America Needs a New kind of labor Movement
America Needs a New Kind of Labor Movement
by John M Repp
a review of Thomas Geoghegan. Only One Thing Can Save Us: Why America Needs a New Kind of Labor Movement. New York: The New Press. 2014
This book is full of ideas that could change America’s political and economic landscape. Thomas Geoghegan (pronounced gay-gen) is a veteran labor lawyer and author. He writes this book in conversational style and publishes it at a time when the labor movement is weaker than at any time since 1937. 1937 was when the sit-down strikes pushed General Motors to negotiate with the UAW (United Auto Workers). The Wagner Act of 1935 made collective bargaining legal, but did not make it mandatory. The sit-down strikes forced many of the big corporations sit down at the table and negotiate contracts with their workers. Not only are unions weaker now, but too many workers are just “temps”, so individual workers are weaker too.
Currently wage levels are not high enough to create the aggregate demand, the buying power, needed to keep the economy at full employment. Debt in one form or another is necessary to keep the economy functioning. Debt increases aggregate demand in the short run, but decreases it in the long run, and therefore is not sustainable. Geoghagen writes that higher wage levels would also increase the role of manufacturing and decrease the size of the financial sector in our economy.
Geoghegan’s proposals were new to me. He writes that we need to make belonging to a labor union a civil right. He proposes that companies be banned from discriminating against union members in the same way they cannot discriminate against workers on the basis of their race, color, gender, age or disability. That would drastically change the legal power available to individual workers.
He also proposes changes in corporate law. He wants employees to be empowered to join a worker’s council on the shop floor and he wants half the members of the boards of directors to be workers. With more control over the workplace, the morale of the workers would improve. This would create more democracy in the workplace. Democracy is a value we cherish but inside corporate facilities operating inside the U.S., hierarchy and control dominate.
Geoghegan is willing to let go of the U.S. model of the union bargaining for all workers in a bargaining unit and use the European model of members-only bargaining. This would undercut the strongest argument of the right wing that people are forced to join a union and pay dues. The new unions would be voluntary. But the unions would be where workers would be educated to participate on the workers councils and boards of directors.
We have been told repeatedly that our jobs have been exported because our wages were too high. However a look at Germany should correct that idea. German auto workers average $66 dollars an hour compared to American auto worker’s wage of $33 an hour. German auto companies produce 5.1 million cars per year; American companies produce 2.9 million cars a year. (pp. 20-21). So the German model is very competitive in global markets despite higher wages for their workers. 24 percent of the German work force participates in manufacturing compared to 9% in the U.S. Manufacturing is 25% of Gross Domestic Product in Germany but just 12% in USA. (pp.98-99) The fact that German workers make up half the boards of directors by law and there are workers councils on the shop floor where workers share power with the managers is a very important part of the German success.
How does Geoghegan propose to bring about the reforms he puts forward? Since currently, organized labor is weak and cannot generally win big strikes, he thinks the tactic should be hit-and-run strikes of short duration, creating a sense that the country is in chaos. This tactic cannot be used where unions have a contract, but, current labor law allows two or more employees to strike for grievances and keep their jobs if they return before the company has hired someone new. The strategy is to force the Democratic Party leaders to support the reforms outlined above that would strengthen workers. Some reviewers of the book have written that the tactics and strategy Geoghegan proposes is a weakness of his argument. But Geoghegan says the situation is dire and implicitly asks what else can we do?
Geoghegan likes what he sees of the new activists coming into labor. He also expresses dislike for much of the “old-boy network”. At a dinner party he met a young organizer and he asked her how she convinced the mostly low wage Latino women to join up. She said: “You have to get them to stop thinking, ‘Maybe I’ll win the lottery’ Or ‘Maybe something will come along.’ You have to make them see: ‘No, that’s not going to happen. But here’s this other thing, the union. Maybe right now it can only get you another dollar or two an hour. But even that could make a difference in your life…. for you and your child.’”
In summary, a new kind of labor movement can jolt our political debate out of magical thinking. The political elites are in denial about the fault lines in our country. They do not understand that the structure of the current economy is unsustainable. A strong labor movement is the only way to hold the country together. At one point, Geoghegan writes: “But for these two programs (Social Security and Medicare), what else is holding our federal union together?” (p. 241) If we think about the fact that the goal of one of the two main political parties in our country is to abolish those programs, the urgency of Geoghegan’s message makes sense.
To answer my friend, Steve, no this is not a revolutionary program. It is reformist. But if the changes Geoghegan proposes can be made, then we can take the next step and democratize the ownership of corporations, making them cooperatives. And, then…. Reforms like those proposed do not rule out more reforms that cumulatively can change the economic and political system.