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Created and published on July 7th, 2021
Edited on July 21st, 2021
Edited on July 21st, 2021
Showing posts with label National Labor Relations Act. Show all posts
Showing posts with label National Labor Relations Act. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 7, 2021
Monday, October 30, 2017
20 Goals for Labortarians: Crafting a Libertarian Policy on Unions
1. Craft a free labor policy.
2. Less government, more unions.
3. End Right to Work laws.
4. Liberalize professional licensing.
5. Fix the free rider problem.
6. Free movement and integrated markets.
7. End unions' monopolies on negotiation.
8. Protect concerted activity.
9. Continue to require bargaining.
10.
Ensure the right to strike.
11.
Legalize illegal union activities.
12.
Make full boycott possible.
13.
Keep divestment legal.
14.
Unionize all walks of life.
15.
Establish free union elections.
16.
Free-market anti-capitalism.
17.
End slavery, domination, and dominion.
18.
Counter the rhetoric of self-ownership.
19.
Free association and non-discrimination.
20.
Promote acceptance and tolerance.
1.
CRAFT A FREE LABOR POLICY: Advance a labor policy which celebrates
the contributions that the organized labor movement has made to
advancing human liberty - and which is in keeping with the
Libertarian Party platform, strict-constructionist and originalist
interpretations of the Constitution, and frameworks to ensure free
and fair markets - by consistently supporting voluntary collective
bargaining activities over compulsion, hierarchy, and state
interference in the affairs of organized labor.
2. LESS GOVERNMENT, MORE UNIONS: Retain the portion of the 1935 National Labor Relations Act (N.L.R.A. / Wagner Act) which promotes the practice and procedure of collective bargaining, but also promote the radical privatization of government services wherever possible and prudent, and demand that most or all necessary government activities be performed by non-state actors. Increase overall union membership in the United States.
3.
END RIGHT TO WORK LAWS: Support the freedom of unions to exercise
their right to become party to contracts with enterprises, by
opposing efforts to pass Right to Work laws and amendments, in all
jurisdictions and at all levels of government. Call on state
governors to nullify and repeal such laws, and state and federal
courts to rule them unconstitutional, due to their prohibition of
union-shop and closed-shop arrangements, union security agreements
which are perfectly free and voluntary (although they may have some
undesirable effects). Repeal the portion of the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act
which prohibits closed-shop union security agreements.
4. LIBERALIZE PROFESSIONAL LICENSING: Make Right to Work laws unnecessary, by demanding an alternative method to preventing the domination of professions within given states by the set of unionized professionals already employed within them. Demand the liberalization of professional licensing laws, in order to accommodate independent contractors and those seeking to form unions.
5. FIX THE FREE RIDER PROBLEM: Ensure that workers everywhere are free to “not consent and refuse the benefits” of union negotiation. Leave all employees free to refuse to pay dues to unions, but only on the condition that the employee refuse all benefits of union negotiation which he can feasibly refuse (i.e., not physical workplace safety and health conditions). Consider liability waivers as a possible solution to the safety and health free-rider problems.
6. FREE MOVEMENT & INTEGRATED MARKETS: Fight globalism and ultranationalism, while supporting globalization, integration and interconnectedness of markets, and the free movement of labor and capital (including the freedom of locomotion for travelers and workers alike). Fight to liberalize immigration laws; end immigration quotas; lower barriers to trade; decrease tariffs, duties, and imposts; and oppose efforts of established unions to lobby for legal measures that unfairly protect or favor domestic labor. Use education to combat the stigmatization of legal and undocumented immigration.
7. END UNIONS' MONOPOLIES ON NEGOTIATION: End compulsory unionism in the private sector, and end the rights of unions to monopolize the representation of workers in negotiation with management. Repeal the section of the Wagner Act which mandates that there is to be one exclusive bargaining representative for a unit of employees. Spread awareness of, and normalize, the practices of members-only collective bargaining, and dual and minority unionism (the presence of two or more active unions in a single workplace). Increase the diversity of the types of union security agreements which are practiced in the United States.
8. PROTECT CONCERTED ACTIVITY: Retain the Wagner Act's provisions that require the federal government to protect the right of union and non-union employees to engage in concerted activity, and retain the protection for discussing wages. Protect these rights, as well as the right to form a union, in all jurisdictions, and at all levels of government.
9. CONTINUE TO REQUIRE BARGAINING: Retain the Wagner Act's requirement that employers must negotiate with employees, on the grounds that a fair market is not possible unless the buyer and seller of labor have equal say in determining the price at which the labor is to be sold.
10. ENSURE THE RIGHT TO STRIKE: Abolish the National Labor Relations Board, and repeal the provision of the Taft-Hartley Act which prohibits wildcat strikes. No union should have to request permission from a government bureau in order to go on strike, nor should any segment of a workplace or work force be denied the right to strike without the approval of a union leader.
