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Election 2004 How are Working Families Doing Under the Bush Administration? Print copies for distribution. UNIONS |
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| People Like Them |
BANKRUPTCIES
UNIONS |
People Like Us |
| Anti-union
sector has friend in president President Bush has fought to eliminate project labor agreements and weaken Davis-Bacon prevailing wage statutes. Bush repealed the federal responsible contractor rule that linked the awarding of federal contracts to firms compliance with federal labor, civil rights and worker safety laws. The rule also prohibited employers from using funds from government contracts to discourage employees from seeking union representation. The administration proposed to terminate collective bargaining for Department of Defense employees under the guise of homeland security. President Bush plans to contract out 85,000 government jobs. [Summer of our Discontent, IBEW Journal, September, 2003] |
Labor
targeted Union membership has dropped to 13.5 percent of the work force. Only eight percent of the private work force is organized. According to polls, an additional 42 million American workers want to join a union. The Bush administration has stacked the National Labor Relations Board with their appointees who often will not challenge employers who illegally interfere with union organizing drives. [www.aflcio.org] The NLRB is contemplating outlawing card-check recognition, one way those 42 million might have a chance to form a union. [Labor Board May Rule on Union Tactic, LA Times, 9/13/04] Union members earn, on average, 20 percent more than nonunion workers, are 21 percent more likely to have employer-paid health insurance, 24.4 percent more likely to have health insurance in retirement and 54 percent more likely to have pensions. Thus, the frustration of attempts by workers to organize unions has led directly to greater economic hardship for millions of Americans. [www.aflcio.org] |
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