HB 1043, introduced by Rep. Torr, seeks to restrict an employer’s ability to negotiate employment contracts through so-called “right to work” legislation. It subjects an employer to criminal penalties and civil suits if it seeks to require payment of union dues as a condition of employment – I believe this is traditionally known as a union shop clause.
Specifically, an employer may not require an individual to become or remain a member of a labor organization; pay dues, fees, assessments, or other charges of any kind or amount to a labor organization; or pay an amount to a charity or third party that is equivalent to or a pro rata part of dues, fees, assessments, or other charges regularly required of members of a labor organization as a condition of employment or continuation of employment.
I’ve never been part of a union and have mixed feelings about them, but I don’t think this kind of legislation will do anything to help alleviate the downward pressure on wages that has been afflicting the middle class for the better part of the last 30 years.
My late father was a big supporter of National Right to Work Committee – so strong that they kept sending him mail for years after his death and then finally started sending it to me.
Times change. I’m not afraid of unions in the private sector, and I’m disinclined to restrict an employer becoming a “Union Shop” if it wishes (or, likelier, considers in its best interest on balance) – especially when the bill forbids arrangements that avoid the freeloader problem (or true conscientious objection to membership) by allowing an employee to opt out of union membership with a charitable contribution equivalent to dues.
Why can’t they just offer two sets of benefits to an employee?
Package A, Union based: Salary is X, Healthcare is Y, and here are a list of other benefits. To qualify for package A, you must be a member of local blahblah with dues at this rate:
Package B, Company based: salary is C, Healthcare is B, and here is a list of other benefits.
Note, you may only change your package once per year at your annual review.
Can someone that is a member of a union explain why this isn’t acceptable?
If I was a company that wanted the union out, I’d let Package B employees reap the benefits of the union by offering a competitive wage package until the union was gone. Then, I’d drop benefits and do my best to make sure the union had trouble reforming.
Well, then the issue is more with making sure it is easy to form unions. I don’t think getting rid of a private ballot is the way to do it, though. That sounds like it makes it easy for unions to threaten people into voting for them.
Toyota and Honda workers, AFAIK, don’t have unions but still have good benefits while not as nice as GM or Ford workers. It was my understanding that they do this to keep the workers happy enough that they don’t want to form a union.
If a company is keeping their workers so happy they don’t want to form a union, isn’t that a good thing?
I just find the idea of being forced to pay money to a union, who then takes my money and gives it to politicians I might oppose, to be morally repugnant. I DO agree unions can have a very important role to play, but I’m not someone who blindly assumes they are always good or always bad. Therefore, you should have a choice about being involved with one.
Last thought: A union could have benefits that the company can’t offer in order to be competitive. For example, I would like to be part of a union who took job performance very seriously. If Local #1234 had a reputation of only having the best workers, I’d pay to be part of that if they found my skills to be worthy. I see that like having a CCIE.
They might not get as much attention as the unions that protect incompetent workers, but these type of unions (or guilds) do exist.
“I’ve never been part of a union and have mixed feelings about them, but I don’t think this kind of legislation will do anything to help alleviate the downward pressure on wages that has been afflicting the middle class for the better part of the last 30 years.”
The law isn’t about raising wages. The law is about the freedom to associate and not mandating that employees join a group (and give money to that group) just to have a job.
Well, I know the law isn’t about raising wages. You aren’t going to see any laws about raising wages – that just hasn’t been a priority among lawmakers over the last 30 years. It is about impairing the freedom to contract – impairing an employer’s freedom to contract with a labor union or vice versa. I’ll grant you that a good number of employers would prefer not to have that freedom to contract, but it’s still government micromanaging how private entities can organize their affairs.
Doug, I think we can agree that, good or bad, the bill is anti-union.
Still, I don’t see how you can argue that the law restricts freedom. The “impairment” you mention is a restriction of two parties (the union and the employer) from forcing a 3rd party (the employee) to restrict his contractual and freedome of association rights (by joining the union) just so he can receive employment.
