Labor Pains: Because Being in a Union can be Painful

Archive: Jan 2011

  • Unions Take Strong Stand for Right-to-Ignore-the-Facts Laws

    Posted on Jan 24, 2011 by Center for Union Facts

    Time for some more union mythbusting. Today’s lesson centers on an old union chestnut about right-to-work laws, which forbid unions from collecting dues without the employee’s individual consent. Such laws, which are on the books in 22 states, are despised by unions. No surprise there. So it is also no surprise that Indiana AFL-CIO President […]

  • Unions Sue South Carolina Governor for Opposing Them

    Posted on by Center for Union Facts

    This just might be our favorite story of the year so far: South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley is facing her first big lawsuit after saying the state would try to keep unions out of the Boeing Inc. plant in North Charleston. The lawsuit filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Charleston by the International Association […]

  • Richard Trumka Yells at a Podium for an Hour

    Posted on by Center for Union Facts

    With the economy still struggling, we imagine you’ve never thought to yourself, “What does Richard Trumka think of all this?” Well, you don’t have to. Trumka shared anyway in his speech at the National Press Club yesterday. There were plenty of highlights from his tirade, but one of our favorites was his conspiracy theory about […]

  • Department of (Organized) Labor Wants Solidarity, Not Enforcement

    Posted on Jan 19, 2011 by Center for Union Facts

    Don Todd previously headed up the Department of Labor’s Office of Labor Management Standards (OLMS) under President George W. Bush. Now he’s charging that, instead of keeping unions honest, the Department of Labor is working hand-in-hand with organized labor: “In a worst-case scenario, your union organizer comes to you, offers you a deal to unionize, […]

  • UNITE HERE Raids Its Own Benefit Fund to Protest Benefit Cuts

    Posted on by Center for Union Facts

    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 […]

  • This Just In (Not): Unions Make Businesses Less Competitive

    Posted on by Center for Union Facts

    This isn’t us spouting off either. This is Bob King, president of the United Auto Workers. King is threatening to go after foreign-owned automakers in the American South with all the subtlety of a Mack truck. “I don’t want to use the word boycott,” he said last week. Our thought: Then don’t. Oh wait, he […]

  • Showdown Looms Between NLRB and the States

    Posted on by Center for Union Facts

    Where will the National Labor Relations Board extend its tendrils next? Here’s your answer: The National Labor Relations Board has threatened to sue the states of Arizona, South Carolina, South Dakota and Utah over recently passed state constitutional amendments that require secret-ballot elections before a company can be unionized. The board says the states can’t […]

  • Public Sector Unions Vs. Private Sector Unions

    Posted on Jan 14, 2011 by Center for Union Facts

    Is there a coming class war between public-sector workers and private-sector workers? Here’s William McGurn in the Wall Street Journal: The notion that Wall Street and Main Street are fundamentally at odds with one another remains a popular orthodoxy. So much so that we may be missing the first stirrings of a true American class […]