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Biden to AFSCME: America’s Workers Should Get a Union If They Want One |
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The Obama administration is committed to leveling the playing field for workers and giving them the bargaining power they need to rebuild the middle class. That was the message Vice President Biden and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis brought to the 2009 AFSCME legislative conference in Washington, D.C., this week. Biden said current labor law isn’t protecting workers’ critical freedoms:
You’ve got to climb up a hill with so many roadblocks on the way to organize that it’s just out of whack.
If a union is what you want, then a union is what you should get. Labor built this country and labor should get a share of the benefits.
On the economy, Biden said the Obama administration will not consider itself a success simply by restoring the gross domestic product (GDP), a benchmark of economic growth.
From 2001 to 2008, the economy grew, but middle class Americans-they actually lost over that period $2,000 in income. If we’re not creating good, sustainable jobs, we’re not meeting our obligations.
Solis called on the union members to support the Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier for workers to form a union without being harassed and intimidated by employers.
The way to “put trust and faith” back into a system of employer-employee relations that has for years favored management “is by making sure we pass [Employee Free Choice Act],” Solis said.
She added that President Obama intends to reverse the “dramatic cuts” by the Bush administration in funding for programs that favor workers.
Under the Bush administration, the Labor Department “lost so many good people,” she noted, particularly within Wage and Hour Division and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). She declared the Obama administration will hire more people in the Labor Department to make sure “all our laws are respected and enforced.”
So I’m telling you, there is a new sheriff in town-a sheriff who cares about working-class people, brings respect back into the workplace and allows more people to associate with unions if they want to collectively bargain. I’m talking about the Employee Free Choice Act. I’m talking about the opportunities for that bill to pass. And I’m talking about the means for us to strengthen our unions.
The 700 delegates then took that message to Capitol Hill yesterday, telling lawmakers to restore America’s economy, guarantee quality health care for all and rebuild the middle class by making it easier for workers to form a union.
Workers should “remind elected officials that you helped put them in Congress. Let them know the issues that are important to you and other members of the union,” AFSCME Secretary-Treasurer William Lucy told the delegates.
AFSCME members from across the country told their members of Congress why the nation must invest in:
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Public services that Americans can count on in good times and bad. That means ensuring that federal stimulus funds are spent as intended-to maintain and create jobs at the federal, state and local levels.
- Comprehensive health care reform that guarantees a choice of coverage, including the choice of a new public health insurance option.
- Rebuilding the middle class, which means passing the Employee Free Choice Act.
For more on the AFSCME legislative conference, click here.
1 Comment
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WOW! Labor Sec Solis actually uttered the phrase “working-class people” - a term even the AFL-CIO rarely, if ever, uses. We usually hear instead the meaningless term “middle class,” as if there is one.