It's a pleasure to meet with CWA's core political activists today at a critical time in our nation's history and for our labor movement. Today, more than ever, it's time to fight back – to aim higher as we build a new political movement across America. We are more than 600,000 strong, and we can make a huge difference this year. We must!
We have a window of opportunity to prevail in the 2008 elections and win a White House and a Congress dedicated to progressive change. Our country is crying out for change, and here's why.
After five years in the quagmire of Iraq, we are suffering continuing loss of American lives, a weakening of our military capacity to defend our country from real threats, and a drain on financial resources to the tune of trillions of dollars, which is killing our economy.
But when it comes to what to do about Iraq – which was never the focus of the war against Al Qaida – John McCain talks about a 100-year occupation, and then he jokes about further military intervention in the Middle East. Remember McCain's Beach Boys parody – "Bomb, bomb, bomb… bomb, bomb Iran."
We have the worse credit crunch since the Great Depression, including a $700 billion trade deficit… the highest rate of home mortgage foreclosures in decades… our dollar at record lows… oil and other commodities at all-time highs.
We have a health care crisis, with higher costs and lower health care coverage than every other industrial nation. Workers are losing pension and retiree health coverage. A major reason for that is that workers' rights and collective bargaining coverage in America also have slipped to bottom in comparison to other countries.
CWA and most of the labor movement are focused on building a political movement around four key issues:
1. Restoring the rights of workers to organize and win collective bargaining rights through passage of the Employee Free Choice Act.
2. Winning health care for all.
3. Creating good jobs and fair trade policies.
4. Protecting and strengthening retirement security.
Restoring worker bargaining rights is the key to sustaining a middle class standard of living. Collective bargaining has led to union workers earning 30 percent more than those without bargaining rights. Collective bargaining gives union members the right to fight for health care, pensions and other workplace standards. In bargaining and in the political arena, labor has lifted conditions throughout our society.
But that success made unions a target for elimination by corporate America. With their political allies, they have virtually destroyed worker protections under our labor laws. As a result, while 50 years ago 35 percent of Americans had bargaining rights, that figure today is down to 12 percent overall – and only about 7 percent in the private sector.
As a result, real wages have risen only 3 percent over the past seven years. Worker productivity is up 22 percent in that period, and it used to be that productivity led to wage increases and job creation – but not today. Instead that wealth flows to corporate profits and CEO pay that is 365 times that of the average worker; it used be only 50 times higher a half century ago.
Employers today are hollowing out our economic capacity. Good jobs in manufacturing are vanishing. Think about it: a trade deficit over $700 billion and dollars for oil pile up abroad while we lose well-paying middle class jobs – more than 3 million lost since 2001.
Bad trade deals have resulted in the loss of millions of jobs – and now the administration is pushing another trade pact with Colombia, one of the worst worker rights abusers in the world. Colombia is one of the few countries with lower collective bargaining coverage than the U.S., and over the past 20 years, more than 2,500 trade unionists there have been murdered while striving to build their movement. I was there a month ago as part of a labor delegation and heard first hand about the horror of right wing death squads. One of those murdered was a Colombian teacher named Figueroa Apia, and I wear a wrist band with her name on it to honor their courage.
Corporate leaders in America often tell us we need to cut our wages and benefits to stay competitive in the global economy. But when we look at other nations, we see a different picture. We see greater numbers of workers with collective bargaining coverage in other democracies, and we see national health care systems providing care for every citizen. By contrast, we pay more per capita for health care than any advanced nation -- $2 trillion each year – but we still have 47 million Americans with no health coverage.
The growing health care crisis parallels the loss of collective bargaining rights in this country. When 35 percent of U.S. workers had union contracts in the 1950s, 70 percent of the workforce – both union and non-union – had paid medical insurance as a job benefit. Today, only 55 percent of private sector workers have job-based coverage, and most are paying more out of pocket for premiums and co-pays. For pre-Medicare-age retirees, employer coverage has plummeted from 66 percent to 33 percent today. At the same time, coverage by traditional pension plans has dropped from 90 percent to around 37 percent of the workforce.
Our top priority to take back America and restore the middle class is to enact the Employee Free Choice Act to allow workers to organize without employer intimidation and to guarantee that they actually get a collective bargaining agreement. Survey after survey has shown that the majority of American workers would opt for union representation if they were truly given a free choice.
But we don't need polls to tell us that. Here's a story about two workers in the telecom industry. John Lindner has been a Verizon Business technician for seven years in New York. He's a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He and over 60 percent of his colleagues have signed up to join with CWA and IBEW to win representation. But Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg refused to grant them recognition. Instead, even the Bush administration's labor board cited Verizon for illegal harassment and retaliation for their organizing activities. John told a joint Senate/House panel in Washington last December: "I served my country and fought for freedom. But when I returned home, I found that my freedom to join a union was denied."
Compare that story to that of John Upright, a wireless retail worker in North Carolina. John works for AT&T Mobility, where CWA has negotiated a card check and neutrality agreement. He and some of his coworkers started a union drive and management stayed out of it. When a majority had signed union cards, their signatures were presented to a neutral third party which verified majority support. They were immediately certified as CWA members and went on to bargain a contract.
With passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, the story of John Upright will be the story of John Lindner at Verizon Business, at Verizon Wireless and of millions of other American workers.
We passed the Employee Free Choice Act in the House last year and we had enough votes to pass it in the Senate. We can take heart from that. However we didn't have the 60 votes needed to beat a Senate filibuster. Nor do we have a president today who will sign the bill.
We have an opportunity with the elections this year to finish the job. We're committed to building a new political movement -- to electing more worker-friendly senators and representatives in 2008 and a president who will lead the way in winning passage of the Employee Free Choice Act next year. A president and a Congress who will show real leadership in establishing a national health care system, in reforming our trade policies, investing in job creation, and strengthening retirement security for all Americans.
Winning this fight won't be easy. The Chamber of Commerce is raising millions of dollars to stop working people from organizing. Corporate America and the right-wing are rallying behind John McCain, who for them represents the status quo – continued policies of tax cuts for the rich and repression of unions and workers' rights.
Right now, the primary fight in the Democratic Party clouds the real picture. The sooner we can choose a candidate to go up against John McCain and lay out the real issues, the better. Because the choice for America is clear. There are really only two sides.
McCain means continued military conflict in Iraq and who knows where else. McCain means more corporate cronyism in Washington and greed-driven economic policies. McCain means middle class families are on their own – no universal health care and look out for privatized Social Security. McCain means more so-called free trade policies that will bankrupt America, not just Bear Stearns.
Our side stands for economic justice. Our side stands for human and workers' rights. Our side stands for health care for all. Our side stands for fair trade and investment in good jobs.
We know what we stand for. We know which side we're on. And we know that together and united we will win!
