Union Perspectives

Unions are being organized at Starbucks, Amazon, Apple and elsewhere. Applications for union elections this year are on pace to approach the highest level in a decade. The people who are organizing are college students, who are taking jobs with the intention of organizing workers. Years ago, unions used college students to help with the groundwork in unionizing companies, and these individuals were referred to as “salts,” and their use as “salting.” This practice was started in the 1860s when the Rochester Trades used “salts” to organize construction jobs. The “salts” educated the less-informed and scared employees of how their work and bodies are being exploited to make the owners wealthy. Once a targeted company has been identified, a college student obtains employment with the company with the full intent of organizing it for a union. According to the National Labor Relation Board, it is illegal to fire a “salt” or refuse to hire a person who makes it know their intentions. Unions...

When Starbucks and Amazon go union they should have no crafts, the union contract should be one union for all Starbucks shops. But, if there are crafts, their contracts should end on the same date or there will be no power for them to weld and there will be no power for sympathy strikes. A crucial elements since Starbucks and Amazon have so many stores or warehouses throughout the United States, it is imperative that the different entities stay in contact with each other. The employees from both these businesses work hard, and they deserve the security of a union. The other way is to not have contracts, just sign a truce for a period of time. This could remedy some of mistakes in past years, such as the meat packing plants, which had 56 different craft union contracts. So, when the craft contracts expired at different times leaving the different crafts with no power and no help from the other unions within the same business. The same thing happened to the street car workers. First they...

All workers need to have and study a book about labor history, what worked and what did not as written in the book “Rebel Voices: An IWW Anthology” by Joyce L. Kornbluh. She outlines how workers fought for the right to unionize, and safe workplaces that the GOP are working overtime to erode. When I Was going to night school on the GI Bill, a person in my class, who was a human resource worker at Point Mugu Navy Base in Oxnard, CA, told me why the antiunion people were beating labor’s ass on most fronts in the work place was because the union-busting people studied labor history and used it against workers. They knew what worked and didn’t work and acted accordingly. Most labor people don’t know their labor history. If you don’t know yourself you will lose half of your fights. If you don’t know your enemy you will most likely lose all of your fights. In Kornbluh’s book, she shows how education of the workers during the 1800 and early 1900s on the tactics unions used, like direct ac...

Workers engaged in the “Gig” job should study the playbook of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), also known as the Wobblies. They fought for free speech and one big worldwide union with a cooperative common wealth, which would be free of class and national distinction. The Wobblies were founded in 1905 and are still around today. The Gig workers should consider joining the IWW since most of the Wobblies were part-time workers and travelled the country looking for work. The 9-to-5 jobs that a worker could retire from are just about gone. Four out of 10 Americans now make a living through nontraditional work schedules. There are a large group of freelance, contract, part time, temporary, virtual shared, and patched-together work. All that the workers fought for since the 1880s and the 21st century have been lost and we are now back to a kind of scavenger economy and existence. Forbes magazine predicted that by 2020, 50 percent of the American labor force will work at least p...

Could Trump, if elected, be like President Woodrow Wilson? During his administration, President Wilson unleashed a reign of terror on the leadership of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and the Socialist Party of America. He imposed martial law on the mining towns of Montana and Arizona, suppressed the press, sent federal troops to enforce corporate rule in logging camps. He encouraged the American Protective League vigilantes to hunt down draft dodgers, burn down what they considered radical bookstores and even lynching radical immigrants. Think Brown Shirts or our own Silver Shirts. President Wilson also invaded Mexico, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Also, a little known fact, he sent two large expeditionary forces to aid the White movement and its military arm the White Army (also known as the White Guard or the Whites were a loose confederation of Anti-Communist forces) who fought the Bolsheviks in the Russian Civil War. While doing all of this, Wilson refused to lift ...

On a night in February 1933, Frances Perkins sat in front of the newly elected 32nd president of the United States as he told her that he wanted her to be the new Secretary of Labor. Perkins told President Franklin Roosevelt she would take the job if she could do it her way. Perkins wanted: a 40-hour work week, minimum wage, work compensation, unemployment compensation, a federal law banning child labor, direct federal aid for unemployment relief, Social Security, a revitalized public employment service, and health insurance. The opposition to Perkins demands came from courts, businesses, labor unions--yes, labor unions, conservatives, and the chamber of commerce. Even with all this opposition against Perkins, a lot was accomplished. Today, we are trying to protect our Social Security, which we pay into, and even to expand it. We also want to go back to providing free college, like we used to have before politicians, like California Governor Ronald Reagan, redirected the money for f...

The right wing governments of the world are pushing the wage slaves from the ballot box to the streets because the oligarchies have bought the ballot box. This forces the toilers to go to the streets to protest the wrongs of the right wing governments, like in Belgium, Brussels, where 100,000 workers had to take to the streets to demonstrate against planned reforms against public transport, schools, post office and other services. The government wants to cut staffing, services along with companies across the country. This is worldwide and here in the USA workers will be even more under assault by the right wing GOP for they now control 27 states, which will finish devastating the unions, and the oligarchies own the ballot boxes here also and the courts. So all that is left is the streets, which will probably be closed soon by Sedition Laws being passed by cities, counties and states, such as what was done in Ferguson, Missouri, where protestors were not able to stop walking, standing ...

