Unions Archives - The Connecticut Star

Commentary: Reforming Private Sector Unions

December 7, 2023 Connecticut Star Staff

Unlike public sector unions, which are inherently corrupt and need to be outlawed, private sector unions have a vital role to play in American society. But these unions have become coopted by the same special interests they were originally formed to oppose. The political agenda of America’s unions is almost exclusively leftist, and being part of America’s institutional “Left” is not what it used to be.

The biggest misconception in American politics today is that the political Left is fighting corporate power. Leftists may still attack corporate profits and demand corporations pay their “fair share,” but on every major issue affecting the economic freedom and prosperity of working families in America, these presumed antagonists are actually in perfect alignment.

Commentary: Outlaw Public Sector Unions

November 30, 2023 Connecticut Star Staff

Money doesn’t guarantee victory in political campaigns. For proof, look no further than Meg Whitman, the California billionaire who in 2010 squandered $179 million in her futile campaign to beat Jerry Brown and become that state’s next governor.

When money is married to institutional power, however, it makes all the difference. This is why, 10 years after the Whitman debacle, Mark Zuckerberg was able to purchase the presidential election outcome in 2020 for $419 million. Whitman’s money paid consultants and bought ads on television. Zuckerberg’s money went to supplement the activities of election offices in swing states – election offices that employed workers represented by unions that overwhelmingly favor Democrats over Republicans.

House Dem Predicts Biden Will Intervene to Stop Strike Against Big Three Automakers

September 7, 2023 Connecticut Star Staff

A House Democrat predicted Tuesday on an episode of Bloomberg’s podcast “Sound On” that President Joe Biden would intervene to avoid a major auto industry strike.

The United Auto Workers (UAW) is currently in negotiations with the Big Three automakers — Ford, General Motors and Stellantis — over employment contracts for unionized workers that are set to expire on Sept. 14. Virginia Democratic Rep. Don Beyer told “Sound On” host Joe Mathieu that he believes that Biden will prevent a strike between the Big Three and UAW by intervening in negotiations, citing past interventions in union negotiations.

Commentary: What Unions Don’t Want You to Know This Labor Day

September 4, 2023 Connecticut Star Staff

A male doing electrical work with a ball cap and safety glasses on

This Labor Day, the Biden administration and Big Labor will no doubt tout the alleged successes of President Joe Biden’s “whole of government” push to increase unionization in the workplace and unions’ modest successes in breaking into a few big corporations. But those stories will also leave a lot out. They’ll leave out the side of the story that unions don’t want workers to know.

That side of the story includes the fact that unionization reached an all-time low of 10.1 percent in 2022 (and only 6.0 percent among private sector workers) as worker satisfaction reached an all-time high of 62.3 percent (according to The Conference Board’s measure, which began in 1987). It also includes the fact that while non-union wages increased by 24 percent over the past five years, union wages rose by less than 17 percent.

Commentary: Unions Have Betrayed America

August 17, 2023August 16, 2023 Connecticut Star Staff

Anyone suggesting there is no role for unions in America today might first consider a fact of history: more than a century ago, when oligarchs and the companies they owned had treated workers as if they were livestock, reduced to living in squalid pens with rationed food and water, it was unions that organized these workers to resist. It was unions who gave these workers back their humanity, and negotiated collective bargaining agreements and laws that eliminated child labor, enforced workplace safety, established an 8-hour work day, paid overtime, health benefits, and retirement pensions.

Commentary: America Needs to Update Its Labor Union Laws

July 6, 2023 Connecticut Star Staff

For years, labor unions have been exempt from the consequences of destroying private property. Would you like a higher wage or salary? Sounds good! So, how would you go about persuading your employer to give you a raise? Why not vandalize some of your employer’s property with your labor union, or at least threaten to do so unless the boss gives you the raise you want?

Let’s say you want to get hired for a certain job, but you are worried that another applicant might get the job you want. Should you slash the tires on the other person’s car and threaten to pound him with a baseball bat if he doesn’t disappear?

Commentary: To Unions, Organizing Time Is Fine When It’s on the Taxpayers’ Dime

June 28, 2023 RealClearWire

Randi Weingarten, the powerful president of the American Federation of Teachers, hasn’t been a working teacher in more than a quarter of a century.

Of the six years she spent teaching social studies, half of them appear to have been as a substitute. Yet despite the long absence from her short tenure in the classroom, the union leader described herself during a recent congressional hearing as being on leave from Brooklyn’s Clara Barton High School.

Commentary: Forgery Cases Give Supreme Court Opportunity to Hold Unions Accountable for Shady Tactics

January 12, 2023January 11, 2023 Admin

In its landmark Janus v. AFSCME ruling four years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a decades-old precedent that 22 left-leaning states used to justify forcing millions of public employees to join or fund a labor union against their wishes. Despite this decision, several unions have used legal action—and illegal actions—to try to prevent employees and their dues from leaving.

