The Inescapable SEIU-NLRB Connection

John Ranson, writing for TownHall.com, points out how the SEIU and their cronies have a heavy hand in the role that the NLRB's effort to punish companies for moving to Right to Work states: In just another example of the Obama administration making law by fiat, the National Labor Relations Board head Craig Becker is proposing new rules that would shotgun the formation of new union shops in as quick as ten days. After the defeat of card check at the legislative ballot box, the former SEIU goon [Becker] is acting creatively in order to implement portions of card check unilaterally. What would one expect from a guy appointed to his position despite his nomination being rejected by the Senate? Obama then made a recess appointment of Becker to the NLRB, the presidential equivalent of Enron accounting for political appointees. NLRB and Becker have been in the news lately because they’ve attacked Boeing for opening a plant in [Right to Work] South Carolina, a state that is less accommodating to union employment but more accommodating to workers and management with project deadlines to keep. But the attack on Boeing is nothing compared to the attack that Becker and organized labor are going to launch against the rest of us starting today.

Taxpayer Funded Big Labor Cash Cow Hit by WI Reform

What Reform Was About Wisconsin Republicans put their careers on the line to reform the state's collective bargaining process for government unions -- standing up to entrenched special interests and back room deals that have dominated the political landscape for decades. Byron York of the Washington Examiner takes a look at one of the corrupt bargains that seems to be coming to an end thanks to their efforts. It appears the union bosses were padding their bottom line by forcing school districts to buy health insurance through a company they owned -- all at inflated costs. Now free of those constraints, schools are saving money on wasteful contracts helping teachers and students in the process. Other states should take note. The Hartland-Lakeside School District, about 30 miles west of Milwaukee in tiny Hartland, Wis., had a problem in its collective bargaining contract with the local teachers union. The contract required the school district to purchase health insurance from a company called WEA Trust. The creation of Wisconsin's largest teachers union -- "WEA" stands for Wisconsin Education Association -- WEA Trust made money when union officials used collective bargaining agreements to steer profitable business its way. The problem for Hartland-Lakeside was that WEA Trust was charging significantly higher rates than the school district could find on the open market. School officials knew that because they got a better deal from United HealthCare for coverage of nonunion employees. On more than one occasion, Superintendent Glenn Schilling asked WEA Trust why the rates were so high. "I could never get a definitive answer on that," says Schilling. Changing to a different insurance company would save Hartland-Lakeside hundreds of thousands of dollars that could be spent on key educational priorities -- especially important since the cash-strapped state government was cutting back on education funding. But teachers union officials wouldn't allow it; the WEA Trust requirement was in the contract, and union leaders refused to let Hartland-Lakeside off the hook. "It's going to save us about $690,000 in 2011-2012," says Schilling. Insurance costs that had been about $2.5 million a year will now be around $1.8 million. What union leaders said would be a catastrophe will in fact be a boon to teachers and students.
Union Bosses Out For Revenge in Wisconsin

Union Bosses Out For Revenge in Wisconsin

The implementation and retention of its new state public-sector Right to Work law are critical for Wisconsin's efforts to furnish relief for taxpaying individuals and businesses and reinvigorate private-sector income growth. Credit: Rick McKee/Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle  Pro-Right to Work Legislators Targeted in July 'Recall' Elections (Source: June 2011 NRTWC Newsletter) For at least a decade leading up to the election of Right to Work advocate Scott Walker (R) as governor, Wisconsin, like many other forced-unionism states, was on an unsustainable fiscal path. From 2000 through 2010, total taxpayer costs for compensation of Wisconsin state and local government employees grew by an inflation-adjusted 9.2%, to a total of $19.83 billion last year. By 2010, state and local government compensation swallowed up the equivalent of nearly 17% of all private-sector wages, salaries, bonuses and benefits in Wisconsin. And over the past decade Badger State government employee compensation grew more than two-and-a-half times as fast as private-sector employee compensation, in percentage terms. Upon Taking Office, Governor Properly Focused His Energy On Forced-Dues Repeal Measure
Right To Work Committee Mobilizes Against NLRB Power Grab

Right To Work Committee Mobilizes Against NLRB Power Grab

If the Obama-selected top lawyer for the National Labor Relations Board gets his way, Boeing will have no real choice but to abandon a brand-new $2 billion plant and 1,000 good jobs in Right to Work South Carolina. Obama Bureaucrat Eager to Tell Businesses Where They May Expand (Source: June 2011 NRTWC Newsletter) Lafe Solomon, the man President Obama has selected to be the top lawyer for the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), outraged millions of Americans across all regions of the country in April by asserting his agency has the prerogative, in many instances, to tell businesses where they may or may not expand. For decades, the NLRB has called the shots with regard to implementation of the National Labor Relations Act, the nation's principal federal labor law. The NLRA covers over 90% of private-sector businesses and front-line employees. The NLRB is thus, no doubt, powerful. Nevertheless, the claim of power by NLRB Acting General Counsel Solomon in his April 20 complaint filed to block Boeing from initiating a new aircraft production line in Right to Work South Carolina is remarkable. As economist Arthur Laffer and senior Wall Street Journal editorial page economics writer Stephen Moore noted in a pungent op-ed appearing in the Journal May 13, this is "the first time a federal agency has intervened to tell an American company where it can and cannot operate a [new] plant within the U.S." Well-informed apologists for compulsory unionism like New York Times labor reporter Steven Greenhouse and former Clinton-appointed NLRB Chairman William Gould don't dispute that the Boeing complaint is, to quote Mr. Greenhouse, "highly unusual." Acting General Counsel: Sensible Business Decision Equals 'Anti-Union Animus'