Big Labor has spent an estimated $400 million since 2006 seeking to elect enough Democrats to assure that card check becomes law. Just last month, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees’ Gerald McEntee said his union would spend another $50 million trying to protect Democratic incumbents in 2010. Here’s to hoping card check opponents in every congressional district in America make ‘em flush it all.

There’s an interesting angle here, and that is what lessons will come from this week’s results. Will candidates realize that they can, indeed, defy powerful labor bosses on the issue of card check? There are certainly a few whispers that are promising.

On the flip side, have union bosses learned not to throw away millions of their members’ hard-earned dues dollars? Have they learned that they can’t force through the most anti-business, anti-jobs, anti-competition political candidates?

Frankly, based on this story in Politico, the simple answer is that it doesn’t seem Big Labor has learned any lessons at all. SEIU’s new president said, “We

If there is one Democratic constituency that has taken a beating with the rising influence of Democrats from the high-tech sector and the ranks of the nation’s professionals, it is organized labor. As labor leaders attempt to capitalize on Democratic control of the White House to win approval of key legislation, they face opposition from Democratic representatives and senators from places with declining or nonexistent union membership and indifference from the party’s upscale Starbucks faction, which seemingly could not care less about the future of the labor movement.

As a result, union leaders have been unable to push through a central goal: the “card-check” provisions of the Employee Free Choice Act. The Senate is on the verge of killing card check, which would replace union representation elections using secret ballots with a system guaranteeing union recognition once a majority of employees sign cards affirming their support. For years, card check has been the be-all and end-all for Big Labor, which sees it as crucial to its survival.

Few interest groups have been a better friend to the party than labor. Not only do unions donate millions to Democrats — $617.6 million since 1990, 12 times the amount they gave to Republicans — but for the past decade, they have also been able to persuade their members, including whites, to vote decisively for Democrats.

Past loyalty, however, counts for little in today’s Democratic Party. The harsh reality facing unions is that they are fading as a force in America politics, and fellow Democrats know it. Since the 2002 enactment of McCain-Feingold legislation barring soft-money contributions, labor donations in federal campaigns have fallen from $96.8 million in 2001-02 to $74.6 million in 2007-08. More important, the number of unionized workers, and their share of the national workforce, has been on a steady downward path since 1955, when 35 percent of U.S. workers were represented by a union. By 2008, that percentage had dropped to 13.7.

Mr. Edsall clearly has valid points on organized labor’s large-dollar donation angle and the sway that it tries to use that influence with respect to card check. But it would be unwise to assume that union officials will not get many items on their wish list — items that will come at a heavy expense to an already-battered economy and tens of millions of working Americans.

Let’s hope he’s right about the fate of card check. But hope is not a plan, so it’s critical to keep engaged in the fight against card check and the rest of the disastrous Employee Free Choice Act.

Apparently the head of the AFL-CIO has decided to give organized labor a PR makeover. According to US News and World Report’s website:

Richard Trumka, expected to be elected head of the AFL-CIO later this week, knows labor has an image problem. And he’s ready to take it on. “Our goal,” he says, “is to try to begin to speak again for all workers.” Already, he’s planning to reach out to blacks, young workers, and the working poor. He blames the media in part for the bad image, suggesting that editors cut or trash broader stories on the labor movement.

There’s going to be a number of problems for this re-branding campaign because there are a number of very serious and legitimate objections people have to the way union officials have set up to represent only some workers. Here are some of the not-so-small obstacles:

• Approval of unions in the U.S. is at an all-time low, with 46 percent saying unions mostly hurt the companies they organize, 51 percent saying they mostly hurt the economy, and 62 percent saying they mostly hurt non-union workers
• It will be difficult to explain how unions speak for all workers when they push for union-only Project Labor Agreements that raise costs for taxpayers and cut out most of the construction industry from vital public projects
• It’s also going to be difficult to speak for all workers when organized labor spends heavily to push an unpopular political agenda

All that — and, of course, the wildly unpopular Employee Free Choice Act. So, good luck to union officials hoping to put lipstick on this proverbial pig. We recommend that they address the core concerns of Americans before they go investing too much hope in smoke and mirrors.