11. LEGALIZE ILLEGAL UNION ACTIVITIES: Demand the legalization of prohibited union activities wherever they could be engaged in voluntarily. Repeal the portions of the Taft-Hartley Act which prohibit secondary strikes, secondary boycotts, secondary and mass picketing, jurisdictional strikes, and monetary donations from unions to federal political campaigns.
12. MAKE FULL BOYCOTT POSSIBLE: Fight for the full right of workers and taxpayers to engage in full boycott of enterprises and unions with which they do not wish to associate. Allow taxpayers to withhold their taxes from governments that would spend it to enrich their favored business cronies and favored unions. Call for tax strikes, which demand either the abolition of the entire corporate welfare state, or that individual citizens be free to decide which programs they will pay for and which ones they will not.
13. KEEP DIVESTMENT LEGAL: In addition to supporting the full rights to engage in strikes and boycotts, fight for the right to engage in divestment campaigns. Encourage enterprises to end their membership in lobbying agencies that disguise themselves as chambers of commerce, and to instead join independent business alliances that promote fair treatment for workers. Keep divestment legal, whether against enterprises, unions, or even governments.
14. UNIONIZE ALL WALKS OF LIFE: Fight for the rights of freelancers, independent contractors, free agents, unemployed people, welfare recipients, homeless people, ex-convicts, non-violent black market laborers, tenants, open-source workers and peer-to-peer process contributors, and people of all professions. to form unions. Additionally, to demand negotiation with their employers, and to resist state control, exploitation, hierarchy, and bossism.
15. ESTABLISH FREE UNION ELECTIONS: Ensure that union members may vote in union elections, and that non-dues-paying members and dues-paying members alike are free to abstain from voting. Advocate for the freedom of union members to hold elections featuring voter privity, with results visible and subject to review by all members of the union(s) and workplace(s) involved.
16. FREE-MARKET ANTI-CAPITALISM: Reject the Libertarian Party's endorsement of private property as a core principle, and oppose any attempts to have the party list “capitalism” or “fiscal conservatism” among its guiding economic principles, Promote the idea that markets must be completely immune from price distortions and undue limitations and inhibitions on markets (which are caused by the state and its cronies, their hoarding, and their participation in the capitalist mode of production), in order to be both fair and truly free. Combat untrue anti-socialist and anti-communist propaganda, and ignorance about left-wing economics, through education and peaceful civil discourse. Oppose misinterpretation of the Non-Aggression Principle that excuses or ignores intimidation, exploitation, and economic pressures that coerce people and make their decisions limited and effectively involuntary. Oppose cutthroat competition, monopolistic competition, and competition to lower prices that neglects the right of workers to receive sufficient compensation for their effort.
17. END SLAVERY, DOMINATION, & DOMINION: Oppose the extension of markets to the realms of “living capital”; i.e., human labor and work, and other living things. Empower consumers to resist the commodification of labor, man, and nature; calling for such market activities to cease. Abolish the markets for exclusively held landed property, the product of human labor, sex work under economic pressure and exploitation, toxic chemicals and poisons that kill when used properly, and perhaps the markets for human organs and endangered animal species. Support the rights of human beings, living or dead, to resist being owned, kept, domesticated, overworked, denied the right to negotiate what amounts to the full product of their labor, and required, pressured, or threatened into performing labors and actions against their will.
18. COUNTER THE RHETORIC OF SELF-OWNERSHIP: Oppose the characterization of liberty as “self-ownership”, in order to resist the perception of the human body and its efforts as things – tangible pieces of property - which can or should be owned, which gives the impression of tangibility, suggesting that the body can or should be owned.
19. FREE ASSOCIATION & NON-DISCRIMINATION: Oppose discrimination and segregation in the public sector, and oppose discriminatory behavior in all ostensibly private firms which receive any forms of taxpayer funded subsidies and/or services, and/or are directly involved in interstate commerce. In the social sphere, and on residential properties, support the full freedom of, to, and from association.
20.
PROMOTE ACCEPTANCE & TOLERANCE: Fight reactionaryism, religiously
motivated bigotry, anti-Semitism, Judeophobia, Islamophobia,
chauvinism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, classism, ageism,
ableism, lookism, Social Darwinism, cultural monism and
assimilationism, and predjuice against people of every race, color,
and creed. Use education to combat ignorance of sociology, human
needs, intersectionality theory, institutional privileges, commonly
agreed upon parental responsibilities, the stigmatization of mental
disorders (especially those that keep people from working), and the
stigmatization of homelessness, poverty, and welfare receipt,
especially in Libertarian circles.
Written on October 30th, 2017
Wednesday, April 23, 2014
On Labor: Offering Tax Incentives to Firms to Transition Power to Workers and Consumers
If
elected to the U.S. House in 2014, I will oppose the Card Check bill,
as well as the Employee Free Choice Act, and all legislation designed
to empower union bosses.
The
exclusive authority to regulate organized labor occurring in the
states is not an enumerated power granted to the federal government
in the Constitution. The federal government should only have the
exclusive authority to regulate labor which occurs in the District of
Columbia and in the nation's overseas possessions, and labor in
industries over which the federal government exercises duly
delegated constitutional authorities to
regulate. I would sponsor efforts to return the power to regulate and
enforce all other areas of labor policy to the states - and to the
people, the labor departments and bureaus, and the local governments
within them - as soon as possible.
