The Outpost Observer

So-called "right to work" laws are not in workers' best interests

out·post, \ˈaut-ˌpōst\, noun: an outlying or frontier settlement

ob·serv·er, \əb-ˈzər-vər\, noun: a representative sent to observe but not participate in an activity

Saturday, December 22, 2012 

By John A. Ostenburg

Michigan has become the latest state in the nation to enact legislation that limits the rights of organized labor.

The co-called “right to work” legislation approved by the Republican controlled Michigan legislature, and then signed into law in early December by GOP Governor Rich Snyder makes the birthplace of modern-day organized labor the 24^th state to enact such a law. The measure prohibits mandatory union membership, and/or the contribution of “fair share” payment equivalent to dues, by workers in either public or private jobs where collective bargaining agreements exist.

Organized labor long has argued that it the negotiation of contracts on behalf of the persons represented by a legitimate collective bargaining agent is a costly process, as also is maintaining the day-by-day assurance that the collective bargaining agreement is followed. As such, since it is the workers who ultimately benefit from both the negotiations and contract enforcement, labor maintains they should be required either to contribute union dues or the equivalent in a “fair share” payment.

In effect, what the new Michigan law does – just as do similar laws in the other 23 states – is require the union to expend its resources on behalf of the workers without the workers themselves contributing one penny toward the process. While some workers bear the burden, others get a free ride.

During the 15 years that I was a staff member for the Chicago Teachers Union, I wrote many articles about how the CTU gained its collective bargaining rights with the Chicago Board of Education. It was a long and arduous process, beginning when the CTU was organized in 1937, and not reaching fruition until 30 years later in 1967. Then came a 20-year period during which repeated strikes finally resulted in fairly decent wages and benefits for all the teachers and support staff in CPS schools. The strike this past year was the first one since 1987, but again the results of that walkout benefited ALL teachers and staff in the system, not just those who are actual members of the union.

None of that was cost-free. Someone had to pay the bill.

Fortunately, Illinois law requires all employees in a unionized setting to contribute their “fair share” toward union costs. If they don’t want to be members of a union – for whatever personal reasons they may have – they have that right. However, they don’t have the right to ride on the back of their fellow workers by not contributing to the costs of the good work being done on their behalf by union representatives.

Unfortunately for Michigan workers, that’s no longer the case in that state.

What’s even more unfortunate for Michigan is the fact that the new legislation appears to be nothing short of a vendetta against organized labor. Governor Snyder has stated publicly that he formerly opposed such “right to work” laws. What made him change his mind? He was angry with Michigan unions because they placed a measure on the ballot for last November’s election that would have constitutionally outlawed such legislation.

The measure apparently cost Governor Snyder’s wealthy corporate friends approximately $32 million to defeat. Those friends obviously complained to the governor about how much they had to spend – dollars that otherwise could have been used to support the candidacies of right-wing Republican candidates – and he caved in.

As President Barack Obama and others have stated, “right to work” is a misnomer. In states without such laws, no residents are denied the right to work. If they find an employer who wants to give them a job, they have the right to take it, and usually do. If they work in a unionized setting, however, they must contribute to the costs that the union accrues during the process of representing them and assuring their workplace rights. In fact, therefore, workers’ rights are better protected in the states that do not have so-called “right to work” laws than they are in the states with such laws.

If one studies the history of organized labor in the U.S., it is obvious that the greatest period of growth in union membership came after the great depression and the difficult economic times of the early 1930s. For the past five years, the country has been suffering from the greatest economic downturn it has experienced since that earlier period. Might those who are supporting laws that limit the power of unions actually be fearful that union membership will begin to grow again as the country comes out of the current economic malaise? Could that be the real reason behind all the anti-union legislation that’s being proposed by the Republicans who represent corporations over workers?

If it’s “rights” that we’re concerned about, then let’s start talking about the “rights” of the workers: the right to negotiate for fair wages and benefits, the right to protections in the workplace against discrimination, the right to legitimate status as part of the middle class, AND the right to have everyone in their workplace contribute fairly and evenly to the costs associated with assuring those conditions.

Isn’t that the true American tradition?

John A. Ostenburg is in his fourth four-year term as mayor of Park Forest, Illinois, and formerly served in the Illinois House of Representatives. He retired in July 2010 as the chief of staff for the Chicago Teachers Union after holding various CTU posts over a 15-year period. A former newspaper reporter and editor, he also has been a teacher and/or administrator at elementary, secondary, community college, and university levels. E-mail him at [email protected].

Leading "ugly" not the answer for organized labor

out·post, \ˈaut-ˌpōst\, noun: an outlying or frontier settlement

ob·serv·er, \əb-ˈzər-vər\, noun: a representative sent to observe but not participate in an activity

Friday, November 18, 2011 

By John A. Ostenburg

Public employees’ unions got a shot in the arm on one day, and a sharp stick in the eye on the next. 

The resounding vote of support for the right of public employees to organize and bargain collectively that came in Ohio on November 8 had a little of its shine diminish when only days later a video of Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) President Karen Lewis – making less than even remotely professional comments before a large gathering of social justice educators – was splashed across the internet and television news channels. In the video, Ms. Lewis makes fun of the speaking manner of U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and also brags about her extended pot-smoking during her college years.

