To Be Announced...

Some people have asked why it is that unions are so hopped up on raising the minimum wage. I'm suspicious too, so I did a lot of searching about it. The reason I'm a skeptic is because I don't believe that unions are all in it for "the little guy" and looking out for the best interests of the "working poor." Call me a cynic, but I ask the questions around here.

"What's in it for them?"

While I couldn't find specific relevant quotes that suggest a link between union wages and the minimum wage, I don't think it's all that outside the realm of reality to suggest that many unions will use an increase in the minimum wage to influence their own collectively bargained wages.

It's a natural human reaction and it happens to all of us. If the dude you're working with gets a raise, then by golly you're probably going to want one too.

What I did find were plenty of suggestions that this is the case.

From the University of Iowa Labor Center, I found a list of a series of workshops to help AFSCME members better negotiate their contracts.

5 workshops Sponsored by AFSCME Council 61 and AFSCME Local 12

Policy issues for AFSCME members

Free Trade in our services? How trade agreements can threaten public sector jobs-and what we can do about it.

Protecting the "floor" under our wages: Minimum wage laws affect our wages. Should "living wages" replace them?

Jobs, food and shelter: What's happening in Iowa-and around the world--to these fundamental worker rights

Wedge issues and the union voter: Understanding key wedge issues and how to keep them from undermining union collective power in the voting booth

The health care crisis: How to understand and explain the debate-and make a difference in public policy

Then, from the International Labour Organization, I found some published papers related to...

COLLECTIVE BARGAINING NEGOTIATIONS

The union's demands should be carefully studied. The following are some of the matters to which attention should be paid:

1. Assess the economic impact of the demands on the company.
2. Make a comparative study, e.g. in a wage demand one should ascertain comparative wage rates in the industry and in allied or similar businesses, the minimum wage, if any, and the rates applicable in other collective agreements.

So I'm going to take that information as a confirmation of my theory. Unions support increasing the minimum wage so as to increase the "floor" at which they base their collective bargaining negotiations upon.

But it gets better than that.

According to a few think tanks (and a dead corrupt union thug), an increase in the minimum wage does more than just increase their own "base wage floor"...

The Minimum Wage: Washingtons Perennial Myth

The success of a union depends on its ability to maintain higher-than-market wages and provide secure jobs for its members. If it cannot offer the benefit of higher wages, a union will quickly lose its members. Higher wages can be obtained only by excluding some workers from the relevant labor markets.

Unions attempt to fix or limit the supply of labor in a particular market, which raises the value or price of the labor available within that market. The winners are those still included in the labor market, the union members. The losers are those excluded from the market, the unemployed.

Although unions already hold privileged positions in labor markets, minimum wages further increase their gains by raising employers' labor costs. As long as union members earn wages above the minimum rate, their positions are made more secure by the government policy that eliminates those who might undercut the union wage. People willing to work for less than the government's minimum are not allowed into the labor market at all.

It was former mob-backed union thug Edward T. Hanley that first suggested the true purpose why unions love a minimum wage:

“The purpose of the minimum wage is to … provide a floor from which we can upgrade your compensation through collective bargaining.”

[Source: Edward T. Hanley in Catering Industry Employee, December 1977, p. 3. Cited in Belton M. Fleisher, Minimum Wage Regulation in the United States (Washington: National Chamber Foundation, 1983), p. 9.]

So to sum up:

A minimum wage increase will raise the incomes of affected workers who continue to be employed after the increase takes effect, but it will also destroy a number of existing jobs and inhibit the creation of new jobs.

No doubt someone will point out the lack of job losses the last time the minimum wage was increased. As pointed out above, that's because our overall productivity increased and was able to pick up the slack. What if productivity doesn't increase this time?

Now here's an interesting transcript from the Iowa Press program on IPTV. Pardon the large caps, but that's the way it was printed on the website:

Sen. Mike Gronstal Show Number: 3413 Nov 24, 2006 Edition

Borg: LAST WEEK ON THIS PROGRAM, YOUR DEMOCRATIC COLLEAGUES LEADING IN THE IOWA HOUSE SAID THE FIRST ITEM OF BUSINESS THE FIRST DAY IS LEGISLATION TO RAISE THE MINIMUM WAGE. AGREED?

Gronstal: ABSOLUTELY AGREED. WE'VE HAD THOSE DISCUSSIONS WITH --

Borg: TO WHAT?

Gronstal: WITH GOVERNOR-ELECT -- WE'RE GOING TO GO THROUGH THAT POLICY PROCESS WHERE WE BRING OUR MEMBERS IN, BUT PROBABLY IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD OF A COUPLE BUCKS PHASED IN OVER 18 MONTHS, 24 MONTHS. I DON'T HAVE THE NUMBER ON THAT, BUT WE'LL GO THROUGH THAT. BUT ABSOLUTELY, THE FIRST ITEM OF BUSINESS, WE THINK, IS TO MAKE A REAL DIFFERENCE IN THE LIVES OF 125,000 IOWANS THAT MAKE MINIMUM WAGE. SEVENTY PERCENT OF THEM ARE BREAD WINNERS FOR THEIR FAMILIES. IT'S NOT ALL KIDS THAT MAKE MINIMUM WAGE.