I
believe that all federal legislation aiming to protect the so-called
rights of unions
and employers alike is
specific legislation affording a special privilege; the General
Welfare Clause was included in the Constitution in order to prohibit
legislation which does not promote the welfare of all of the people
equally. Special legislation concerning unions, enterprises, business
associations, and lobbyists and political action committees from
both sides of the aisle has
only served to empower all of
these organizations to participate in the regulation and control of
the people. This has resulted in diminished political power for
ordinary taxpayers, diminished economic power for ordinary consumers,
and a less productive economy.
I
oppose the Card Check bill and the Employee Free Choice Act not
because it should be illegal or any more difficult to join or
organize a union, nor easier for employers to fire people for
engaging in legal union activity. I take this position because the
taxpayers – as
both the employers of federal workers and the consumers of the
services they provide –
have the responsibility to ensure that the power of organized labor
does not make the delivery of such services unaffordable. Federal
workers should bear in mind that they, too, are consumers and
taxpayers, and therefore need affordable government just like the
rest of us.
Furthermore,
I take this position in order to protect the rights of minorities; in
this case, the rights of minority unions alongside those of majority
unions. Gaining majority status for being the certified winner in a
National Labor Relations Board election should not be the sole method
of invoking bargaining obligations on the part of employers; plural
and proportional representation would be legal alternatives if
legislation requiring majority status were abolished.
I
believe that majority unions should have a role in such bargaining,
but so should minority unions, as well as consumers and shareholders,
and - in the case of labor by government employees – taxpayers. But
agreements between these parties can be achieved through private
arbitration (following mutual company and union agreement about which
materially uninterested agency shall be deemed trustworthy to
arbitrate the dispute) and liens on business properties, rather than
through litigation and motivated state intervention concerning what
sort of bargaining between companies and unions shall be acceptable.
I
do not support any organization that interferes with individual
freedom to associate through federally protected concerted activity
for mutual aid and protection, and to bargain collectively on a
members-only basis. I take this position regardless of whether it
is an
employer or a union interfering
with these freedoms, and regardless of whether there is an
established majority union in the workplace.
Majority
unionists should understand that their desire to be the only
union in the workplace only puts all of their eggs in one basket. The
federal law requiring majority status vote for a union to remain in
existence only exposes unions to the risk that a future federal law
could empower government to require all
eligible voters
to weigh in on a union election at their workplace, even if they'd
rather not pick a side. I believe that compulsory union voting is one
of the most significant sources of political polarization and
divisiveness in America today.
As
long as majority unions are free to appeal to the federal government
to either abolish minority unions or diminish their power to
negotiate, the prevailing union shop / closed shop dichotomy in
unionized workplaces can only serve to perpetuate an environment of
monopolistic competition over the representation of labor. I oppose
such uses of coercive state power to enforce unconstitutional special
legislation; this is activity which should be considered in violation
of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
Unless and until it becomes politically feasible to repeal all special federal legislation empowering unions and
businesses alike, I will propose amendments to the Constitution
authorizing the federal government to enjoin states against giving
such illegal special privileges and monopoly representation powers to
majority unions (often referred to as a “national Right to Work
amendment”). I take this position because in 1985 the Supreme Court
ruled that nobody may legally be required to become a full member of
a union as a condition of continued employment.
Although
the federal government should not be in the business of telling
people in the states how to regulate labor therein, in regards to my
legislative position on the federal government's jurisdiction over
labor (in the District of Columbia, overseas, and in industries it
was duly delegated the authority to regulate) - and in regards to my
general recommendations for the states – I believe that individual
freedom to choose whether to join a union can coexist alongside
workers desiring solidarity in collective bargaining.
I
also believe that each government, in its respective sphere of
authority to regulate labor, should provide for a more collaborative
negotiation between employers and non-employers from across a wider
and more diverse set of economic organizations. I would suggest that
this be done by prohibiting unions (especially pro-business majority
unions known as “business unions”) from making contracts with
employers in a manner which does not welcome the input of ordinary
people. This includes the input of not only taxpayers, shareholders,
and non-shareholding but nonetheless affected “stakeholders”, but
most importantly of potential employees who are all too often
underinformed about their rights as a result of such contracts.
Unconstitutionally
empowering the federal government to nationalize companies and then
to award controlling stakes in them to the public and/or to labor
unions with majority status is not the only way to ensure that
everyone gets their fair share of influence over how our society and
economy are governed. There is a way to passively –
rather than actively and coercively – allow ownership and
management responsibilities to transition into the hands of workers
and consumers.
Moreover,
there is a way to do this while promoting economic growth, without
crushing the entrepreneurial spirit of the people or causing people
to work past their planned retirement ages unnecessarily, and without
diminishing the freedoms of individual workers and minority unions to
have meaningful influence on the workplace and in the industry of
their choice.
