Harry Targ
The Michigan legislature and Governor Richard Snyder
passed a new “right-to-work” law on December 11, 2012. Such laws, authorized by
the anti-labor Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, allow states to prohibit union locals
from requiring workers who choose not to join the union that represents them at
the work place and who receive union services from having to pay for them.
Social scientists refer to the dilemma this creates
as the “free-rider” problem. Why pay for bargaining and negotiation, support
for worker grievances, and other services if you can get them free? In the long
run, supporters of right-to-work laws hope to reduce union membership and
weaken organized workers as an economic force in the workplace and a political
force in the electoral arena.
The Michigan Governor reversed his earlier
declaration that he would not support this controversial legislation. Michigan
is a state where the modern labor movement was formed in the 1930s during the
sit-down strikes in auto plants. Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels also promised
labor leaders that he would not support such legislation. They both changed
their minds because the prospects of defeating labor at this critical juncture
seemed too good to miss. So Michigan, like Indiana, dusted off its copy of the
American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) model legislation and passed it.
As the Economic Policy Institute states,
right-to-work provisions have negative consequences for workers. In right-to-work
states workers earn significantly lower wages than workers in states without
such laws. Also, they are less likely to benefit from employer-sponsored health
insurance plans. Some studies note that health and safety at workplaces in
right-to-work states fare poorly compared with workers in states without such
laws. In short, Section 14 (b), the right-to-work provision of the Taft-Hartley
Law of 1947, was designed to weaken the burgeoning new and militant labor
movement of that day and as a result to increase corporate rates of profit.
On December 12, Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels (soon
to be Purdue University president) announced that nine companies were
“expected” to make investments in his state creating 2,552 new jobs. These
included such companies as Angie’s List, BidPal Inc, and Mitsubishi Engine
North America. The Indianapolis Star indicated that the nine companies who “expect” to
add these jobs by 2016 will receive over $27 million in tax credits. It was
likely that the Daniels announcement was designed to support Michigan Governor
Snyder’s claim that he was inspired by the alleged economic boom Indiana
experienced since adopting right-to-work legislation last winter.
Governor Daniels indicated that “…we have seen a
significant surge of new interest in the past several months.” Again, Governor
Snyder was inspired by the Indiana story not because of the tax giveaways but
because he claimed it was Indiana’s right-to-work law which was passed
ten-months ago that spurred this
“economic miracle” in the Hoosier state.
In a recent article on the Economic Policy Institute
(EPI) website written by political scientist Gordon Lafer, economist Marty
Wolfson, and Indiana state AFL-CIO President Nancy Guyott, it was pointed out
that investment decisions require a lengthy process of study. Since the law was
passed last January, became effective in March and is being challenged in
court, the authors argued, it was unlikely that the new law would have affected
decisions to invest in Indiana.
Further Lafer, Wolfson, and Guyott point out that
none of the nine companies the Daniels’report referred to claim that the new
right-to-work law had anything to do with their plans to invest more in the
state. Some of the nine already had major facilities in the state. In addition,
the authors examined companies that were courted by the state but chose to go
elsewhere. Their research indicated that right-to-work was not a criteria for
choosing before 2012 to invest in other states.
Perhaps the most significant facts gleaned from
recent research on the Indiana economy were published by the Indiana Institute
for Working Families in their study entitled “Status of Working Families in
Indiana, 2011.” (http://www.incap.org/statusworkingfamilies.html).
Among their key findings are the following:
-the state had 231,500 fewer jobs as 2012 began than
pre-recession employment.
-21,200 state and local government jobs were lost
from August, 2008 through February, 2012 (22 percent of jobs lost).
-in 2012, 19 percent of unemployment is among youth.
-Indiana is among 17 states continuing to experience
absolute declines in the labor force since the recession began.
-only 14.6 percent of Hoosiers over the age of 25
have bachelor’s degrees.
-Indiana ranks 41st in average wages
earned; economic inequality in the state has grown since 2000 but worker productivity has increased by
14 percent.
-median family income fell by 13.6 percent over the
past decade.
-since 2000 poverty has increased by 52 percent.
The figures on the devolution of the Indiana economy
over the last decade, as its state government has shifted to the right, are
staggering. This is the model to which the Michigan Governor and legislature
aspire.
Several conclusions can be drawn from the data and
the contemporary political context in the industrial heartland of America.
First, economic decline has been a characteristic
feature of workers’ lives before, during, and since the recession.
Second, during much of the last decade, particularly
in states like Indiana, the political environment has been increasingly shaped
by the rightwing economic agenda of the Republican Party.
There is no evidence, historical or contemporary,
that right-to-work laws will reverse the severe economic decline workers
experience. But there is evidence that the wealth and power of the super-rich
will increase, while workers’ wages decline at the same time that their productivity
rises.
Third, looking at capital/labor relations since the
onset of the twentieth century, the strength of organized labor matters for all
workers. Right-to-work, rather than attracting new investors, primarily
enriches the current corporations in right-to-work states and weakens unions.
Finally, as President Obama stated in a visit to
Detroit just before the Michigan legislative vote, the resurgence of
right-to-work campaigns is “political.” Why? Because the labor movement is the
only financial and grassroots base of opposition to the shift to pre-New Deal
economic policy. This was demonstrated in the “ground game” of the labor
movement in key battleground states during the last election. It also was
reflected in campaigns to reverse assaults on public employees in Ohio and
mobilizations of teachers in Chicago to protect public education. In general
organized labor represents the front-line of defense against shocking inequalities
in wealth and power, opposition to the privatization of virtually all public
institutions, and the protection of programs that have given modest economic
security to large portions of the population.
The Michigan story and the mythology about Indiana
are just part of the ongoing struggle of the financial/corporate class and
their rightwing politicians to destroy the last movement that can save
Americans from destitution. While weakened labor appears to be mobilizing to
protect the interests of the broadening working class.
