No one should be allowed to unionize. People should get paid what the market will bear. Clearly, the CEO of Exxon works a million times harder than the guy driving the gas truck, so stop trying to screw us all, commies!

Increased private sector unionization is probably the only effective, large-scale way to systematically help America's middle class,

That's not true. We can also eat the rich.

It's all supply and demand. Karl Rove loves immigration because allowing American employers access to the "vast reserve army of the unemployed" south of the border allows companies to crush strikes. Here's what Cesar Chavez testified to Congress in 1979:

" … when the farm workers strike and their strike is successful, the employers go to Mexico and have unlimited, unrestricted use of illegal alien strikebreakers to break the strike. And, for over 30 years, the Immigration and Naturalization Service has looked the other way and assisted in the strikebreaking. I do not remember one single instance in 30 years where the Immigration service has removed strikebreakers. … The employers use professional smugglers to recruit and transport human contraband across the Mexican border for the specific act of strikebreaking…"

http://www.amconmag.com/2006/2006_02_27/article.html

And what about those who don't sign the cards? Are they free to continue in their jobs just as today?

Increased private sector unionization is probably the only effective, large-scale way to systematically help America's middle class

Wrong Kevin. Unions hurt the middle class. First, union members are lazy and don't do any work even though they get paid a lot. This forces prices to go up even though the quality of service and products go down. Second, unions are corrupt and don't help their members. Instead the head of unions try to take all the money themselves rather than give it to workers. The far better option is to let the free market decide who gets hired and fired. This ensures the most qualified worker gets hired and those who work harder get paid more while those who don't work hard are fired.

Great post Kevin. I would only point out that private sector union density in the US has been declining since the early 1950's; essentially all growth in union density between the late 1950's and the early 1970's was in the public sector.

I'm all in favor of making it easier for employees to unionize if they think that will help them. But those of us of a certain age, who remember when American Big Industry bestrode the post-war world like a colossus while Europe rebuilt, Russia stumbled along, and "Made in Japan" mean cheap, shoddy tchotschkes and Big Labor could Big Industry fight over their respective shares of the swag piling up in Detroit or Pittsburgh, might wonder whether in the global competitive economy there is now enough surplus swag for the unionized American worker to grab a meaningful share of.

That's not true. We can also eat the rich.

Bad idea for our LDL. We're better off sending them to Iraq to paint schools so that they can personally live out their dream of spreading freedom.

In memory of John Kenneth Galbraith:

"[Galbraith's] second [book], American Capitalism (1952), ... argued that American post-war success arose not out of "getting the prices right" in an orthodox sense, but rather of "getting the prices wrong" and allowing industrial concentration to develop. It is a formula for growth because it enables technical innovation which might otherwise not been done. However, it can only be regarded as successful provided there is a "countervailing power" against potential abuse in the form of trade unions, supplier and consumer organizations and government regulation. Many have since argued the formula for East Asian success later in the century was based precisely on this combination of oligopolistic power and "countervailing" institutions."

The corporate state we see now is the product of the decline in what Galbraith called the "countervailing" powers -- the unions and government regulation particularly. All manner of ill effects arise from this -- great wealth and income disparity, failure to deal with the global warming crisis, and so on.

And what about those who don't sign the cards? Are they free to continue in their jobs just as today? - Yancey Ward

No, they are rounded up and sent to the gas chambers. Of course they're free to continue in their jobs, you joker.

The far better option is to let the free market decide who gets hired and fired.

No, the far better option is to let Donald Trump decide who gets hired and fired. This ensures maximum entertainment value. You're fired!

Indeed, Kevin - in any government-supported marketplace (and let's face it, there's no other kind of functional marketplace) there are two forces: those who own and control the means of production, and those who do not and must work for those who do. A healthy marketplace is regulated by the government through law so that the two forces are more equal than they would be with no regulation. With no regulation, those owners have a strong advantage by virtue of their position. As we saw viscerally in the industrial revolution and its corresponding labor struggles, as we are seeing in Mexican maquiladoras and other "free trade" corporate protection schemes, and as we have been seeing here in America for decades.

When the government abandons its role of balancing the system to defend labor, the government's own ability to govern is soon threatened by the profit-seeking ownership class, and democracy itself is at risk.

Brooksfoe,

They don't have to pay any union dues if the union decides to assess them?

Adam Piontek --

That's what the elder Galbraith said in 1952.