Provably untrue. It is largly kids that make up the minimum wage earners.

Minimum wage workers tend to be young. About half of workers earning $5.15 or less were under age 25, and about one-fourth of workers earning at or below the minimum wage were age 16-19. Among employed teenagers, about 9 percent earned $5.15 or less. About 2 percent of workers age 25 and over earned the minimum wage or less. Among those age 65 and over, the proportion was about 3 percent.

And this.

According to U.S. Census Bureau data, fully 93% of employees in Iowa whose wages would be increased by the proposed minimum wage hike either live with their parents or another relative, live alone, or have a working spouse. Just 7% are sole earners in families with children, and each of these sole earners has access to supplemental income through Earned Income Tax Credit.

The transcript gets better:

Gronstal: ...WILL LABOR BRING OTHER CONCERNS TO US THAT WE'LL RESPOND TO? OF COURSE THEY WILL. BUT I WANT TO MAKE SURE THE FIRST THING WE DO IS RAISE THAT MINIMUM WAGE.

Borg: WELL, THERE'S SOMETHING FOR LABOR CALLED FAIR SHARE. RATHER THAN REPEALING 14B, OR THE RIGHT TO WORK LAW, FAIR SHARE, IS THAT LIKELY TO BE ENACTED?

Gronstal: I THINK THAT'S LIKELY TO BE VISITED. I DON'T KNOW IF IT WILL BE ENACTED OR NOT.

Borg: WHAT'S THE CONCEPT THERE?

Gronstal: WELL, THE CONCEPT IS IF THE THREE OF YOU ARE REPRESENTED BY A GROUP AND YOU DON'T PAY ANYTHING AND THEY PAY, YOU'RE A FREELOADER. YOU'RE GETTING ALONG -- YOU'RE GETTING A FREE RIDE FOR ALL THE SERVICES THAT THEY PROVIDE. YOU'RE A FREELOADER. ASKING YOU TO PAY YOUR FAIR SHARE OF THE DUES -- NOT THE ENTIRE DUES BUT YOUR FAIR SHARE FOR THE BENEFITS YOU RECEIVE --

My underlining added, but it bears repeating: You're a Freeloader

So in the same breath that Gronstol originally floated the idea of increasing the minimum wage for "family breadwinners" in Iowa, he also called those same breadwinners who happen to work in a union shop and aren't members of the union, "freeloaders."

Besides, unions don't provide any "services"...they negotiate with management on collective bargaining. Then, they take union dues and give it all to Democrats to get them elected.

And sure enough:

Iowa Democrats to consider 'fair share' laws

DES MOINES -- Governor-elect Chet Culver and Democratic leaders in the Iowa Legislature said Tuesday they will consider "fair share" laws that require non-union employees to pay for benefits they enjoy through organized labor.

"I think we need to have a debate and a discussion on that important issue and many others," Culver said

Democrats argue that unions currently are forced to represent non-union employees in contract negotiations and disputes with management, even when those employees aren't paying union dues.

Gronstal sparred with Republican House Speaker Christopher Rants, R-Sioux City, over the issue Tuesday.

"If you're going to force people who don't belong to a union to pay some sort of substitute for union dues, that is an attack on Iowa's Right to Work law," Rants said.

Incoming House Speaker Pat Murphy, D-Dubuque, said the fair share law would not mean repealing the right to work law.

"I think that's the big problem is some people don't understand the difference," Murphy said.

Uh...I read the law and I understand it pretty well, Mr. Murphy. You only wish I didn't have the research skills to actually look up something like that. This is why the information age is so dangerous to these imbeciles.

They call it "fair share" like every other boneheaded tax policy of theirs. As one comment on the news site mentions:

If I choose not to belong to a union. I choose to "negotiate" my own contract with my employer. I choose to put forth an honest day's effort for an honest day's pay. Don't steal my money to support a union that doesn't represent me.

I don't see how this "fair share" is fair at all. It certainly isn't fair to the current law...and probably violates it:

731.5 Deducting dues from pay unlawful.

It shall be unlawful for any person, firm, association, labor organization or corporation to deduct labor organization dues, charges, fees, contributions, fines or assessments from an employee's earnings, wages or compensation, unless the employer has first been presented with an individual written order therefor signed by the employee, which written order shall be terminable at any time by the employee giving at least thirty days' written notice of such termination to the employer. (Enacted April 28, 1947; Amended 1959, Recodified 1977.)

Oh, well...they're the majority now - elected by the vast majority of Iowans - they can do whatever their "mandate" allows, can't they?

Labels: fair share