Socialist Action /November 1999
Labor Briefing
To no one's surprise, AFL-CIO leaders at their October convention endorsed
presidential candidate Al Gore and plan to spend $40 million from the union
federation's piggybank in 15 states to aid the Democrats.
As enumerated by a New York Times reporter (Oct.11), the AFL-CIO "has
13 million members, produces millions of campaign leaflets, organizes tens
of thousands of volunteers, registers hundreds of thousands of voters and
coordinates union efforts across the country. Its endorsement is distinct
from, but builds upon, the endorsements made by its 68 member unions."
Reportedly, a few unions, including the Food and Commercial Workers and
Brotherhood of Painters, voiced some doubts about the endorsement. Nevertheless,
all but two unions went along: the Auto Workers, which has sought protections
from imports, and the Teamsters Union, which favors a ban on Mexican truckers.
Teamsters President James P. Hoffa told the convention that the Teamster
ranks want more information about candidates before the union makes its
choice, but that the union had no principled objection to Gore. "We
appreciate," said Hoffa, "the efforts that this [Clinton-Gore]
administration has made to advance the needs of working families."
Since the convention, Clinton said he will continue the Teamsters-backed
ban on Mexican truckers. (Former Teamster President Ron Carey got from Clinton
an indefinite suspension of a NAFTA provision that allows Mexican truckers
to drive in the United States.) Of course, Hoffa wants something more, such
as a commitment to free the IBT from the Fed's 10-year Consent Degree.
Even if Hoffa ultimately backs a Republican or a Reform Party candidate
(Pat Buchanan, perhaps), the union's regional and local bodies will continue
their dependence on long-standing political machines, mainly Democrats.
Finally, if Sweeney hasn't changed his plan, the AFL-CIO's endorsement
of Gore should not be taken as the height of its political ambition. For,
after the election of Sweeney's New Voice slate, he wrote in Labor Research
Review, "Our new approach to politics has already split the conservative
and moderate wings of the Republican Party, and we look forward to a day
when we can once again support politicians like Nelson Rockefeller, Mark
Hatfield, and Jacob Javits." (Against The Current, March/April, 1997.)
WILL AFL-CIO PLAN COMPUTE?
John J. Sweeney has a fresh inspiration on how to reach the troops. He's
asking unions to offer cut-price computers and internet services to their
13 million members. The idea is that electronic communications will strengthen
letter-writing campaigns to politicos, publicize boycotts, and the like.
It isn't clear how the officialdom's overall message will differ from
that contained in the countless union house organs that devote most space
to the comings, doings, and photos of the leaders. Surely, the old message
can only short-circuit any hoped for practical results. Still, the idea
has this merit: On its face it seems more relevant than an attempt 10 years
ago to jump-start the labor movement with a union-backed credit card.
DEMOS BACK BIG BUCKS
Between 1940 and 1980, probably 21 million workers were exposed to asbestos
on the job. Asbestos, a fire-retardant mineral, was a common insulation
material used in ships, factories, homes and even household appliances.
Years after exposure, workers are struck down, sometimes fatally, with lung
cancer, asbestosis, mesothelioma, and other truly scary diseases.
Asbestos victims have turned to the courts for compensation, and sometimes
have won. Now a piece of legislation is moving through Congress that would
give protections not to the victims of asbestos poisoning, but to the GAF
Corporation, mostly owned by Samuel J. Heyman, a billionaire.
A Ralph Nader public interest group told The New York Times (Oct. 17)
that the proposed legislation, "would cut off more than half of the
population injured by asbestos from pursuing their cases."
Backing the GAF legislation is a bipartisan cabal that in just the last
year, reports The Times, has received more than $250,000 in political donations
from GAF. Included are prominent, so-called liberal Democrats the AFL-CIO
proudly calls "friends of labor."
At the top of the list are both U.S. Senators from New York, Daniel Patrick
Moynihan and Charles Schumer, who, reports the paper, "has been a significant
recipient of campaign contributions. The Heymans gave $77,500 to his Senate
campaign, including $62,500 ... in the final week of the race."