My
recommendation would involve immediately closing all tax loopholes
and taxing all corporate income (including capital gains) at a flat
base rate, and from there offering tax credits in order to
incentivize owners and managers of firms to take steps planning and
providing for the gradual transition of ownership and management of
such firms to organization modes which are more hospitable to
egalitarianism and a balance of workers' rights with the interests of
consumers.
Firms
in the public and private sectors alike would be offered tax
incentives to essentially evolve into one of any number of types of
organizations. Examples of such organizations should include open
shop unions; dual and minority unions; workplaces with members-only
collective bargaining agreements; autonomous unions and guilds;
syndicates; egalitarian labor-managed firms; cooperative
corporations; consumer-driven cooperatives; worker-consumer
cooperatives (i.e., mutuals); mutual aid societies; cooperative
wholesale societies; and voluntary cooperatives.
I
would additionally recommend a hybrid example, combining the
functions of as many of these types of organizations as possible into
one firm; that is, a voluntary worker-consumer wholesale
purchasing cooperative.
Such a cooperative should coordinate the planning of purchasing as
tightly as possible with other cooperatives like it, and be required
to serve any customer who comes to it (on the condition that he or
she does not request unjustifiable quantities of the goods and
services offered).
Although
coordinating their efforts would save the most money, such
cooperatives should remain technically separate organizations,
function in a market system, be free to accept and give charitable
donations, and be free to have differing practices regarding in which
circumstances additional quantities of goods and services afforded to
certain individuals above the base level are justifiable.
The
main objective of such a cadre of firms would be to provide a
counterbalance against the oligopoly powers of sellers and
distributors of labor and capital pertaining to the relevant goods
and services produced by said firms. Such firms would accomplish this
by pooling wealth in order to save costs in the purchasing and
delivery of the relevant goods and services, providing for the
affordable organization of production.
This
would occur under the condition of regular negotiation concerning any
and all potential conflict which is likely to arise between
consumers' demand for low prices and workers' demand for high
compensation. A worker who consumes the very good or service which he
or she produces, possesses good management skills, and has
constructive suggestions concerning improving the workplace, might be
asked to serve as a tie-breaking vote in any leadership or management
of such a firm.
The
State of Oregon can do better on labor policy without the obstructive
effects of association with the federal government. The federal
government's ownership of vast tracts of land in the state inhibits
(in those areas) the kind of productive labor which would allow the
state to afford such a relationship, if only the state had the
ability to fully tax the value of the land within it, instead of
resorting to taxing the production of its own taxpayers through taxes
on individual income. Whether they call the compensation they desire
“all the fruits” or “the full product” of their labor, I
would urge people of the left and right alike to oppose the eventual
abolition of the individual income tax.
For
more entries on unions and collective bargaining, please visit:
Sunday, April 20, 2014
Right to Work Laws and Union Security Agreement Contracts
Written on April 15th, 2012
Edited in April 2014
"If
legislation... had not created privileges for the unions, the need
for special legislation concerning them would probably not have
arisen... once special privileges have become part of the law of the
land, they can be removed only by special legislation.
Though
there ought to be no need for special 'right-to-work laws,' it is
difficult to deny that the situation created in the United States by
legislation and by the decisions of the Supreme Court may make
special legislation the only practicable way of restoring the
principles of freedom.
...Such
legislation... should not go beyond declaring certain contracts
invalid..."
-
Austrian School economist Friedrich Hayek
Over
the past year, I have been inclined to criticize
"compulsory-unionism" laws (the private-sector labor laws
which exist in non-Right-to-Work [RTW] states, pursuant to the
National Labor Relations Act), even going so far as to characterize
such laws as conferring government-afforded monopoly privileges to
labor unions.
However
- as I have determined that I had overlooked some important details
about private-sector labor laws in the course of my research, and
also that I had neglected to examine the issue in the context of
contract rights (which I have described as the basis of all
legitimate governance) - I have recently had to re-think my stance on
private-sector labor law.
Before
my recent research, I had thought that in non-RTW states, the
management of all unionized workplaces within a given state is
required to negotiate with the single labor union recognized by the
government as having the exclusive right to represent workers in
negotiation - whether or not such workers sanction and approve of
that representation - and that employees in unionized workplaces who
do not join unions within a given time frame can be fired.
Essentially,
I'd thought that in non-RTW states, all unionized workplaces had
union-shop union security agreements (henceforth referred to as
USAs).
What actually happens
in non-RTW states is that employers and labor unions are permitted to
enter into contracts functioning as USAs (which include closed-shop,
union-shop, agency-shop, fair-share-provision / dues-checkoff), which
usually entail that one particular union has the exclusive right to
represent workers within the workplace.
(In
contrast to this practice, the Industrial Workers of the World
[I.W.W. / Wobblies] support dual-unionism, the practice of two unions
to represent workers in negotiation with the management of the same
workplace).
Before
criticizing the Hayek quote and summarizing my position, I'd like to
make it clear that I am not totally reversing my stance on
private-sector labor laws.
