Why unions fail
Published: Wed, Nov. 19, 2008 12:30AM
Modified Wed, Nov. 19, 2008 06:55AM
E-Mail
Print
tool name
closeIn reply to the Nov. 12 op-ed article by Froma Harrop: More than half of U.S. workers say they would join a labor union if they had the chance. Why, then, do so many union certification elections end with the defeat of the union? A good part of the answer is employer intimidation.
Managers hire anti-union lawyers and PR firms to lead them against union organizing efforts. At the direction of those consultants, managers use captive audience sessions and one-on-one interviews to propagandize against union representation without letting pro-union workers respond. They fire workers who are active on the organizing committee. They barely veil their threats to close up if the union wins. They try to set whites, blacks and Latinos against one another. They delay the election while their intimidation mounts.
Secret ballot union representation elections were prescribed by the 1935 Wagner Act to give workers a voice in their representation without employer interference. With jobs as insecure as they are today, managerial intimidation is interference that can shake workers' will to take charge of their futures through union representation. The Employee Free Choice Act would return a voice about their representation to workers who have largely lost it.
More Letters
Jeffrey Leiter
Raleigh
Get it all with convenient home delivery of The News & Observer.
The News & Observer is pleased to be able to offer its users the opportunity to make comments and hold conversations online. However, the interactive nature of the internet makes it impracticable for our staff to monitor each and every posting.
Since The News & Observer does not control user submitted statements, we cannot promise that readers will not occasionally find offensive or inaccurate comments posted on our website. In addition, we remind anyone interested in making an online comment that responsibility for statements posted lies with the person submitting the comment, not The News and Observer.
If you find a comment offensive, clicking on the exclamation icon will flag the comment for review by the administrators, we are counting on the good judgment of all our readers to help us.