Speaking of card checks, how much purchasing power is lost by people paying 18+% on credit card balances in perpetuity because they don't realize the effect of only making the minimum payment or can't do without what they are buying or pay more?

Timely point from Galbraith.

Thanks. Countervailing forces -- exactly.

Bob

Taft-Hartley was really the first nail in the coffin ...

Oh, and Eisenhower renaming May 1st "Law Day" ....

Bob

Yes, Yancey, I imagine they would have to pay union dues. That's what a "union shop" means. As anyone who's ever worked a union job knows, the pay differential between union and non-union jobs generally dwarfs the dues.

Basically, when everyone else in your business decides to go union, if you decide to resist, you're going to run into some trouble. Similarly, if everyone is contributing to the office Christmas party and you decide to shirk your contribution, you're going to have some trouble. And if your neighborhood votes to raise the property tax, and you decide you'd rather not pay it, you're going to run into some trouble.

Left-wingers scared to death of secret ballots. I'm shocked, shocked.

Let's face it, the left-wing is against democracy. Always has been.

With a lot of our large industries being dragged underwater by older overly-generous union contracts, I'm not sure that unions have a lot of appeal to most private manufacturing companies.

Add to that the fact that we are already struggling to compete with low-wage labor overseas and coming in over our borders, and unions just increase that gap, making things less competitive. It doesn't do a union a lot of good if the business collapses.

Businesses that are not as vulnerable to offshoring might do okay with more unionization. A university falls into that category, largely competing only with other American universities. So do service industries. You're not going to be getting somebody in China to work in a hotel or restaurant.

And of course, public functions that don't have to compete with anyone at all do quite well with unions.

As for "card checks," how fair would they look if management passed cards around for people to sign in their presence asking if the employees did not want a union?

Please, brooksfoe, would you explicitly define "run into some trouble"?

Not "Law Day" anymore either, Bob, haven't you heard? Now it's "Presidential Power" day.

Will Allen: I actually have no idea. I've never managed to work for a union shop. Always wanted to though. In the industries I've worked in, the union sectors were the privileged ones - if you got a chance at a union job and union membership, you were psyched. If any organization I ever worked at was considering going union, though, I'd vote for it in a second. I'd think you'd have to desire your own poverty not to.

Basically, if you refused to pay your dues when the union was responsible for raising your wages, I imagine your co-workers would think you were an asshole. As far as I can tell, unionized workers always make more money than non-unionized ones.

Kevin:
"Union representation in private industry has been declining since the 70s and is now down to about 8% of the workforce."

Good.

brooksfoe,

Now I understand, you really don't continue in your job as before, and you have no choice but to join the union.

Isn't there a amendment about reedom of assembly?

Working or not, I can join any union that would have me, or start my own for us union rejects.

What exactly is Kevin complaining about? Have the service workers at the U or Miami just e mail me and I will put them on a union list, and they can have all the union strikes they want. If there is any problem, just let me know, I will hire the lawyers.

I don't attack scabs, I draw the line there. Is this mportant? Does the NRLB discriminate against scabs?

you really don't continue in your job as before

Look, I really have no idea. Ask somebody who knows. The basic point is, everybody else in your workplace has gotten together to do something that's going to make you all richer and better off, but requires that everybody chip in and lend a hand. People like me are inclined to chip in and lend a hand. People like you seem to be inclined to tell everybody else to go screw themselves, and then go home, get drunk, and stab yourself in the leg with a pencil, or whatever you people do for entertainment.

brooksfoe,

No, people like you are inclined to use the threat of violence to make me agree to join the union, or to just give up my job.

Brooksfoe, if you wish to use terms that you have no idea as to what they mean, well, feel free, I guess. I asked because there is a rather different outcome between having people deride you as an asshole, and losing your home, or being jailed, for failure to pay taxes. The first outcome is rather unpleasant for most, while the second, if resisted, will ultimately get you killed.

I have no objection to unions, as long as they do not avail themselves to violence to maintain their position. If a group of employees can convince an employer to only hire those who belong to that group, that's fine by me. As soon as threats of violence are employed, however, sorry, but the threatners should be doing time in a small room, no matter if the threats come by way of hired Pinkerton goons, as was common by management in the pre-war era, or by way of union thugs, as was commmon in the post-war era.