First,
I would support legislation which would prohibit the federal and
state governments from mandating that all unionized workplaces within
given jurisdictions make closed-shop or union-shop USAs (meaning that
only union members may be employed, and that workers must join the
union within a certain time-frame in order to keep their jobs,
respectively). Although I don't think such mandates would be likely
in the U.S., I would note that Mexico had a closed-shop mandate until
about two decades ago.
Second,
I do not support any union security agreements, much less
enthusiastically so. I feel that they often:
(1)
act as unnecessary barriers of entry into the labor market,
(2)
increase unemployment levels and the cost of living,
(3)
make it less likely for new and fledgling labor unions to gain
prominence, exacerbating the oligarchicalization of agencies
representing workers in negotiation with management,
(4)
make independent ["wildcat"] strikes less likely to occur,
(5)
narrow the range of acceptable tactics for - and goals of -
negotiation, and
(6)
[in the case of union-shop agreements], fail to ensure that employees
become aware during their job interviews of their obligation to join
the union as a condition of employment within a given time-frame
[which is what happened to me at one of my first jobs].
I
do not see why there should exist an agency like the National Labor
Relations Board which has the authority to approve and deny unions'
requests to engage in strikes. I imagine that Hayek would describe
this system as a labor policy which is only practiced due to special
legislation, and I would agree with that characterization.
However,
I would not put union security agreements in the same category. I
believe that collective bargaining in the private sector is a right.
This is not to say, though, that unions have the right to compel
management to accede to their demands. What I mean is that workers'
rights to collectively bargain is limited by management's willingness
to entertain and give credence to claims of such rights.
Essentially,
anything goes, so long as government, unions, management, and those
who support them do not - and may not - compel one another to act
against their will. I would add that this notion is not fundamentally
different from the private-sector labor policy which is administered
in non-RTW states today.
At
least ideally, we have a contractual government (meaning that laws
are contracts made between consenting agents), government honors all
contracts made amongst consenting individuals, and legislation cannot
impair the obligation of contracts (contracts, however,may be
impaired retroactively as the result of judgments in lawsuits).
This
is why I find myself at odds with Hayek when he asserts that
"legislation... declaring certain contracts invalid" is
acceptable and desirable.
In
closing, the following is a summary of my policy on private-sector
labor (at least, as it stands today):
(1)
Repeal the National Labor Relations Act and abolish the National
Labor Relations Board. They are not necessary to uphold the right to
collectively bargain (which existed prior to - and exist
independently of - the current federal private-sector labor-policy
system), and they diminish the role of independent,
non-government-sponsored unions.
(2)
Repeal the Taft-Hartley Act, invalidating state Right-to-Work laws.
These laws impair the obligation of contracts, which - whether
retroactively or not - are inhibitive of individual rights and the
freedom of association.
(3)
Enact legislation prohibiting the federal and state governments from
mandating closed-shop and union-shop union security agreements in all
unionized workplaces within the given jurisdictions.
(4)
Vociferously discourage unions and management from making union
security agreements in negotiation.
(5)
Encourage unions and management to practice members-only collective
bargaining and open-shop agreements, in order to counter-act the
free-rider problems which arise as the result of success of point
(4).
(6)
Encourage dual- and multiple-unionism. Encourage unions, union
members, and union supporters to tolerate competition by other
unions, and encourage management to negotiate with multiple unions.
For
more entries on unions and collective bargaining, please visit:
Tuesday, December 31, 2013
Wisconsin and Collective Bargaining: My Journey on Labor Policy
I
was in my home town of Lake Bluff, Illinois in mid-February 2011,
when protests began at the State Capitol in Madison, Wisconsin
against newly-elected Governor Scott Walker's proposals of reforms to
the state budget. I had lived in Madison from 2005 to 2009 while
attending the University of Wisconsin at Madison, studying political
science. I managed to move back to Madison that summer, and the
following spring I filed to run for the U.S. House of Representatives
from Wisconsin's 2nd Congressional District in 2012.
On
February 16th,
2011 – just a day or two after finding out about the protests from
a friend in Madison – I published my reaction to Governor Walker's
suggested public-sector collective bargaining reforms as a file
entitled “Scott Walker's Public Union Proposals” in a Facebook
group dedicated to my congressional campaign.
Initially,
I agreed with the provision that public employee unions retained the
right to negotiate on wages at all, but disagreed with taking away
their right to negotiate on health benefits and vacations, disagreed
with requiring them to negotiate every year, and disagreed with
freezing their wages until a new contract is made. However, I agreed
with the provision that there be an annual secret ballot on whether
public employees want to stay unionized.
Also,
I opposed the provision that public employee unions could not get
salary increases above the consumer price index except if approved by
public referendum, agreed that public employees should pay 5.8% more
of their salaries for their pensions and 12.6% more for their health
coverage, disagreed that the state should stop collecting dues
for unions, and disagreed with taking away the right of home health
care, family child care workers, University of Wisconsin Hospitals
and Clinics employees and UW faculty and academic staff to
collectively bargain.
