LABOR MATTERS
GOP Dismisses Landmark Labor Reform Act
compiled by Jeff Burman
 Jeffrey Burman |
On June 26, the Senate voted 51-48 to end a Republican filibuster of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which would strengthen workers’ right to choose a union, writes John Logan in the online Tom Paine. The House of Representatives had already passed the bill in March by a vote of 241-185. But according to Senate rules, supporters of the legislation needed a supermajority of 60 votes to invoke cloture, ending the filibuster. Congress is not expected to take any further action on the bill until after the 2008 elections.
Still, it would be wrong to consider the Senate vote a defeat for supporters of the measure, argues Logan, an instructor at the London School of Economics. A year ago, few observers would have predicted that by June 2007, EFCA would have won the support of a majority in both Houses of Congress. Supporters of the bill have always considered their effort part of a three-year legislative campaign, the end goal being enactment of EFCA by the summer of 2009––assuming, of course, that the Democrats win control of the White House and retain or expand control of the Congress in the November 2008 elections. The support offered for EFCA by leading Democratic candidates for president––Hillary Clinton, Barak Obama and John Edwards––only underscore the point.
Even if Democrats prevail in the 2008 elections, EFCA supporters will face a daunting task getting 60 votes in the Senate. For three decades, writes Logan, this supermajority requirement has presented the biggest obstacle to the modernization of our antiquated and increasingly irrelevant labor law. Labor law reform is still a no-compromise issue for the business community and its Republican allies in the Congress. The vote in June was not the first time that Senate Republicans have blocked a labor law reform proposal––they twice filibustered a bill strengthening workers’ rights in the 1970s and one outlawing the permanent replacement of strikers in the 1990s––nor will it be the last.
 Cartoon by Carol Simpson, Carol Simpson Productions |
The case for stronger legal protections for workers’ rights is compelling, asserts Logan. The US system of union recognition is the most cumbersome in the developed world, and it provides the weakest protections for workers’ right to choose a union. Employer intimidation is endemic, and there are now about 60 million Americans who want a union but can’t get one, according to the eminent Harvard economist Richard Freeman.
EFCA would remedy that situation by imposing greater penalties on employers who discriminate against union supporters, providing for mediation and arbitration when employers and unions fail to negotiate first contracts, and allowing workers to form a union when over 50 percent sign union membership cards, adds Logan.
By blocking the Employee Free Choice Act from a final vote, writes AFL-CIO president John Sweeney in The Huffington Post online, Republican senators “reject the will of the people––69 percent of Americans say they support the Employee Free Choice Act. These Republicans demonstrated how out of touch they are with America’s mainstream, with the millions of employees who seek to improve their lives and those of their families, and with the best traditions of their own party.”
Hollywood Tax Credit Bill Declared DOA in State Senate
Hollywood’s hopes for a tax break rose and fell in the space of about
12 hours in mid-July as California lawmakers rushed to pass a belated State
budget, write Richard Verrier and Marc Lifsher in The Los Angeles Times. At
one point, the Assembly passed a package of tax cuts that included more than
$145 million over three years for film, television and commercial producers
in an effort to stem so-called runaway production.
The tax credit bill ran into immediate trouble in the Senate, where President Pro Tem Don Perata (D-Oakland) declared it dead on arrival. He refused to take up the tax credit bill before the Legislature left for summer recess, saying the loss of revenue “would decimate public education, public health, public safety.”
That was frustrating news to union leaders, who have been lobbying for years for incentives to keep shows from leaving California for cheaper locales. The proposed tax breaks would have provided a 12 to 15 percent tax credit on qualified film, TV and commercial production expenses for projects shot in California, with a $3 million cap for film production companies.
Clinton, Obama Lead in Hollywood Fundraising
Politicians are finding truth to the Hollywood saying, “Fame tops the
food chain,” writes Ted Johnson in Variety.
Star candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama pulled ahead of other contenders
in entertainment industry contributions in the second quarter, with Clinton
again edging out Obama in the race to tap Hollywood donors.
According to preliminary figures released by the Center for Responsive Politics, Clinton collected $753,790 from donors in the industry to Obama’s $617,388. The numbers cover the period from April 1 to June 30.
The margin of difference between the two candidates was nearly the same as that in the first quarter. Though Clinton’s campaign got a boost of momentum in June from the high-profile endorsement of Steven Spielberg, the figures show that Obama continues to enjoy significant industry support, adds Johnson.
The entertainment industry is a prominent source of money for the campaigns but by no means the most lucrative pool of donors. For both Clinton and Obama, show business ranks seventh among all of the industries that have given to their campaigns. Lawyers rank first.
A Backlash Against Billionaires
For mysterious reasons, writes David Ignatius in The Washington Post, people
can suddenly become indignant about government policies they have accepted
for years. Such a seismic shift seems to be happening in public attitudes
toward taxation of America’s super-rich.
