The U.S. Supreme Court released an opinion in Harris Vs. Quinn that allows some public sector workers to opt out of paying union dues. The opinion, written by Justice Samuel Alito, was 5-4. The majority held that some employees don’t have to pay union dues, even though they enjoy the benefits negotiated by the union. But the decision left intact the unions’ right to bargain collectively.
Here are the reactions of the leaders of the two major teachers’ unions.
The NEA and Dennis Van Roekel released this statement:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 30, 2014
WASHINGTON—The Supreme Court of the United States today struck another blow against working families with its narrow 5-4 decision in Harris v. Quinn when it eliminated agency fee arrangements for Illinois home healthcare workers. By casting doubt on case law that has been settled for decades, the Court’s ruling also creates insecurity and instability for employers and unions throughout the public sector. Harris v. Quinn was brought by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (NRTW), a political group whose extreme agenda seeks to weaken the power of working people.
At issue in the case was whether non-union members could reap the wages, benefits and protections negotiated in a collectively bargained contract without needing to pay their fair share. The National Education Association, joined by California Teachers Association and Change to Win, filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court to expose the truly radical nature of NRTW’s arguments and underscore their audacious claim that public-sector collective bargaining itself is constitutionally suspect.
“Quality public services, economic stability and prosperity starts with strong unions, but today the Supreme Court of the United States created a roadblock on that path to the American Dream. This ruling jeopardizes a proven method for raising the quality of home health care services—namely, allowing home health care workers to join together in a strong union that can bargain for increased wages, affordable health care and increased training.
“Americans count on quality public services provided by public employees like educators. We need workplaces, including public schools, where front-line employees have a voice. Today’s decision shuts the door on one proven method for ensuring that public sector workers’ voices are heard. At a time when we are just starting to dig out of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, we should be creating an economy that works for all of us—not taking radical steps that undermine the rights of public workers while creating uncertainty and instability in the workplace.
“As a high school teacher and coach for 23 years, I saw how the entire team benefited when we all worked together. With today’s ruling, the Supreme Court took away the fairness and camaraderie that comes with working in a team. Agency fees are a common-sense, straight-forward way to ensure fairness and protect equity and individual rights. Every educator who enjoys the benefits and protections of a negotiated contract should, in fairness, contribute to maintaining the contract. And fair share simply makes sure that all educators share the cost of negotiations for benefits that all educators enjoy, regardless of whether they are association members.
“Despite today’s decision, we know that public sector workers will continue to organize—in public sector bargaining states and non-bargaining states, in agency fee states and right to work states—because public sector workers know that a union is the best way for all of us to ensure good schools, quality public services and economic prosperity.”
# # #
The AFT and Randi Weingarten released this statement:
For Immediate Release
June 30, 2014
AFT President Randi Weingarten on the Harris v. Quinn Decision
WASHINGTON—Statement from American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten on the Harris v. Quinn decision. Today’s Harris v. Quinn decision upholds the right of public sector unions to represent public employees, including their right to collectively bargain, but the Supreme Court refused to extend the right for a union to collect fair share fees for that purpose from Illinois home healthcare workers who are not members.
“While the court upheld the importance of collective bargaining and unions to families and communities, let’s be clear that working people, who have aspired to the middle class and tried to make a better life for their families, have taken it on the chin for years. Stagnating wages, loss of pensions and lack of upward mobility have defined the economic distress they have experienced. Today’s decision makes it worse.
“The Roberts court has consistently ruled in favor of corporate interests, while diminishing the rights of labor. This court has built a record of weakening the rights of both voters and working families; no one should be surprised by this decision.
“America’s workers have gone through the crucible of tough times and adversity—that’s why they formed America’s labor movement. Workers did not start off with their rights being protected by government. We had to—and still must—organize ourselves, our families and others to secure good jobs, great public schools, prosperous communities and opportunity for all. While disappointed in the court’s decision, the American Federation of Teachers will do what we have always done: redouble our efforts to empower and engage our members around the issues they care about and the work they do, and to serve as a strong voice for our communities, our democracy and opportunity for all.”
