“Union Wages Buy More” said a novelty front-bumper license plate that state AFL-CIO organizations, including Kentucky’s, put out several years ago.
That wasn’t just a catchy slogan. Nationwide, union workers enjoy higher wages and better benefits than non-union workers. But nothing drives home the point better than personal examples.
I’m an avid photographer who especially enjoys getting moving trains in my trusty Nikon’s viewfinder. The Canadian National’s main Chicago-to-New Orleans line bisects the town where I live.
Train crews are union. So are workers who maintain tracks and signals.
I know a CN electrician who works on signals. He makes $42 an hour. When he told me about a guy who does the same job for a nearby non-union railroad in my neck of the woods, I immediately thought of that old license plate.
The non-union guy makes $18 an hour. I’d also bet the guy’s benefits are a fraction of the IBEW member’s.
Last August, the Economic Policy Institute issued a new report documenting “the strong correlation between higher levels of unionization and a range of economic, personal, and democratic well-being measures,” according to an EPI press release The release added that “in the same way unions give workers a voice at work, with a direct impact on wages and working conditions, the data suggest that unions also give workers a voice in shaping their communities. Where workers have this power, states have more equitable economic, social, and democratic structures.”
According to the release, unions don’t just sweeten paychecks. They improve working conditions, shrink racial and gender wage disparities, increase median household incomes, and improve access to unemployment and health insurance. In addition, the highest union density states have paid sick leave laws, while less than 12 percent of the low-union density states do. Too, high union density states spend more money on public education and have fewer voting restriction laws.
“However, union density levels across the country are not nearly as high as they could and should be,” the release also says. “While nearly half of all nonunion workers say they want a union in their workplace, just 11.1% of all workers are covered by a union contract. Current law places too many obstacles in the way of workers trying to organize, and gives employers too much power to interfere with workers’ free choice. It is therefore critical that policymakers enact legislation that restores a meaningful right to organize and collectively bargain, such as the Protecting the Right to Organize and the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Acts.”
Said Heidi Shierholz, EPI president: “Unions don’t just improve workers’ paychecks – they shape the social and political fabric of the communities they operate in and lift standards for both union and nonunion workers. Policymakers must enact reforms that restore a meaningful right to organize and collectively bargain. Rebuilding worker power is not just good policy – it is a democratic imperative in the face of authoritarian backsliding.”
When I was webmaster-editor for the Kentucky State AFL-CIO, I often quoted then President Bill Londrigan’s warning: “Elections have consequences.”
Bill and I are both retired, but his admonition is as timely as ever. So is that license plate.
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