The new right-to-work law in Michigan has been great political theater and may signal an interesting trend for government, politics and the American labor movement.
President Obama’s election in 2008 was hailed as a victory for organized labor. His administration is the most blatantly pro-union in recent history. Yet unions have been decisively defeated in Wisconsin, Indiana and Michigan. More setbacks for unions appear likely as the economic gap widens between right-to-work and compulsory-union states, and as local taxpayers confront the unsustainable costs of public employee unions.
The union response has been traditional picket-line theater with chanting mobs and thuggish threats of blood and civil war: predictable and so 20th-century. The argument that workers will not join unions unless required by law is an admission of weakness. The invocation of union history and the 40-hour week, etc., makes me wonder whether unions have worked themselves out of a job and what they’ve done for their members lately.
State right-to-work laws are significant because our federal system often makes states the bellwether of change. States are leading on issues such as gay marriage and legalized marijuana, and if this trend continues our dysfunctional national government will eventually follow. Limitations on union power may be on the same trajectory.
I’m no fan of unions, but I’d hate to see them disappear because they play a useful role in the private economy as a check on management stupidity. Unions win about half of certification elections, and the threat of unionization is a potent force in keeping employers honest. But they’re a drag on the economy when they kill jobs, block free-trade agreements and bankrupt cities.
Unions are overdue for reform and have an opportunity to re-invent themselves if they choose. There is no reason why unions cannot thrive in a right-to-work environment if they are accountable to their members and make a persuasive case for voluntary payment of union dues. That would be a big change, however: Unions operate like Third-World governments with far less transparency and accountability than corporations, and their leaders are more accustomed to coercion than persuasion.
Unions won’t reform on their own, of course. Union monopolies finance the Democratic Party, and elected officials will use their considerable power to maintain the status quo. One of the ironies of progressive politics is that folks who are pro-choice on abortion are required to be anti-choice when it comes to joining a union or selecting a public school. That makes no more sense than the conservative coupling of economic freedom with Christian Sharia law.
It’s going to be interesting to see what happens.
The picket lines in our future
The new right-to-work law in Michigan has been great political theater and may signal an interesting trend for government, politics and the American labor movement.
President Obama’s election in 2008 was hailed as a victory for organized labor. His administration is the most blatantly pro-union in recent history. Yet unions have been decisively defeated in Wisconsin, Indiana and Michigan. More setbacks for unions appear likely as the economic gap widens between right-to-work and compulsory-union states, and as local taxpayers confront the unsustainable costs of public employee unions.
State right-to-work laws are significant because our federal system often makes states the bellwether of change. States are leading on issues such as gay marriage and legalized marijuana, and if this trend continues our dysfunctional national government will eventually follow. Limitations on union power may be on the same trajectory.
I’m no fan of unions, but I’d hate to see them disappear because they play a useful role in the private economy as a check on management stupidity. Unions win about half of certification elections, and the threat of unionization is a potent force in keeping employers honest. But they’re a drag on the economy when they kill jobs, block free-trade agreements and bankrupt cities.
Unions are overdue for reform and have an opportunity to re-invent themselves if they choose. There is no reason why unions cannot thrive in a right-to-work environment if they are accountable to their members and make a persuasive case for voluntary payment of union dues. That would be a big change, however: Unions operate like Third-World governments with far less transparency and accountability than corporations, and their leaders are more accustomed to coercion than persuasion.
Unions won’t reform on their own, of course. Union monopolies finance the Democratic Party, and elected officials will use their considerable power to maintain the status quo. One of the ironies of progressive politics is that folks who are pro-choice on abortion are required to be anti-choice when it comes to joining a union or selecting a public school. That makes no more sense than the conservative coupling of economic freedom with Christian Sharia law.
It’s going to be interesting to see what happens.
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