As long as nobody is using violence to maintain their positions, either themselves, or by proxies, including the state, how various employers and employees choose to come to agreement regarding compensation and other workplace issue is of little concern to me. I suspect that absent such physical coercion, employees with skills which are difficult to replicate would have a lot of leverage, and employees with skills that are very easy to replicate would have rather less leverage, although in a tight labor market even completely unskilled labor can have some leverage.

This is all tied to immigration, of course, which another complex topic altogether. Although I generally favor pretty lax immigration regulation, the best case I can make for really tightening the flow of unskilled labor into this country is that as long as the corruption riddled Mexican political economy can use the U.S. economy in the manner it does, things will not improve dramatically for the Mexican citizen. I don't have any easy answers, however.

Here's the economy a decline in unions has brought.

"SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- DaimlerChrysler AG ... said Tuesday U.S. vehicle sales fell 6% in April, to 211,365 from 225,351. Sales in the automaker's Chrysler Group division, which includes the Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge brands, came in 8% lower, at 190,095 compared with 206,546 in the same month last year. Its Mercedes-Benz USA division posted a 13% rise in sales, boosted by its flagship 2007 S-Class sedan and the new 2007 SL550, to 21,270 vs. 18,805."

Will Allen: I agree. Threatening to use violence on another person, for any reason, is illegal and immoral.

I would be very surprised if the issue of violence were relevant in the campaign to organize a university service workers' union which Kevin was referring to.

David, I fail to sse the relevance of your last post. Yes, many people who previously wished to purchase Chrysler, Dodge, and Jeep brands now buy Honda, Toyota, and Nissan, among others. Many that have made the switch have done so because they prefer to purchase vehicles which have a defect rate which is about 1/3 lower. What's your point?

"No one should be allowed to unionize."

ALLOWED? ALLOWED? You don't allow me to organize. It's my right. My father's, and their father's had their heads beaten to secure me my rights, and you think you ALLOW me. I will take my rights, and protect them. Got it?

Yeah, brooksfoe, I doubt whether violence has been an issue in the Miami situation; I just get a little concerned when vague terms such as "run into some trouble" are used, because I have personally witnessed situations where it was reasonable to conclude that the phrase was inclusive of activities as minor as vandalizing cars, and as major as attempted murder, and a lot of stuff in between. Now that I know that such actions are not consistent with your usage of the term, I am less concerned with your post.

We just unionized my workplace (a private college). My understanding about membership is that any employees covered in the agreement may join or not join, but that the bargins agreed to by the union and the college will cover members and non-members in the same way.

Members will pay national and local dues and have access to various membership benefits (life insurance, travel discounts, etc); non members may be assessed a small amount yearly, but that amount is decided on by the local.

fritz,

I see, the non-members have no say on the yearly amount assessed.

Yeah, you're probably right, Will. But the formal juxtaposition struck me, I guess. And there's no doubt that the wages of those who would have been in unions in the past are stagnant (declining if you factor in recent increases in energy costs, I bet), while the incomes of the Mercedes buyers of the world are enjoying healthy increases.

Yancy those of us that oppose bushs excellant mid east adventure still have to pay for it. I don't believe we had a say in that.

Seems like those with the strongest opinions on this have the least knowledge about unionization. Here is some info to fill the void:

Collective bargaining agreements have "security" language (meaning union security, not worker security) that pertain to union membership. The agreement may require union membership as a condition of employment, or may require employees to pay dues whether or not they join the union, or may not require union membership or dues. If a worker joins the union, he/she usually is required to remain a member during the term of the agreement.

Regarding NLRB secret ballot elections, I have been involved in many of them and never experienced any of the problems that Kevin alludes to. Card checks, on the other hand, subject workers to pressure to sign, often in the presence of co-workers and union staff. Not the best approach if you value free choice.

I don't understand how a secret ballot election doesn't give workers more freedom than having them sign cards publicly.

Certainly there have been disparate rates of wealth increases among different economic classes in the past thirty or forty years, David, but I am suspect of the studies which purport to show stagnant living standards for median wage earners in that time period. The median wage earner of today, compared to the median wage earner of twenty years ago, to say nothing of thirty or forty years ago, is more likely to be a homeowner, and that home is larger now. Where housing costs have outstripped purchasing power, it is in large part due to local housing regulations.