Viewing the video is like watching an elementary school child challenge a playmate: “Your mother wears combat boots!” Or perhaps an adolescent bragging to teenage companions about getting away with an illicit act. But Ms. Lewis shouldn’t be emulating a small child or an adolescent; she should be showing the kind of leadership that negates all the unfair criticism that these days is being directed at public employee unions and their members.

My intention is not to poke fun at Ms. Lewis for her gaffe, for doing that would be little more than what she did in speaking sarcastically of Secretary Duncan’s slight lisp. Nor is it to chastise her for her confession of youthful drug use, for such a confession – in the proper setting and circumstances – could have positive benefit. Instead, I want to address the issue of how a once powerful union is slipping every day in its influence, and of how this slippage is bad for organized labor in general.

First, my own confession. I was a staff member for the Chicago Teachers Union for 15 years. I began as a communications consultant and then held positions as editor of the union newspaper, legislative director and lobbyist, head of the Communications Department, and ultimately chief of staff. I served three presidents but chose to resign when Ms. Lewis was elected, in large part because I didn’t like the tone that she had set in her campaign for the CTU presidency, but also because I felt it was time for me to move on.

During my tenure at the CTU, I didn’t always agree with the leadership on all issues. For one thing, I felt that each of the three presidents under whom I served was much too inclined toward patronage in the selection of persons who held staff positions within the union. This is a very common occurrence in organized labor, just as it is in many areas of government. Persons who work in the campaigns of the successful candidates are rewarded with staff positions, many times without any regard whatsoever for whatever skills, experience, or knowledge they might bring to the job. That’s not always the case; but it certainly is true too often.

I also was disappointed with all three administrations because such rudimentary actions of good management as employee evaluations never occurred. Nor did comprehensive long-range planning. Too much attention was directed toward grievances and matters of that sort, which actually only concerned a small portion of the total union membership. The CTU is the largest local union in the state of Illinois and has tens of thousands of members; by contrast, grievances during any year might benefit a handful of a few hundred. What about the needs of all the rest? Professional development for members, for example, garnered only a slight percentage of the union’s overall budget, even though all the members of the union regularly faced criticism – unjustly, I might add – that they were not up to par in the delivery of instruction to the students and could  benefit from more union-sponsored professional development.

But even with these areas that caused me concern, I always believed I was working for an important cause in doing the work of the union. One of the tasks I undertook throughout my years at the CTU was to spend lots of my own time reading, studying, and writing about the history of the union. The CTU will be 75 years old in October 2012; it was born in a period of labor unrest that was the aftermath of the creation of the Chicago Teachers Federation (CTF) in 1897, which was the first teachers’ union in the United States. The CTF was one of the initial creators of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) in 1916, and both CTF and CTU members served in key roles in the AFT in the initial years of the national organization.

At the time the CTU was chartered by the amalgamation of several small unions and in its early years, educators in the Chicago Public Schools faced lots of problems. There was a period when teachers were paid in scrip because the Board of Education didn’t have sufficient funds to meet regular payroll obligations. Teachers often were hired because they were patrons of powerful politicians, and many who were serving with distinction arbitrarily were fired in order to make room for the patronage hires. The union wasn’t immediately successful in changing things – it took 30 years before the union gained collective bargaining rights and entered into its first contract with the Board of Education – but dignified and steady leadership eventually won the day and the CTU was recognized statewide and nationally as a powerful force.

During all those years, even though some folks were hired for positions within the union as a result of supporting the caucus that controlled things, the organization itself was stable and individuals moved up the ranks of leadership based on the experience they gained in posts at lower rungs on the ladder.

In 2001, the dominant caucus – the United Progressive Caucus – was defeated in the union elections and a new group came into power. While many of the persons hired by the new caucus were inexperienced, the new president herself had been an employee of both the CTU and the AFT and had a sense of what union leadership was all about. The three years Deborah Lynch served in office weren’t the best for the union – the contract she negotiated, for example, had lots of holes in it – but she managed to keep the organization afloat. The biggest problem facing the Lynch administration was that the president was somewhat alone in the area of experience; virtually everyone around her was totally new to the union leadership role.

When Marilyn Stewart was elected as president in 2004, she had the wisdom to call back into the staff ranks a number of individuals who had worked or held office in previous administrations and were greatly experienced in union matters. As a result, in 2007, the Stewart administration negotiated one of the best contracts in the union’s history. President Stewart also oversaw the greatest financial reform the union ever embraced, taking the organization from a deficit of more than $600,000 to a surplus of more than $2 million over a two-year period. Unfortunately, though, some internal problems among the officers resulted in a deep split within the union ranks and after six years in office Ms. Stewart lost her post to Karen Lewis.