Additionally,
I supported the provisions that public employees could opt out of
paying union dues if they wish, that state and local employees would
have the right to refuse to join unions, and that the National Guard
should be used to suppress strikes which disrupt state services such
as prisons. Also, I opposed firing 6,000 state employees if Walker's
measure did not pass, as well as opposing firing teachers for going
on strike and firing the Democratic state legislators for going to
Rockford, Illinois in order to deny the Republicans a quorum on the
vote for Walker's proposed legislation.
At
this time, I had not yet taken a position differentiating the needs
for collective bargaining rights of private-sector workers as opposed
to public-sector government employees. Being that, at the time,
Governor Walker was stating that he did not want
Wisconsin to become a Right-to-Work state, I opposed him on that (he
has since changed his position, and I have revised mine several
times). Explaining my positions, I wrote that all types of employees
should have the authority to collectively bargain, that collective
bargaining should be “free, open-ended, and frequent”, and public
employee unions should have the responsibility to collect their own
dues without help from the state government.
I
further explained that “Individual employees [should] be free to
choose whether to join unions and pay dues to them, joining a union
would never be a precondition for employment, and refusal to join a
union would never be a legitimate reason to fire an employee.” I
have espoused this position since, during high school, I worked for a
grocery store, and discovered that my workplace had enacted what is
called a post-entry closed shop agreement (however I quit to
re-assume my high school studies before I would have had to join the
union).
I
ended my explanation of my position on Walker's proposals by
disagreeing with the argument that people who refuse to pay union
dues are choosing to become free-riders. My explanation supported the
individual worker's subjective evaluation of the benefit which may
come from being represented by a union; I argued that to compel the
payment of dues to unions in order to bargain for increased benefits
would ameliorate the employer's financial incentive to hire new
employees.
I
have since argued on my blog - based on my experiences as a temporary custodian at the Madison
Area Technical College - that lack of freedom to and from association
with unions only serves to create animosity between unionized and
non-unionized workers.
After
studying the issue for two more weeks, I published another file on
February 28th,
2011, on the topic of the difference between public-sector and
private-sector unions. I argued that “public-sector unions have
more leverage than private-sector unions because government[al
service providers] is more likely to have a monopoly in the provision
of services than in the market” (i.e., than non-governmental
commercial service providers).
I
wrote that while “[g]etting rid of collective bargaining rights for
certain types of jobs is one way to address this problem,
[a]nother... and... a more libertarian solution... would be to
undermine the government monopolies in the provision of such
services” (i.e., education, health, public works and
infrastructure, police and judicial services, etc.).
As
a market anarchist and a student of Gustave de Molinari, I recognized
then, as I recognize now, that the State – the local monopoly on
legitimate violence – is the source of legitimacy of all monopoly
and oligopoly in the private sector. I wrote that “[t]he only way
to solve Wisconsin's union problem... is to encourage competition in
the provision of those services which are typically provided by
government.”
Rather
than believing that corporations dominated public interest - and that
if we didn't have a State, corporations would control our lives - I
believe that the State is the source of corporate power, and that if
the State didn't exist (that is, if there were no ban on governments
competing to provide services in a territory), corporate power would
be small enough to be able to be effectively limited by non-violent
consumer and worker action.
My
positions on collective bargaining result from an awareness – due
to studying Milton Friedman - that unions seek State power to help
them monopolize the
representation of workers in collective bargaining, in the same
manner in which businesses seek State power to help them monopolize
markets, industries, and the provision of certain services.
In
non-Right-to-Work states, private-sector unions monopolize the
representation of workers in bargaining by enacting “compulsory
unionism” - laws permitting closed-shop and union-shop union
security agreements in unionized workplaces - and by promoting
majority unionism over dual unionism and minority unionism.
When
such practices are implemented, individual workers become less free
to negotiate with management on their own merits, and unable to
join and pay dues to some other union. Arguably, this is good because
it stands to increase worker solidarity, but majority unions would be
free to appeal to the State to prohibit alternative unions, whether a
union would demand less,
or whether it would be more
radical in
its demands, and call for a strike of which the majority union
leadership would not approve.
In
late March 2011, I was asked to respond to the argument that
Right-to-Work legislation interferes with an employer's and a union's
right to freely enter into contract. In my reply, I explained that it
is not primarily the law which
interferes with the contract rights of employers
and unions,
but the employers
and unions which
interfere with the contract rights of the individual
worker.
Explaining
my opposition to unions and employers colluding to require workers to
join unions, I wrote that “I am more concerned about preserving the
individual employee's right to freely enter into contract with either
or both unions and employers than I am with preserving union or
business rights”. I also supported requiring closed-shop and
union-shop businesses to notify applicants about their type of
bargaining arrangement during the application process.
I
explained that I did not want employees to be “forced to choose
between participating in a strike and continuing to work” in order
to provide for himself, risking getting fired for agreeing to work
without committing to fund a union that might not actually even do
anything that promotes his own interests in the workplace.
