LaborPains.org

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis announced on Wednesday afternoon that she is resigning her post. By all accounts, Solis clearly stood on the side of organized labor. As Byron York notes, Solis served as a cheerleader for union members opposing Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s reforms, and she supported the anti-secret ballot EFCA before it went down in flames.

As the speculation begins as to who might replace Solis, she has already put in motion at least one major change that ensures yet another advantage for organized labor. The Department of Labor (DOL) is approaching the Final Rule stage of a new regulation that would change the definition of “advice” and “persuader.” The proposed rule would revise the way the DOL interprets the Labor Management Reporting Disclosure Act (LMRDA) by limiting the exemption of whom an employer must share information about.

Prior to this proposal, the DOL interpreted Section 203 of the LMRDA to mean that employers only had to reveal information about “persuaders,” those who help the company in deterring union campaigns, if those individuals were in direct contact with employees. Under this altered interpretation, employers would have to reveal the names of the lawyers or other consultants that they relied on for advice, as well as how much it cost to hire them.

This is especially problematic for attorneys, as the American Bar Association (ABA) stated in its comment in opposition to the rule. It would force attorneys to violate rules of confidentiality with their clients. According to the ABA Model Rules and several state bar rules of professional conduct, the divulging of information relating to representation of a client without the informed consent of the client is not permitted.  The ABA says:

By requiring lawyers to file detailed reports with the Department stating the identity of their employer clients, the nature of the representation and the types of legal tasks performed, and the receipt and disbursement of legal fees whenever the lawyers provide advice or other legal services relating to the clients’ persuader activities, the Proposed Rule could chill and seriously undermine the confidential client-lawyer relationship.

This is but one part of the pro-labor legacy that will remain even though Solis is moving on.

Labor unions have a big problem: Americans don’t like them as much as they used to. Luckily for the union cause, labor has a plan to right the sinking ship—ditch, or at least replace, the “union” label.

The latest numbers paint a bleak picture. Public approval of labor unions has dropped nearly 15 percent in the past ten years. It’s currently hovering just a few points above its all-time low of 48 percent in 2009. That’s a far cry from the 75 percent approval rating unions enjoyed in the 1950s.

Then there’s the membership crisis. Union rolls have been steadily shrinking for decades. Private sector union membership is at a 70-year low, and union members as a percentage of the workforce has tumbled from 28 percent in 1954 to a mere 11.2 percent this year. Last year alone saw a substantial loss of roughly 379,000 union jobs.

It’s not hard to explain these numbers. Take the last month, for instance. November saw Hostess implode after a disastrous bakers union strike, taking the Twinkie with it in the process, a dead-on-arrival Walmart union walk-out on Black Friday that made headlines but hindered no one, and an annoying but ineffective SEIU strike at LAX. Early this month, a strike at West Coast ports threatened to put a damper on holiday retail sales.

When you consider these incidents, it’s no wonder that Americans are turning away from the union brand. Yet Labor, well aware that its popularity is on the wane, has found a way to reverse its fortunes: a rebrand.

Welcome to the “Worker Center.” These organizations are little more than labor unions by a different name. They organize unionization pushes and even bargain using union-style brinksmanship and corporate campaign tactics. Yet unlike an official labor union, worker centers don’t have to abide by federal labor law.

These organizations already exist. OUR Walmart, a worker center affiliated with the UFCW, organized those failed Black Friday protests. The Restaurant Opportunities Center—which was originally supposed to be called the Restaurant Organizing Center—is another. ROC, which has nine local affiliates in major American cities, is now actively trying to unionize the restaurant industry. A similar organization, Fast Food Forward, has initiated ongoing strikes at New York City’s fast food chains using professional union organizers to aid in its mission.

The AFL-CIO, not to be left behind, has also started a rebrand. Its non-union union organizing group, “Working America,” is technically classified as a “527.” That’s the same tax-exempt status used by political action committees and political parties. Based out of the AFL-CIO’s D.C. headquarters, Working America boasts some three million non-union members—people which the AFL-CIO still counts on its membership lists.