The three leading Democratic candidates––Clinton, Obama and Edwards––
each announced recently that they support higher taxes on what’s known
as “carried interest,” a form of compensation received by financial
moguls that has created some of the biggest new fortunes on Wall Street. “For
decades, the capitalists who ran private equity, venture and hedge funds managed
to convince Congress that the 20 percent carried-interest profit share they
took on deals wasn’t ordinary income [taxed at up to 35 percent] but
a capital gain [taxed at 15 percent], even though they typically were risking
almost none of their own capital,” adds Ignatious. “This gross
inequity was taken as a financial fact of nature. But no more.”
Edwards, Trailing Rivals, Holds Sway Over Party’s Agenda
John Edwards, argues Christopher Cooper in The Wall Street Journal, may be
stuck in third place in the polls and in fundraising in the race for the Democratic
presidential nomination, but the populist “seems to be playing an outsized
role in driving the terms of the party’s debate––generally
to the left––on everything from Iraq to health care.”
In mid-June, the former North Carolina senator made his most prominent bid yet to place the oft-ignored issue of poverty prominently on the 2008 agenda, with a four-day tour of some of the most neglected parts of the South and Midwest, beginning with his sixth trip this campaign to New Orleans, devastated by Hurricane Katrina. He has spoken about the issue more than any of his rivals, and was the first to adopt a “poverty” plank in his platform.
Edwards pledged to hire a full-time rebuilding czar to jump-start the balky recovery along the Gulf Coast, build a veterans’ hospital in downtown New Orleans and create a program that would offer job training and “stepping stone” employment to 50,000 workers. He also promised to push the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour by 2012. “Nobody should be working in America and living in poverty,” he said.
Democrats Will Try to Counter Ruling on Pay Discrimination
A recent Supreme Court decision restricting workers’ ability to sue
for wage discrimination has prompted Democrats to introduce legislation to
counteract the ruling, writes Jacqueline Palank in The New York Times.
In May, the Supreme Court ruled 5 to 4 against a supervisor at a Goodyear tire plant in Alabama who, after working there for nearly two decades, discovered that her male colleagues––including those with less experience––had been receiving higher salaries. Most courts had ruled that each unfair paycheck was a new act of discrimination, effectively a new opportunity for an employee to seek a remedy in court. But the current justices said the clock started running the first time a worker was paid unfairly and that therefore, the plaintiff, Lilly Ledbetter, had waited too long to file suit.
In late July, by a 225-199 vote, the House passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act that in effect overturns the court’s decision. The bill, writes Mike Hall in the AFL-CIO’s blog Now, would strengthen equal pay laws and clarify that every paycheck or other compensation resulting in whole or part from an earlier discriminatory pay decision constitutes a violation of the Civil Rights Act. As long as workers file their charges within 180 days of a discriminatory paycheck, their charges would be considered timely.
Also in July, Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) and a bi-partisan
group of 14 co-sponsors introduced the Senate version of the legislation
called the Fair Pay Restoration Act. Action on that bill was expected
to begin following Congress’ August recess.
To add insult to injury, the Associated Press reports that Goodyear Tire and
Rubber has billed Lilly Ledbetter $3,165 for expenses related to the former
plant worker’s lawsuit seeking to remedy two decades of pay discrimination.
Ledbetter, whose husband was due to undergo cancer surgery the week of the
billing announcement, told the AP she doesn’t know how she will pay
the bill.
“I am very disappointed and very upset that the corporation that I
worked for and gave so much to would do this when all I asked for
was to be treated fair and equal to my peers,” she said. “With
all their profits, they’re doing well; and I am struggling to
survive on my retirement and Social Security. It would be very difficult
for me to pay this bill. This is not a great deal of money––except
when you are retired and your income is limited.”
President Bush has indicated that he would veto the measure.
 Cartoon by Mike Keefe, Cagle Cartoons, Inc. |
Income Inequality Revisited
Massachusetts Representative Barney Frank recently spoke about strategies
for tackling the nation’s income inequality during a forum at the Economic
Policy Institute (EPI), writes Tula Connell in the AFL-CIO’s blog Now.
Frank keynoted the “More Jobs, Good Jobs” forum, where he pointed to the latest data by the best measures which show there is now greater income inequality than at any time since 1929. Frank’s point, reinforced by two scholars who presented papers after his keynote, is disturbing: While US statistics on job growth seem to indicate a rosy economy, less well-reported data demonstrates the extent to which the rich are getting richer while the middle class are slipping into poverty.
From 1979 to 2004, the percentage of households in the middle class category––those with incomes between $30,000 and $90,000––fell from 47 to 39 percent, according to mainstream Washington Post columnist Steven Pearlstein.
Further, as Frank points out, productivity and wages, which rose together until the mid-1970s, have begun to track in different directions. While workers’ productivity grew an impressive 18 percent between 2000 and 2006, most people’s inflation-adjusted weekly wages rose only 1 percent during that time. This was the first economic expansion since World War II without a sustained pay increase for workers.
Jeff Burman represents Sound Editors on the Guild's Board of Directors. He can be reached at jeffrey.burman@nbcuni.com.