Also,
I elaborated upon the idea that bargaining for increased benefits has
adverse effects on the incentive to hire: “Increased benefits
can... mean higher standards for the hiring of future employees;
...[making it] more difficult for future employees to qualify for
those increased benefits... contributing to unemployment.”
In
mid-April 2012 – around the time I filed for candidacy in
Wisconsin's 2nd District
congressional race – I published a lengthy file about
private-sector labor laws and contract rights. This occurred shortly
after I learned about collective bargaining agreements and labor laws
from a co-worker who aspired to organize our workplace.
I
responded to a statement by economist Friedrich Hayek that
Right-to-Work laws and union privileges are both the results of
favorable special legislation, that there should be no need for
either, and that such special privilege should be removed by special
legislation declaring certain pertinent contracts invalid. I agreed
about the special favors, but I argued that legislation should not
impair the obligation of contracts, because judgments in lawsuits are
the only way to retroactively invalidate contracts.
I
explained that union security agreements “act as unnecessary
barriers of entry into the labor market... increase unemployment
levels and the cost of living... make it less likely for new and
fledgling labor unions to gain prominence[,]... make independent...
strikes less likely to occur, [and] narrow the range of acceptable
tactics for – and goals of – negotiation”.
I
supported discouraging unions and employers from making union
security agreements at all, and I supported prohibiting any and all
(although admittedly unlikely) legislation which would seek to impose
- in all unionized workplaces - security agreements such as
union-shop and closed-shop, which empower established unions more
than other agreements.
I
took this position because I was struggling to apply the lesson which
I was learning; namely, that “compulsory unionism” is not the
result of state laws mandating favorable
organizing conditions in all unionized
workplaces within a state, but rather the result of state
laws permitting the
representatives of labor and capital to govern their workplace
together.
Because
I understood an inkling of the aforementioned position, I took the
position that the Taft-Hartley Act should be repealed, thereby
effectually invalidating Right-to-Work laws, and making them
unnecessary. I began to argue that Right-to-Work laws “impair the
obligation of contracts”, by which I meant the responsibility of
the State to refrain from infringing upon the rights of individuals
and agencies (in this case, employers and unions) to privately make
contracts (in this case, governing how particular unionized
workplaces are run in terms of union security agreements). I came to
support a system of individual contract rights in a system of
personal law, rather than a system wherein the State has power to
dictate what sorts of contracts are acceptable.
I
also expressed criticism of the long-standing power of the National
Labor Relations Board to approve and deny unions' requests to engage
in strikes (as well as of the power of union leaders to decide
whether or when a strike will occur). I supported abolishing the
board and repealing the National Labor Relations Act, saying that
“[t]hey are not necessary to uphold the right to collectively
bargain which existed prior to – and exist[s] independently of –
the current federal... labor-policy...“. I also supported
establishing labor relations boards at the state and local
levels, and “urging local governments to begin to administer
N.L.R.B.-type services”.
Additionally,
I supported local governance, counter-economic activity, and
mass-scale direct consumer action (including boycotts) – rather
than empowering the State and excusing the growth of its power to
remedy the special business privileges which the State erected – to
uphold the right to collectively bargain; by demonstrating that
the powerto
do so lies in the workers, and that it is retained regardless of
State endorsement and protection of such rights claims. I recognized
that this view is compatible with the segment of the Industrial
Workers of the World (I.W.W. / Wobblies) which did not choose to
pursue Statist political solutions to the labor struggle, and to
instead pursue revolutionary anarcho-syndicalism.
Because
I observed that the free-rider problem which arises in workplaces
when workers are not required to pay dues actually arises
because non-dues-paying workers are required – as workers at an
organized workplace - to receive the benefits of collective
bargaining which they did not help fund and in which they did not
participate, I supported encouraging unions and workplaces to adopt
dual-unionism and minority-unionism, members-only collective
bargaining, and open-shop union security agreements, so that there is
a place for individuals and unions alike - multiple
unions, at
that - within the workplace.
Since
adopting those positions in 2012, I have come to recognize the
existence of labor unions as a feature of a capitalist system (which
actually resembles feudalism due
to its rentier system and lack of allodial property rights, and I can
name anarcho-socialists and students of the Austrian School alike who
would agree with this notion).
My
most startling realization about unions being part of State
capitalism occurred when Joseph Carriveau wrote to me that “[u]nions
are not syndicates”. I began to understand that the purpose of
collective bargaining is not just to get as much compensation out of
management and profits as possible, but to bring about egalitarian
cooperative management and control of production in the workplace.
Most importantly, “autonomous unions” (syndicates) require that
the union be free to decide how and under what conditions it strikes,
rather than beholden to the supposed authority of a government board.
Soon
after, I began learning more about egalitarian labor-managed firms
(E.L.M.F.s), cooperative corporations, mutual and cooperative banks
and credit unions. I began to understand syndicalism, cooperativism,
corporativism, mutualism, entrepreneurialism, and others as – as
Rudolf Rocker put it - “only different methods of economy”; that
is, only different methods of making certain financial, structural,
and organizational decisions about matters of the firm, such as the
relationship between labor and management or capital, the logistics
of investment and funding, and the methods of profit and cost
calculation.
