thetruthaboutefca.com | The Truth About The Employee Free Choice Act & Card Check

Sure, it’s the job of loud-mouth talk show hosts to get their audience riled up. But sometimes the truth gets totally lost. And that’s where we pick up with Ed Schultz on MSNBC:

The Employee Free Choice act is about, just that, choice. What could be more American than having a choice in the workplace as to whether you`re going to organize or not?

Now, the point being here is that if you get your friends together in the workplace and you decide you want to do collective bargaining, you can do it. Yes, you can do it today. But this would change.

Now, one of the claims that`s being made out there by the antis of the Employee Free Choice Act is that this would take away the right of a secret ballot.

Folks, I`m telling you tonight, that is an absolutely lie.

Taken, in order, is the Truth About EFCA(.com!):

• It’s not about choice if one is trying to quell two-sided debate and kill the period of contemplation
• Yes, current law does allow workers to bargain collectively, so why go to the extreme of curtailing employee rights?
• And, again, EFCA does effectively eliminate secret ballots … that’s not a lie, it’s a practical fact

It’s unfortunate that those carrying water for organized labor continue to lean on mis-truths while managing to call everyone else a liar.

Click here for the video of Schultz’s misleading rant.

Connie Feist writes in the Bismarck Tribune yesterday:

I was raised in Butte, Mont., and many people in my family are union members. Butte is a town with a strong labor history and people there are proud of their union affiliations. However, while union membership is valued by many in my hometown, they also place equal value on their individual rights. The card-check provision outlined in the EFCA bill erodes each person’s right to privacy. The idea of forcing a public declaration of one’s intentions in voting, whether it be voting to unionize, voting for the local dog catcher or voting for the next president of the United States, challenges the very freedom that defines our democracy.

While I grew up in a union household, my husband and I are now proud to own a business in Minot that provides a living for many employees. We have an open-door workplace, where employees feel free to come to us to discuss job duties, performance issues, wages and benefits. We know this is the case because it occurs on a regular basis. The EFCA would essentially slam shut such an open-door policy.

Keep up the letters to your own editors and elected officials. Use our site if it’s helpful. Just get engaged!

Anyone who owns, operates, works in, or is related to anyone in a business will often find it difficult to agree with the anti-business rhetoric of syndicated columnist Harold Meyerson. But sometimes he does a public service by lifting the veil of special interests, as he (possibly unintentionally) does this morning in his Washington Post column.

Discussing an interim step in reunifying the fractured labor movement, he writes:

The unification is the result of both dashed hopes and new hopes. The dashed hopes are those of the founders of Change to Win, who argued that by focusing on organizing rather than politics, they could reverse the decline in union membership. That proved not to be the case, which is why all of labor now sees passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, which would protect workers’ right to join unions, as key to their expansion — or survival.

First, set aside the false characterization of protecting workers rights. But let the larger point soak in: because organized labor couldn’t organize its way to reversing its own decline, it’s turned to odious EFCA. This is a rare case in which Meyerson’s description of the labor movement tracks almost perfectly with critics of EFCA: it’s about results, not process. And, apparently, who cares about process when the only ones harmed are 105 million employees and the free enterprise system?

A reader alerted us to this don’t-miss editorial from the Grand Rapids Press on the seeming stumbles for the Employee Free Choice Act:

The bill should remain on hold, permanently. The legislation would do away with an employer’s right to demand a fair, secret-ballot election when employees seek to form a union. In place of that time-tested method would be a “card check” process allowing a union to establish if more than 50 percent of employees simply signed a card — absent a private election.

Just another voice against card check. Thanks to our readers for helping keep this machine chugging. Add your comments to our post or send us an email.

Wow. Gary Shapiro had better prepare for a tough audience. Over at HuffingtonPost.com, he writes of the Employee Free Choice Act:

I am the son of a union organizer, but I represent more than 2,000 companies. I have never felt stronger that a proposal would be so bad for our country. I spend time on the AFL-CIO website and comments section on its blogs simply to understand how and why the unions can see things so differently than me.

I know (and lots of research shows) this proposal, if enacted, will cost millions of American jobs. The CEOs of my member companies also tell me this. From the biggest hi-tech CEOs to the guy in a garage with one employee, manufacturer, software company or service provider, they all agree that if this proposal becomes law, they will be incentivized to outsource. Most technology jobs are location neutral and can be performed anywhere in the world.

He adds:

The data does not support the union arguments. In 2007, almost 6,000 charges were filed against unions with some 85 percent alleging illegal restraint and coercion of employees. Of those, more than four out of five were filed by individuals with other unions filing many of the rest.

The present law does not seem to disfavor unions. Union membership actually rose in 2008. What card check would do is guarantee big union membership rolls and provide a jump in mandatory union dues.

In any case, even members of Congress are saying they have had enough.

While Shapiro may well get shouted down at HuffPo, he was able to squeeze in this conclusion:

The only compromise I see now is that both sides agree to drop the issue until the economy improves. In the meantime, a respected bipartisan study group should research the issue of union and management intimidation and report back on whether the present law should change.

I am very hopeful that card check is dead for this Congress. The issue is divisive, harmful, and not a good use of time by anyone.

Given the national economic crisis, unions need to do a reality check on card check and check out on this issue.

Of course, the HuffPo audience will shout that Shapiro’s a shill. Whether they’ll listen in between shouts is the more important question.

Below is the complete statement issued by Senator Lincoln last night: