Working Together: Is it Really the End of Workers' Rights?

Do you find the cover of the CWA News disturbing? We all should. It’s unthinkable that we’re seeing the kind of all-out assault on basic workers’ rights and collective bargaining that we’re seeing now in Wisconsin, New Jersey, Ohio, Indiana, Florida, Oklahoma, Missouri, New Mexico and many more states, and in the House of Representatives.

Workers’ rights and collective bargaining are under a vicious attack. Our opponents, backed by the Chamber of Commerce and big bucks, right-wing interests like the Koch brothers are promising not to stop until they succeed in taking away the fundamental right of workers in a democracy to join together and bargain collectively. That’s the reality.

10,000 union members, pictured below, stood in the rain in Trenton, N.J. to hear CWA President Larry Cohen, above, and other leaders from labor, environmental, community, and religious groups condemn efforts to take away workers’ rights and balance state budgets on workers’ backs.

The state assault now is focused on public workers, but private sector collective bargaining has been under attack for years. Collective bargaining rights for private sector workers are lower than they were in 1900 and just 1 in 15 now have collective bargaining rights. It’s not because workers don’t want a union voice, but management has made the price for having a voice on the job a high-risk decision.

The coming weeks and months are critical if we’re going to preserve collective bargaining rights. We’re witnessing incredible solidarity in Wisconsin, New Jersey, Ohio, and many other states. It’s amazing to see so many working families saying, “it’s enough.”

Clearly, this fight is not about public workers. It’s not about Wisconsin. This is about all of us, public and private sector. This is one fight. The right wing says this is labor’s last gasp, but it’s not. This is the dawn of a new movement, this is an awakening.

CWA also is leading the way in building new coalitions and alliances. We’re working together with the Sierra Club, religious groups, Common Cause, the civil rights community, and as many allies as we can find. We know we won’t win the fight if we stick to our old ways. We can’t live in the past.

In Wisconsin and too many other states, we’ve seen the results of the 2010 elections hit working families smack in the face. Republican governors and Republican-controlled legislatures are using budget arguments to wipe out the voice of workers, along with their collective bargaining rights. Too often, it’s a false argument. Wisconsin was actually looking at a budget surplus earlier this year, until Gov. Scott Walker pushed through $140 million in tax breaks for corporations.

Walker cries budget deficit so that he can eliminate public services and strip public employees of their collective bargaining rights for everything but wages, and cap wage increases at 2 percent. Wisconsin public workers have offered wage and pension changes that the governor is pushing, but Walker insists that’s not enough. Clearly this isn’t about balancing the budget but busting unions.

In New Jersey, the contract covering 40,000 CWA state workers expires June 30. Led by CWA, thousands rallied in the rain on Feb. 25, marking the beginning of that fight. Hundreds from Districts 2 and 13 rode buses and joined public and private sector workers from District 1 in saying to Gov. Chris Christie, “You say divide and conquer. We say unite and win.”

Christie has proposed to cut state workers’ pensions. New Jersey workers have been making contributions to their pension plan regularly, and never missed a payment. The state, on the other hand, hasn’t made a full pension payment in 15 years and Christie has no plan to pay up. Christie says the state can’t afford to make its contributions, but then vetoed the millionaires tax, eliminating $1 billion in revenue.

Christie is also attempting to impose huge cuts in health care coverage, privatize thousands of jobs, and eliminate seniority and other provisions. But most importantly, like Walker in Wisconsin and Kasich in Ohio, he has no intention of bargaining. He prefers to dictate and counts on the legislature to cave in and back him up.

It’s no surprise, given this agenda in state after state, that tens of thousands of workers are standing up for good jobs and strong communities, sending the message that working and middle-class families won’t give up our rights.

Several campaigns are highlighted in this issue of the CWA News, and there’s a lot of work to do. We need to seize this moment and have unprecedented mobilization in every state. Here’s what we can do now:

• Take this discussion into every workplace. Talk about our key issues, quality jobs, health care, retirement security and bargaining rights, and make sure everyone knows what’s at stake.
• Support local events and get coworkers, their families, their friends and other supporters to turn out.
• Take this opportunity to build a strong political movement by electing to every level of government people who will stand with working families.