What can you tell me about the Employee Free Choice Act?

[proud2BlibKansan]

I don't mean I want you to research and post links explaining what it is. I think I understand it and why it is being proposed.

I am looking for your gut feelings. Do you support it and why? Any personal stories that form your opinions?

Thanks! :hi:

[HillbillyBob]

1. To help workers get better treatment and keep corpses from denying them the

right to collectively bargain for wages and other benefits, time off, vacations.
I have lived and worked in socalled right to work states which is a lie because the only rights are the ones that that the business owners have , they set waged collectively I worked as an electrician and electrician helper and as a helper got only minimum wage and as a mechanice and journeyman not much more.
Really the right to work law is against labor , it really means the right to fire you for no cause.

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. So how would you argue against those who say a secret ballot should be used?

They have even proposed a law in MO to force all union elections to be secret ballots.

[Juche]

4. Secret Ballot is just a tool corporations use to intimidate workers

If unions can use the card check they can get a union under the radar. However with the secret ballot the company has several months to intimidate, harass, threaten and fire workers who they think will join a union.

A good metaphor I heard for the secret ballot was something like 'Its like an election between Obama & McCain, but only McCain is allowed to campaign and he is able to fire Obama's staffers, threaten his supporters and threaten to destroy the nation if he loses the election'. That is what the secret ballot is about, giving companies enough time to threaten and intimidate workers who try to form a union.

[LiberalFighter]

14. Secret ballot would not be democratic.

The ballot would only involve those that show up to vote. If they are on vacation they won't be able to vote. If they are out on medical or in the hospital or otherwise incapacitated they won't be able to vote.

Card check-off would include everyone that wants to have a union. This would be the most democratic type of election. 100% participation by either signing the card for a union or not signing it not to have a union.

More democratic than an election for President.

[patrice]

3. I know there would be no better opportunity for employers to come to terms with employees' right to

organize than when there are layoffs and downward pressure on wages and relief from having to provide healthcare on the table.

If employers ever harbor anything like hope for somekind of equitable relationship between themselves and Labor, to benefit BOTH, right now would seem to be their best opportunity for establishing that relationship, because it seems reasonble to expect that employees, given their right to organize, will, otherwise, be pretty cooperative due to general economic conditions.

[MnFats]

5. if outfits like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce LIKE it, it's bad for working people

lots of dummy organizations spent a lot to get that thing dumped.

since when did the CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

come out doing any favors for working people?
suddenly they're oh-so-concerned about working stiffs//

[proud2BlibKansan]

6. Good point

[Idealism]

7. The EFCA is vital for rebuilding wages in America

The EFCA will make it easier for people to unionize, thus raising wages eventually and making workers more secure in their jobs.

Anything that Big Business is willing to throw tens of millions of dollars trying to get it to fail, is something that ALL Americans should be for. They haven't had anyone's best interest at heart save their own, now is no different.

[patrice]

8. Imagine how some employees probably game both sides if there's never anything

but a private ballot. Then, if employers can, at certain strategic points, call for a public vote, when it is most opportune for them, they can find out who the opposition is and pressure them in the next round. Thusly beating the pro vote down lower and lower over time.

If both sides can call for either a private or a public vote, the playing field is leveled.

[patrice]

9. Actually, now that I think about it, some management probably games both sides too.

Public votes would limit their power to do that, because the employees would know who of their fellow employees are for and who are against.

[catnhatnh]

10. I can tell you a bit....

The first thing is to realize all you truly need to know is that corporations are trumpeting the glories of the "secret ballot" and you know right of the bat that whatever they are opposing MUST be better for the workers. Under "secret ballot" they do indeed have many methods to delay and harass the workers.

Card Check is a completely different animal and it terrifies them. Under card check ANY single worker from the ranks and file can secretly contact a union and get union pledge cards. If that worker can then contact and get a majority of workers-and by majority I mean over 50%-to sign the cards the shop is legally represented by the union. That for them is the scary part...a union can be contacted, workers organized, and legally established, COMPLETELY without the knowledge of the management. Their first hint is when a union agent walks in and starts setting up contract negotiations. There will then be no discussions or dissuading or minor concessions to avert...its a done deal.