It’s a sorry state of affairs when labor has to abandon its longstanding brand. Yet for many Americans, “union” has become a dirty word, precisely because of debacles like Hostess and Walmart. Rebranding the movement might just be its only hope.

But rebranding isn’t a guarantee of success. Companies like Comcast (now Xfinity) may have been successful, but others like Blackwater (now Xe) didn’t exactly pan out. Many of the failed attempts ultimately flopped because their name change was not accompanied by any corresponding change in tactics or purpose. Some things just can’t be whitewashed with a few new words.

Unions should take heed. In the long run, self-examination might be more beneficial than a mere name change or a repackaging of the same-old message. Perhaps Americans are shying away from unions not because we’ve changed, but rather because Labor has turned away from what made it great. Unions should reclaim their heritage, not rebrand their their name.

Get ready for labor’s next big campaign: unionizing fast food workers.

On Thursday, 200 fast food workers in New York City protested in front of several restaurants. Organizers are calling their group Fast Food Forward.  As Steven Greenhouse at the New York Times reported:

Workplace experts said it was by far the largest series of job actions at fast-food restaurants ever — part of an ambitious plan that seeks to unionize workers and increase wages at fast-food restaurants across the city.

Other reports indicate that the effort has been in the works for several months, as 40 full time organizers sought to reach out to employees to garner support for the walkout. Organizers say their goal is to raise wages to $15 per hour and unionize the workforce. But this is actually a plan that goes back several years.

In a blog this morning, we’re reminded of the original report of a leaked SEIU document, uncovered in May 2010:

Internal SEIU documents have exposed a December 2009 plan hatched to unionize the nation’s fast food workers.  The SEIU plan details how the purple behemoth plans on targeting fast-food chains in Los Angeles first, the using L.A. and an “east coast” city as a spring board into other cities.

The 2009 memo is enlightening. The SEIU strategy, coming from the Property Services Division, is to ramp up organizing efforts in “the new, low-wage service economy” and to target specific geographic areas. At that time, the group intended to focus on Los Angeles and “an east coast market” and aim to unionize 15,000 in just six months. Some other key elements to the plan included limiting the campaign to the largest chains, reaching out to local officials, and to use rhetoric for a “living wage” to rally the troops. The memo ends:

• Move fast and furious with an army of 200-300 Staff/MOs/VOs/other volunteer organizers and the necessary number of leads to:
  • Petition for living wage
  • ID leaders
  • Bring workers together within geographies
  • Sign authorization cards
  • File on dozens of restaurants per week

Labor Union Report notes a few good reasons why this type of unionization is a boon for labor:

If unions are successful in unionizing fast food workers, particularly in non-right-to-work states that allow for mandatory dues payments, unions will not only collect union dues from these workers but, thanks to the high turnover, also be able to collect initiation fees every time a new worker is hired.

So how does that compare to the Fast Food Forward campaign?

This is taking place in the similarly union-friendly city of New York. The homepage shouts “We can’t survive on $7.25!” and “Higher Pay for a Stronger New York!” and keeps a petition signature count.  It features videos of workers who are not making a “living wage” and the group has been quick to seek out martyrs for the cause. A slew of local politicians—primarily Democrats running for mayor next year—are backing the protestors.

And according to Greenhouse the organizers are the usual suspects: New York Communities for Change, formerly known as ACORN; United NY.org, an advocate for increasing the minimum wage; the Black Institute, whose president and founder,Bertha Lewis, was the former ACORN CEO; and last, but certainly not least—the SEIU.

It’s been a slow slog for union organizers to make it to this point—nearly three years ago, this was just an idea on a piece of paper. Now, unions are ready to launch a full-time campaign to take advantage of more employees in order to fill labor’s bank accounts.

If you went to a Wal-Mart this weekend, chances are that you had more trouble getting to the best deals thanks to obstructions from your fellow shoppers, not because of a much-ballyhooed, but little-attended labor action.

