Joe Biden set out to be the most pro-labor president in memory, and succeeded.
He became the first president to join a picket line during the epic United Auto Workers strike against the “big three” automakers that the unions won — game, set and match.
Donald Trump spoke at a non-union auto parts plant in Michigan, dismissed the UAW’s efforts, and predicted economic catastrophe under Biden’s policies. Nothing could more perfectly sum up the difference between the two parties.
For decades, Republicans attempted to curtail unions’ ability to bargain for improved wages, benefits and working conditions. They’ve sponsored anti-union “right to work” laws, encouraged replacement of striking workers, and substantially weakened federal labor laws.
If capital is given free rein and wages are depressed, the consumers benefit from lower prices; that’s the GOP’s pitch.
Democrats have been equivocal. Presidents Carter, Clinton and Obama did nothing to correct the imbalance against organizing, so profoundly stacked against new unions that it’s virtually impossible to organize growing sectors such as restaurants, hotels and resorts.
Biden is different. He’s spoken out repeatedly and included pro-union provisions in major infrastructure and climate legislation passed by Congress.
But he hasn’t been able to change federal law because he’s never had a working majority in the Senate. Democrat-in-name-only Sens. Manchin and Sinema ensured that.
It’s not beyond imagining he might yet have the votes if recent labor successes reverse longstanding images of decline.
The pandemic played a key role. By shuttering businesses overnight, it exposed basic facts about the economy we’d like to ignore. Low-paid but nevertheless “essential” workers bore the brunt of fatal COVID infections, required to work while bosses stayed home. The pandemic also created a massive labor shortage.
For the first time in years those at the bottom of the wage scale did better than those at the top. The once-visionary $15-an-hour minimum wage was achieved, largely via the labor market.
Then, two high-visibility strikes focused attention on what labor can achieve with widespread public support.
The UAW’s wage gains were impressive, driven by the reality they’d never recouped cutbacks accepted when the Great Recession threatened the industry’s survival.
More impressive, however, were agreements allowing organizing at non-union battery plants that were driving a wedge between unions and environmentalists over electric cars. Company negotiators claimed this was impossible, but it happened.
Last weekend, the Emmys finally took place after being postponed since September by writers’ and actors’ strikes. Both had highly favorable outcomes for unions, including protections involving streaming and other new technologies; would that non-union writers had such protections.
Practically unnoticed, the Maine State Employees Union (MSEA) has also enjoyed a comeback. Gov. Janet Mills, like her predecessors, was in no hurry to bargain after contracts expired.
The union successfully implemented a new strategy: convincing Democratic legislators to appropriate enough money to cover substantial raises.
They’ve now arrived: a two-stage 9% increase, and a commitment to study the large gap between state and comparable private sector jobs, estimated at 15%. Unlike past wage studies, this one requires an implementation plan.
How did these breakthroughs occur? In part, through vigorous union leadership.
Alec Maybarduk became MSEA director in 2018, and began publicizing staffing shortages threatening to create havoc at agencies such as emergency dispatch.
When administration negotiators dragged their feet, MSEA members didn’t hesitate to picket the Blaine House.
Shawn Fain was elected UAW president almost simultaneously with the beginning of the strike. Using targeted walkouts rather than industry-wide shutdowns, he achieved unprecedented gains for members.
Fain framed the issues clearly, saying, “In the last 40 years, working class people went backwards continually. There’s this massive chasm between the billionaire class and the working class. When those things get out of balance, we need to turn it upside down.”
Are such gains lasting? Despite contentions that union deals cause inflation, the dramatic recent decrease in inflation shows that other causes, primarily shutdowns and supply chain breakdowns, were chiefly responsible.
It all depends on how working Americans perceive their interests. Do they see unions as righting the balance between large corporations and employees, providing jobs that actually support a family?
Or do they tilt back toward those promising low prices and steady growth, even if that growth trends endlessly toward the billionaires?
Sen. Bernie Sanders’ moment last March with Starbucks CEO Howard Shultz sums it up. Shultz strenuously objected to Sanders calling him a billionaire, while fervently opposing unions at his coffee shops, despite 200 voting to unionize.
There are issues more loudly debated in the current presidential campaign, but none more important to the nation’s future.
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