As a member of a local union, I support non-union and union shop both. I started out as non-union electrical contractor , and then started a union shop .
The one thing about the union shops, you get a lot more with the union.
The non-union shops get more profit, the union shop has to pay workers
his pay and benfits. So if you want less pay for a job …No brainer. Well lets us remember safety on a job . That the real ticket, Its all about money, will you take less for a job that is a hazard to your health. Think people. Its a step back . Its a scam .
If party #1 and party #2 want to enter into a contract specifying the terms on which they’ll deal with a third party; seems like the third party can go elsewhere if he, she, or it do not want to do business under those terms.
To me, it is the same level of government intervention as a smoking ban is. I’m for a smoking ban as well, since it protects worker’s health, and I don’t think “find another job” is an excuse for that, or for unions.
I would be curious to hear someone who is opposed to one of these laws and not the other, though.
(Jason, your post made me think of this):
If an employer and union chose to execute a contract that required all employees not smoke, or that all employees give money to charity (rather than pay union dues), would you still argue that the ability of an employer and union to make such contracts (on the employee’s behalf, whether they like it or not) is pro-freedom?
I suppose when you get down to it, any contract is “anti-freedom” – it compels and restricts action. But, we generally don’t object in terms of “freedom” when private parties enter into agreements on how they are going to govern their relations.
I think what this gets down to is a policy preference for one kind of contract over another – an employer contract with an individual employee over an employer contract with a union. Certainly it isn’t the first time government has gotten into the business of preferring certain kinds of contracts over others. But, it seems to me that the reason for this policy preference is that an employer has more negotiating leverage over a contract with an individual employee than it has over a contract with employees in the aggregate acting through a labor union.
With private sector unions being about 8% or less of the workforce, the issue is not “downward pressure on wages”. The issue is economic growth and showing that Indiana is ready for business.
The combination of right to work and no income tax is the recipe for economic growth in America. It seems to me that this bill is a step in the right direction, although personally I’d be more interested in seeing Indiana lose the income tax.
If unions are such a limited part of the economy, why is weakening them such an important part of economic growth? And, on maybe a more philosophical note, if economic growth is of a nature that doesn’t improve the standard of living of the middle and lower classes, should we care about it?
Because there is always the threat that a site could unionize. It’s why Honda and Toyota located in Southern Indiana, not northern Indiana. The people in the south are less likely to unionize, even though productivity in the industrial north was higher at the time that the plants opened.
But if Indiana were RTW, perhaps those plants would be in Kokomo instead of Evansville, or whatever.
You know, the one thing that you never considered in your posts about wages in the South is that the cost of living is lower there. Taxes and right-to-work are one aspect of that, as is lower regulation, especially in the housing sector. Low cost of living attracts people who might not have the highest productivity, allowing them to survive and even thrive where they might not in a high tax, high regulation state like Indiana.
It’s kind of similar to how libs compare the US to Europe and note how high European productivity is compared to the US. But the structural unemployment rate is so high in Europe that low productivity folks are kept out of the job market. High productivity in that case is actually a sign of economic weakness, not strength.
I don’t think that people in the south are less likely to unionize because of personal propensity, but rather that those areas are traditionally have less organized labor infrastructure, whereas that still exists in more northern areas. That, I think, is why Honda and Toyota located where they did (along with some competitive incentive selling on the part of the localities). It’s just harder to unionize in areas where one has to start from scratch these days.
You could be right. I was basing my opinion in part on this Wall Street Journal article showing how Honda would not hire displaced autoworkers from the north because of fear that they would push for unionization.
Well, I’m not a labor historian, but it seems to me that it is easier to create an environment of employment [i]fear[/i] in places where potential employees have not had a tradition of long-term union organization.
And, the higher the level of [i]fear[/i], the lower the wages and benefits paid to hourly employees, and thereby higher profits for owners and stakeholders.
Oh, fudge. Can’t these blogs all decide on a single formatting methodology for italics?