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Diane Ravitch's blog 
Here’s the super-cool celebrity line-up at the charter school conference today:
Campbell Brown and Eric Cantor! Oh, and Frank Luntz to advise on “messaging” I suppose. As you can see, it’s packed with education experts.
I bet a cheer went up in that room when the court ruled against unions.
http://www.publiccharters.org/involved/conference-2014/
88-90% of charters are non-union. Teachers have no rights. Teacher turnover is high.
Oh, I know. I followed the case where the Chicago charter did everything but claim they were a church to avoid their employees organizing.
Turns out, they’re private contractors according to the NLRB.
“The most recent fight between charter teachers and administrators is under way at Chicago Math and Science Academy on the North Side. Teachers at the widely acclaimed school have formed a union under Illinois law, but the administration has refused to begin negotiating a contract.
Academy administrators agree that teachers have a right to organize and bargain collectively but say they are not obligated to negotiate with the union because Chicago Math and Science Academy is private and falls under federal — not state — labor laws, according to a statement read at a recent meeting of the academy’s board.
Union leaders contend that because the school receives more than 80 percent of its financial support from public sources, the administration is obligated to recognize the union.”
They “agree” they have a right (which is real generous of them, since it’s federal law) they just don’t want to allow them to exercise that right.
Then, Diane, perhaps charters should unionize. Even Mr. Joe Nathan has been open minded to this idea . . . .
Joseph, please chime in . . . . .
“On Monday, the Supreme Court of the United States sided with the right to work movement and weakened the ability of hundreds of thousands of U.S. domestic workers to collectively bargain for higher wages. In its 5-4 ruling on Harris v. Quinn, the Court held it is a violation of the First Amendment for the state of Illinois to assess dues on home care workers for the purposes of paying for collective bargaining efforts. This decision affects the several states who have in-home care programs like Illinois’s program, including California, Oregon, Washington, Massachusetts, and Missouri.
And in its holding, the Court is analyzing the First Amendment in a way that further entrenches the notion that domestic work is not “real” work. It is a blow to significant progress made by the domestic workers’ movement and public sector unions to show that domestic labor is indeed real labor, worthy of the same economic protections as other work.”
What a proud day, huh?
Is this one “for the children”? I can’t tell.
“And in its holding, the Court is analyzing the First Amendment in a way that further entrenches the notion that domestic work is not “real” work.”
I don’t follow this. How does the Court’s analysis entrench the notion that domestic work isn’t real work?
By claiming that they are only half state workers since they work in a home and not a traditional workplace even though the state pays them and regulates their work. In other words, they aren’t “real” state employees and their work is not “real” work that qualifies for collective bargaining regulation.
Ah, I see. I agree that the opinion is saying they’re not real state employees, but I don’t see how it follows that their work isn’t real work. But thanks for explaining the reasoning.
I’m not sure what else we should expect from a Corporations Are The Only Persons and Money Is The Only Speech sort of Supreme Court.
Perhaps there should be an amendment to laws, if you are part of the union or agency, you get the agency contract, if not, negotiate your own contract. Here in Nevada we actually had the right wing think tanks advocating this and telling us that good teachers could negotiate a better contract. I’d love to see the young know it all super teachers see what kind of bargain the district would give them.
Oh, you have young know it all teachers in Nevada. A TFA, who is leaving was given the task of interviewing my replacement. She just completed her second and last year of teaching.
Since these brilliant workers won the right to not pay their fair share to the unions I think they also need to give up the rights that unions won for them in their contracts.
Time to end the 5 day work week, 8 hour day, sick leave, holidays, vacation time, minimum wage, etc. They can negotiate their own schedules with their employers who already pay them well below the poverty line. Good luck being on your own!
And they need to individually negotiate their own pay and benefits, so states like Maine and Wisconsin, where state legislators want to abolish the child labor laws, can offer to pay you 50 cents an hour or threaten to give your job to a 12-year old who will work for 25 cents an hour, 7 days a week, 12 hours a day.
Sexual harassment? Better keep your mouth shut or look for other work. They’ve got the Supreme Court on their side — remember THEY paid for your case and they OWN you now.
