AFF Sentinel Vol.6#8

With a rowdy audience of union supporters, the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions held a hearing Tuesday discussing demolishing workers' rights to a secret ballot on unionization -the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA).

Sen. Tom Harkin (D.-Ia) expressed displeasure at the audience's booing, hissing and stomping when Sen. Lamar Alexander (R.-TN.) called the act the "Employee No Choice Act," because fully 49 percent of a work force could have no opportunity to voice their opinions once 51 percent sign cards. Harkin served as chairman with Ted Kennedy absent.

With a rowdy audience of union supporters, the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions held a hearing Tuesday discussing demolishing workers' rights to a secret ballot on unionization -the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA).

Sen. Tom Harkin (D.-Ia) expressed displeasure at the audience's booing, hissing and stomping when Sen. Lamar Alexander (R.-TN.) called the act the "Employee No Choice Act," because fully 49 percent of a work force could have no opportunity to voice their opinions once 51 percent sign cards. Harkin served as chairman with Ted Kennedy absent.

Harkin supported card check, proclaiming "unions are what created the middle class." He contended that more union representation led to better standards of living and attacked rising CEO pay.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, listed as a Vermont Independent -- an avowed socialist, he cannot lean right enough to be a liberal Democrat -- was blunt: big business doesn't want workers to get good pay.

Such was the opening atmosphere, reflecting union pressure on card check and the efforts of business groups to block elimination of a cherished American tradition and business competitiveness.

This when taxpayers are bailing out a poster unionized industry -- Detroit's auto industry -- and the United Auto Workers force itself on the firm," he said. No court can block the deal or ensure a reasonable return on capital or make sure the business could be competitive. The government could force $50/hour labor on businesses but strip their ability to subcontract, determine promotion policies or walk away.

A telling study examined decades of Canadian experience with union card check and concluded that if EFCA works as unions expect, the addition of 1.5 million union jobs in one year would result in 600,000 lost American jobs the next year, according to Anne Layne-Farrar, director of LECG Consulting.* For every three percent increase in union membership, overall unemployment would increase one percentage point the next year. If the unions' first year results happen as predicted -- five to ten percent increased union membership -- the predicted result would be 1.5- 3.5 million jobs lost the next year.

California farm groups have coalesced to fight EFCA, fearing card check leading to unionized packing and processing plants, refrigeration facilities and transportation. That could force companies to pay farmers and ranchers lower prices to compensate for "uncompetitive union contracts."

The United Farm Workers has fought to unionize feedyards in the Northwest. The United Food & Commercial Workers allied with R-CALF to fight packer cattle ownership, contracting and cattlemens ownership of packers. The AFL-CIO partners R-CALF and OCM in the Coalition for a Prosperous America, an anti-free trade group and mCOOL supporter.

Unions put roughly $300 million into the entire election cycle. Card check is their membership decline silver bullet.

None of the union proponents, civil rights supporters or faith representatives even addressed the secret ballot question. Even they cannot find justification for stripping American workers of that right.

Hope? One has to think if proponents had the votes they would have scheduled a vote now. Instead, the vote was delayed until July.

*"An Empirical Assessment of the Employee Free Choice Act: The Economic Implications," Anne Layne- Farrar, Law and Economics Consulting Group LLC.