Salon.com > Organized labor

Right-to-work doesn’t work

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 21:40:00 +0000

Michigan lawmakers gave final approval today to a so-called right-to-work law, which bans unions from charging mandatory dues, arguing that it will be a boon for the state’s economy. “This is to move Michigan forward. It’s about more and better jobs, and it’s about worker choice,” Republican Gov. Rick Snyder told MSNBC this afternoon.

Right-to-work laws are already in place in 22 states, so do they actually create more and better jobs? We asked some experts to find out and the answer is, well, complicated.

Lonnie Stevans, a professor at Hofstra University who used quantitative models to study the issue, is not bullish on the laws. “Although right-to-work states may be more attractive to business, this would not necessarily translate into enhanced economic verve in the right-to-work state if there is little ‘trickle-down’ from business owners to the non-unionized workers," he told Salon.

Bringing the Apple jobs back home

Fri, 07 Dec 2012 12:45:00 +0000

Tim Cook may not be Steve Jobs, but the new Apple CEO proved this week that he is just as good as the old Apple CEO at getting the media to snap to attention. One carefully calibrated bomb dropped toward the end of a humongous Bloomberg BusinessWeek interview -- that Apple plans to spend $100 million to bring some Mac manufacturing back to the United States in 2013 -- rocketed around the world, from Twitter to the New York Times, in less time than it takes to run down the battery on your iPhone. Who needs Steve Jobs? Real jobs are coming back to America!

The timing was perfect for a growing cohort of economy-watchers eager to make the argument that globalization's malign impact on the American worker has hit high tide and is finally beginning to ebb. Just a week ago, the Atlantic presciently published "The Insourcing Boom," a fascinating in-depth story by Charles Fishman investigating General Electric's decision to start up new appliance assembly lines in the U.S. And "GE is not alone," writes Fishman, arguing that an increasing number of American corporations are discovering it makes economic sense to bring the factories back home. Apple's news was the exclamation point at the end of the Atlantic's sentence.

Vulture capitalism — not unions — killed Twinkies

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 12:45:00 +0000

As the final Twinkies, Sno-Balls and those glowing orange cupcakes were stuffed with cream and wrapped in cellophane on Friday, the business world and much of the news media knew who was to blame for this dying American icon. It was the unions.

The Wall Street Journal described the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union as “The union that brought the 85-year-old baker of Twinkies and Wonder Bread to its knees.” Over at RedState, a headline tried to mix anti-union sentiment with conservative humor: “The Demise of Twinkies? Yes, It’s True. Parasitic Unions Kill Their Hosts (or, in this case, Hostess).”

As Hostess moved to end its operations last week -- a bankruptcy judge asked the company Monday to try mediation with its unions; those talks are scheduled to begin today -- commentators were eager to blame the rigidity of unions.

Labor chief Richard Trumka: “We won’t be taken for granted”

Mon, 12 Nov 2012 15:51:00 +0000

Unions had a good night last Tuesday. “I think we were the margin in states like Ohio, Wisconsin and Nevada, and probably three or four other ones,” AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka told Salon in a Wednesday interview. In Ohio, said Trumka, AFL-CIO members are 83 percent white. 40 percent are evangelicals, and 53 percent own guns. “And they voted 70 percent for Barack Obama.”

Building on last year’s successful referendum campaign to overturn collective bargaining attacks in Ohio, the AFL-CIO racked up 80,000 volunteer shifts and 2 million voter contacts in the state. An all-out labor effort also helped deliver victory for labor stalwarts like Elizabeth Warren and Tammy Baldwin. While unions’ effort to write collective bargaining rights into Michigan’s constitution fell flat, they beat back well-funded anti-union measures in Michigan and California that their enemies would love to take national.