The Union Label - September 4, 2006
Posted on September 4, 2006 at 10:49 pm by Chuck Muth
TAKING ON THE UNIONS
Our friends at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation have produced a funny new web-video highlighting the difference between the public face the teachers puts on for public consumption and their real nature of their extortion racket. Check it out here…
In related news, our friends over at the Center for Union Facts are taking on the all-powerful public workers unions with a new ad campaign.
“On August 16 the Center for Union Facts launched profiles of public employee unionization for every state in the nation, and everyone’s talking about it,” CUF noted in an August 25 release. “Media outlets in California, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Texas have all run stories covering our new campaign to publicize just how much public-sector union bosses have cost taxpayers.
View this new commercial and all of CUF’s print and electronic ads here…
And last, but certainly not least, the College Republicans ain’t afraid of no unions. They’ve spent the summer dedicating a lot of their time and effort to doing combat on the political ground with organized labor. Check ’em out here…
THE HISTORY OF LABOR DAY
“Labor Day was established through a hastily-passed act of Congress in the days following the 1894 Pullman strike, during which President Grover Cleveland sent 12,000 federal troops into the Illinois town to end a strike that had crippled the Pullman railroad sleeping car company. The strike was aided by Eugene V. Debs of the American Railroad Union, which was disbanded after the strike. Debs went on to become the Socialist candidate for President in 1920, winning almost a million votes while campaigning from jail.”
- Labor Reform News, 8/30/06
LONG HISTORY OF CORRUPTION
“Since its origins in the 1880s, Labor Day has served as our nation’s tribute to working men and women. The holiday also provides occasion once more to ponder the untrustworthiness of so many labor unions, presumably the trustee of workers’ interests. It is hardly news that American organized labor has a long history of corruption at national, district and local levels. And despite all the successful investigations and prosecutions, union financial crimes still occur with disturbing regularity, and on due occasion through sweetheart deals with the criminal underworld.”
- Carl F. Horowitz on FrontPageMagazine.com
DUES MONEY FOR POLITICS I
“The AFL-CIO launched a $40 million voter drive on Wednesday, targeting 21 states and hoping increased turnout among union members swings competitive races in Ohio and Pennsylvania. The financial commitment amounted to the most expensive by the union for the midterm elections. The focus is 21 governors races, 15 Senate races and at least 50 House races.”
- Washington Post, 8/30/06
DUES MONEY FOR POLITICS II
“Not to be left out, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) union on August 10 announced plans to raise member dues to ‘spend $60 million more a year to campaign for universal health coverage, to unionize 70,000 workers annually and to register 280,000 union members to vote,’ according to The New York Times. The union is spending $8 million, the Associated Press reported, to provide half the funding of a new ‘527’ political organization devoted to establishing majorities in state legislatures that will redraw Congressional districts along labor-friendly lines.”
- Center for Union Facts, 9/1/06
THE MORE THINGS CHANGE…
“Disregarding last year’s largely symbolic split triggered by differences over whether to spend money on politics or coercive organizing programs, union elites within the so-called ‘Change to Win’ coalition and the AFL-CIO recently pledged their unity in the 2006 election cycle. In fact, not only have the two groups pledged to share mailing lists and contributions, but they also vowed to work hand-in-glove at the local level, mobilizing armies and paid ‘volunteers’ for their hand-picked candidates.”
- Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Committee
2006 LABOR DAY CHEAT SHEET
12.5% - Percent of workers belonging to a labor union (down from 20.1% in 1983)
7.8% - Percent of private sector workers belonging to a labor union (down from 16.5% in 1983)
36.5% - Percent of government sector workers belonging to a labor union (unchanged from 36.7% in 1983)
18 - States with minimum wages higher than the federal minimum wage
22 - Right to Work states
17 - States that offer a defined contribution pension for state employees
11 - States that offer an HSA option for state employees
$925 million - Direct political spending by unions in 2004 election cycle
215 - Cosponsors of H.R. 1696, “Employee Free Choice Act,” which would strip workers of their secret ballot protections
552 - Union thugs convicted of unfair labor practices since Elaine Chao became Secretary of Labor
5.5 million - Jobs created since Bush tax cut was fully-implemented in 2003
4.8% - Unemployment rate
- Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
FAMOUS LAST WORDS
“People need to know that there’s a major political institution in this country called labor unions, and these political institutions have over time gained an enormous amount of power and leverage in the private as well as the public sector.”
- Las Vegas Review Journal, 8/21/06
“Although benefits for their current members are legally untouchable, union leaders derive substantial power from the existing system and will battle any attempt to change it.”
- Wall Street Journal editorial