What
I have learned about the subjects has given me hope that an effective
counter-economy could develop through an anarchy-without-adjectives
coalition of business associations which unite egalitarianfirms –
including dispute-resolution and security-provision agencies -
operating under each particular anarchist “method of economy”
(indeed, if all enterprises were cooperative, then it would be
difficult to distinguish a professional association, business
association, business alliance, industry trade group, or pro-business
lobbying firm, from an autonomous, industrial, trade, craft, or guild
union, a federation of cooperatives, or a pro-labor lobbying
firm).
These
security and dispute-resolution agencies, each offering voluntary
citizenship, would provide choice from amongst competing
governments, which would aim to out-compete the State in public
service provision through offering more perfectly progressive
user-fee structures (potentially paying disadvantaged
citizens to choose to accept their protection over that of others),
fostering an environment of free and fair trade - with reasonable and
justifiable profit - without either necessitating involuntary
subjugation to a single State or interfering with the obligation of
contracts.
While
it is still my position to support only the types of private-sector
union security agreements and union organizational and election
practices which are the least Statist and majoritarian, and which are
the most compatible with individualism, voluntary exchange, and a
desire to eliminate the free rider problem, I would take a much
stronger position against public-sector unions - especially the
Association of Federal, State, County, and Municipal Employees
(A.F.S.C.M.E.).
This
is because public employee unions - through donations, lobbying, and
elections - practically have the power to appoint their own
employers; the politicians who serve and represent the people who
have the power to write laws that grow or shrink bureaucracies, and
to hire and fire public employees. Thus public employees have
personal financial incentive to elect candidates who will continue to
promise them the continuation of their jobs and increases to their
benefits, at increasing expense to taxpayers. Growth in the size and
costs of bureaucracy is growth in the power and inefficiency of the
State.
This
is problematic, of course, because governments all over America are
in debt, and in some cases paying off debts incurred over a hundred
years ago, so any promises to keep funding insolvent governments only
serve to cause future generations to go further into debt. And let us
not forget that all of this revenue collection occurs in the context
of Statism; the local monopoly on legitimate coercion in the
enforcement of government order, including the enforcement of tax
law.
Rather
than increasing the freedom and egalitarianism of governance and
commerce, the unchecked power of public-sector collective bargaining
risks growing the State; thereby entrenching a barbaric, backwards
system of legitimized violence, monopoly and oligarchy, and
territorialism, which has no concern for either a logical justice
system or classically liberal civic and economic values such as
market choice and competition, voluntary association, and freedom of
choice in government.
In
all cases, I support dismantling all State-erected privileges and
protections for businesses and unions alike, and I support maximizing
the decentralization of - and limiting majority power within –
representation in government, by business associations, and through
collective bargaining.
I
believe that this would have profound positive effects, such as
curbing the growth of State and corporate power, electing less
corrupt politicians through less expensive elections, strengthening
bipartisan opposition to federal centralism, allowing growth of and
diversity of thought within the labor movement, freeing the markets
for consumer goods, and fostering the natural development of free
enterprise, fair credit, and affordable and responsibly-financed
government.
I
additionally support transcending the “centralization vs.
decentralization” paradigm in favor of a diffusion of power,
brought about through increasing the rights and
the abilities of
the accused to represent themselves in court (and of people in
general to participate in a system of interpersonal contracts), so
that people are able to effectively represent themselves without
necessitating empowerment of political, business, and union
leaderships and bureaucracies.
Insofar
as I am willing to support tactics utilizing the current
representational government - gradualistic reforms to the State - my
position now is that I disagree with Friedrich Hayek that
Right-to-Work laws should be removed by special legislation, so I
also disagree with Ron Paul's attempts in the early 1990s to pass a
national Right-to-Work law.
Instead
of invalidating Right-to-Work laws nationwide through special
legislation by Congress, I believe that Right-to-Work laws should be
found unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court; i.e., through a
judgment, the only legitimate way to retroactively invalidate
contracts. However, I understand that Paul's legislation – had it
passed – would eventually have forced the Supreme Court to make a
decision about the constitutionality of Right-to-Work laws.
I
also believe that union security agreements should be found
unconstitutional by courts in the states and at the federal level,
because they hinder the ability of potential employees to interact
unilaterally with employers. I take this position not out of lack of
solidarity with the needs of working people, but out of the necessity
to avoid taxpayer debt, socialist bureaucracy, labor aristocracy, and
excessive planning that inhibits freedom.
I
would wager that Joseph Carriveau agrees that for workers to get
their fair share, most contracts – however constitutional – ought
to be dissolved.
For
more entries on unions and collective bargaining, please visit:
http://www.aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/04/on-monopoly-and-scott-walker-recall.html
For
more entries on Wisconsin politics, please visit:
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