Forced Unionism on the War Path

The National Labor Relations Board has become nothing more than puppets for the union bosses who were unable to achieve their goals legislatively and have now set their sights on forcing workers into unions administratively. WFI's Fred Wszolek looks at the three-headed monster of schemes the board is proposing to foist coercive unionism on workers across the employment spectrum. The NLRB and DoL are working to enact three sweeping rule changes that would restrict the freedoms of employers, while significantly shifting workplace power into the hands of Big Labor. Workers who would be directly and negatively affected by these changes are largely unaware that Washington, D.C. has declared war against them and jobs by advancing bureaucratic regulations that will increase unemployment and restrict hard-won liberties. The NLRB is currently pushing two changes: quickie union elections and the formation of micro units. Both of these change decades-old board law and procedure that have not hurt unions, instead allowed them to win the majority of organizing elections and strengthened the collective bargaining unit that has been formed. Successful union elections are still taking place with a 67.6 percent success rate. It is reported that unions brought in $8.8 billion in dues in 2010. So why the need for these rules changes? A closer examination shows that, quite simply, the Obama Administration is bailing out Big Labor with little to no regard for implications on workers due to the fact union membership has declined. The proposed quickie election rule shortens the time for union elections from a median time of 38 days to as little as 10, depriving employees of the ability to make an informed choice on perhaps the most important issue they will face in the workplace: whether to unionize. The aim? To catch businesses off guard and leave them scrambling so that a vote happens before employees can study the facts. During an already difficult economic time, the proposal for quickie elections would place additional costs and burdens on small business owners, who lack the resources and legal expertise to navigate and fully comprehend the NLRB’s election processes.
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'

Want Jobs and Rising Income Levels? Pass Right to Work

The Investor's Business Daily confirms that enacting Right to Work laws is a recipe for jobs and economic growth: The business world is abuzz over the National Labor Relations Board's complaint vs. Boeing's new South Carolina production line. For NLRB critics, the case boils down to one thing: "right-to-work" laws. Right-to-work states have generally lower unemployment, higher job growth, lower taxes and better business climates. They have growing populations and have been attracting businesses from other states. In most states, once a workplace is unionized, employees are required to join the union or they can't work there. But 22 states, including South Carolina, have passed laws that give employees the right not to join. Hence the term "right-to-work." Unions dislike these laws for the obvious reason: It reduces their membership.

Fred Barnes "Is there anything Obama won’t do for unions?"

  Former murdered Mineworkers International presidential candidate “Jock” Yoblonski’s campaign manager and Weekly Standard Executive Editor Fred Barnes reminds us that Obama has created more Big Labor Boss paybacks than just the NLRB v. Boeing case. Besides the Obama National Labor Relations Board’s assault on Boeing’s South Carolina employees and workers in Right To Work states in general, Barnes mentions the recent new regulations proposed by DOL to hamper employees getting to hear both sides of the story during union organizing campaigns. But, the main focus of the article is the Obama Administration’s repeated attempts to overturn multiple defeats of unions to organize DELTA airlines. If you want to get more outraged at the Obama administration for its continuous assaults on free enterprise and individual employee choices, then read Barnes’ America’s Labor Party, Is there anything Obama won’t do for unions? Here are a few quotes to whet your appetite: How far will President Obama go to advance the interests of organized labor? Awfully far. We know this not only from the effort to keep Boeing from building a plane in a right-to-work state, South Carolina, but also from the way Delta Airlines is being railroaded into recognizing unions its employees have repeatedly rejected.

Fred Barnes "Is there anything Obama won’t do for unions?"

  Former murdered Mineworkers International presidential candidate “Jock” Yoblonski’s campaign manager and Weekly Standard Executive Editor Fred Barnes reminds us that Obama has created more Big Labor Boss paybacks than just the NLRB v. Boeing case. Besides the Obama National Labor Relations Board’s assault on Boeing’s South Carolina employees and workers in Right To Work states in general, Barnes mentions the recent new regulations proposed by DOL to hamper employees getting to hear both sides of the story during union organizing campaigns. But, the main focus of the article is the Obama Administration’s repeated attempts to overturn multiple defeats of unions to organize DELTA airlines. If you want to get more outraged at the Obama administration for its continuous assaults on free enterprise and individual employee choices, then read Barnes’ America’s Labor Party, Is there anything Obama won’t do for unions? Here are a few quotes to whet your appetite: How far will President Obama go to advance the interests of organized labor? Awfully far. We know this not only from the effort to keep Boeing from building a plane in a right-to-work state, South Carolina, but also from the way Delta Airlines is being railroaded into recognizing unions its employees have repeatedly rejected.
Hope? Change? Transparency?

Hope? Change? Transparency?

In the dark of the night, Big Labor puppets at the National Labor Relations Board passed new rules to force "quickie" labor elections without many people even knowing they were considering the provision in the first place. The lone Republican on the Board blasted the majority for skipping critical steps that would have alerted the public that they were even considering such a move.  The Investor Business Daily's Sean Higgins weighs in: Lost in the clamor over Tuesday’s proposed National Labor Relations Board rules for labor elections was how surprising the action was in the first place. The NLRB was not reacting to any legislation or court ruling. It simply decided to come up with new rules on its own. Nobody outside the NLRB itself even knew about them until they were leaked to the AP Tuesday morning. That was apparently deliberate. In his official dissent, the NLRB’s lone Republican appointee, Brian Hayes, claimed that the board’s majority skipped numerous steps that would have alerted the public to what it was considering.

Latest NLRB Big Labor Handout – Ambush “Elections”

If punishing employees in Right to Work states isn't enough to please the union bosses, then the NLRB continues to try. Their latest giveaway is an effort to impose "quickie elections" -- a blatant effort to ensure that workers do not get both sides of the unionization issue. The Washington Examiner's Philip Klein looks at the latest union bailout: With union membership precipitously declining (it was less than 7 percent in the private sector last year), big labor has been desperate to expand its ranks by any means necessary. As Peter Schaumber, former NLRB chairman, warned last week, "Imagine a political election in which only one party were given the opportunity to tell voters its side of the story, and could set an election date only days away, all without prior notice to the other side."