Virtually no one who is part of the Lewis administration is an experienced union leader or administrator, and the problems that the CTU has faced during the past year clearly are a result of that. When Rahm Emanuel was elected mayor of Chicago in early 2011 – less than a year into the Lewis presidency – he quickly took on the CTU and the union’s leaders seemed clueless in how to deal with him. Aside from a number of antagonistic public statements, CTU leadership seemed unable to enter into effective talks with the new mayoral team. The biggest loss the union experienced was the defecting of members at several schools from the union’s position on a longer school day; as union members in one school after another chose not follow the CTU directive on the length of the school day, and instead to accept what Mayor Emanuel was requesting and offering, the union looked more and more like a paper tiger. Finally the CTU itself caved in on the longer-day issue.

Whether or not a longer school day is needed wasn’t really the true issue in the battle Mayor Emanuel was waging with the CTU. He wanted to show that he was stronger than the union and he won. A more experienced leadership at the CTU would have handled the situation in a manner that saved face even if losing on some fronts. That, in fact, is the essence of good negotiations: each side gets something in the end. As regards the longer-day issue, in the end CTU members got only what Mayor Emanuel had offered from the very start. The union appeared almost as an uninvolved bystander in negotiations between the mayor and the teachers.

Mayor Emanuel effectively defeated collective bargaining by successfully wooing teachers in some schools to follow his lead rather than maintain solidarity with their colleagues at other schools. The whole basis for collective bargaining is that the membership is represented by one voice and what is negotiated is applicable to everyone and not just segments of the membership. That concept flew right out the window in the longer-day settlement.

Now, the comments made by Ms. Lewis at the social justice gathering do even more to diminish her effectiveness as a leader, and thus to erode the power of the CTU. Leaders don’t make fun of the physical defects of their opponents; leaders don’t childishly boast about how they violated laws and customs; leaders sit down across the table from one another and work out effective solutions to problems.

If the Chicago Teachers Union fails in its purpose of representing the best interests of its members, the spin-off effect on other unions will be devastating. Soon Chicago and Illinois will be seeing the same kind of anti-union actions by legislators and statewide elected officials as have been seen in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio.

The CTU has been quick to offer the explanation that President Lewis comments were taken out of context and are being exploited by right-wing anti-labor organizations.

On the first of these arguments, the video itself seems to prove the contrary. There was no legitimate context for saying that Arne Duncan would have lost his lisp if he had attended public, rather than private, schools; Ms. Lewis herself acknowledged that was an “ugly” comment. Likewise, there was no legitimate context for implying to an audience that included school-children that smoking pot is a good way to “self-medicate” at times of personal crisis.

As regards the charge that the comments are being exploited by right-wing anti-labor forces, the CTU is correct. However, while it’s true that the anti-labor groups are taking shots at the CTU, it’s also true that the gun the anti-labor folks are using was loaded by Karen Lewis.

John A. Ostenburg is in his fourth four-year term as mayor of Park Forest, Illinois, and formerly served in the Illinois House of Representatives. He retired in July 2010 as the chief of staff for the Chicago Teachers Union after holding various CTU posts over a 15-year period. A former newspaper reporter and editor, he also has been a teacher and/or administrator at elementary, secondary, community college, and university levels. E-mail him at [email protected].

More jobs: linchpin for the nation's economic well-being

out·post, \ˈaut-ˌpōst\, noun: an outlying or frontier settlement

ob·serv·er, \əb-ˈzər-vər\, noun: a representative sent to observe but not participate in an activity

Tuesday, October 4, 2011 

By John A. Ostenburg

What’s behind the inability of the economy to get moving?

Economists point mostly to the fact that high unemployment results in less disposable income being available for purchases of goods and services. It would seem, therefore, that creating jobs is the best way increase the availability of disposable income and thus the best way to get the U.S. economy moving again.

Unfortunately, though, for some government officials the political agenda is more important than the economic agenda.

Many elected officials rale on and on, making noise in opposition to the stimulus dollars that went into private-sector job creation, while simultaneously adopting public policy that eliminates increasing numbers of public-sector jobs. That’s because the right-wing within American government wants to achieve two goals: it wants to throw as many roadblocks as possible in the way of White House efforts to improve the economy, and it also wants to fire as many government workers as it can because it fears that higher taxes on the wealthy are going to be needed to keep those government workers on the job.

On the first point, despite what some Republican opponents want to say about President Barack Obama’s efforts to stimulate the U.S. economy by an infusion of federal dollars into the private sector for job creation, the plan did in fact work. True, the overall effect of the stimulus hasn’t been to uplift the nation’s economy to the extent that everyone had hoped, but nonetheless private-sector employment has been on a steady increase and that has been in large part due to the stimulus plan. Mr. Obama’s opponents are livid at the thought that he will be given credit for accomplishing this result.

Meanwhile, though, public-sector jobs – in other words, people who work for government – have been on a steady decline. So government dollars are being used to increase jobs on one hand, at the same time that government itself is cutting back on its workforce and putting more people on the unemployment roles. Doesn’t it sound a bit schizophrenic?

In taking action against government workers, conservatives argue that too many government jobs are unionized and thus are too costly to maintain. Not only do they desire to cut back on the number of those jobs, they also seek to destroy public-sector unions in the process.