The median wage earner of today spends a smaller percentage of his wages on transportation, once quality is factored, if the time period of ultra-cheap gas in the 90s is excluded. Yes, the median wage earner spends more on health care for his family, but then again, if his child is diagnosed with leukemia, it isn't a near-automatic death sentence, as it was thirty years ago. Do you think he would trade the living standards of 1976 for the living standards of today?

One area in which costs have skyrocketed, much faster than median wage growth, without a skyrocketing of quality, is in the cost of a college education, and the answers to that problem are complex (more subsidies would likely just drive the rate of cost increase higher still), and what solutions there are would likely displease many who decry median wage growth stagnation.

As to the rate of wealth growth among those already considered wealthy, it is a problem where the wealth growth has been the result of the principal/agent problems which plague our corporate governance culture. These are difficult problems as well, for which I sure don't have easy answers. Would more unionization help? Maybe, but not if it follows the pattern of so much unionization, in which the union becomes a hindrance to innovation. That's just substituting one problem for another, and arguably a worse problem. GM may have overpaid for some executive performance, but that cost pales in comparison to the competitive disadvantages the UAW has bargained for. GM's top executives could work for free for the next five years, and it would hardly make a dent.

Blix is definitely correct that those with the strongest opinions in this thread have the least knowledge. (Though he does go on to add to the store of misinformation)

Starters:

David in NY wrote:

Here's the economy a decline in unions has brought.

DaimlerChrysler AG ... said Tuesday U.S. vehicle sales fell 6% in April, to 211,365 from 225,351. Sales in the automaker's Chrysler Group division, which includes the Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge brands, came in 8% lower, at 190,095 compared with 206,546 in the same month last year. Its Mercedes-Benz USA division posted a 13% rise in sales, boosted by its flagship 2007 S-Class sedan and the new 2007 SL550, to 21,270 vs. 18,805."

FYI: MercedesBenz is union top to bottom. Perhaps you'd like to identify another factor accounting for Chrysler's performance?

I suspect that kevin tends to oppose people being pressured into a choice most vociferoulsy when it is a choice that kevin is in opposition to. Many, if not most, people think this way.

Next point:

And what about those who don't sign the cards? Are they free to continue in their jobs just as today?

Posted by: Yancey Ward on May 2, 2006 at 12:03 PM | PERMALINK

Sorry Yancey; the minority who don't sign cards become part of the bargaining unit and have to pony up dues like everyone else.

News flash: this is the case in NLRB elections, too; the losers can't opt out.

The point of both card check and NLRB elections is to determine whether a union (or which union if there is competition) will represent a defined unit of workers for the purposes of bargaining. If this is determined affirmatively - a successful election or a showing that a majority of the workforce has signed cards - by law the employer has a duty to bargain a contract with the designated workers' representative. (though there are of course many ways of avoiding this)

Your point is not germane to the question of card check vs. NLRB elections. If you think the minority in either process has the opportunity to opt out, what you are really saying is union membership should be entirely voluntary, which is tantamount to saying we should not have them.

If that's what you mean, say it; lets not get bogged down in procedural matters of the merits of card check vs elections.

Will,

I'm just guessing here, but I think there's a confusion in what you say between "living standards" and wage rates. It may well be that "living standards" have risen since 1976 (although they weren't so bad then, as I remember), but my guess is that most of that is attributable to the fact that most households are double-earner households now. So to the extent that you rely on conditions such as bigger houses and more effective(?) healthcare to show improvement, you've got to balance it against lost leisure and increased stress.

I think it's pretty well established that, leaving aside corporate executives and the like, wages have sat still or increased marginally since, say, 1976. That is -- families are getting more, it's true, but they are working proportionally more as well, at considerable cost to them. It strikes me that a conservative interested in family values (here I'm not really addressing you) would want to see working wages that could support a family at current levels on one income; wages don't at this time because they haven't really increased much for decades. So I'd think conservatives ought to be supporting unions, which, outside the public arena, have a track record of raising wages.

Sorry, Labor friendly, I wasn't meaning what you thought. I think Will Allen understood my (somewhat muddled) drift and refuted it above. I was thinking the workers couldn't buy their Chryslers but the execs were having no trouble buying their Mercedes. Will points out the workers are just buying Toyotas instead, which may well be true.

"Labor Friendly" says everybody in the bargaining unit has to pay dues. That is only the case when such language was written into the labor agreement, which is not always the case, especially in a first contract. Unions usually get around to such requirements in subsequent agreements.

One can only conclude from workers' aversion to unions that they prefer to work for lower wages.

