Job losses far worse for workers laboring under union monopoly bargaining agreements regardless

Statement by National Right to Work Committee President Mark Mix Regarding the White House ‘Jobs Summit’

WASHINGTON, D.C. (December 3, 2009) – President Obama is clearly not interested in getting sensible, sound advice at today’s “jobs summit” about how to stop the hemorrhaging of private-sector jobs and get businesses across America hiring again. Because if he and his Administration were serious, they would not have invited union bosses like AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, Service Employees International Union President Andy Stern, and Teamster President Jim Hoffa to participate.

The record clearly shows that forced-unionism advocates like Mr. Trumka, Mr. Stern, and Mr. Hoffa are very adept at destroying private-sector jobs, but little help when it comes to creating them. From 2008 through the first three quarters of 2009, according to data compiled by respected labor economists Barry Hirsch and David Macpherson, jobs held by unionized private-sector employees plummeted by 7.8%, nearly double the national average job loss.

Job losses were far worse for workers laboring under union monopoly bargaining agreements regardless of whether or not they were employed in the internationally competitive manufacturing sector. Unionized non-manufacturing private sector employment plunged by 6.6%, more than double the national average for that sector.

And the Hirsch-Macpherson findings merely add to a mountain of evidence that having a union exercising “exclusive” monopoly power to negotiate your pay, benefits, and working conditions greatly diminishes the likelihood that the business you work for will flourish, grow, and hire additional employees.

That’s why, in June 1995, participants at a small-business conference sponsored by the Clinton White House had it right when they endorsed, to the great dismay of their hosts, national Right to Work legislation barring compulsory union membership, dues and fees in all 50 states. Since more than 10% of the participants in the Obama “jobs summit” are union officials, and many other participants are Big Labor politicians and forced-unionism ideologues in academia, there was never any possibility this summit would make a similar endorsement. But rolling back union monopoly bargaining and forced union dues still could be one of the most effective tonics for the American economy today.

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The National Right to Work Committee, established in 1955, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, single-purpose citizens’ organization dedicated to the principle that all Americans must have the right to join a union if they choose to, but none should ever be forced to affiliate with a union in order to get or keep a job. It’s web address is nrtwc.org.