Senator Torricelli and the Democrat's Senatorial Campaign Committee have
"received at least $41,000 from the Heymans and the GAF so far this
year." To date, "the company and the family have made donations
to more than 100 current and former lawmakers."
According to The Times, "Most of the donations came after GAF suffered
a stunning setback in the Supreme Court. The court suggested that only Congress
was in a position to clamp down on GAF's mounting asbestos liability. After
that decision, more than 93,000 asbestos claims were filed against GAF and
its affiliated companies, and by the end of last year the company faced
113,800 cases."
The AFL-CIO estimates that up to a million current or retired members
were exposed to asbestos and that many will suffer from serious aliments.
Presumably, the federation's tops have sympathy and solidarity for the unionized
workers, as well as the other victims of asbestos poisoning. Yet those feelings
were parked at the door in October when the AFL-CIO voted to spend $40 million
in dues money to elect more "friends of labor" in 15 states.
Of course, that plainly means that other workers will find themselves
in a similar spot as the asbestos workers whose dues are paying congressional
"friends of labor" to lawfully swindle them and their families
out of their just compensation.
MINIMUM WAGE
Newsday (Oct. 18) reports that pending legislation to raise the national
minimum wage ("the current wage of $5.15 would have to be $7.49 an
hour to give a low-wage worker the same purchasing power he or she had in
1968") will also boost the fortunes of the rich, if it also ends the
tax on estates worth more than $1 million, a "tax paid by the 2 percent
of Americans who leave estates big enough to be taxed."
The bonanza doesn't end there, for there's a legislative maneuver to
"give $2 in tax cuts for every dollar a business might have to pay
a low-wage worker." All in all, "the tax breaks lawmakers are
trying to stuff into the minimum wage bill cost an estimated $35 billion
-double the $18 billion cost to business from the wage hike."
The Newsday report also says that "the booming economy has worsened
inequality, with more than a quarter of the workforce now earning a poverty-level
wage."
The Census Bureau, says The New York Times (Oct. 18), may revise its
take on what "poor people must spend on food, clothing, housing and
life's little extras." The Bureau's current income threshold for a
family of four is $16,6000. "Sociologists and economists who study
what people must earn to escape poverty in the United States ... put the
threshold between ... $21,000 and $28,000...
"Not surprisingly, the White House, which would have to authorize
a change in the poverty formula is proceeding cautiously. 'We have at least
a couple of years more work to do,' a Clinton administration official said."
SHRINKS PASS UNION IQ TEST
After three years debate, 3200 psychologists are affiliating with the
New York Federation of Teachers, hoping to be able to force managed-care
groups to provide better mental health care benefits.
One psychologist explained the decision, saying that "with managed
care we are being deprofessionalized and we have to face that fact. We are
being made into people just paid to do things. We don't have control over
our work the way we should have." (The New York Times, Oct.19.)
BIG 3 AUTO JOB LOSS TO GO ON
Auto workers ratified proposed 4-year contracts with lop-sided majorities,
boosted by a $1350 signing bonus. And who could blame them. The annual wage
increases are said to be pegged at 3 percent above the inflation rate. While
that looks OK to the individual worker, the workers as a whole are going
to end up helping the stockholders pay for the raise. That's because the
new pacts do not stop work rule concessions, outsourcing, downsizing through
attrition, and the proliferation of multiple wage tiers in the auto parts
sector, the main sources of the unabated shrinking of the unionized workforce.
One estimate is that the deal allows "a 17 percent reduction ...
over the life of this contract ... GM could shed about 30,000 of its 179,000
workers by 2001." (Labor Notes, October 1999.)
The new money spread over fewer workers building more cars actually means
that the workers' proportionate share of what they produce will shrink,
winding up as stockholder dividends.
Most observers believe that the auto corporations had no intention of
forcing a strike, with car and passenger truck sales at their highest level
ever in the 1999 model year. Nevertheless, the UAW leadership didn't use
that leverage to wrest back any of their past concessions to the auto moguls.
Socialist Action /November 1999 |