Unions have done such a great job for the employees of United Airlines, Delta Airlines, General Motors, Tower Auto, etc., etc., I just can't imagine why everyone employed in the private sector doesn't want to be in one.

Fact: rising living standards are due almost entirely to productivity growth (i.e., capitalism run rampant) and almost not at all to union activity.

The only arena in which unions have been successful in raising employee wages and benefits over the long haul is in the public sector, and that's only because their employers (i.e., state, local and federal Government agencies) are monopolists who don't face any competition.

When I was young I worked construction. I was a member of the Laborer's Union and worked both union and non-union jobs. The union jobs paid a lot better and were generally easier - lots of breaks, standing around waiting for somebody else to do something, blah, blah. So why wouldn't any working person want to be in a union - better pay for less work?

I guess the answer is that businesses in competitive industries that have to pay union employees more to work less go belly up.

It is true that union members make more money and have better benefits than non-union workers the same industry. DBL admits as much -- "The union jobs paid a lot better and were generally easier ..."

If you don't believe it, Google "wages unionized non-unionized" or some such and just see what you get. Let's not get fact-free, here, OK?

Sorry, David in NY - I can see your meaning, but that point was, shall we say, rather obscurely made.

It is a good point, one repeatedly made by Harold Meyerson and others - the effective demand strategy based on real improvements in workers' standards of living. The best invention in history for doing this is the labor movement.

Yeah, L.f., I already apologized to Will Allen for obscurity, so here's your apology. Just struck me -- they can't sell cars to the little guys, but the fat cats are getting there.

Although I am a professional worker, I am, by the way, a UAW member.

David, it is true that failing to account for hours worked when attempting to measure differences in living standards is a major mistake, and no doubt one that is often made. It is also a mistake, however, when comparing wage growth, to fail to account for what the wages will purchase, which is also a frequent mistake. Anybody who would question whether the family with a member diagnosed with cancer is better off now than in 1976, or whether they are better off having any number of medical problems now than in 1976, is obviously making this mistake.

Tell ya' what, you find me median wage earner who would happily trade his '06 Honda Civic for a '76 AMC Pacer, to drive his child with leukemia for the treatments available in 1976, instead of the treatments available now, before they fly to Orlando for a vacation, at real airline prices of '76, compared to '06 airline prices, where they will eat out at the choices available in '76, compared to the choices now, before going back to their hotel room to enjoy what entertainment options were available then, compared to now, and then a stronger case will have been made that the median wage earner of today is not significantly better off.

DBL writes:

Fact: rising living standards are due almost entirely to productivity growth (i.e., capitalism run rampant) and almost not at all to union activity.

Sorry, DBL. Necessary, but not sufficient condition. You say nothing about distribution. There is nothing inevitable about the benefits of productivity growth accruing to the workers whoh helped produce it. If you can tell me another mechanism that can help workers get a "fair share" or the means to live, I'm willing to entertain it. Somehow I suspect you aren't going to suggest that the state perform this function!

Moreover, "productivity growth" is a loaded term that ultimately tells us very little - there are ways of improving it that do nothing for "rising living standards". Nor is there anything incompatible between rising productivity, rising standards of living, and high unionization rates. There have been periods when this was the case, other times, not so much.

What's this? A chance to turn Microsoft and Google into the next GM and Ford? Sign me up!

David, as a UAW member, what is your response to those who simply refuse to buy products made by UAW members, because they can purchase products of higher quality in their price range, often made in the United States? Surely this cannot completely be the attributed the American car companies' admittedly poor management, can it? Does not the UAW bear some of the reponsibility?

Will Allen: Indeed, who would choose to spend all day listening to Peter Frampton?

We can pick and choose all day what we liked and disliked about the past compared to the present.

You haven't answered David in NY's point not to confuse wage rates with living standards. It doesn't seem too controversial to say whatever the general level of development of society, whatever the advances between 1976 and today, if wage rates have not changed. your ability to enjoy the improvements is diminished. This isn't, of course, a good thing for workers, and not a very good thing for the stability of democracy.

A better leukemia treatment means nothing to me if I can't pay for it - and the overall ability to pay for medical care for most workers is worse today than it was then; not that it was a panacea then, but today?

Blix, when you were a union member, was it on a federal job, or in a right-to-work state?

