Anti-Union Life at Target

http://www.dissentmagazine.org/atw.php?id=478

Mark Engler - June 22, 2011 2:00 pm

The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) suffered a rough blow this past Friday when they lost a unionization vote at a Target store on New York’s Long Island. Had the union won, the store would have been the first of more than 1,700 Targets across the country to be organized. As it is, Target, like WalMart, will remain entirely union-free.

According to the New York Times coverage:

In a statement, the president of U.F.C.W. Local 1500, Bruce W. Both, said that the workers at the Valley Stream store had endured a “campaign of threats, intimidation and illegal acts by Target management.” As a result, he called on the National Labor Relations Board to direct a new election and order Target to cease its “illegal activity.”
....
“Target did everything they could to deny these workers a chance at the American dream,” said Mr. Both, of the union local.
....
The union filed a complaint with the labor board last month asserting that Target had unlawfully prohibited employees from wearing pro-union buttons and from discussing working conditions on online sites. It also said Target had unlawfully threatened employees with dismissal if they spoke about the union.

In meetings and fliers, Target officials told employees that a union could not guarantee better pay or benefits and that the organization only wanted their dues. In a move that worried numerous workers, the company said there were no guarantees that the store would remain open if the workers unionized.

Target, of course, denies that it did anything wrong. Its position is that this unionization drive—like all previous notions by employees of bringing a union to any of their stores—has failed because the company is one big, happy family. As spokesperson Molly Snyder put it in the Times article, “We believe in solving issues and concerns by working together with the help and input of all team members. Our team has embraced that philosophy by rejecting union representation.”

FULL story and the target video shot with union actors believe it or not at link.

"If the Democrats win the next elections, everybody is fired."

That's how fair the Target election was.

As it is, Target has their hands full trying to compete with Wal-mart and other retailers.

Because competition obviously rules out unions. They're lucky to have those jobs and shouldn't complain.


Look forward to reading more of your insightful posts well into the future.

You said it right......

and return to their roots.

Last I knew President McEntee makes $400,000 a year. I pay $40 a month dues and a special $4 a month for the cost of negotiations we will have for the next local contract. Negotiations start next year under a new state law that means give backs. My local President makes about $25 an hour currently as semi salaried. I'm fine with these figures.

http://www.afscme.org/union/leadership/gerald-w-mcentee

We have 1.7 million members.


Gerald W. McEntee
President

Gerald W. McEntee is the President of the 1.6 million-member American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO (AFSCME), one of the most aggressive and politically active organizing unions in the AFL-CIO. McEntee was first elected AFSCME President in 1981 and was re-elected in July 2008 to another four-year term. AFSCME membership has increased annually throughout the years of McEntee’s presidency.

As a Vice President of the AFL-CIO and chair of its Political Education Committee, McEntee is a key leader of the labor movement and its political efforts. Under McEntee’s leadership, the federation created its highly successful and much imitated voter education and mobilization program, which increased the number of union household voters to a record 26 percent of the electorate in the last Presidential election.

McEntee has long been a leader in the fight to reform the nation’s health care system. He chairs the AFL-CIO’s Health Care Committee and is a co-chair of Health Care for America NOW!, the national grassroots coalition that successfully mobilized to pass President Obama’s historic Affordable Care Act of 2010.

McEntee is a co-founder and chairman of the board of the Economic Policy Institute, the preeminent voice for working Americans on the economy. He led the successful fight to stop President Bush’s plan to privatize Social Security, was an outspoken proponent for increasing the federal minimum wage, and is one of the nation’s leading advocates for America’s vital public services.

For his efforts to improve the lives of working families, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights presented McEntee with its prestigious Hubert H. Humphrey Award in 2004.

Before assuming the presidency of AFSCME, McEntee began his distinguished career as a labor leader in Pennsylvania in 1958. He led the drive to unionize more than 75,000 Pennsylvania public service employees, which at that time was one of the largest union organizing campaigns in history. He was elected executive director at the founding convention of AFSCME Council 13 in Pennsylvania in 1973 and an International Vice President of AFSCME in 1974.

McEntee holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from LaSalle University in Philadelphia. A native of Philadelphia, McEntee and his wife Barbara live in Washington, DC.

http://www.afscme.org/

We Are AFSCME

AFSCME is the nation’s largest and fastest growing public services employees union with more than 1.6 million active and retired members. AFSCME’s members provide the vital services that make America happen. We are nurses, corrections officers, child care providers, EMTs, sanitation workers and more. With members in hundreds of different occupations, AFSCME advocates for fairness in the workplace, excellence in public services and prosperity and opportunity for all working families.

AFSCME is a union comprised of a diverse group of people who share a common commitment to public service. For us, serving the public is not just a job, it’s a calling. An important part of our mission is to advocate for the vital services that keep our families safe and make our communities strong. We also advocate for prosperity and opportunity for all of America’s working families. We not only stand for fairness at the bargaining table — we fight for fairness in our communities and in the halls of government.
How AFSCME Works

AFSCME has approximately 3,400 local unions and 58 councils and affiliates in 46 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Every local writes its own constitution, designs its own structure, elects its own officers and sets its own dues.

The International Union, based in Washington, DC, coordinates the union’s actions on major national issues such as privatization, fair taxes and health care. The International also provides resources to councils and local unions for organizing, bargaining, political action and education, and administers members-only benefits. Every two years, delegates to AFSCME’s International Convention decide on the union’s basic policies. Every four years they elect the International Union’s President, Secretary-Treasurer and 35 regional vice presidents.

That's pretty much standard fair for anti-union companies.

What to do though, pressure like that. Will the union replace that job if they shutter the store? I would have voted union, but I don't need the job as much as their workers likely do.