Battling the ‘right to work’ scam (Michigan)

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.pww.org/article/articleview/12485/1/143/

This past Labor Day, trade unionists were outraged to wake up and read an editorial in The Detroit News arguing for a “right-to-work” law in Michigan.

Right-to-work bills failed to garner majority support in the Michigan Legislature last year, but the editorial in the state’s leading business newspaper signaled that the anti-labor crowd is not giving up. Now it is putting its energies into collecting what will have to be almost 500,000 signatures to place a right-to-work initiative on the ballot this November. In response, the state AFL-CIO has started a campaign to educate union members and the public to speak out against what, in every sense of the word, is an attack on the state’s working families.

“Right-to-work” is the second far-right ballot initiative that Michigan has had to deal with in the last two years, and there are parallels between them. In 2006, passage of the cleverly named anti-affirmative-action Michigan Civil Rights Initiative was a setback for democracy and equality.

Many years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King aptly pointed out that those “spewing anti-Negro epithets from one mouth and anti-labor propaganda from the other mouth” are, almost always, “a twin-headed creature.”

A look at the National Right to Work Committee shows this to be true. This committee is part of an anti-labor, anti-civil-rights, anti-democratic network involving organizations such as the Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, Sarah Scaife Foundation, and Michigan’s own conservative think tank, the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.

With Michigan hit hard by plant closings, layoffs and budget shortfalls, how much worse can things get for the working class? Plenty worse, if this measure gets through.

FULL story at link.

[Jeffro40]

1. Many workers dislike unions in Michigan also

I live in MI - and I can tell you it's not only big business and right-wing wack-nut that are looking for right-to-work laws.

In my wife's job, a tutor at a college, the union controls all sorts of things, but she gets little benefit (not fat hourly paychecks like most people assume - that's only true in the auto industry in Detroit).

The unions have become almost as bad as the business in some jobs. They both need a wake up call.

[Oldtimeralso]

2. They should be called the "right to work for less" laws n/t

[Jeffro40]

3. I know too many in MI that would give anything to work for less

I myself was laid off several years ago - and for 8 months I couldn't get back to work. Want to talk about desperation? Debt? Horrified? Depressed?

I would have worked for almost anything to feed and clothe my family - but Nooooooooooooooooooo. The union wouldn't allow it!

Unions are good and I support them, but there is a limit to everything.

[cap]

4. it's the race to the bottom

same old story... just substitute the demon in the competition for a decent wage.

The unions never stopped you from working... its the factory bosses that are to blame.

[Jeffro40]

5. Uhhhh no, you're incorrect

The Union DID stop me from working .. . you don't have a clue what you're talking about. Please stop making crap up to support your position.

[Omaha Steve]

8. Tell us your story

Otherwise we have to guess at it.

[cap]

9. if you are correct, you are the exception to the rule

please do not generalize about your particular experience.

Did you talk to your shop steward about this? Labor activists in unions generally like to improve things for labor.

[lligrd]

6. Right To Work For Pennies Law

is what it should be called.

[A HERETIC I AM]

7. Here's a short example of what right to work has done in Florida...

I had a conversation the other day with a guy running a contract job involved in cleaning up a landfill in Collier County (Naples area). He told me that there are so many Dumptruck operators looking for work (Housing bust and all) plus the nature of the way the job was bid means that the money he has available to pay those operators to haul for him is less than what their day-to-day operating expenses are.

And the jobs can continue to be bid lower and lower cause there are so many otherwise idle trucks.

If they were all Union, the jobs would have to have a minimum bid. Sure, there would still be idle trucks and laid off drivers, but the ones doing the available work would not be competing for an ever decreasing rate.