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Big Labor's Empire Strikes Back
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Big Labor's Empire Strikes Back
by Reed Larson
Are Floridians too prosperous?
Do Florida's workers earn too much money, enjoy too high a standard of living or hold too many high-paying manufacturing jobs?
Well, that's Florida today according to Gerald McEntee, Washington boss of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) union.
Reeling from last year's defeat of their hand-picked presidential and many of their congressional candidates, Big Labor has launched a referendum to repeal Florida’s cherished Right to Work Law.
If union officials are successful, hundreds of thousands of workers would be forced to pay union dues or “fees” to the union bosses or lose their jobs.
McEntee went so far as to announce last month that Right to Work’s destruction would be his top priority in 2002.
For more than three decades the Florida state constitution (amended in 1968) and statute (passed in 1974) have protected Florida's workers from having to pay union dues or fees to a labor union just to get or keep a job. And Floridians have benefited enormously from the state Right to Work law. Bill Clinton's own Labor department has acknowledged that Florida (and other states with Right to Work laws) have outpaced states where workers are left vulnerable to Organized Labor's forced unionism demands.
Right to Work states created nearly 3 million high-paying manufacturing jobs over the last four decades. Florida alone experienced manufacturing employment growth of more than 140%. On the other side, states without Right to Work laws suffered a loss of more than one million manufacturing jobs.
When it comes to income, the picture is just as bright. From 1990 to 1998, Florida residents' personal income grew 37% more rapidly than the income growth reported in states where forcing workers to pay union dues is allowed.
Workers benefit not only from higher real incomes in Right to Work states, but also from the lower cost-of-living.
Dr. James Bennett of the Nobel Prize-winning economics department at George Mason University has studied cost-of-living-adjusted household incomes for metropolitan areas in Right to Work and non-Right to Work states. According to his just-published study, median spendable household income for metro areas in Right to Work states is $2,333 higher than the median income in non-Right to Work states.
Big Labor's knee-jerk reaction to the job-creating machine of Right to Work is certainly predictable. However, their attack now has added significance.
Organized Labor's political protection in Congress is slowly eroding. Each year more and more congressmen and senators are going on the record in support of repealing federally sanctioned compulsory unionism. Such legislation, the National Right to Work Act (H.R. 1109/S. 873), has already been introduced in both chambers of Congress.
The National Right to Work Act would simply strike provisions in federal labor law that force workers to pay union dues or "fees" as a condition of employment. During the 106th Congress 138 representatives -- including more than two-thirds of the House Republican caucus -- cosponsored such legislation. In the U.S. Senate, more than 40 senators either voted for the bill in 1996 or have cosponsored the measure since then.
And in last summer's debate on federal health insurance reform, 201 House members supported a Right to Work amendment protecting health care professionals from being forced to support a labor union against their will.
Faced with the growing grassroots support for ending federally authorized forced unionism, Organized Labor's only recourse is to attack workers in states, such as Florida, by repealing state Right to Work laws.
This is not to say that Big Labor's commanders have become paper tigers; quite the contrary.
During the last election cycle, union bosses spent over $800 million, mostly from forced union dues, to install Rep. Dick Gephardt as Speaker of the House and put Al Gore in the Oval Office. Experts estimate that in their attempt to repeal Florida’s Right to Work Law, union bosses John Sweeney, Jimmy Hoffa and Gerry McEntee will spend more than $100 million.
Florida’s workers have to be made aware of Big Labor’s latest attack on their individual rights. Over the next year, the National Right to Work Committee® will do just that.
The Florida Constitution is on the side of freedom. The attempts of Gerry McEntee -- and other Washington union czars who crave compulsion –- to tamper with Florida's Right to Work Law should be defeated.
Reed Larson is president of the Springfield, Va.-based National Right to Work Committee®.