It turns out that the proposed strike, walkout, protest — whatever you want to call it — really didn’t amount to anything. And even if you spotted a few of these lonely folks, there was no guarantee that they were even Wal-Mart employees. And that’s even with the $50 gift card enticement that the organizers offered give out if you wanted to “sponsor a striker.”

The groups behind the effort, Organization United for Respect at Walmart (OUR Walmart) and Making Change at Walmart are both efforts of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union. The UFCW has long pined to get a foot in the door at America’s largest retailer, but to date, its efforts have resulted in complete failure.

And this weekend’s actions appear to be a repeat performance of the union coming up short.  Most reports found a handful of employees at a protest, if there were any at all. Regardless of the numbers, even the highest estimates wouldn’t make much of a dent in the 1.4 million people employed by Wal-Mart.

Wal-Mart attempted to stop the proposed action last week, but the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) was unable to reach a decision before the non-events, claiming that it was “complex” and could not be decided so quickly. A recent paper published in Engage, the practice journal of The Federalist Society, takes a closer look at groups such as OUR Walmart and explains what types of issues the NLRB will likely have to address in its ruling.

Along with several other labor groups, OUR Walmart is classified as a “worker center,” not a labor union like the Teamsters or the United Auto Workers, for example. As authors Stefan Marculewicz and Jennifer Thomas explain, worker centers are able to avoid complying with the laws that affect labor organizations, including the protections given to workers by federal law.

We certainly do not take any position in this article with respect to the value these worker centers may offer to workers.  However, no organization, no matter how laudable its mission, is above reproach.  Just as corruption plagued the labor movement in the last century, and gave rise to the legislation that governs labor organizations and provides workers the basic protections enjoyed today, so too could similar malfeasance cloud the efforts of worker centers.  Compliance with the NLRA and LMRDA serves not only as a protection for workers, but also, perhaps, as a validator of the worker centers that claim to represent them.

A goal of many worker centers is to ensure that employers of their members comply with the basic laws that offer protections to the workers.  It is quite reasonable to expect worker centers to comply with them as well.

So what of OUR Walmart? The group is considered a subsidiary of the UFCW and its goals for how it plans to affect change at Wal-Mart include alterations to wages and hours of employment as well as other employment-related policies. The group has also directly demanded these changes on Wal-Mart’s management. For these reasons, Marculewicz and Thomas find that OUR Walmart should be considered a “labor organization” under federal law and must therefore follow the rules that they are currently avoiding.

Labor, in making a lot of noise about Wal-Mart and not backing it up with any real action, may damage itself by bringing more attention to its apparent end-run around federal labor law.

The notable supporters of the plan are the AFL-CIO, SEIU, and the Big Labor-funded Economic Policy Institute. The report was released at EcPI and included remarks from Richard Trumka of the AFL-CIO.

The group Loewentheil founded, The Roosevelt Institute, received a total of $35,000 from the AFL-CIO, UNITE HERE, and the Teamsters in July and August of 2011. And the website for the report directs the “Contact Us” email address to Jeff Parcher of the Center for Community Change, another supporter of the plan. The Center and its sister organization, the Campaign for Community Change, received a combined $35,000 from the SEIU National Headquarters and a local chapter, AFL-CIO, and UNITE HERE in 2010-2011.

So how do we get to the promised land? With more unions, of course!

It's hard to tell anti-capitalist protesters from AFL-CIO leaders these days. (Photo credit: csuspect)

The AFL-CIO is demonizing millionaire CEOs that make their money the old-fashioned way—by working hard and earning it. According to the union, more than 100,000 median wage earning workers could be supported if the nation’s top earning CEOs were, presumably, eliminated or magically decided to work for free. The AFL-CIO’s “Executive PayWatch” website states:

In 2010, Standard & Poor’s 500 Index company CEOs received, on average, $11.4 million in total compensation— a 23 percent increase in one year. Based on 299 companies’ most recent pay data for 2010, their combined total CEO pay of $3.4 billion could support 102,325 median workers’ jobs.