A more cynical blog would conclude that legislators who support EFCA are doing so for a political advantage. We, however, will simply conclude that some legislators have been genuinely misled about the bill’s attack on workplace democracy and the resulting loss of jobs.

But were EFCA to pass, ignorance would be no excuse for legislators having voted for it or any form of EFCA-lite. Just one more thing for the political calculus.

The debate is one of Washington

]]> http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/08/09/employee-free-choice-act-its-about-redistribution/feed/ 2 http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/08/06/card-check-big-labor-makes-it-rain-for-congress/ http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/08/06/card-check-big-labor-makes-it-rain-for-congress/#comments Thu, 06 Aug 2009 14:34:49 +0000 Admin http://thetruthaboutefca.com/?p=859

OK, by now most of us know the deal: Union officials have poured hundreds of millions of dollars into lobbying and supporting politicians who will cram the horrifyingly misnamed Employee Free Choice Act down America’s throat. One union official even openly declared EFCA was the “payback” Big Labor sought for its investment, even though the issue has become toxic for politicians.

So it’s noteworthy that CQToday reports (behind a password) that “Unions top the list of biggest campaign contributors in first half of 2009″. Consider these facts and figures from the report: In just 6 months Big Labor spent more than $10 million of their members’ money. That is a staggering figure, given that there are just 545 elected officials in the legislative branch.

Those numbers are even more shocking given the industries Big Labor outspent during a time when the legislature and president are haggling over economy-changing bills on health care and energy. Union officials managed to out-cash Health care, finance/insurance, transportation, energy/natural resources, ideological groups, communication/technology, retail/services, defense, real estate/construction, law, and manufacturing.

The spending spree is also telling for where the money’s coming from. Major union groups — including the AFL-CIO and SEIU — have reportedly already spent themselves into deficits or near deficits. That means they are fighting for the whole enchilada on EFCA.

Click here to learn more about Big Labor’s lobbying from OpenSecrets.org.

]]> http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/08/06/card-check-big-labor-makes-it-rain-for-congress/feed/ 0 http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/07/09/the-35-billion-reasons-big-labor-wants-card-check/ http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/07/09/the-35-billion-reasons-big-labor-wants-card-check/#comments Thu, 09 Jul 2009 14:27:39 +0000 Admin http://thetruthaboutefca.com/?p=737 Katie Packer from the Workplace Fairness Institute writes:

Labor unions themselves concede the passage of EFCA would generate millions of new members with the head of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) projecting 1.5 million new dues-paying union members every year for at least 10 years. If you assume that union members pay, on average, $425 per year in dues, the numbers are staggering: Passage of EFCA would result in $35 billion over the next 10 years, headed straight for union coffers.

Ka-Ching!

Of course, that’s the “benefit” side. The cost comes in lower economic activity, hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of jobs, and basic workplace rights. (What’s the opposite of “Ka-Ching”? “Ching-Ka!”?)

]]> http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/07/09/the-35-billion-reasons-big-labor-wants-card-check/feed/ 2 http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/06/13/the-employee-free-choice-act-windfall/ http://www.thetruthaboutefca.com/2009/06/13/the-employee-free-choice-act-windfall/#comments Sat, 13 Jun 2009 15:26:28 +0000 Admin http://thetruthaboutefca.com/?p=654 Not hard to understand why union officials — but not union members — are so desperate for passage of the unfortunately misnamed Employee Free Choice Act:

Union bosses have said that EFCA would generate millions of new members. The head of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) projects 1.5 million new dues-paying union members every year for at least 10 years if EFCA is passed.

It’s pretty simple to understand. With more dues-paying members, unions have a lot of money to gain and spend.

A recent estimate of the average union dues among the top 15 unions by Labor Notes suggests that as of 2004, dues amounted to $377 in 2004, or about $425 in today’s dollars. According to the United Auto Workers (UAW), dues for a typical autoworker were $552 as of 2000, or about $682 in today’s dollars. Therefore, assuming membership growth of 1.5 million per year and the lower average dues estimate ($425), enactment of EFCA would increase union receipts by $637,500,000 per year.

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