ACROSS the US, thousands of workers marched to Labour Board Offices and Worksites, demanding Freedom to have a Trade Union, on Monday July 10.
Workers said that the upcoming ‘Kentucky River’ decisions from the Bush Labour Board could strip away their protections through trade unions.
In a week of actions starting last Monday, thousands of nurses, construction workers, miners and other workers marched to regional Labour Board offices and worksites to demand that they not be denied their worker rights and union protections.
This is the first time that such a set of concerted actions has focused on the Bush Labour Board’s decisions.
The workers have their eyes on three cases currently pending at the NLRB that are often referred to as the ‘Kentucky River’ cases.
By broadening the legal definition of ‘supervisor,’ these cases significantly strip workers of their existing contract protections and deny even more their right to organise reversing decades of worker protections.
At stake are collective bargaining rights for hundreds of thousands of workers who could be reclassified as supervisors and therefore not eligible for union protection under federal law.
‘At a time when America isn’t working the way it should for working people, the implications of losing union protections run deep for them,’ said AFL-CIO Organising Director Stewart Acuff.
He points out that if workers lose their protections as ‘employees’ under federal law, they may be fired or otherwise disciplined for union activity.
They’ll lose the freedom to choose to join or remain a member of a union. And they will lose their ability to have a voice on the job.
In recent decisions, the Bush-appointed National Labour Relations Board has taken away workers’ protections and workers’ rights, including the rights of disabled workers, temporary employees and graduate employees.
The nurses at the rallies said that union membership provides a voice on the job and the protections needed to be effective patient advocates.
‘A nurse with a union works with confidence to make tough calls and be a strong patient advocate on the hospital floor,’ said Margaret Shanks, RN, from the Children’s National Medical Center who is represented by the DCNA/UAN trade union.
‘Strong patient advocates need a strong voice to stand up to those who put the bottom line before patient care.’
Even foremen on construction jobs who work with a team of workers could lose their union rights under a broad definition of ‘supervisor.’
That means thousands of painters, welders, sheet metal workers, plumbers, electricians and others could lose their right to be in a union.
The attacks on trade unions, and the decisions of workers to defend their trade union rights comes at a time of economic and political crisis in the US.
Two reports by the federal Bureau of Labour Statistics (BLS) on rising consumer prices and sharply falling real wages again show just how vulnerable is the US capitalist economy to sharp slowdown.
Consumer prices rose by 0.4 per cent in May and by 4.3 per cent since May a year ago.
Over the past three months, the Consumer Price Index has risen at an annual average rate of 5.7 per cent.
Urban consumers are paying even more because of higher commuting costs.
The BLS report issued June 15 shows real weekly wages fell 0.7 per cent behind prices in May for non-supervisory workers in the service and manufacturing industries.
Weekly wage declines in May were widespread, said Charles W McMillion, president and chief economist of MBG Information Services.
Wages for service-producing jobs are down 0.4 per cent compared to a year ago. Manufacturing wages dropped by 0.9 per cent over the same period.
At the same time, worker productivity in the manufacturing sector increased by four per cent over the past year and is up 43.7 per cent since 1998, McMillion said.
In the distant past, real wages and productivity grew at roughly similar rates. But that has changed dramatically with today’s unregulated global commerce.
The report of sharply falling real wages should be a matter of great concern, McMillion said.
Households were already spending far more than their disposable incomes in April and even with very weak retail sales in May, the report suggests that households were forced to dip even further into their savings in May.
As well, high interest rates, a cooling in the housing market and high energy costs have taken the toll on the job market as payrolls grew by only 90,000 jobs last month.
This has been the lowest quarter of job growth since the third quarter in 2003.
The second quarter average for the year shows only 86,000 jobs added per month – a clear sign that the economy is slowing down.
The housing sector registered its first back-to-back monthly losses since the spring of 2001, as residential construction fell 6,800 over the past two months.
Last year over the same six-month period, residential construction registered 20,000 new homes as compared to 7,000 thus far this year.
‘Downstream industries’ from the housing sector have also been notably flat over the past few months.
According to a study by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), changes in wages tend to occur more gradually.
That is, it takes a while – at least half of a year – for the momentum from the job market to begin to reach and effect wage trends.
The report suggests that if the current slowdown in job growth sticks, we can expect wages (which have accelerated of late) to follow suit by declining sometime early next year.
The report also states that the Federal Reserve is likely to target the faster wage growth rather than the slower job growth.
Given the delayed reaction times, the Fed will probably worry less about lagging labour demand and continue in its rate-hike campaign in hopes of stemming higher wages.
Entering the third quarter, a slower economy, higher interest rates, high gas prices and reduced job growth could prove to be a major factor when voters go to the polls in November elections.
All these factors have made workers much more determined to safeguard their trade union rights and to match the soaring productivity gains made by the bosses at their expense with real wage rises and a struggle for job security.
The drive of the GM, and Ford motor car bosses to drive down wages, to sack tens of thousands of workers, and rid their contracts negotiated with the trade unions of ‘expensive’ and ‘unaffordable’ health and pension benefits has had a massive impact on US workers.
Workers are demanding a trade union leadership and also a political leadership capable of taking the employers on and defeating them.
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