A helpful backgrounder on the economics of unionization from James Sherk, the Heritage Foundation’s top labor expert, “What Unions Do: How Labor Unions Affect Jobs and the Economy“:

What do unions do? The AFL-CIO argues that unions offer a pathway to higher wages and prosperity for the middle class. Critics point to the collapse of many highly unionized domestic industries and argue that unions harm the economy. To whom should policymakers listen? What unions do has been studied extensively by economists, and a broad survey of academic studies shows that while unions can sometimes achieve benefits for their members, they harm the overall economy.

Labor’s claim that the Employee Free Choice Act would produce a stronger, larger middle class has always been more a profession of faith than an actual argument.

From the Wall Street Journal, “Specter Suggests Changes to Union Bill.”

Sen. Arlen Specter is floating two compromise proposals on a contentious union-organizing bill to gauge the business community’s willingness to accept the changes and find a middle ground on the bill, according to people familiar with the discussions.

Compromise. Right. From the Latin com — with — and promiterre — who are you kidding.

The radical restructuring of U.S. labor law that Sen. Specter (D-PA) is considering includes mail-in ballots in union organizing elections, ostensibly to preserve an employee’s choice, and some modified version of binding arbitration to include an element of “last best offer” negotiating. So employers and employees would have to live under government-imposed contract terms, reached by a more complicated process than proposed under the current version of the Employee Free Choice Act.

While some politicians and organized labor involved will no doubt continue to use the anodyne “compromise” in describing changes to their proposed Employee Free Choice Act, the media really ought to drop the term. When like-minded parties eager to achieve a politically palatable, sellable piece of legislation make changes, it’s not a compromise. It’s packaging.

Some helpful reading, including commentary on President Obama’s EFCA remarks in New Mexico.

• Heritage Foundation, James Sherk, “What Employer Advantage?”
• EFCA Report blog, “President Obama Remarks on Need for Compromise on EFCA“
• El Nuevo Herald, “MEL MARTINEZ: El voto secreto“
• Newsweek Blog, “Specter on EFCA: Yes. No. Maybe.”

We all too often hear claims by labor bosses that employers engage in illegal efforts to prevent union organizing. Today, the Heritage Foundation helps shed some light on some of the harsh realities of the tactics employed by union organizers. Further evidence that the best way to prevent intimidation and harrassment in the workplace is through private ballot elections.

Rian Wathen, Former Organizing Director for the UFCW discusses how authorization cards are often collected.

Hat tip: James Sherk

The most-common misleading response from organized labor to the criticism that the Employee Free Choice Act will destroy the secret ballot in the workplace goes like…well, here’s a recent example. It comes from Bill McCarthy, president of the Minneapolis Regional Labor Federation.

In attacking the EFCA, opponents distort the facts and charge that the legislation would end secret ballot elections in union organizing drives. Not true.

The foundation of modern labor law, the Wagner Act of 1935, provided a path to union recognition when a majority of workers in a workplace signed union authorization cards — simple and fair.

When labor adversaries passed the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947 over President Truman’s veto, however, employers gained the right to reject the workers’ union authorization cards and to petition the National Labor Relations Board to conduct an election to determine if a workplace should become union. ..[snip]

The EFCA would give workers, not employers, the right to decide how to express the choice about going union: through the card-check process OR through the NLRB election process.

McCarthy is playing the readers for idiots. Theoretically, oh sure, union organizers might, possibly, theoretically, choose an election, maybe. But under what possible circumstance would that be a realistic choice?

John Raudabaugh, Chicago attorney, labor expert and a former NLRB member, spoke at a Senate Republican Conference meeting on Monday devoted to the Employee Free Choice Act. He told Senators:

Labor wants card-check with 50+ percent yield to bypass but equate to the ballot box process. Why? To effectively silence the employer by conducting a quick, one-sided campaign without counter-information from the employer. Moreover, without the ballot-box, there is effectively no cure to overreaching and false Labor promises.

Labor and its funded academics ignore Taft-Hartley specifically protecting a worker’s right to refrain from third-party representation. Were the union to come up short of 50+ percent signed cards, would it really proceed to file a petition for an election? No, the secret ballot would not remain a real option under the EFCA proposal.

The real option, the REAL WORLD option, will be for labor to ratchet up the pressure and intimidation on employees until the organizers reach the 50-percent-plus-one required signatures.  

Both Raudabaugh and the Heritage Foundation’s labor fellow, James Sherk, gave excellent statements at the Senate session explaining current law and dissecting labor’s falsehoods. (Raudabaugh; Sherk.)

The details are important, which explains why labor shies from away from them in making the case for card check. The advocates prefer soundbites and platitudes — “It evens the playing field,” or “It restores the balance” or, “It doesn’t eliminate the secret ballot.”

Which warrants a snort and retort, “Do you think we’re idiots?”