The time is right for unions to organize and rebuild unions that will take the fight to the GOP anti-union/anti-worker machines. We should just look at how the West Virginia teachers won their fight for a wage increase. The teachers were organized, they planned every detail of their walkout in advanced to ensure the success of the walkout. The organizers worked with students’ parents and local businesses to ensure the walkout would not harm those in need. Daycare centers and meals were organized in advanced so the students who were dependent on the school lunches would not go without.
This walkout was not just a single school, but the entire state. Had the organizer organized one school, the board of trustees would have beat the school employees back, but organizing the entire state, the sheer number of employees standing together against a single state entity, allowed the employees to win.
If union workers follow the example of the West Virginia workers’ wildcat strike or what the old International Workers of the World (IWW) called a Wobble. The wildcat or Wobble takes the pressure off unions and keeps the unions from being sued.
How did these West Virginia teachers win when so many walkout strikes have failed throughout the years? It was well planned, like a battle, as outlined in the book “Art of War.” To build support for a long strike there must be a good public relations program set up to take care of the workers and those effected by the strike, in this case the students, who depended on the school lunches.
The organizers contacted churches, specially the Church of Nazarene, which gathered donations from stores, farmers, restaurants, strikers and other workers and dozens of volunteers. This kind of operation was organized in every county across the state of WV. It was a class of people with the courage to rise up, fight for what’s right and they won.
It looks like Oklahoma is next up with its 41,000 teachers, and 36,000 have already signed up to do a wildcat strike. Oklahoma state workers and teachers will stand together. The entire state could someday turn into a countrywide walkout over inequity and inequality.
If other workers are thinking about something like what WV did and Oklahoma is preparing to do, a good book to read and study is “Bread Upon the Waters” by Rose Pesotta. Other books worth reading and studying is “The Iron Heel” and “The Dream of Debs” by Jack London.
Labor is back.
Unions’ long game is to get all union contracts to expire on the same day nationwide. The United Auto Workers combines contracts ends on April 28, 2028. This could then result in a mass national strike starting on May Day beeginning that year. This could then put enormous pressure on employers, but also on lawmakers. It’s the muscle and sweat of the workers that keeps this country great, not the individual company or corporations. This May Day strike would be the time to change the workers’ world for the better by negotiating for a 32-hour week with the same pay, and the U.S. adopts a healthcare for all with no out of pocket costs. This would also help the employers as they would no longer have to provide healthcare. By striking, the UAW won same pay for new workers, all UAW contracts will end on the same date, a 25-percent pay increase, a cost of living adjustments, a guaranteed right to strike over potential plant closures, and also the right to vote to unionize through the card che
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