Since the Janus decision, several hundred thousand government workers have parted company with their unions—and kept hundreds of millions of dues dollars in their own pockets—after deciding the association no longer made sense for themselves and their families.

Commentary: The Monopoly Hiding in Plain Sight

October 14, 2022October 13, 2022 RealClearWire

With persistent inflation and growing concerns over a recession, pundits, policymakers, and the president have expressed concern about an alleged lack of competition lurking in the dark corners of the U.S. economy. As President Biden himself said, “capitalism without competition isn’t capitalism, it’s exploitation.” From Big Tech to baby food, both sides of the aisle are on the lookout for monopoly power. But sometimes the best place to hide is in plain sight.

Major Government Unions Lose over 200K Members

October 2, 2022October 1, 2022 The Center Square

The top four public labor unions in the U.S. lost hundreds of thousands of members since a 2018 Supreme Court case that ruled government employees could not be forced to pay a union to keep their job, a new report shows that.

The Commonwealth Foundation released the report, which found that the top four public labor unions – AFT, AFSCME, NEA, and SEIU – lost nearly 219,000 members altogether since the Janus v. AFSCME ruling.

Commentary: Workers Increasingly Favor Right-to-Work States

September 9, 2022September 8, 2022 RealClearWire

Union bosses and their apologists often grossly understate, or forget about altogether, regional cost-of-living differences when they are debating living standards in Right to Work states versus in forced-unionism states.

California’s New Pro-Union Law Could Grind the Supply Chain to a Halt

July 18, 2022July 17, 2022 Admin

California truckers are protesting across the state to express their disapproval of Assembly Bill (AB) 5, a new law backed by unions that reclassifies them as employees rather than independent contractors and could send shockwaves through an already-stressed supply chain.

The regulation was partly enacted to protect gig workers at companies like Uber and Lyft that hire independent contractors in large numbers without affording them the benefits given to employees, but will complicate or render illegal the current employment status of many of California’s approximately 70,000 independent truck owner-operators, The Wall Street Journal reported. The law will likely force some truckers out of the industry, thus lowering shipping capacity and raising prices for transporting cargo in the Golden State at a time when California ports have already experienced major supply-chain bottlenecks during the COVID-19 pandemic, CalMatters reported.

Connecticut House Passes Legislation Barring Work Meetings Discussing Unions

May 2, 2022May 1, 2022 Bradley Vasoli

On Friday, Connecticut’s House of Representatives passed a bill prohibiting companies’ management from requiring workers to listen to discussions regarding labor organization, politics or religion.

The AFL-CIO, to which more than 200,000 Connecticut workers belong, lauded the move in favor of the policy — known as a “captive audience” restriction — which no other state except Oregon has enacted. Union leaders have denounced the kind of meetings banned by the legislation, complaining that such events are unfairly used to inveigh against union-organization efforts.

Connecticut Public-Sector Unions to Get Costly Raises and Bonuses If Contracts Approved

March 21, 2022March 20, 2022 Bradley Vasoli

According to a brochure distributed by Connecticut’s public-sector-labor coalition, Gov. Ned Lamont (D) and the state’s unionized employees have negotiated contracts that will cost taxpayers plenty if ratified.

Wins for each unionized worker would include $3,500 in bonuses and and three yearly wage hikes of 2.5 percent, which would be made retroactive to summer of 2021. About two-thirds of union-affiliated employees would also get “step” raises; i.e., elevation to the next pay rate. These bonuses and salary gains would also factor into future pension payments.

Connecticut Bill Would Have Employers Pay Unemployment to Strikers

March 14, 2022March 13, 2022 Bradley Vasoli

If Connecticut’s Democrat-run General Assembly and Governor Ned Lamont (D) approve a bill now before the Joint Committee on Labor and Public Employees, striking workers will gain the right to collect unemployment.

Current state law does not permit union strikers to collect jobless benefits, as eligibility requires having come into “unemployment through no fault of your own.” The legislation under consideration, sponsored by State Representatives Michael Winkler (D-Vernon), David Michel (D-Stamford) and Robyn Porter (D-Hamden) would, starting this October, allow strikers to get unemployment checks two weeks into a labor walkout.

Proposal Would Let Connecticut Agencies Sue Employers and Bestow Proceeds on Unions

March 7, 2022March 6, 2022 Bradley Vasoli

A bill in the Connecticut House of Representatives would allow the state to effectively nullify worker-employer agreements designed to prevent lawsuits and let state officials bestow some monetary awards on unions.

The legislation, sponsored by State Representative Michael Winkler (D-Vernon), would evade what it refers to as “forced arbitration agreements” and “allow employees to sue employers on behalf of the state after having waived their personal rights to sue.”