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740,000 Sign on to Million-Member Mobilization for Employee Free Choice |
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The union movement’s Million-Member Mobilization to get 1 million signatures supporting the Employee Free Choice Act is fast approaching its goal. With fewer than 50 days to go before the November elections, some 740,000 people have signed cards and petitions calling on the new Congress to immediately pass and the new president to sign the legislation when they take office in 2009.
The legislation would allow workers to freely choose how they want to form a union. (You can show your support for the Employee Free Choice Act by clicking here to sign our online card.)
The Communications Workers of America (CWA) is leading the way with 83,432 signatures from local union members. With piles of cards and petitions waiting to be tabulated, and more arriving in the mail or over the Internet every day, CWA’s total of supporters likely will grow even bigger in the remaining weeks.
CWA President Larry Cohen, who chairs the AFL-CIO Organizing Committee, says:
The cards and petitions keep flowing in because of our members’ activism and understanding about exactly what’s at stake in the upcoming elections. The corporate bullies who are scared to death of the Employee Free Choice Act have millions of dollars to spend to try to defeat it. Our side has millions of working families who are fed up with having their rights stomped on, and our postcard campaign is one way we will make that abundantly clear to lawmakers.
CWA set a goal of reaching 15 percent of its members to sign cards and petitions. Already, more than half of the local unions have met that goal and many have surpassed it.
When the new Congress comes to Washington, the cards and petitions from CWA and other unions will be presented to the congressional leadership and displayed in the U.S. Capitol to show the massive support for the Employee Free Choice Act.
Says Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), chair of the House Education and Labor Committee and a key sponsor and supporter of the bill:
Imagine in January 2009 that there are 1 million cards at the U.S. Capitol. That’s the kind of momentum we need to prevail.
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I support the card check bill as one — outdated — way to get around the obstacle course placed in the way of union organizing votes — nobody should have to run the gauntlet just to vote on an political or economic level.
But why is the only proposal on the table an early twentieth century labor law — retread — that some smart labor lawyer luckily spotted a few years back — suppose he hadn’t spotted it; can’t we think for ourselves?
The late twentieth century answer to the race to the bottom — to Wal-Mart killing the pay scales of legitimate workplaces — is SECTOR-WIDE labor agreements: where everybody doing the same job in the same geographic locale must under law work under a common collective bargaining contract even for different firms.
Wal-Mart just closed 88 big boxes in Germany because it could not make out paying the same wages and benefits as everyone else. Supermarket workers and airline employees here would kill for sector-wide agreements.
Germany has the most comprehensive version of sector-wide — France has a “lite” version where nonunion firms must work under contracts negotiated by union firms. French-Canada has the latter. Our economy is almost the same as French-Canada — it should be no trouble to incorporate sector-wide “lite” here.
Under German style sector-wide scabs should not exist because everybody must work under the same contract — and scabs have no contract.
Argentina (second-world) uses sector-wide. Indonesia (third-world) uses sector-wide. Even if we get card check here, American labor law will still be behind the third-world. What are we fourth-world?
I think all of those things would be great but with only 12% union density we don’t have the power. to do the things you suggest we need to organize workers to provide the political support for representatives who will stand up against the business classes. but to do that we need to overcome the serious hurdles we face in the law and with union busting companies. EFCA is the first step. Build the power base. then do something with that power.
I’m against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG.
Instead, I’m in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to all Americans as a “Dividend”.
To make the math simple, let’s assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide U.S. Citizens 18+
Our population is about 301,000,000 +/- counting every man, woman and child.
So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up..
So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billion that equals to a hefty “$425,000.00″
My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a “Dividend”
Of course, it would NOT be tax free. So let’s assume a tax rate of 30%.
Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes. That sends $25.5 Billion right back to Uncle Sam.
But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket.
A husband and wife have $595,000.00.
What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?
Pay off your mortgage “housing crisis solved”
Repay college loans “a great boost to new grads”
Put away money for college “it’ll be there”
Save it in a bank “create money to loan to entrepreneurs”
Buy a new car “create jobs”
Invest in the market “capital drives growth”
Pay for your parent’s medical insurance “health care improves”
Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folks who lost their jobs at
Lehman Brothers and every other company
If we are going to re-distribute wealth let’s really do it…instead of trickling out
If we’re going to do an $85 billion bailout, let’s bail out every adult U S Citizen 18+
As for AIG liquidate it and Sell off its parts.
Sell off the real esta te.Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.
Here’s my rationale. We deserve it and “AIG doesn’t” we were not invited to the last 10 years of “party time” bonuses
And remember, That this plan only really costs $59.5 Billion because $25.5 Billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.
This sounds really good, and it would be, except that your numbers are off by three zeros. 85 billion divided by 200 million is only 425. The point made, however, is the same; no bailouts for the lending institutions that clearly, together with government approval of deregulation, have created this entire mess.
There’s a lot of talk about people bringing this upon themselves when they signed up for these loans to begin with, and yes, many people really should have thought things through a little better before they signed on the dotted line. However, we cannot, even in the most ridiculous situations blame the average homeowner completely. Here’s why. Signing an ARM is risky in itself. Banks and lending institution should have NEVER offered them to low income people. They knew it. Nor should they have pushed the even riskier sub prime loans. That’s financial suicide for the borrower. Second, given the loans, together with the bursting bubble of real estate values, the adjustable rate did not merely go up a few points, which may have still been feasible for many people, but, instead went up as much as ten percentage points. Here’s where regulation would have really come in handy. Limits on the increase of interest SHOULD have been capped. Third, when homeowners reached the point of economic collapse, the lenders should not have foreclosed, but should have made it a priority to help the homeowners keep their homes by finding ways to lock in fixed mortgages. Something which should have happened all along. It is because the banks and lenders continually sold (passed on) these loans that the final destination of the loans (bank) knows absolutely nothing about the borrower and their financial situation, nor would they care. So we have mass market foreclosures, and bank collapse.
I blame the banks, the lenders AND the government for all their reckless, greedy deeds. I do not blame the majority of the borrowers. Some borrowers, of course, did in fact take advantage of the situation by purchasing several properties and “flipping”, but the majority of homeowners out there only wanted a place to live.
It all sounds just lovely but you’d better wear your hard hat next time. I think you hit that steel beam harder with your head than you realized. No, actually it would be great but we have a hard enough time trying to weasel fifty cents out of our republican boss!