The strikes for $15 to $18 an hour are mere incidents in the class warfare. The strikes are tests of strength, periodic drills in the course of which the workers train themselves for concerted action. This training is most necessary to prepare the wage slaves for the final catastrophe, the general strike, which will complete the expropriation of the employers. The violence of a strike is simply the folding of the workers’ arms or putting your hands in your pockets. This philosophy was eloquently voiced by International Workers of the World organizer Joseph Ettor. If the workers of the world want to win all they have to do is recognize their own solidarity. They have nothing to do but fold their arms and the world will stop. The workers are more powerful with their hands in their pockets than all the property or money possessed by the capitalists and oligarchies. As long as the workers keep their hands in their pockets, the capitalists cannot put their hands in the pockets of the worker...

Old International Workers of the World’s (IWW) dream of a worldwide workers fight for economic justice is coming. This has got to feel very good for the old IWW’s Wobblies and it is showing respect for the martyrs who gave their lives or did prison time on mostly trumped up charges. All workers and retired people need to stand up and support the $15 an hour wage or a living wage, which some, like California Rep. Barbara Lee (D) say should be in the $26 an hour range, which is where it would be today if the minimum wage had kept up with inflation. The proletarians worldwide have awakened to the fact that no government is going to help them, they’re on their own. Just like always. It is the families and fellow workers who help you. Remember when you have nothing you don’t have much to lose and this is where the oligarchies have made a strategic mistake. You never force your enemy into a corner (Art of War) and left them with no alternatives, but to fight. Also remember if you are afraid...

How did the USA lose so much ground in the economical struggle, which has destroyed the middle class? The fight between oligarchies and the commoners began when President Roosevelt started the New Deal, which came on the heels of the 1929 Great Depression. The Great Depression was caused by the Robber Barons, the old oligarchies who destroyed the trade unions and the International Workers of the World (IWW) unions. With the IWW and the New Deal, the 99 percent came back, but forgot that in every war when one side loses they sometimes just go underground to harass and rebuild. This is what the Koch brothers did and what the billionaire party has been doing and their Holy Grail was getting control of the U.S. Supreme Court. Remember, the U.S. Supreme Court gives and takes away the Citizens United decision took the election process away from the workers and gave it to the one-tenth of the 1 percent. They have all the money and can buy or defeat any candidate. Their long-term economic goa...

Union members within California state government to include those in counties, cities, and union school teachers, medical, all firefighters and law enforcement must not ever take their unions and benefits for granted. Your worst enemy, besides all the GOP union busters, is apathy and not knowing your union/labor history. I have been working with California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection union members who do not support their own union. In fact, I cannot even get a retired or working rep to come to our Local Labor Council meetings once a month, nor, for that matter, any city union members, and some of the county members periodically at best. This apathy demonstrates that these workers are oblivious to how they came to earn their benefits and think the benefits would remain if the union was disbanded. This ignorance is astounding. Yes, California at this time is mostly Democratic and still has lots of unions, but the members are not involved in keeping their unions strong b...

Has the time finally come for the dreams of the International Workers of the World (IWW) for a world workers’ union. For a lot of IWW’s ideas was way ahead of its time. The old IWW wage slaves had nothing or very little money. They were just people who shared the dream of a better life for themselves and their families, and they felt that all wage slaves should belong to one union of the world, J.F. McDaniels wrote. There would be no borders of countries. Just like some unions in the USA. A sheet metal worker can move and work anywhere and his pension and healthcare follows the union member. They have an international union member, but they still must register with the local union. But, still, they can move and follow the jobs. This was part of the IWW’s dream in 1905, when the socialist, anarchists, trade unionist and revolutionaries met to lay the ground work for one big union combining elements of Marxian and Darwinian together. The IWW ideology envisioned a utopian society consist...

Labor needs to take a historical look at the philosophy of the industrial unionism. The fast food low-wage workers should embrace what Big Bill Haywood shouted out at a meeting in 1905 at the Brands Hall in Chicago, “I do not care a snap of my fingers whether or not the skilled workers join the industrial movement at this time. We are going down into the gutter to get at the mass of workers and bring them up to a decent plane of living.” The International Workers of the World (IWW) were way ahead in its philosophy and tactics, such as it viewed a labor/management contract as an interference with labor’s only true weapon: the strike. Contracts were also rejected because they hampered workers from declaring strikes at the most critical times for employers. Most labor contracts have done more harm in the long run than good, such as stopping strikes. Maybe labor should take another look at Fr. Thomas J. Hagerty’s 1905 scheme, considered the most comprehensive scheme of labor organizations...

