AP: It's not just right-to-work: Bills targeting unions multiply

[Omaha Steve]

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20150310/us--republicans-labor_politics-a28b94b936.html

By JONATHAN MATTISE and NICHOLAS RICCARDI

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — It's not just Gov. Scott Walker.

Republican lawmakers in statehouses nationwide are working to weaken organized labor, sometimes with efforts that directly shrink union membership. Walker's signing of right-to-work legislation in Wisconsin on Monday puts his defiance of organized labor even more at the center of his nascent presidential campaign. And the inability of unions to exact a price for the first round of legislation targeting them in 2011 is encouraging even more proposals to limit their power.


FILE - In this Feb. 28, 2015 file photo, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker speaks in Palm Beach, Fla. Republicans lawmakers in statehouses nationwide are working to weaken organized labor, sometimes with efforts that directly shrink union membership. Walker's signing of right-to-work legislation in Wisconsin on Monday puts his defiance of organized labor even more at the center of his nascent presidential campaign. And the inability of unions to exact a price for the first round of legislation targeting them in 2011 is encouraging even more proposals to limit their power. (AP Photo/Joe Skipper, File)


The Republican wave in the November elections left many unions nationwide looking exceptionally vulnerable. In West Virginia, a union PAC spent $1.4 million trying to keep the statehouse in Democratic hands but couldn't reverse the cultural trends turning the state red. Exit polls found that even union members were almost evenly split between the Republican and the Democrat in the major statewide race for U.S. Senate.

Now Republicans, in control of the state legislature for the first time since 1931, are taking advantage of their opportunity, pushing measures to expand non-union charter schools and scale back requirements that public projects pay higher, union-scale wages.

FULL story at link.

[RiverLover]

1. Scary trend.

And interesting to read about WV. As if things weren't bad before in that state.

Thanks for posting.

[Enthusiast]

3. Fascism scares me.

[Enthusiast]

2. Kicked and recommended a whole bunch!

[Scuba]

4. It's called "unfunding the political opposition."

[secondwind]

5. bastards, all of them n/t

[Cryptoad]

6. The logical conclusion,,,

of cheaper and cheaper wages is Slavery. Now that is "Freedom to Work" in its purest form. ~~~ gggez!

[Dustlawyer]

7. The union members evenly split Republican and Democrat. That's the problem we have,

the union members themselves fall for the propaganda and the racism and take the benefits obtained by unions for granted.
How much media coverage are the refinery strikes getting now as the USW expands the number of plants/refineries in the strike!