For those who doubt that more private-sector jobs are being created, take a look at the ADP National Employment Report for August 2011. Mind you, this isn’t a government report; it’s a report prepared by a respected private firm. It’s conclusion, “Private-sector employment increased by 91,000 from July to August on a seasonally adjusted basis.” The ADP website points out that for the previous month, private-sector jobs increased by 109,000. That’s 200,000 more jobs in the private sector over a two-month period.

Meanwhile, though, a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics report shows that government jobs decreased during the same period by 143,000.

Presently, President Obama has a new proposal for creation of jobs: “The American Jobs Act.” The bill also focuses on private-sector job creation, although many of those jobs will result in public-sector improvements. Rather than the government hiring workers to improve the nation’s infrastructure, the President is proposing that federal dollars be put into contracting with private firms for those improvements, encompassing with that the re-employment of large numbers of the American construction workforce to re-build and replace our nation’s highways, bridges, water and sewer lines, etc. Meanwhile, through employment-tax breaks, the bill also will encourage other private businesses to hire more workers.

“The American Jobs Act” is a great step forward in the effort to re-energize the U.S. economy by putting more people to work and thus creating a better stream of disposable income to be used for purchase of goods and services. A component of the bill does, in fact, also preserve a number of public-sector jobs along with those in the private sector by making funds available to hire back teachers, firefighters, and police officers who have been displaced through government employment cutbacks.

The President’s proposal, though, is not supported by all the members of Congress and thus may have a very hard time coming to fruition. For some in Washington, any expenditure of tax dollars – regardless of what effect it may cause – is something to be opposed. While it is puzzling why so many elected officials want government to create greater job-loss statistics by eliminating so many of its own employees, it’s even more puzzling that they would oppose putting dollars into creating new private-sector jobs. Do they think the economy is going to recover entirely on its own? Or are they simply hoping to stall any recovery until after the 2012 elections?

Here’s the formula espoused by the anti-Obama forces in Congress: (1) don’t appropriate any more money for unemployment benefits for those who have lost their jobs, (2) cut back on how much we spend on government jobs and eliminate as many as possible, (3) don’t let the President achieve any level of success by increasing private-sector employment. And what’s that the formula for? Ostensibly it’s to assure the defeat of Barack Obama when he stands for re-election in November 2012. In reality, it will assure the complete and total collapse of the already fragile U.S. economy. The anti-Obama forces are taking a huge gamble, using the economic well-being of American citizens as their stake.

Without more money becoming available to households across the U.S., so they can buy more goods and services, more and more retail and service businesses will close their doors. What we now call a recession soon will become a depression.

Republicans and a handful of conservative Democrats in Congress need to step beyond their narrow ideological focus and come to realize that creating more jobs and improving working opportunities for the nation’s workforce is the only viable way to get our economy rolling once again. Likewise, they need to recognize that paying better wages to workers, providing them with such benefits as adequate healthcare coverage that thus eliminates the way medical expenses eat away at income, means more dollars to be spent in purchases of goods and services and in paying taxes.

Economic well-being is a circular operation: more money in the pockets of workers means more money spent on purchases and in payment of taxes. More money spent on purchases means more money available for business to thrive, to make a profit, and hire even more workers. More money paid in taxes means government can properly perform its duties – without any profit involved – and also hire even more workers.

Organized labor takes lots of hits from many people because it supposedly is interested only in improving the lot of its members. However, improvement in the workplace for union members also means improvement in the general economy and thus improvement for business and non-union workers also. A major reason America enjoyed such an economic upswing in the aftermath of World War II was because workers were unionized, demanded and received better wages and working conditions, and then pumped more money into the general economy by purchasing increasingly more goods and services.

It can happen again. The first step is simply to create more jobs and then to make sure workers are properly compensated.

John A. Ostenburg is in his fourth four-year term as mayor of Park Forest, Illinois, and formerly served in the Illinois House of Representatives. He retired in July 2010 as the chief of staff for the Chicago Teachers Union after holding various CTU posts over a 15-year period. A former newspaper reporter and editor, he also has been a teacher and/or administrator at elementary, secondary, community college, and university levels. E-mail him at [email protected].

Putting 'labor' back into the celebration of Labor Day

out·post, \ˈaut-ˌpōst\, noun: an outlying or frontier settlement

ob·serv·er, \əb-ˈzər-vər\, noun: a representative sent to observe but not participate in an activity

Monday, September 6, 2010 

By John A. Ostenburg

For more than 125 years, Americans have observed Labor Day on the first Monday of September.

 

The observance began with a ceremony in New York in 1882 and soon spread across the nation, becoming a federal holiday in 1894. Today it is considered by many as representing the start of something: e.g., a number of school districts across the country begin classes on the day after Labor Day; the two major political parties traditionally have used Labor Day as an official kick-off for their campaigns; fall fashions are considered to be in vogue after Labor Day. By happenstance, a few people even use the day to talk about workers and their plight.