During the years of 1905-1908, IWW’s Big Bill Haywood wanted to organize the forgotten unskilled workers (think fast food workers of today), those without votes – without unions. Haywood once said at a meeting, “I do not care a snap of my fingers whether or not skilled workers join the IWW movement at this time.” He shouted at the meeting, “We are going down into the gutters to get at the mass of workers and bring them up to a decent plane of living (think minimum wage $15 to $16 per hour). It is these ‘have nothings’ who will be the shock troops of labor who will establish the first beach head in the resistance of the entrenched industry so that later labor organizations can win what is rightfully theirs for the masses. Eugene Debs, labor leader, said the industrial workers are organized not conciliate, but to fight the 1% oligarchy class. The oligarchies own the tools they do not use. The workers use the tools they do not own. So you can see there is power with the wage slaves. They...

Things are starting to look up for wage slaves. The economy is slowly recovering. Manufacturing is starting to return to the USA. Construction is starting to build again and most of all the workers are starting to understand how to organize themselves for workers’ rights and not just here, but all over the world. Soon there will not be a country where the anti-union companies can threaten workers with moving their factories to and this is evidenced by the companies that are returning to the USA. So 2013 could be the tipping point for the workers. Hell, we have already won the people’s election of our president, which showed the power of people over moneyed people so what’s to stop us from getting good wages and benefits from the Walmarts of this world. The fact is there is nothing to stop us except fear, apathy, and ignorance of how it was done before, and what worked and what did not and for this knowledge we can use the secret weapon, which are our labor histories. Everything we ...

It looks like the unions are finally waking up to the fact that they will have to take care of themselves and not wait for some elected politician to do their work for them. So with that in mind our unions have withdrawn their support, $1 million, in funding from the Democratic National Convention, which is being held in a nonunion state in nonunion hotels. This is a slap in the face to unions. This money is our union dues, which was going to pay for this. There are more important ways to spend our dues, like organizing and training our members in labor history. To win the war against the money people we must know ourselves and also learn about our enemies, and this takes time and lots of money we need to run advertisements about why unions are good and the badness of Wall Street corporations with their oligarchies. We must be ready in November and have a plan for moving ahead or a plan for defining ourselves. We must not become pessimistic. We must stay positive in our thoughts ...

It seem that what the 99% are working for is to try to take back our rights to the time of the Commons, which are the parks, housing, jobs, living wages and social safety nets – all things that the 99% have in common. This is not a new idea. Nature’s gifts have been the Commons’ property since the beginning. Thomas Paine declared that these gifts were the property of the human race and the land ordinance of the 1785 drafted by a committee of the Continental Congress that included Thomas Jefferson. They established a cooperative model for settlement of the West by setting aside one-square mile in every township as a Common property to be used to support a public school. The New Deal gave us Social Security; the GI Bill was also our Commons. We, the 99%, Commoners are now under attack and we, at this time, are being denied our basic needs of food, housing, healthcare, daycare, education, transportation, job training, paid vacation, old age benefits and common dignity in our lives. ...

There can be no doubt that we, the 99%, are in a class war and the oligarchies are draining the treasury of the 99% and the unions, which a classic way to win a war (Art of War). When we, the 99%, have to defend our labor rights, voting rights with a court system that is slanted toward the corporations - Citizens United - (which only supports the 1%) then the oligarchies can, with unlimited money, buy lawmakers, governors, judges and presidents of the United States, which creates a plutocracy-type government. We are very close to a plutocracy government and getting closer with each election. The Koch brothers and Karl Rove’s GPS Crossroads are dedicated to this end. One of the things that can turn this around is the 99%, OWS movement, with the help from labor. Right now labor is working at a disadvantage because of some labor contracts that labor has entered into, such as no strikes, but they might just Wobble like in the old days of IWW movement or when a state or other entity votes...

Some times having nothing is an easier way to win. If a person or group have no home, no family, no job, no money or no hope, what do you have to lose? When your opposition finds this out then having nothing becomes a game changer. This is what the IWW or Wobblies found when they were fighting for free speech in Fresno, Calif., in the year of 1911. They won when law enforcement came to understand that people who have nothing to lose really can’t lose anything except their lives; and some in those days didn’t care for life was not very good when you have no family, job, home, money or hope. So, just like the 99%ers, the Wobblies outnumbered and outlasted the establishment to bring about change -- with nothing but their bodies and uncompromising determination. This is pointed out in the “Art of War;” when you have nothing else to give but your life, that’s when you fight the hardest. Wall Street big banks, corporation-led GOP and their Machiavellian strategy is actually playing into ...

Is it time we retired union workers with our nice pensions start paying back? Our union workers of old fought and died for our rights today so today’s retirees could live in comfort. Most of our retirees today did not have to spill blood to protect their jobs; hell, most of us only had to show up for work and pay our dues. Now our unions have just about vanished and on our watch. We might think hard about parking our golf carts, motor homes, and our boats and think about how we can pay our unions back and help rebuild the working class - the 99%. We need to support the OWS, who are there for the 99% by being on the streets, sacrificing at all costs and creature comforts for a better America. When things finally turn around and the unions go to the workers and ask them to join the unions, the workers will ask, ‘Where in the hell were the unions when we, OWS - the 99% - were in the streets?’ They have a right to ask that question. OWS - the 99% - are fighting for our members, our chi...