Unions And The Right To Work

Labor: If unions were formed to protect workers from employer abuse, right-to-work laws were created to protect taxpayers and workers from union abuse. States with such laws enjoy higher growth and purchasing power.

With Wisconsin still under siege by the "angry mobs" of bused-in union workers, the Ohio of GOP Gov. John Kasich is the next target of those opposed to restricting the collective bargaining rights of public-sector unions that have bankrupted state after state. Ohio's SB5 also aims to address a similar Buckeye budget deficit in the billions and the anchor of state-funded union pension obligations.

Bills in the Indiana House by Republicans who gained a majority in November would go both Wisconsin and Ohio one better by making Indiana a right-to-work state, removing the requirement that workers pay union dues.

Those who have assembled the mobs of Madison are motivated more by the Wisconsin legislation's impact on coerced union dues than they are by "worker rights."

Curbing union power in 22 other states are right-to-work laws under which workers, taxpayers and states do better and enjoy more freedom. Right-to-work states limit the ability of Big Labor to organize and forcibly collect dues from employees. Wisconsin, Indiana and Ohio are not yet among them.

According to statistics compiled by the National Institute for Labor Relations Research, real personal income in right-to-work states grew 28.3% from 1999 to 2009 vs. 14.7% in forced-unionism states — almost double. Disposable income in right-to-work states stood at $35,543 per capita in 2009 vs. $33,389, and growth in real manufacturing GDP jumped 20.9% from 2000 to 2008, compared with 6.5% in forced-unionism states.

Unions And The Right To Work

I see the continued scam of conflating "public worker unions" with "private sector unions."
Exactly the same as the fraud of lumping legal immigrants and illegal immigrants together.

That public employees are the main cause of fiscal meltdown at all government levels is beyond dispute.

PUBLIC EMPLOYEE UNIONS.

The argument that I keep hearing made by the hysterical legal criminals is that union membership is a right. When public employee unions are handed the power to paralize a city a county or a state, neutralizing the duties of elected officials and frustrating the delivery of those necessities that government is expected to provide, things must change.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the unacceptabilty of that under any circumstances.

That was true in FDRs time, 75 years ago, and no more acceptable today.

JFK screwed up big time, allowing public employee unions. But the old warning is just as valuable today as ever : Those who don't remember the mistakes of the past, are condemned to repeat them.

In a little-known letter he wrote to the president of the National Federation of Federal Employees in 1937, Roosevelt reasoned:

"... Meticulous attention should be paid to the special relationships and obligations of public servants to the public itself and to the government. All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. It has its distinct and insurmountable limitations ... The very nature and purposes of Government make it impossible for ... officials ... to bind the employer ... The employer is the whole people, who speak by means of laws enacted by their representatives ...

"Particularly, I want to emphasize my conviction that militant tactics have no place in the functions of any organization of government employees. Upon employees in the federal service rests the obligation to serve the whole people ... This obligation is paramount ... A strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intent ... to prevent or obstruct ... Government ... Such action, looking toward the paralysis of Government ... is unthinkable and intolerable."

A private enterprise union can bankrupt a business large or small, but can never paralize and bankrupt a city or a state.

Those who have assembled the mobs of Madison are motivated more by the Wisconsin legislation's impact on coerced union dues than they are by "worker rights."

I don't know if anyone else caught Gov Walker statement but it isn't just the union dues. At least in Wisconsin, unions have their own health insurance which people, who are forced to join the union, must buy. When the state suppliments the employees' health insurance, they are paying into the union coffers. The unions jack up the price of the health insurance so that it costs the state and union workers far more then a free market plan.

This isn't just about union dues. It's about forcing people and the state to suppliment the union fat cats.

Another logical inference is that if the public sector is kept small (as it should be) - the civil servant who feels that he is not getting paid as much as he is worth is free to seek employment in the private sector. Ditto if he feels “oppressed” by rules he must abide if in the public sector.

On the other hand - government has a vested interest in ensuring that companies and workers (and worker unions) have the ability to balance competing needs (and costs) and improve rights while balancing profitability. If a union gets the upper hand - a company might go out of business and both loose. If a company gets the upper hand - it might loose talented employees to other companies, and loose out.

But public sector provides an unholy alliance between workers and politician (of the left-leaning stripe) - who help elect the people who sit on the other side of the bargaining table, and rather than protect the taxpayer, the politicians take “legal bribes”.

I think that it would be totally fair to prevent ANY donations from public sector unions or public sector workers as part of any efforts to fix public policy!

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