Date: 2007-03-01
Speaker: GEORGE MILLER (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: California

I thank the gentleman for yielding. and I thank all of my colleagues who participated in this debate. At a time when the middle class standard of living in America for millions of Americans is at greater risk than at any time in recent history. at a time when people see employers arbitrarily terminating their pensions. freezing their pensions. shifting the cost of their health insurance. cutting the benefits under health insurance. at a time when they see that they have no new money to take home in their wages. that their wages have been flat. at a time when CEOs are awarding themselves golden handshakes. golden parachutes. and golden hellos. worth hundreds of millions of dollars. at that time at that moment we have an opportunity here to redeem a provision of the law which has been in the law for 70 years to simply give the workers a choice. They can choose an NLRB election. or they can choose a majority signoff. That is a simple choice that these adults in the workplace can make. It is a choice that was given to them 70 years ago. and it was a choice that later was taken away by a veto of the employer. Imagine. a majority of the Americans get together and they do something and one person gets to veto it. One person gets to veto it in the workplace. Think of what the relationship is between that employer and those employees. Think about how those employees must have felt that they needed to organize in the workplace. because employees know that they do if they are going to stop the trend and the bleeding that they see today. against the benefits that they have at their workplace. against their salaries. against their hours at work. against their right to a -retirement nest egg that .means something. Every day you pick up the business journals of this country and you read where again another employer has terminated a pension. has restricted the pension. wont pay into the pension. puts the pensions into bankruptcy. You want to know why people need card checks? People need card checks so they can have the freedom of choice to choose do they want an election. do they want a card check. It is in the Na.tional Labor Relations Act today. it is the law. but for the veto. the veto of the employer. How more arbitrary can you possibly get that a single employer could override the desires of a majority of the employees in its workplace? How more arbitrary can you get? It is the same arbitrariness those employers show when they cut your health care benefits and your pensions and .your retirements without any say by the employees. without any negotiations. That is why millions of Americans want representation at work. so that they can have a voice in that workplace. they can have a voice in their future. they can have a voice in whether or not they are going to be able to buy a home. buy a car. educate their children. have a health care policy that they can afford that will be there when they need it. That is what this is really about. This is about whether or not we are going to strengthen and help maintain and grow the middle class in this country. Because it is not happening under the arbitrary policies that are imposed on workers today by their employers. This Employee Free Choice Act gives the workers that choice. the choice that is currently in the law. I urge my colleagues to vote in support of this legislation when it comes time for passage. Again. I thank all my colleagues for participating in this debate. I thank the Chair for the courtesy they have shown both sides. Madam Chairman. We all know that workers in the U.S. are among the most productive workers in the world. Yet for far too long. they have not been reaping the benefits of their hard work. For years and years now. many workers have found themselves working harder and harder just to stay in place. And many more have been losing ground financially despite their work. This is troubling enough on its own. But what makes it even more troubling is that. over the last several years. our economy has been growing. The stock market is doing- well. .Corporate profits are high. Consider the facts. Since 2001. median household income has fallen by $1.300. Wages and salaries now make up their lowest share of the economy in nearly six decades. The number of Americans who lack health insurance has grown by 6.8 million since 2001. to 46.6 million. a shocking record high. The number of Fortune 1000 companies that have frozen or terminated their pension plans has more than trlpled since 2001. Indeed. the middle class itself has shrunk. Over 4 million more Americans have joined the ranks of the poor since 2001. And meanwhile. corporate profits make up their largest share of the economy since the 1960s. Madam Chairman. there are a lot of explanations for the growing inequality in our economy. Congress failure to raise the minimum wage for 10 long years is an obvious example. But perhaps the .most significant explanation is that workers rights to join together and bargain for better wages. benefits. and working conditions have been severely undermined. Today. when workers want to form a union. their employers can force them to undergo a National Labor Relations Board election process. That process is broken. because it allows irresponsible employers to harass. coerce. intimidate. reassign. and even fire workers who support a union. Take the example of Ivo Camilo. Mr. Camilo is from Sacramento. not far from my district. For 35 years. he worked at a Blue Diamond Growers plant in Sacramento. In 2004. he and several dozen coworkers sought to form a union. For that. Mr. Camilo was fired. After 35 years of -service. Blue Diamond tossed Mr. Camilo out on the street. just because he wanted a union. The same thing happened to Keith Ludlum when he supported union representation for him and his coworkers at a Smithfield foods plant in Tar Heel. North Carolina. Mr. Ludlum. a veteran of the first Gulf War. was fired in 1994 because he wanted a union. It took him 12 years of litigation to get his job back. What happened to Mr. Camilo and Mr. Ludlum happens with distressing frequency in this country. In 2005 alone. over 30.000 workers were receiving back pay from employers that had committed unfair labor violations. Earlier