 

Throughout the rest of the world, working men and women are honored each year on May 1 -- International Workers' Day -- rather than on the first Monday of September. Ironically, the May 1 date was selected in observance of one of the most important American labor events ever to occur: the 1886 Haymarket Massacre that took place over a two-day period, May 4 and 5, on Chicago's Randolph Street a short distance from the Loop. In the U.S., May 1 passes with only a slight nod toward workers, even -- unfortunately -- within the ranks of organized labor itself.

 

The Haymarket tragedy occurred because three elements suddenly were juxtaposed: (1) laborers were demanding fair treatment in the workplace and a decent wage for their on-the-job performance, (2) their employers were unwilling to provide either, and (3) political bosses sided with the economically powerful rather than the struggling worker. I suspect I'm not alone in thinking that something close to similar conditions may be present in our nation today.

 

Today's problem situation is less based on wages and working conditions than on the fact that so few jobs are available for the large number of potential workers who are seeking them. While economic studies are showing that American businesses are on a financial upswing as a result of the stimulus that the federal government has provided, those same studies also show that the improved businesses are being extremely reluctant to create more jobs for American workers. Too many Washington politicians are turning their heads and refusing to confront this dichotomy.

 

Financial giants Citibank, JPMorgan Chase, and Bank of America are advertising jobs that are available in overseas markets, most notably in China. Each of those institutions received stimulus dollars. While it is understandable that these U.S. businesses and others might have the need for overseas employees, shouldn't they have certain obligations for creating jobs here at home first, considering that they survived economic ruin because taxpayers bailed them out?

 

As part of his Labor Day message, President Barack Obama proposed some new incentives to encourage business to engage in more research and development in order to move into new areas of manufacturing that will increase the potential for more American jobs. While that's a very good carrot, I think lots of Americans are wondering, "But what about the stick?" What are the President and Congress prepared to do if those businesses take the government's money, do the research and development that's being urged, but then create the new jobs in overseas markets, where costs may be lower and their profit margins thereby greater?

 

While I don't suspect that unemployed Americans are contemplating the kind of protests that resulted in the Haymarket event, or the Pullman strike and demonstration of 1894, or anything else quite so volatile, I do believe the current anti-government environment that's being fostered by our economic conditions is the kind of fodder that nurtures anarchy. It's most likely to materialize first in the defeat of a number of incumbents in the coming mid-term elections, but it could develop into broader protests if angry unemployed Americans begin to think the electoral process isn't working to their advantage.

 

Any new programs that Washington is considering as a means of assisting business need to include some specific and clear consequences for anyone who takes the money but then fails to produce returns. The President needs to be clear on this point. Full and total accountability must be the order of the day. Anything less is an insult to the nation's taxpayers, especially those who are out of work.

 

Revolutions, even when they are less than successful, destabilize governments. Each time anarchy emerges, no matter how limited it might be, it challenges the solid foundation upon which the common good is based. Yet, sometimes segments of the public seem so disenfranchised that they see no avenue for correction other than to attack the system by whatever means may be available. I fear much of the current unrest that's being generated by right-wing extremists can have influence over ever larger segments of the current American population that in better times would send the extremists packing. Politicians who ride on the backs of the extremists for personal political gain may be causing greater threats to our national fabric than would any outside terrorists.

 

The bottom line is this: America needs to wake up and give more attention to its average citizen, the every-day worker whose only desire is to earn his bread by the sweat of his brow and thus to provide for his or her family. President Obama and members of both parties in the Congress had better awaken to this reality and begin to collaborate on programs that truly are of benefit to workers.

 

Talking about the creation of jobs isn't the answer. Criticizing someone's else's plan for the creation of jobs isn't the answer. The answer is the creation of jobs!

 

When that finally happens, we'll have lots more happy celebrants on Labor Day, regardless of whether it's observed on the first Monday of September of the first day of May. The time of the celebration is irrelevant; it's the reason for the celebration that matters.

 

John A. Ostenburg is mayor of Park Forest, Illinois, and formerly served in the Illinois House of Representatives. He recently retired as the chief of staff for the Chicago Teachers Union. E-mail him at [email protected].

Americans don't understand plight of Central America workers

out·post, \ˈaut-ˌpōst\, noun: an outlying or frontier settlement

ob·serv·er, \əb-ˈzər-vər\, noun: a representative sent to observe but not participate in an activity

Friday, October 23, 2009 

By John A. Ostenburg

A dockworkers strike in Puerto Limon, Costa Rica, on October 21 resulted in a tour ship of the Holland America line not being allowed to dock or disembark any of its passengers for sightseeing visits.

 

Although officials of the cruise line – including both the captain and his on-ship staff and executives at the line’s Seattle office – made attempts to negotiate with government authorities to allow the ship to engage in its pre-scheduled stop to the port, no solution was found. The ship’s captain announced to the passengers that government officials feared for the safety of any persons who might attempt to cross the strikers’ picket line, and that they also feared for the security of the ship itself if it were allowed to dock. In fact, they refused for the ship even to remain anchored in the bay adjacent to the Puerto Limon pier.