I am far removed from the automobile industry, Will, so I really have no view on your question. The actual UAW folks (with true union involvement) I've met are people I've met socially and are wonderful, progressive people. Not the union goons and obstructionists you seem to imagine. But that's mere anecdote. Doesn't the UAW operate satisfactorily at some of the Japanese automakers' in this country, or am I mistaken about that?

Ah, yes. Here you go, Will. A list of good, union-made cars in the US, including the Toyota Corolla, a few Mitsubishis, and so on.
http://www.uaw.org/uawmade/cartruck2006.cfm

Labor friendly, please identify one median wage earner, or, heck, even a well below-median wage earner in the U.S. who has had a child diagnosed with leukemia in the past year, and has not had the child receive exponentially better treatment than a child from even the wealthiest family received in 1976. This is a ridiculous straw-man.

David, I never said the average UAW member was a goon or an obstructionist. I said I've witnessed union members engage in violence against those who choose to cross a picket line, and that unions quite often hinder innovation, which is a real cost. Are you saying that UAW behavior has played no role in the fix that the American auto companies find themselves in?

Kevin write: one of [the reasons for the decline in private sector union membership] them is that old, smokestack industries have been declining — and their unions with them

And the reason for the decline of these "old, smokestack industries" is ... ?

Absurdedly anticompetitive union contracts, maybe?

Absurdedly anticompetitive union contracts, maybe?

Absurdedly anticompetitive against non-American sweatshops, fo' shizzle. Obviously we need to repeal all the labor laws and go back to the good ol' days of the 19th century.

Of course, we know where that led to, don't we, Comrade Normie?

Norman Rogers: "Absurdedly (sp?) anticompetitive union contracts, maybe."

Maybe that is A factor in explaining why textile producers ran away to the southern US in the 1950s and 1960s. But does it explain why they couldn't make it in the virtually union-free south?

If you want to rant, rant. But we are not brain-dead; you can come up with more sophisticated explanations to complex problems.

Will Allen: a "ridiculous straw man"?

Yes, if you can get the care, your treatment is exponentially better.

But where have you been? Do you think people can simply walk in to any hospital and obtain this treatment? Even for those with some kind of health insurance, the co-pays and deductibles and premiums make the costs prohibitively expensive so folks must make choices between maintaining treatment and paying for other necessities of life.

Lets say you've got minimally acceptable insurance; you even find the means to cover the copays and deductibles on your kid's leukemia treatment. And he definitely has a better chance of surviving than he would have had in 1976. Along the way, however, you lose your house, your savings, and forget about him going to college. And if you lose your job (especially if you don't have a union to protect you), say goodbye to the health insurance - or, as likely, the company cancels your policy.

Hello charity care!

This is basic; you could easily find 1,000 accounts of what I am describing.

Here's one credible assessment, from a survey done by the Harvard School of Public Health, the Kaiser Family Foundation and USA Today.

http://www.kff.org/newsmedia/pomr090105pkg.cfm

Look, lf, you were the one who wrote....

"A better leukemia treatment means nothing to me if I can't pay for it"

....ignoring he fact that even if one doesn't have insurance, or has bad insurance, ANY child diagnosed with leukemia today is much more likely to be alive five years from now. Unless one is willing to say that they would rather have their savings than their child alive, it is foolish, and yes, a strawman, to claim that a better leukemia treatment means nothing if one can't pay for it. That simply is untrue, except for those parents who would rather have their savings than their child alive. As to college, yes the one area in the American economy where costs have skyrocketed, while quality has remained stagnant, is in higher education. Funny how that is one of the most regulated and subsidized sectors of the American economy.

Look, I was more than willing to state that one needed to account for hours worked if one wished to get a truly accurate picture of the quality of like today compared to thirty years ago. Why is it so difficult for labor friendly people (and again, I have nothing against unions, as long as they don't use violence or coercion) to acknowledge that one also needs to account for what goods and services a typical wage earner enjoys today, as opposed to thirty years ago?

Speaking of violence, what about economic violence?
http://www.publicchristian.com/index.php?p=119

I recall some attempts in the early 90s to unionize graduate student employees at the flagship public university in my state under IBEW.
Seems the lab slaves, RAs, and TAs wanted their compensation to actually reflect the amount of time and effort they put into their duties.
It was somewhat contentious, as much of that work performed would get expensive if paid at wages commensurate with the skills required.

