Recently union members marched in protest against the National Labor Relations Board in Washington DC and in front of nineteen regional offices, demanding that the board “close down for renovations.” It was hard to know if the protestors were simply being shrill or just plain silly. Their efforts were certainly frivolous and inept.
Organized labor is apparently upset that its membership rolls have dropped dramatically since the 1950s. During that decade more than 35% or workers were unionized, and today that figure is 12%, which represents many governmental workers.
And now that the terms of three of the members of the NLRB will soon expire, organized labor is worried that President Bush might appoint new members who will be pro-business. Organized labor believes that if they shout loudly enough, they can force Congress to object to any appointees chosen by the president.
Rather than looking at the themselves as the source of their problems, organized labor is blaming the NLRB for its diminished influence. It is obvious to all but the most myopic union officials that the union message no longer offers much promise to workers.
Yelling and protesting will not augment union membership rolls. Indeed, until organized labor realizes that its future lies in developing a cooperative partnership with Corporate America it will continue to lose members.
Throughout the years, following a strike, long-time strikers could return to their jobs. In such cases, management had to fire replacement workers, for the replacement workers were considered at-will employees who could be terminated for any reason.
Now the National Labor Relations Board has ruled that workers who went on strike for economic reasons such as wages, hours, and benefits, can be replaced and need not be re-instated following a strike.
In order to keep replacement workers as permanent employees and not re-hire workers who went on strike, management and replacement workers must agree that the worker’s hiring was meant to be permanent, not just for the period of the strike,
This represents a major pro-management decision for Corporate America, and it removes a once effective weapon from organized labor’s arsenal.
The U.S. Chamber of commerce recently warned its members that organized labor is determined to try and return Corporate America to the bad old days of the 1950s when unions confidently dictated their demands to management, and if those demands were not met, unions could bring entire industries to a standstill.
In a recent article in the Dallas Morning News, for example, pilots, flight attendants, and other employees at American Airlines have stated they want to get back everything they had negotiated away in previous labor agreements.
This trend amongst militant labor unions will only serve to make America less competitive with foreign companies as well as helping to bring the economy to the brink of a recession, which all responsible leaders are working to avoid.
Unions not only want a return to obsolescence, but they also want to organize the entire labor force and control as many boardrooms as possible. Their treasuries are brimming with money specifically earmarked for upcoming political campaigns so that they can also control our political institutions.
As a result of labor’s revived militancy, Corporate America must fight back. If it does not organize as well as the unions have, it will find itself in a precarious and defensive position in the years to come. Unions must be challenged in the courts, before the SEC and the NLRB, and in Congress. Finally, Corporate America must educate its employees about the benefits of a free-market economy and lower taxes, two objectives that unions are against.