 

As a union official who was on board the ms Zuiderdam, I found myself siding with the striking workers. After all, they have been engaged in a major labor dispute for quite some time now as the government of Costa Rica has attempted to privatize the docking operations. The workers fear that they would lose salary and major benefits if that were to happen, especially since that’s already been the case in one other Central America port. They also are seeking an adequate wage that will provide some level of security in the future, given the tendency by management to find private alternatives for handing the work that the strikers normally perform.

 

Of course, it wasn’t just the cruise ship that was prevented from docking. The striking workers also made sure that cargo vessels were allowed neither to be loaded with materials to be shipped out or to be unloaded with items that were coming into the country. Dockworkers themselves traditionally perform the work of removing items from cargo ships. Colleagues who secure the ship’s anchoring ropes to the pier refused to cross the picket line to dock the Holland America vessel.

 

Strikes are one of the few ways that workers have to actually flex their muscles. By not allowing ships to dock, the strikers were sending a strong message to their bosses: “If you want the commerce that comes from these ships visiting our harbors, you need to provide for the security of your employees who make those stops possible.” It’s the same message that strikers give to management when other labor disputes reach the highpoint of a work stoppage: “If we’re going to do the work, you must honor our demands.”

 

I can’t say, however, that many of my fellow passengers on the 10-day cruise from Ft. Lauderdale to the Panama Canal and back – with various scheduled stops along the way, including the one to Puerto Limon – were as understanding of the workers’ plight as was I. Grumbling was commonplace aboard the ship, as angry Americans (a handful of passengers were from other countries too, but I didn’t hear any of them complaining the way the U.S. citizens did) insisted that the strikers were doing harm to themselves because keeping the ship out of harbor meant the loss of thousands and thousands of tourists’ dollars.

 

I was particularly taken by the outrage expressed by one older gentleman who was wearing a tee-shirt adorned with the image of a cross and some words of scripture. He told everyone within hearing distance in the elevator we all were riding that the workers were selfish and should give more consideration to all the people they were inconveniencing by their work stoppage.

 

Well, excuse me, Mr. Christian, but when I was a Catholic seminarian some years ago, I remember reading a passage from the Holy Bible that said the worker deserves his wage. Does your Bible say something different?

 

In many regards, life in Costa Rica seems to be pleasant enough. For example, the country has no standing army and universal health care is available to all. Nonetheless, conditions for workers are not all rosy. At the same time the dockworkers were striking in Puerto Limon, school teachers and taxi drivers also were on strike. Costa Rica is a rather small country to have so much worker unrest. Obviously, workers are less than happy with the conditions under which they labor.

 

It’s not easy for most Americans to accept the reality that workers in many countries – especially in Central America and South America – truly are victimized by their employers. The International Labor Communications Association, for example, regularly issues news reports about beatings and killings of labor leaders in those countries as thugs engaged by powerful management bosses use brutal intimidation to force employees to accept low-paying jobs, long work hours, and meager benefits.

 

Sadly, many of the financial figures behind the companies that engage in those tactics are Americans who are driven by a desire for wider and wider profit margins on their investments. They argue that they are giving work to people who otherwise would be unemployed. As such, in their minds, they are justified to be paying the workers so little, because even a little is better than nothing at all.

 

Members of American labor unions need to show support for their brothers and sisters in countries where workers are not treated so well. They need to educate themselves about the conditions faced by workers in countries such as Costa Rica, and then they need to raise their voices in angry protest over the inequality from which unionists in other countries suffer. Certainly workers don’t deserve the majority of the revenue resulting from various business enterprises, but they do deserve their fair share.

 

Workers must support one another, no matter what the setting may be. Solidarity for all must mean for ALL in order to be more than just an empty slogan.

John A. Ostenburg is mayor of Park Forest, Illinois, and formerly served in the Illinois House of Representatives. He is the chief of staff for the Chicago Teachers Union. E-mail him at [email protected].

For labor, after health care reform, next goal is passing EFCA

out·post, \ˈaut-ˌpōst\, noun: an outlying or frontier settlement

ob·serv·er, \əb-ˈzər-vər\, noun: a representative sent to observe but not participate in an activity

Thursday, September 3, 2009 

By John A. Ostenburg

Organized labor in America has two major goals during the coming year: (1) to see health care reform enacted by the Congress of the United States, and (2) to see the same body pass the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA). 

Anyone in the nation who is not up on the current debate over health care and insurance, must have his/her head stuck firmly in the sand.  Although lots of folks seem to lack a comprehensive knowledge of what actually is being debated in Washington, few can be accused of not at least knowing that a debate is going on.

As a result of special interest groups that are more interested in stopping any reform of health care coverage  than in promoting it, the public's knowledge of what is being argued in the halls of government is clouded by false accusations of death panels, socialized medicine, cuts in Medicare, and the like. When folks turn on the television for the evening news, they see video reports of shouting protesters at town hall meetings alleging that President Barack Obama is akin to Adolph Hitler for evening suggesting that the American health care system has problems. The protesters have been convinced by someone that the President wants to force them either to see doctors not of their choosing or to go without medical care at all. Never mind that what he actually wants to do is reduce health insurance costs so each American will be able to afford to see the doctor of his or her choice in future years.