Those worried about being forced to join a union need only to move to a right-to-work state, where no one can be forced to join the union in a union shop, and closed shops are against the law.

Will Allen:

"Unless one is willing to say that they would rather have their savings than their child alive, it is foolish, and yes, a strawman, to claim that a better leukemia treatment means nothing if one can't pay for it."

Will - a society that forces a substantial proportion of its population into making these kinds of choices is no longer worthy of the appellation "civilized." And it is certainly not indicative of improvements in the "standard of living" which is the core of your argument. Shameful is a better description.

Labor Friendly, if you want to go on record as saying that thousands of children alive, as opposed to dead of cancer, does not signify an improvement in living standards because some of those parents used up their savings, you just go right ahead. If you want to rail against the way health care is rationed in this country, fine, rail away, but I'll note that putting forth incentives which tied health insurance to employers (thanks, Harry Truman) was a major factor in creating the disfunctional health care market we have today. To say that because some typical wage earners have their savings consumed in saving their children, whereas thirty years ago, all the children of typical wage earners, along with children of everyone else, died of the same type of cancer, it means that living standards haven't improved, well, that is exactly the disingenuous argument I was speaking of.

Will, you've rambled off into incoherence.

I made no claims about tying health insurance to employers. Me, I'm for single payer. The system created after WWII was a least-worst option, and one of the only possibilities for giving health care to a large proportion (but not nearly all) of American workers and their families. The relevant comparison is not whether it was better than some ideal system, but was it better than what was in existence at the time? And the answer was clearly yes. And was there any political possibility of creating a different kind of health care system? The answer is no. It was a very flawed compromise.

But half a loaf...

Returning to the main discussion, it is difficult to understand how any kind of healthcare benefits will be available to the janitors of Miami outside of those provided through a union contract (which was the point of Kevin's original post). I'd certainly like to see folks get benefits through a single-payer system. I know the defects of employer-tied healthcare. But what is the real-world alternative RIGHT NOW?

This is why the union agreement is crucial - whether through card check or an NLRB election is immaterial: it is the best (only?) means for workers to achieve improvements in their wages.

But listen to yourself:

"To say that because some typical wage earners have their savings consumed in saving their children, whereas thirty years ago, all the children of typical wage earners, along with children of everyone else, died of the same type of cancer along with children of everyone else, died of the same type of cancer..."

The conversation has moved on: use your imagination: is the current scenario you are painting characteristic of a civilized society?

I really can't see how we can say our standard of living has improved when these kinds of "choices" are foisted on a substantial portion of the population (you are parsing when you use these words - you know that we are discussing considerably more than "some typical wage earners).

If you want examples of systems where access to the kinds of medical advances you describe is possible without bankrupting users, look no further than western Europe and its social democratic societies or social market societies; Canada, Israel, a few others. Any number of societies have found better ways than we to distribute healthcare to those with limited means to pay; and their health outcomes are better, and at lower cost to users and society as a whole.

I would say these are clearly examples of societies where standards of living could be demonstrably proven to have improved over the 1970s.

The US? Not so sure.

The difference is political and social arrangements - and not technological breakthroughs. How society decides to distribute its wealth.

Look, lf, you made a claim that having children alive was no improvement, if it meant that some people had their savings consumed. Do you stand by that claim, or do you retract it?

Let's remember that, although the "rightening" of the NLRB began already back with Reagan, this was another thing that techie wonk Clinton continued on his own eight-year watch.

While Gore, or Kerry, might have given lip service to unionism, how friendly to modern unionization efforts are most Democrats today, anyway, unless a revitalized Farm Workers gives them the chance to score points with Hispanics?

For that matter, I'd wager that a fair chunk of traditional heavy-industries union members are selfish enough they might not look totally favorably on the SEIU/HERE breakaway group's efforts to unionize retail worers.

I'm sorry, but unionization is an area where I'm the most cynical about most modern Democrats. Besides Bill Clinton, one only need look at a Dick Gephardt to see why.

I'm glad as hell that my wife is in a union. The union dues are more than made up for by the cheap medical insurance.
My workplace charges almost 300 dollars a month for insurance. My wife pays 38 dollars for both of us.

Will(fully) obtuse:

I never said "having children alive was no improvement, if it meant that some people had their savings consumed"

Specifically, what I said was "A better leukemia treatment means nothing to me if I can't pay for it - and the overall ability to pay for medical care for most workers is worse today than it was then; not that it was a panacea then, but today?"

