union. If it were easier to organize,
perhaps more people would have health care even without Obamacare, or maybe
more people would have retirement pensions.
At
the federal level, unions made fixing the Wagner Act a top priority in 2008 and
2009 with the Employee Free Choice Act.
The law would have streamlined organizing and holding elections. While initially as candidate saying he would
support such changes, President Obama never pushed the Act when the Democrats
had control of Congress, and now the chances for its passage are dead. Perhaps the most important structural reform
of the economy Obama could have made, he simply ignored.
It's
hard to make the case that Labor Day is a celebration of workers anymore. Today ain't what it used to represent and
that is bad for all of us.
You are absolutely correct about labor's history in the U.S., and about Reagan. In my opinion, his presidency was disastrous for this nation on multiple levels.
ReplyDeleteI think that reinstating the labor laws of the 1950s, and a massive restructuring of campaign finance laws is needed to truly create a fully functional economy and democratic government. What do you think?
(Just found your blog. Recommended to me by a friend.)