The AFL-CIO and its affiliated unions are working diligently to set the record straight on health care reform. Labor leaders realize that some of the citizens who have been stirred to protest because of the misinformation that's being spread by the insurance industry and other special interests are retired union members. Many of them have seen their pensions disappear in recent years because of the collapse of companies that formerly employed them, and now they're being bombarded with propaganda that says their Medicare also is going to go away as a result of the President's reform efforts. Organized labor has a major task ahead of it in reversing the negative course on which many of its own members have erroneously embarked.

Labor also is putting the heat on legislators it has supported over the years and making it clear that health insurance reform is an issue that will decide what kind of future support will be forthcoming. AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka -- destined to take over top leadership of the organization from retiring President John Sweeney at the AFL-CIO convention in September -- wrote on the Huffington Post blog recently that he intends to put the full force of labor behind only those candidates who show the courage to support a public option as part of insurance reform. "If you’re going to have health insurance reform, you must have a public option in it," he told lawmakers. "If you don’t, don’t expect us to support you."

If the timetable that the White House and congressional leaders currently are holding up in fact is followed, the health care issue should be decided -- one way or another -- no later than mid-fall. That's when the major push for passage of EFCA should be hitting federal lawmakers full force.

At present, companies completely control the process on how workers can form a union. Even if 100 percent of the workers at a given company have signed cards indicating their desire to organize, the company can refuse to recognize that action and insist instead that a secret-ballot election be held. What too often happens in the interim period between the employees' request to form a union and the election that has been scheduled by management is that pressure is put on a number of the workers -- including threats that they will lose their jobs or benefits -- as a means of influencing the outcome to the vote.

If EFCA were enacted, the National Labor Relations Board would be required to recognize the will of workers when more than 50 percent of them signed cards indicating their desire to organize (a process often referred to as "card-check"). According to the AFL-CIO, surveys have shown that as many as 60 million Americans desire to form unions in their workplaces but presently do not have an opportunity. Organized labor maintains that EFCA will provide those workers with the opportunity they are seeking.

While EFCA is being fought-out on the national level, a Chicago-based organizing campaign among workers is a good example of how companies will spend great sums of money in an effort to stop unionization.

Recently teachers at three Chicago charter schools signed cards to organize as a union. They maintained that they could use card-check as a means of organizing because it is permitted under the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act (IELRA). Because the legislation that established charter schools in Illinois refers to them as public schools, and because proponents of that legislation back in 1995 indicated in legislative debate that the charter schools would be under the IELRA, they thought they had a firm case. However, the companies that run the charter schools argued differently; they insisted that they are private employers -- even though they receive public funds for their operation -- and thus are under the jurisdiction of the NLRB where card-check currently is not permitted. The employers insisted, therefore, that a secret-ballot election was necessary in order to trigger unionization of the teachers.

Fortunately the election that was held a few weeks later overwhelmingly ratified the position previously illustrated by card-check and the teachers presently are negotiating their first contract with their employer. However, in the few weeks before the election, management was able to peel off some of the strongest supporters of the unionization effort by offering special employment deals. They also spent large sums of money on anti-union attorneys in an effort to deny their workers the right to negotiate for salaries and benefits.

If EFCA were in place, the card-check would have been recognized and negotiations on a contract could have begun immediately, without pitting some workers against others and without wasting dollars.

President Obama long has been a supporter of EFCA and has indicated that he will sign the legislation into law if it reaches his desk. The AFL-CIO says that it currently has survey results that show nearly 73 percent of the public in support of EFCA and it thus hopes that will be sufficient to convince a suitable number of legislators to vote for the bill.

Both health care reform and EFCA are important worker issues.

The current process whereby health insurance is a component of employment in most circumstances is problematic for workers because the constant increases in insurance costs eat into any potential salary increases that might otherwise be forthcoming. Furthermore, with the current economic downturn, many workers are losing jobs and thus losing health insurance coverage also. Without genuine reform, the current run-away costs for health care will force increasingly larger numbers of the middle class into the lower class in the years ahead. Meanwhile those presently in the lower economic bracket will see even more devastating conditions than they already experience. The goal of American public policy should be to left up those who are in poverty rather than to push more citizens to that level. Therefore, maintaining the status quo on health care is not an option.

EFCA also is important to workers for many reasons, but especially because of the change currently underway within the American employment structure. When unionization began to become prevalent on the U.S. landscape it was because of the conditions so many families suffered during the Great Depression. Perhaps things will not reach those levels, but the Great Recession currently underway is changing the way millions of Americans are living because they either are unemployed or are underemployed. As the U.S. economy regains its former strength, new job openings will be on the horizon and millions of individuals will be seeking to be hired. If we have learned anything from history, it is that management will not share willingly with its employees the profits that are realized. Collective bargaining, therefore, will be a necessary ingredient in re-establishing a solid working class that is paid adequately and enjoys the benefits that it deserves.

Health care insurance reform and EFCA: two very important goals for organized labor in 2009.

John A. Ostenburg is mayor of Park Forest, Illinois, and formerly served in the Illinois House of Representatives. He is the chief of staff for the Chicago Teachers Union. E-mail him at [email protected].