Taking a page from the AFL-CIO’s book of wishful thinking, bloggers at The Union News reverse-engineered the union’s argument to see what would happen if billions in union dues hadn’t been collected in 2010 and blown on “salaries and benefits of union bosses, their staffs, and their golf courses, airplanes, and other costs.” The results, though speculative, seem to shatter the glass house in which the AFL-CIO enjoys throwing its rocks:

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2010, there were 14.7 million union Americans belonging to unions. While that only represents 11.9 percent of all wage and salary earners, there is a substantial amount of dues money flowing to unions.

If we were to use a conservative figure of $50 per month for union dues, in 2010, unions collected $735,000,000 per month in union dues from America’s unionized workers. Multiply $735,000,000 by 12 months and you get a whopping $8,820,000,000 that was collected in union dues in 2010.

Divide $8,820,000,000 by $33,227 and you’ll find that if unions did not take union dues from workers in 2010, 265,447 workers’ jobs could have been supported.

We’re guessing AFL-CIO leader Richard Trumka probably won’t be testing out The Union News’ theory to see if it holds any merit, and for obvious reasons.

The Daily Caller has another fascinating article about an Obama Administration policy that could give unions a membership boost:

By increasing the number of “green” requirements truckers have to comply with in order to get into some major United States ports — like Los Angeles, Long Beach and Oakland — the Obama administration and the Environmental Protection Agency are helping push previously independent truckers into companies, which then makes them vulnerable to unionization or, in many cases, forced to join a union. As these aren’t administrative laws from the EPA per se, trucks that don’t fit this new “green” standard, which is meeting at least 2007 EPA emissions levels, are still allowed to operate throughout the country. But each of the major port authorities won’t let them in if they don’t fit the new environmental regulations, which would force many independent truckers out of business if they resist since many truckers depend on business from the ports to survive.

And sure enough, the Caller goes on to quote a spokeswoman for a coalition of groups (including the Teamsters) saying she wants to stop the “misclassification” of truckers as independent contractors. Far better for distant labor leaders to decide truckers’ employment arrangements rather than truckers and trucking companies.

This is a story to watch for two reasons. First, it’s another example of the government stacking the deck in favor of labor unions, which look increasingly unable to survive without the feds. Second, it shows the continuing efforts by organized labor to co-opt the green movement and use it to gain members. As we’ve noted in the past, the Teamsters have embarked on a protracted effort to eliminate independent truckers — all under the guise of being “environmentally friendly.” Now they’ve enlisted the EPA in their scheme.

Image courtesy of Hugo90.

In October 2009, UNITE HERE hotel workers in San Francisco voted to go on strike against several hoteliers. The workers organized ostensibly because they don’t feel the hotels are doing enough for them to cover health care costs.

But the hotels aren’t the only ones supposedly depriving them of benefits. UNITE HERE was caught diverting money from a union benefit fund to spend on their strikes:

After the National Labor Relations Board brought a legal case against Unite Here Local 2, which represents 12,000 hotel employees in San Francisco and San Mateo counties, the union agreed to reverse its actions and restore the monies to the proper funds with interest, hotel spokesman Pete Hillan said in a written statement.

In May, the Grand Hyatt and Hyatt Regency complained about the practice to the NLRB, and the agency subsequently intervened, Hillan said. Before the union redirected the funds, the money had been going to fund child care and elder care.

“One million dollars is a lot of money to chase business away from San Francisco,” San Francisco Grand Hyatt General Manager David Nadelman said Tuesday at the first of two dueling news conferences at the Union Square Grand Hyatt.

The employees are striking primarily over a reduction in health benefits. Organized labor has reacted with outrage when states don’t fully fund their benefit funds. Alleged attempts to “raid the Social Security and Medicare funds” have also elicited dramatic responses from unions.

There can only be one solution. In order for UNITE HERE to be consistent, it has to go on strike against itself. Any business or government willing to raid its employees’ benefits for cynical purposes must be taught a lesson. That’s their talking point, right?

Image courtesy of Marshall Astor.