6 minute read
Career/Business
As much as big business wants to suppress the truth, the secret is out—unions raise incomes, improve benefits, create job security, and reduce racial and gender disparities.
Union members are paid, on average, 11.2% more than non-union 32 • August 4, 2022 - August 10, 2022 fellow workers on the same job. Ninety-six percent of union memJUMP bers enjoy health insurance paid for by their employer—only 69% of
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non-union shops have the same. More union members have paid sick leave (93%) than workers at non-union shops (75%) and they are vastly more likely to enjoy a defined retirement benefit (79% to 17%).
Union membership is the great equalizer when it comes to racial, gender and social justice. Union membership guarantees that people working the same job receive commensurate compensation regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation.
It’s why Black, Latino and female workers make 26%, 39.2% and 23.8% more, respectively, overall than their non-union counterparts. The stability these good jobs and benefits provide are reflected in stable families and communities.
Unions benefit all working people, not just union members. Unions, for example, were instrumental in the recent recognition of Juneteenth as a federal holiday. The labor movement has played a pivotal role throughout our history, from the Civil Rights Movement, establishing the 40-hour work week and the notion of the weekend, and abolishing child labor.
Today is an exciting time for workers who are seeking a brighter future and a voice on the job, as we watch the next generation of leaders, like Chris Smalls, flex their collective muscle and speak truth to power. By this time next month, I hope to report a major victory for 400 registered nurses in New Jersey who are currently organizing to become the newest members of my union, 1199SEIU, in what would be the biggest healthcare organizing win in that state since the pandemic.
I urge you to support today’s union and not-yet-union workers as they continue the struggle to win dignity and rights for all people. I’m thrilled to see new rankand-file leaders breathing new life into our labor movement, and you should be too—simply because we are stronger when we unite for our common good.
THE NEW YORK AMSTERDAM NEWS
George Gresham is president of 1199SEIU, the nation’s largest healthcare union representing 450,000 members in New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Maryland, Florida, and the District of Columbia.
Legislative
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effect,” the CWU said in a celebratory statement. “After several months of or32 • May 26, 2022 - June 1, 2022 ganizing to establish these protections for House staff, we join 85 congressional workers in taking the next step in our organizing drive by filing for a union election in 8 offices in the U.S. House of Representatives.”
Contacting staff who want to join the CWU is proceeding with caution so that no Capitol Hill staff members face the retaliations of being fired or blacklisted. The CWU is organizing staff in the offices of eight congressional representatives—all Democrats, all members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Staff members in the offices of Representatives Cori Bush (Missouri), Alexandria OcasioCortez (New York), Ilhan Omar (Minnesota), Jesús “Chuy” García (Illinois), Ro Khanna (California), Andy Levin (D-Michigan), Ted Lieu (California), and Melanie Stansbury (New Mexico) have all agreed to hold elections to decide whether or not to unionize.
In Albany, New York State Senate employees have come together to form the New York State Legislative Workers United (NYSLWU). In announcing their unionizing plans, they sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins: “We are the newly formed New York Legislative Workers United, a collection of staffers in a range of positions representing senate offices across the state. … [W]e write to you today to share our intention to present our union for voluntary recognition, and put our trust that your long history of fighting for the working people of New York will guide your decision making as we take our organizing efforts public.” Now that they have announced their formation, the organizers are trying to collect union cards from a majority of the 700 staff employees and then will try to become a bargaining unit. They so far plan to ask Stewart-Cousins to voluntarily recognize the union and begin negotiating a contract—rather than force the union to go through the lengthy process of a secret ballot election.
The unionization of New York State Senate employees is in one part a response to the yearly New York State budget negotiations which traditionally become all-night negotiation sessions. Legislative staff are essential to these late-night sessions, but only receive the promise of comp time— which they rarely get to use—instead of extra income payments.
In New York City, the City Council staff won recognition for their union last Aug. 13 following a 21-month campaign. Now recognized as the Association of Legislative Employees (ALE), they are the nation’s largest legislative staff union and are currently bargaining for a contract.
Dan Kroop, president of ALE, told the AmNews his union is focused on bringing the labor movement into the social movement and the social movement into the labor movement: “When the Dobbs decision came out, ALE was one of the only unions in New York City to co-sponsor the massive, almost 30,000-person strong rally that went from Washington Square Park to Bryant Park, shutting down most of the city, to say that we defend reproductive justice for every single person who can get pregnant and that we refuse to go back. It’s the same for same-sex marriage, and every issue that touches our membership,” Kroop insists. “We can’t stand idly by and think that they’re ancillary.
“It’s important to tap into the best traditions of the CIO [Congress of Industrial Organizations], of the Civil Rights Movement, of Black Lives Matter, of the Women’s Movement, of the Anti-War Movement and to bring those pieces into our labor movement. It’s only when we act in solidarity and defend all of our members, not just where the workplace ends but outside of the workplace too, that we can make transformational change and truly defend our members.”
The ALE constitution contains explicit provisions to promote equity throughout the union’s governance, operations, and program strategy and
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