Stop blaming the workers for corporate mismanagement

out·post, \ˈaut-ˌpōst\, noun: an outlying or frontier settlement

ob·serv·er, \əb-ˈzər-vər\, noun: a representative sent to observe but not participate in an activity

Tuesday, August 18, 2009 

By John A. Ostenburg

Organized labor needs to take the gloves off and begin to fight back. Sure, a handful of labor leaders are speaking out and making the point that it's not the workers who have caused the economic mess the country is in at present, but the public perception remains that workers' good wages and benefits need to topple in order for the economy to improve.

From the very beginning of problems in the auto industry, who was asked to make concessions in order to save dollars for the struggling manufacturers? The members of the United Auto Workers (UAW). Their salaries, benefits, pensions, and jobs were cut.

Meanwhile, as the nation saw when the industry leaders made their famous fly-in to Washington, D.C., to beg for federal dollars to bail their companies out, the plush and expensive life-style of the "rich and famous" bosses had changed little. They continued to travel in their expensive private jets, eat at the best restaurants, and stay in hotel suites bigger than some of the work-spaces they allocated to the men and women back home who were continuing their daily efforts to do the real work that was needed in order to save the company: produce more and better automobiles!

When the American auto industry is compared to its competition worldwide, the emphasis usually is on the difference between the workers in the plants. The public is told that workers elsewhere don't receive the huge salaries and benefits that American workers receive, and that's the reason why American sales have lagged, supposedly because prices for U.S. autos are so much higher than the costs for foreign models.

Really? A Chevrolet costs more than a Mercedes? A Ford costs more than an Audi? A Dodge costs more than a Volvo? Sure, some foreign makes and models cost less than U.S. brands, but certainly that's not a universal enough detail to tag it as the real reason for Americans to be moving toward foreign brands. Overall, prices between American-made and foreign-made vehicles aren't that much different when all the various options are taken into consideration.

The real reason that American consumers have been going to foreign makes and models is because they've been designed better. And -- in case you don't know it -- that's a management decision, not one that's made by the rank and file workers on the factory floor.

What are the common denominators among the foreign makes and models that have the greatest popularity with American consumers? They have better fuel efficiency. They have longer operational spans. They have a wider range of amenities.

For years, environmentalists and consumer advocates were urging Detroit to put more emphasis on fuel-efficiency. Did the high-priced executives give the warnings any heed? Of course not. Instead they chose to help advance the American love-affair with gasoline. Now, however, as a result of gas prices at the tipping point as regards the decision made by citizens on which vehicles to purchase, Detroit suddenly is coming out of the closet with electric vehicles that can get as much as 200 miles per gallon. Even though we're no longer in the horse-and-buggy days, might not the adage about locking the barn door after the escape of the horse apply here?

The real issue, though, is the role of the workers in all of this. They had little -- if any -- input into the decision-making process that continued the production of less popular American vehicles. They simply did their jobs in following the manufacturing plans that were handed to them by their bosses. So, why is it that they have had to pay the price for their employers' failures? Have their executive bosses paid an equivalent price?

Another example of how it has been corporate decision-making that has caused America's financial burdens is the the banking and investment industry. Thank God there are few unionized workers in that industry or we'd be seeing their unions blamed for that mess too. But -- again -- it's many unionized laborers who are suffering most because of the errors that have been made at an executive level. What category of workers across the nation is facing the greatest unemployment as a result of the current financial downturn? It's the one in which construction workers, most of whom have union cards in their pockets, are employed. Tight money means less building; less building means fewer jobs for folks in the trades.

Finally, the latest wave of union-bashing because of the failed economy is coming in the public sector as government workers are facing layoffs, furloughs, unpaid holidays, and threats to their pensions because failures in the private sector are producing fewer tax dollars to fuel the public sector. Whether the public recognizes it or not, the unionization of government jobs has been a major tool in halting the spread of patronage. Before teachers were unionized, for example, many a school post was given to the mayor's niece, or the alderman's sister-in-law, or the school board member's grandson. If the public believes that destroying public employees' unions is a pathway to greater efficiency, it had better think again.

American workers are the backbone of our nation, but they have been used by selfish interests as the scapegoat for just about every problem that pops up on the horizon. They have been pitted against one another through the challenge of non-union positions vs. union ones, even though no one has been able to prove that the use of lower-paid non-union workers accomplishes anything more than greater profits for management and owners. Without unions, would we have the eight-hour day? The five-day work week? The minimum wage? Health insurance? Pension programs?

Yes, these things cost a little, but they in no way compare with the multi-million-dollar returns that big business has reaped from workers' efforts over decades. They've taken those benefits, run their companies into the ground by poor management, and then ejected themselves from their elaborate offices, protected from hard-landings by the golden parachutes they've given themselves. And all the while, they keep pointing their fingers at workers and repeating the same mantra: "It's their fault!"

I think it's time for labor folks to stand up and shout "No more!"

John A. Ostenburg is mayor of Park Forest, Illinois, and formerly served in the Illinois House of Representatives. He is the chief of staff for the Chicago Teachers Union. E-mail him at [email protected].