Yoda's World

EFCA-Employee Free Choice Act

Home
Poll: Majority of Americans want to end Bush Tax cuts for the rich
Michele Bachmann
Complaints filed with IRS on Hannity and North charity
GOP Unemployed "insignificant"
GOP to President Obama, its our way or nothing at all
Tea Party death threats mimic Muslim Terrorists
Guns at New Mexico teabaggers tea party
Dick Cheney no longer a chickenhawk, now just a chicken
The GOP purity and purge test
Limbaugh the most influential conservative in America
It smells like socialism
Right wing media always giddy when America loses
LIST OF THE 47 BUSH CZARS
Glenn Beck: The body on the side of the road
HEALTH CARE REFORM
HEALTH CARE
SARAH PALIN
GOPER WORLD
GOP SMEAR AND SPIN MACHINE
GOP POLITICS OF FEAR CARD
THE RIGHT WINGS GOD SQUAD
The House on "C" Street
GOP SENATORS PART OF RELIGIOUS CULT
LA. GOV. BOBBY JINDAL PERFORMS EXORCISM IN COLLEGE
The top 20 Truths about Ronald Reagan
EFCA-Employee Free Choice Act
THE ECONOMY
THE ENVIRONMENT
THE MYTH OF CLEAN COAL TECHNOLOGY
TEXAS TEA, BLACK GOLD, OIL
GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
CIVIL LIBERTIES
VETERANS
ETHICS / CORRUPTION
ISRAEL
GOVERNMENT DATA MINING PROGRAMS
THE QUOTES PAGE
HUMOR IN POLITICS
HUMOR IN POLITICS - THE VIDEO'S
HALLIBURTON
WOMEN'S RIGHTS
BUSH AND FASCISM
VOTING FRAUD
An Invention that Could Change the Internet for Ever
WEIRD STUFF
BUSH DESTROYS AMERICA - 2000-2008 ARCHIVES
THIS WEEK IN GOD/ARCHIVES
PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES 2008
CONTACT ME

Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA)

By: Joe Davenport

March 16, 2009

For Yoda’s World

 

Well it is underway at last, the debate of the Employee Free Choice Act.  So why is it that this is the most feared thing since the sit down strikes of the 1930's?

 

Power

 

Pure and simple this tool shifts power away from the employer and into the hands of workers who wish to form a union.

 

"Workers who wish to form a union" is the key here.  Despite what you might hear or read most union organizing is not the result of a group of "union bosses" sitting around a table and picking targets, that is called 'strategic organizing and is about 1/4 of all actions.

 

The rest of the time a phone rings or an e-mail pops up from a worker somewhere who thinks a union would be a good idea at Whateverco's plant in Whereverville.  Perhaps they were bullied, or insulted, or told if they didn't come in at 5pm on Thanksgiving they were fired whatever.

 

The union they call assigns an organizer (or a team if it's a big group).  Then it's off to Whereverville to find out if there really could be a union at the whatever plant.  The organizer meets with the person or group that dropped the dime and starts learning about the plant and the workers.  That small group becomes an organizing committee led and trained by the staffer.

 

Very quietly the committee builds enough interest to start the card process.  Then comes the race with the boss a "blitz" where the committee tries to sit down with every potential member and find out if they are willing to help organize, or wear a button at work when the time comes or just sign the card if they want the union to piss off.

 

If all goes well the current law says the union can ask for "card check “from the boss.  Well the boss almost always calls for an election-even if 87 of his 100 workers signed cards saying yes give me a union.  This where it gets sticky.

 

The boss will use every tactic he can think of to undercut union support: he might fire organizers, or even hold required meetings where he'll threaten to close the plant, and say the union won't do anything at all except collect dues, as well as remind them that we're a family here and they are not part of the family. (Now all that except the last one is against the law but).

 

The changes under EFCA are that the WORKERS are the ones who ask for an election if they don't want card check.  If the boss fires a worker for trying to organize, it'll cost him triple what the worker loses in pay (currently you only get what you would have made minus any unemployment or pay from another job).

 

The biggest change is that there would be only 6 months to negotiate a first contract, which is key, because most failed unions happen trying to get that first agreement, the boss stalls and stalls and the dues come out and the workers get pissed off and call it quits. Under EFCA any issues left after 6 months would go to arbitration.

 

Some in the labor movement feel these changes will double union membership, which would put the percentage of workers in a union at about 20 percent; the zenith of union density was only 35% in the 1950's.

 

So it’s about power in the work place AND power in elected offices.

 

Joe Davenport is a member of and sometime Volunteer Member Organizer for AFSCME local 1488 Seattle

lightbluedividerplain.jpg

Employee Free Choice Act

What is the Employee Free Choice Act?

The Employee Free Choice Act, supported in 2007 by a bipartisan coalition in Congress, would enable working people to bargain for better benefits, wages and working conditions by restoring workers’ freedom to choose for themselves whether to join a union. It would:

  • Establish stronger penalties for violation of employee rights when workers seek to form a union and during first-contract negotiations.
  • Provide mediation and arbitration for first-contract disputes (PDF).
  • Allow employees to form unions by signing cards authorizing union representation.
Here's Why We Need the Employee Free Choice Act

Employee Free Choice Act

You can Learn more about the Employee Free Choice Act here at the web site of the AFL-CIO

lightbluedividerplain.jpg

lightbluedividerplain.jpg

YodasWorld.org is updated each Monday. Some of the items from the previous week are added to the various topic links on the left side of the main page. Links embedded should be good for at least the date posted. After the posting date, link reliability depends on the policy of the linked sites. Some sites require visitors to register before allowing access to articles. Material presented on this page represent the opinion's of YodasWorld.org.
 
Copyright  2000-2011 YodasWorld.org. All rights reserved on original works. Material copyrighted by others is used either with permission or under a claim of "fair use."