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Freedom to Choose a Union

The polls make it clear: many Americans, as many as 57 million, would vote to join a union if they could, and most think unions are a good way to get problems solved at work.

Most American workers have a right, founded in their Constitutional rights of free speech and association, to form a union at their workplace. Unfortunately, many employers choose to do everything they can to prevent employees from joining a union.

One recent report on union organizing efforts 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 never negotiate a contract.

It is abuses like these that led to the introduction of the Employee Free Choice Act in the U.S. Congress in April, 2005.

Attacks on the Freedom to Choose Unions in Pennsylvania

In March of 2005 the so-called "Open Workfore Initiative" was introduced in the Pennsylvania House by Representatives Daryl Metcalfe (R-Butler County), Rep. Teresa Forcier (R-Venango County) Rep. Tom Creighton, and Rep. Sam Rohrer (R-Berks County).

If passed into law, the collection of bills would allow non-union workers to get all the economic benefits of union membership while paying nothing to support the bargaining efforts that secured the benefits in the first place. Federal law requires unions to represent all workers -- union and non-union -- in a workplace where there is a union.

Such "right to work" laws are part of a national strategy, well-funded by business interests, to undermine unions and depress wages.

TOWN HALL MEETING IN PITTSBURGH

The Pennsylvania AFL-CIO recently sponsored a Town Hall Meeting on the Employee Free Choice Act in Pittsburgh.

You can download audio and video of workers and labor leaders talking about the bad behavior of Comcast toward the IBEW and the need to protect workers' right to organize.

Speakers include Rep. Mike Doyle of Pennsylvania's 14th Congressional district, a co-sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act.

AMERICANS APPROVE OF UNIONS

According to a polls conducted for the AFL-CIO by Hart Research . . .

In 2002

50% of workers would vote to join a union if they could.

In 1999

52% of Americans think that Unions are good for the United States.

52% off Americans think that workers in Unions are better off than those who are not in unions.

69% of Americans think that joining a union is the best way to get problems at work solved.

54% of workers between the ages of 18 and 34 would vote to join a union if they could.

The EMPLOYEE FREE CHOICE ACT

Visit the national AFL-CIO Web site to hear the stories of harassment and intimidation of workers by employers told at the introduction of the Employee Free Choice Act on April 19, 2005.

SHARE YOUR ORGANIZING STORY

Do you have a story about how workers have been harassed by employers for trying to join a union in Pennsylvania? Send it to us.

By documenting cases of employer efforts to oppose organizing efforts in Pennsylvania we can make the General Assembly and the U.S. Congress face up to the problem.