Company propaganda implies unions coerce card signers-what they actually want is a chance for they themselves to apply coercion...and if you let the company run the election that's just what happens.

[proud2BlibKansan]

12. That card check sounds great

Why in the world should an employer be involved in setting up a union?

[Omaha Steve]

11. EFCA does not end the secret ballot

It lets the employee decide on the card if they want just card check OR a secret ballot. The employer no longer has the choice.

It also sets up rules for a first contract, penalties, fines, etc. for labor law violations.

http://www.aflcio.org/joinaunion/voiceatwork/efca/brokensystem.cfm

The System for Forming Unions is Broken

Today, CEOs get contracts that protect their wages and benefits. But some deny their employees the same opportunity. Although U.S. and international laws are supposed to protect workers' freedom to belong to unions, employers routinely harass, intimidate, coerce and even fire workers struggling to gain a union so they can bargain for better lives. And U.S. labor law is powerless to stop them. Employees are on an uneven playing field from the first moment they begin exploring whether they want to form a union, and the will of the majority often is crushed by brutal management tactics.

Cornell University scholar Kate Bronfenbrenner studied hundreds of organizing campaigns and found that:

* Ninety-two percent of private-sector employers, when faced with employees who want to join together in a union, force employees to attend closed-door meetings to hear anti-union propaganda; 80 percent require supervisors to attend training sessions on attacking unions; and 78 percent require that supervisors deliver anti-union messages to workers they oversee.
* Seventy-five percent hire outside consultants to run anti-union campaigns, often based on mass psychology and distorting the law.
* Half of employers threaten to shut down partially or totally if employees join together in a union.
* In 25 percent of organizing campaigns, private-sector employers illegally fire workers because they want to form a union.
* Even after workers successfully form a union, in one-third of the instances, employers do not negotiate a contract.

Learn More

* Get the facts in a one-page flier: Employer Interference—by the Numbers.
* Report: Impact of Republican-Appointed Judges: The Courts of Appeals’ Mistreatment of Union and Worker Success Before the NLRB.
* Read the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights report on the Employee Free Choice Act (PDF).

* Why majority sign-up? What's wrong with "secret ballot elections"?
* Out Front with John Sweeney: Management-Controlled Balloting.
* AFL-CIO Now blog: Here’s What NLRB 'Elections' Really Mean.
* Firedoglake weblog: These Elections Aren’t Democratic.
* Elections—NLRB Style.
* Read Human Rights and Workers' Rights in the United States (2005) by Lance Compa, author of the 2000 Human Rights Watch (HRW) report.
* Learn more about Voice@Work, the campaign to restore all workers’ freedom to form unions.
* See what you can do if you’re punished for supporting a union.
* Download the AFL-CIO issue brief, The Silent War: The Assault on Workers’ Freedom to Choose a Union and Bargain Collectively in the United States.
* Read a summary or download the full HRW report, Unfair Advantage: Workers’ Freedom of Association in the United States Under International Human Rights Standards.

American Rights at Work

Advocacy group American Rights at Work investigates workers' rights abuses, promotes public policy that protects workers' rights to form unions and bargain collectively and sponsors reports on workers' rights issues.

* The Anti-Union Network: Profiles of Unionbusters.
* Workers' Rights Watch: Eye on the NLRB.
* Read a new American Rights at Work study, Secret Ballots Aren't Enough (PDF).
* Read Undermining the Right to Organize: Employer Behavior During Union Representation Campaigns, a disturbing study of employer interference (PDF).
* Read Labor Day List: Partnerships that Work (2006), a report on successful partnerships between employers and their employees’ unions.

[proud2BlibKansan]

13. I knew you would have great information for me, Steve!

Thanks so much.

[LiberalFighter]

15. It would take reduce the impact employers would have on employees forming a union.

Employers should not have any say as to whether their employees can have a union or not.

Only the employees can be members. Only the employees can decide their rules and how they spend their dues. Only the employees can decide whether they accept or reject a contract. Only the employees can elect their officers and representatives.

So why are they wanting to decide whether their employees should be allowed to have a union?