On What the 10% Have
We’ve heard a lot about the 10% of Americans who hold almost 70% of the nation’s wealth. There’s a different 10% that Americans don’t understand all that well, that the top 10% is deathly afraid of. That’s the 10% of workers in America who belong to a labor union. The top 10% have spent literally billions demonizing and marginalizing those Americans, because they know an organized workforce counters their power and vaults filled with coin.

I began thinking about this as I prepared bargaining proposals for a group of workers we represent. Our negotiations start in two weeks, and the process of formalizing of what these workers want, has been going for months. Yet most Americans have no clue about how unions go about determining what their memberships want and need. This is on purpose. Corporate America wants people to think of becoming union as joining a bunch of thugs and going on strike. They know the more people understand how representation and bargaining actually work, the more popular it will become. They also know that it only takes a third of the workforce to get organized for workers to loosen the economic chokehold we currently face.

The bargaining process differs depending on what kind of workers are being represented, the size of the bargaining unit and how long the membership has been organized. In the case of the members we’re building contract proposals for, there are about 800 workers who are spread out all across the country. We started with an extensive survey, consulted with the on-site Stewards, went through the existing contract line by line and reviewed grievances we have dealt with in the current contract. All that resulted in what will be about fifty proposals. Once the bargainers have a tentative new agreement, it is put out to the membership to ratify or reject. This is the process that gives union members a “voice”, that 90% of American workers don’t have.

If more workers understood how the process works and its value to the quality of their lives on and off the job, it would be naturally appealing to them. The popularity of unions is at a several decades high as workers in traditional and emerging types of work are turning to unions, to gain that voice and some equity. Management has constructed a high-hurdle course for workers to run. They have managed to weaken workers rights that were established as part of the “New Deal” and dramatically increased their own ability to legally and economically suppress the needs and wants of their workforces.

But the top 10%’s dominance is now under direct challenge. Strikes against large employers in key sectors like manufacturing, transportation and health care, are rising. Large organizing drives are like Amazon, are increasing. Workers themselves have found leverage in the current worker shortages and are showing a new mobility as they leave unsatisfying employers. Congress has before it a comprehensive PRO Act, that would re-balance the legal power between workers and management. Shiver me timbers, say the titans of our new Gilded Age.

The truth is that this is a long time coming and is sorely needed. If you want a nation with real opportunity, you need jobs that pay a living wage and provide a pathway for improvement. It’s clear that we don’t have that now and its one of the key roots of our economic disparity and social dysfunction. My wish on this Sunday morning, as I put the final edits to what 800 low-paid workers want from their employer, is that as a nation, we will again get to at least that one third of American workers who are organized. Time to massively increase those “Proud to be Union” stickers all across this great land of ours. Time to reestablish the American Dream for all.
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