I think this is indisputable. Are you suggesting that every child with catastrophic illnesses in the United States accessing the advanced cancer treatments describe?

I took up your challenge, to find "one median wage earner, or, heck, even a well below-median wage earner in the U.S. who has had a child diagnosed with leukemia in the past year, and has not had the child receive exponentially better treatment than a child from even the wealthiest family received in 1976."

Well, I guess you are right; I didn't look too hard, but couldn't find anything one way or another. Will keep trying.

But...Here's what the Institute of Medicine has to say about the health consequences for the uninsured - people with too much money to qualify for indigent care, but not enough to pay for insurance:

Uninsured children have poorer access to health care, use fewer services, and delay seeking care. This scenario repeats itself for uninsured pregnant women and newborns....The deficits in health services for the uninsured extend to

*preventive medical, dental, and mental health care for children and youth;
*care when a child is sick or has special health care needs;
*access to prescription medications;
*prenatal care, more expensive obstetrical procedures, and length of maternal stay; and
*specialized care such as interventions for children with injuries or coarctation of aorta.

Too often uninsured parents do not seek care that insured parents and their providers would consider necessary. Disparities stem from their financial constraints and from providers’ decisions to provide less intensive services to uninsured patients or the failure to develop health facilities that are geographically accessible to uninsured populations.

Here's a chilling assessment of the consequences of the delay of care:

Parents of uninsured children often opt not to seek care for what appear to be non-life-threatening conditions and for which insured families in otherwise similar circumstances would consider medical attention necessary, as would medical providers. This lack of care can have both physical and psychosocial repercussions. Studies of injuries and mental health problems illustrate diminished care seeking for uninsured children with these conditions. Some conditions (e.g., asthma, ear, nose, and throat [ENT] infections and their complications; vaccine-preventable diseases) respond to timely outpatient care, and without that care, unnecessary hospitalizations frequently follow. In the worst cases of delayed care seeking on the part of families and the failure of the health care system to provide the same intensity of services to uninsured children, the uninsured child has a greater risk of dying.

Uninsured children with certain diagnoses have been found to be more likely to die than insured children, due to failure to reach a hospital or receive appropriate specialized care until late in the course of the illness and to the greater severity of illness at presentation resulting from delayed care.

Uninsured children are less likely to receive medical attention for their injuries. Overpeck and Kotch (1995) report that children without insurance had lower rates of both total and serious injuries that received medical attention, compared with the rates for children covered by Medicaid or private insurance. They estimated that uninsured children are 30 percent less likely to receive medical attention for their injuries than are insured children and 40 percent less likely to receive medical attention for serious injuries than are insured children.

My deduction is that a system that can't treat uninsured childrens' serious injuries, colds, and "vaccine-perventable diseases" is not doing a much better job treating their leukemia.

The second strand of my argument changes direction - from those who don't have the capacity to pay for insurance, to those who have insurance, but can't afford the associated costs, and end up delaying, cancelling or otherwise shortchanging treatment.

My argument here was that a modern society, with the means to do otherwise, cannot be described as civilized when it forces people into the choice you pose between financial ruin and treatment of a child's cancer.

There is no logical or moral reason why we have to tolerate a situation in which millions go without or delay care (to the point of increasing the risk of death) and millions more face daily "Sophie's Choice" dilemmas over providing healthcare for their families. Especially when other economically advanced countries have done a substantially better job of solving this problem.

Did we do a better job of providing healthcare for more people in 1976, even though medicine at the time did not have the capacity to treat certain diseases? With all the imperfections of our helathcare system in 1976, I think the answer is a clear: YES.

Then unionization of America is diffently in a down swing and things will probably get worse before they get better. My wife works in a unionized industry, but sometimes she questions whether they would be better off without the union. I point out that she would probably make considerably less money.

Union Friendly, I just came across your question regarding my union membership. While working my way through college, I was a janitor in the SEIU. After completing my doctorate, I joined the NEA. Later, I became an administrator and sat on the other side of the bargaining table with the NEA. And later still, I became an HR guy and negotiated contracts with SEIU, UFCW, 1199, and other unions.

I must also note that the discussion seems to be going in circles over health care coverage. Many other nations spend quite a bit less than we do on health care and achieve better results. They all have a form of national health care. We need to get employers and unions out of the health care coverage loop and adopt a national health plan that covers all Americans.