Corporations Now Widely Using Wal-Mart Tactics, New Report on Unionbusting Finds

http://www.alternet.org/workplace/140167/corporations_now_widely_using_wal-mart_tactics,_new_report_on_unionbusting_finds/

Corporations Now Widely Using Wal-Mart Tactics, New Report on Unionbusting Finds

By Art Levine, Huffington Post. Posted May 20, 2009.

A definitive study of anti-union campaigns finds that corporations are punishing workers seeking to form a union with a wide range of tactics.

A definitive new look at the scope of employer anti-union campaigns by a noted Cornell University labor scholar finds that corporations have ramped up a wide-range of tactics designed to punish and intimidate workers for seeking to form a union. In nearly 60 percent of union election campaigns, employers threaten to close the plant, half of employers threaten workers in one-on-one "sweat sessions," and in a third of the elections, they retaliate by firing workers.

Kate Bronfenbrenner, director of labor education research at the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations, has studied labor organizing for decades, and now concludes, "There's been a change in the nature of employer campaigns. They've become not just more intense, not just more aggressive, but they switched to a more punitive system: there's no more of this 'let's try the soft stuff and pretend to be nice.'"

In response, the Chamber of Commerce attacked her as too pro-union to be believed, even though she reviewed a random sample of 1,000 National Labor Relations Board elections and all those elections' unfair labor practices documents and decisions, supplemented by in-depth interviews and surveys of organizers involved in over 500 campaigns.

She's also been criticized by business interests for actually interviewing and surveying union organizers and workers for her research. But as Ross Eisenbrey, the vice-president of the Economic Policy Institute, which is releasing her report, observes, "Employer groups don't believe the victims , the workers. Who are you going to believe, the employers?" He adds, "Despite a very difficult burden of proof, unions are winning 45% of allegations."

FULL story at link.

corporate controlled government to strip We the People of rights protected by the Seventh Amendment.

HR 1020 would correct some of those abuses but it seems to have little support among liberals in general and DUers in particular.

When we lose our rights and don't fight to regain them, we suffer loosing them perhaps forever.

I don't think a lot of people know how widespread these anti-union tactics are.

The anti-union propaganda has been so strong for the past 20 years.

I was so glad to see Ed Schultz get his own TV show because he has been bringing on union people to speak regularly.

in this recession, I see that Wal-Mart has a valid place to fill. I still hate that mom and pop shops were closed because of Wal-Mart.

But when you think of it....generic prescriptions for $4 for an unemployed or underemployed person can change the quality of someone's life, when money's tight. A family can save tons of money on basic groceries and other essentials.

Would it be a better country if no Wal-Marts existed? Maybe. But then, the recession would still have happened, and people would have nowhere to buy all their necessities if there were no big box stores. (I'm grouping Target in with Wal-Mart, although I think Target treats its employees better.)

It's complicated. What was once so clear to me is now muddled.

I have one appx 5 blks from home. I usually only purchase Cat Litter, Pool Chemicals, and Rabbit Food. I should not be there at all. It kills me when I do go. But I have vowed only these things. Considering it is the only place in town where you can go shopping, my protest hardly matters, it is packed everyday and it is a filthy mess of a store. I feel my Mayor made a deal with the Devil.
Tax subsidies, we pay for Parking lot care etc...

a PC game comes out that I really want, and Meijer doesn't have it stocked at midnight on the day of release. Since Mal-Wart doesn't get a markup on these items- the price is controlled by the publisher, not the retailer- I can live with myself.

But if it were a choice between Mal-Wart and starving, I'd beg food from friends first. Which I have done, and recently, too.

they will always talk Unions down. I belong, for 18 yrs. It's not perfect. But I get overtime after 8 hrs a day, not after 40 a week, i have a Pension plus an Annuity, I have been laid off since August and still have Health Insurance!! I also get paid a weekly Stipend on top of Unemployment paid for by the Union. Yes I have to pay dues, a pretty hefty amount but considering all the Benefits I have, why complain. I do have complaints but I view it as the fault of my Business Manager, along with various members who have the "I got mine, screw you" thinking.
I try to remember if you stick together, they can't take everyone down. This may not make sense but on the series "Friends" when they were negotiating their contract, they all stuck together, no one acted the "star" who deserved more money. They seen themselves as equal to the success of the show, hard to hold ego back I'm sure, but they ALL came out on top!!! This thinking has to apply to us all, these Corporations wouldn't fight so hard against it if it didn't benefit us. Most people don't seem to get that.