this year. the Center for Economic and Policy Research estimated that employers fire one in five workers who actively advocate for a union. A December 2005 study by American Rights at Work found that 49 percent of employers studied had threatened to close or relocate all or part of the business if workers elected to form a union. And Human Rights Watch has said. "[F]reedom of association is a right under severe. often buckling pressure when workers in the United States try to exercise it." Corporate executives routinely negotiate lavish compensation packages on their own behalfs. but then they deny their own employees the ability to bargain for a better life. This debate is about restoring workers ability to choose for themselves whether or not they want a Union. To make that happen. the Employee Free Choice Act does three things. First. it says that when a majority of workers sign cards authorizing a union. they get a union. The legislation requires the National Labor Relations Board to develop model authorization language and procedures for establishing the validity of signed authorizations. The legislation does not take away workers ability to have a National Labor Relations Board election instead of majority signup if thats what they want. It gives them the choice. If 30 percent sign cards saying they wanta union and petition the Board for an election. they get an election. But. if a majority of workers sign cards saying they want a union and they want recognition now. they get a union. This majority signup is not a new idea. Under current law. when a majority of workers sign cards authorizing a union. then they can have a union if their employer consents to it. But instead of consenting. employers often reject the employees choice and force them through an NLRB election process that is dramatically tilted in the employers favor. The Employee Free Choice Act would simply take this veto power away from employers. Under current law. its the employers choice that matters. Under the Employee Free Choice Act. its the employees choice that matters. Majority signup has a proven track record for reducing coercion and intimidation. In cases where responsible employers. like Cingular Wireless. have permitted their employees to form a union through majority signup. both sides have praised the process for increasing cooperation and decreasing tension. Second. the legislation increases penalties against employers who fire or discriminate against workers for their efforts to form a union or obtain a first contract. Under current law the National Labor Relations Board is required to seek a federal court injunction against a union whenever there is reasonable cause to believe that the union has violated the. secondary boycott prohibitions in the National Labor Relations Act. Under this legislation. the Board must seek a federal court injunction against an employer whenever there is reasonable cause to believe that the employer has discharged or discriminated against employees. threatened to discharge or discriminate against employees. or engaged in conduct that significantly interferes with employee rights during an organizing or first contract drive. The legislation authorizes the courts to grant temporary restraining orders or other appropriate injunctive relief. Employers found to have discharged or discriminated against employees during an organizing campaign or first contract drive must pay those workers three times back pay. instead of the simple back pay required under current law. Employers found to have willfully or repeatedly violated employees rights during an organizing campaign or first contract drive would receive civil fines of up to $20.000 per violation. Under current law. remedies are limited solely to. make whole remedies: back pay (minus any additional interim wages the employee did or should have earned). reinstatement. and noticethat the employer will not engage in violations of the National Labor Relations Act. Many employers conclude that. even if caught. it is financially advantageous to violate the law and pay the penalties rather than to comply. And third. the legislation provides for mediation. if an employer and a union are engaged in bargaining for their first contract and are unable to reach agreement within 90 days. After 30 days of mediation the dispute would be referred to binding arbitration. Under current law. employers have a duty to bargain in good faith. but are under no obligation to reach agreement. As a result. a recent study found that 34 percent of union election victories had not resulted in a first contract. Madam Chairman. we have heard a lot of shamefully misleading claims from the critics of this bill. Those critics claim that they have workers best interests at heart. and that they are trying to protect democracy. Yet their claims are belied by the fact that some of the nations leading workers rights and prodemocracy- organizations support this bill. including Human Rights Watch. Interfaith Worker Justice. and the Drum Major Instituteamong many. many others. These are organizations that are dedicated to the mission of improving the lives of American workers. I can tell you that if this bill would do the kind of harm that its critics claim it would. then these respected organizations would not be supporting it today. I want to close by just reminding people how much is at stake here. We can continue on our nations current path. where our society grows more and more unequal and polarized. If we stay on the same path. then our middle class will keep getting squeezed. and will struggle to pay for just the basic necessities of life. like housing. healthcare. education. and transportation. We can stay on that path. or we can go in a new direction. We can ensure that every American worker gets his or her fair share of the benefits of a growing economy. To strengthen Americas middle class. we have got to restore workers rights to bargain for better wages. .benefits. and working conditions. After all. union workers eam 30 percent more. on average. than nonunion workers. They are much more likely to have retirement and health benefits and paid time off. I urge all of my colleagues to support H.R. 800 so that we can finally start to reverse the middle class squeeze and create an economy that benefits all Americans.