Growing up in a union state, and having parents who were in labor unions, the answer was always obvious to me. When the local grocery store went on strike, we didn’t shop there and my dad honked his horn in support of the picketers when we drove by them. We always had medical insurance, and I knew that when my dad worked overtime, he was making time an a half (or double time on Sunday). It wasn’t until I entered the workforce though that I realized the effects that unions had. I’ve had jobs that were union, and I’ve had jobs that had no union representing them. I’ve even had a union job in a non-union (“right to work”) state where I had great benefits and better pay than other people in my industry in the town who weren’t represented by a union. In recent years, however, I’ve seen a lot of anti-union rhetoric, and it’s often from misinformed workers who actually benefit from labor unions.
Many workers don’t understand the reason for union dues. If a company decides to treat their employees badly by not giving overtime pay, having unsafe working conditions, or even just not paying them at all, they may be able to get away with it pretty easily if the workers can’t afford a good lawyer. Unions charge dues so they can afford the legal power to fight any bad companies that exploit workers. They also use the dues for administrative costs, as well as to pay negotiators who bargain for fair deals in the first place. I had a part time job at a college for a while, and for the last few years I have gotten bombarded with anti-union propaganda trying to convince me that I would save so much money if I didn’t give it to the union. Obviously the school doesn’t like being policed. I mean who can blame them? Wouldn’t life be great if we could just go around doing anything we wanted without the possibility of being sued? Ugh.
Some workers think that when a union makes a deal with a company, they are joining the side of that company, when in fact, they are making a deal to police that company. They are essentially saying “if you want to do business in this industry, you have to agree to follow all of the rules agreed on by the workers in the industry”. And it’s not just the union members who benefit. By raising the bar for the rules companies have to follow in a certain industry, it causes other companies in that industry, and even in other industries, to raise the bar. Otherwise, nobody will want to work for them. This is why we have a 40 hour work week (instead of 70), and why we have overtime pay, and relatively safe work environments. The stronger our unions are, the better our wages and working conditions are.
A while back when I worked in a different industry, two unions were having a vote on whether to merge into one. Since they both represented the same type of work, it made sense to increase the strength of both unions by joining forces. The companies that had workers in those unions were against the merger because a stronger union would mean it would be harder for them to exploit workers. There was a particular company that was spreading a bunch of anti-merger propaganda, and the owners seemed to be pretty successful in getting a bunch of workers on their side by telling everyone that they themselves started out as workers in the industry. This may have been true but why should that matter? Just because they were “one of us” doesn’t mean they still are.
There have been a fair amount of strikes recently and I’ve been pleasantly surprised to see pictures of my social media friends picketing- especially those whose political preferences don’t align with mine. This tells me that although some politicians may try to convince us that being pro or anti-union coincides with how left or right leaning you are, in reality it’s about whether or not you believe workers should be treated fairly, which to most people is a no-brainer. Inflation has been increasing while wages have stagnated. Many economists say that is because of labor unions weakening. Workers might complain that they didn’t get everything they wanted in a negotiation. Then they complain to other workers, making it sound like the union is “bad”, when in fact, it’s just weak. If more workers in the industry join the union, they can make better deals since they will have more bargaining power. So, yes, we do need labor unions, and we need more unity in the unions themselves.
Thanks for reading!
Rebecca H. Lee
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