Things to Reflect on this Labor Day
This Labor Day, most Americans will go to barbecues or parades with little thought to the meaning behind the holiday. Dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers, Labor Day was originally a creation of the labor union movement. Yearly, we are supposed to reflect on the contributions the labor movement has made to the strength and prosperity of our nation.
But this Labor Day, we're unlikely to reflect on how far we've come, but rather how far we've gone astray. What started as a noble cause to protect workers' rights and expand the middle class has degraded into a corrupt political machine.
Two important pieces of legislation aim to change that. The Employee Rights Act (ERA), introduced by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Rep. Tim Scott (R-SC), along with the Rewarding Achievement and Incentivizing Successful Employees (RAISE) Act, sponsored by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Rep. Todd Rokita (R-IN), are two new bills that employees will celebrate if Democrats allow them to become law.
Unions have gone from acting as employee advocates to serving as Democratic Party piggy banks. During the 2010 election, 93 percent of political donations made by unions went to support Democrat candidates, even though 42 percent of union households voted Republican.
To keep union leadership's spending in line with the interests of union members, the ERA offers political paycheck protection. Rather than taking money first and making members ask questions later, the ERA's paycheck protection provision requires labor unions to obtain prior approval from membership before leaders spend dues money on political causes.
The ERA also offers employees a chance to exercise a right that many Americans hold sacred, and one that has been denied in many union shops -- the right to vote. An analysis of data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the National Labor Relations Board indicates that seven percent of currently unionized employees in the private sector voted for the union in their workplace. The ERA would allow current employees to vote and reaffirm that they do, in fact, want the union voted in by their predecessors to represent them exclusively.
But what good is an election if there is no secret ballot? According to data from the NLRB, in 2009, 38 percent of all union recognitions bypassed secret ballot elections and instead used so called "card check" to unionize employees. With "card check," paid union organizers seek to pressure workers to sign cards in public saying that they support union representation, providing a binding contract that makes them dues-paying members.
The ERA eliminates the card check system. No longer would employees have to openly declare which side they are on, making for a much more democratic process.
The RAISE Act also works to make the workplace more rewarding for employees by allowing them to receive bonuses and pay raises based on merit. Amazingly, union-backed Democrats in the Senate recently voted against the legislation!
Currently, 80 percent of union contracts prohibit merit-based pay raises for individual employees. Instead, raises must be approved by the union, and in many instances, there is a pay ceiling -- the maximum amount of money any person under a collective bargaining agreement can earn. Such a system discourages ambition and promotes and entrenches mediocrity.
Even in the face of this provision's overwhelming support from union households, labor leaders would rather continue to fill their bank accounts than represent the true interests of their members.
It's been generations since we've updated our basic labor laws. The labor leaders who celebrated Labor Day decades ago stood on the same side as their members. Times have changed. It's time to stand for employees and give them the ability to control their own destinies. It's time for a new Labor Day.