Those southern legislators who always talk about the glories of slavery are salivating now. They have prison laborers available through the for-profit prison system. Now they can figure out how to eliminate pay altogether — company scrip instead — when they succeed at destroying the unions once and for all.
Wage theft? They are already getting away with it at WalMart and other megacorps. Pay women less than men? Again, corporations are people with more rights than you so shut up and smile.
No more OSHA — if your employer tells you to much out the nuclear waste drums without gloves or goggles, you must do it. After all, you are “free” to find other paid work.
And if your employer claims that his religion doesn’t like what you do on your own time you can be fired no questions asked. No more having to hire godless heathens and LGBT folks.
We are living the conservative dream — dystopian oligarchical fascism.
We are little more than peasants now.
We are fast becoming the new India! Pakistan! and China! USA! USA! USA!
“Time to end the 5 day work week, 8 hour day, sick leave, holidays, vacation time, minimum wage, etc. They can negotiate their own schedules with their employers who already pay them well below the poverty line. ”
Charter schools got that covered and it’s all for the children. See:
http://edushyster.com/?p=3609
unions would not be necessary if the leaders and administrators were held to some standards of fairness and decency. But the labor history of the US is not one of fairness and decency. Quite the opposite, with pictures of child labor and workers covered in grime and exhausted, teachers not allowed to marry or date. Workers had strikes where there very lives were in danger and they lasted it out to win the 5 day workweek, sick days, decent wages and benefits. Greed doesn’t seem to have abated in the least, and the billionaires still don’t get it. They made that money on the back of workers, and teachers taught them how to read and think, and instead of giving back they strike back. To me it’s a spiritual issue. Just plain spiritual immaturity to think you don’t have to give back and take care of those who have helped you along the way. Not everyone can be a CEO, not everyone can be a billionaire, some people need to fix the pipes, make the tv sets, and do the paper work of business and teaching the kids. Is there some kind of joy in denigrating those people who keep the machinery of our society well oiled humming and running? Evidently there is. But I envision a nationwide or at least state wide strike of enormous proportions if this chipping away at the strength of unions persists and believe me I will be there shouting at the top of my lungs. I did it in LA often and I’ll do it again.
Well said, julie. History tells lots of interesting stories about what happens to the people with this level of hubris and narcissistic greed.
“Is there some kind of joy in denigrating those people who keep the machinery of our society well oiled humming and running? Evidently there is.”
Julie, you made me think of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis…
Yes, the conditions of labor in US history were so terrible that millions and millions of workers left the US to find opportunity in other countries.
You might want to educate yourself on the actual history of labor.
In my home state of WV dozens and dozens of workers died to end the exploitation of the mine bosses who paid them in scrip that could only be spent in the company store and gave them no rights whatsoever.
The labor movement has a long and storied history and has been supported by great and small, including the Roman Catholic Church, Martin Luther King, Jr., Abraham Lincoln, and even Ronald Reagan:
““Where free unions and collective bargaining are forbidden, freedom is lost.” ~Ronald Reagan”
Educate yourself and maybe you won’t be so prone to embarrass yourself by making ridiculous comments here over and over again.
Public sector unions, who negotiate with the very people to whom they make political donations, are quite different from private sector unions Chris.
Seems bizarre to me that anyone could seriously argue that someone must pay dues to an organization s/he doesn’t belong to as a condition of employment.
If your field is unionized, you belong to it by default because you benefit from what the union has negotiated. Teachers have contracts that set their pay, benefits and other working conditions. All teachers benefit from that. Why should any teacher not have to contribute toward the union that negotiated that?
You’re not necessarily a member, and this case was about non-members. Justify it all you want, but the bottom line is that you are trying to force people to pay dues to an organization to which they don’t belong for services they did not request.
Fine, Jack. Go negotiate your own contract and benefits with management, relinquishing all rights to the laws passed with union support over the last 100 years.
And keep a fire extinguisher handy. Triangle Shirtwaist Factory days are coming back thanks to attitudes like yours!
It’s pretty simple because maybe that individual does not agree to what was negotiated on behalf of its members and therefore should not be obligated to pay the dues. I will elaborate; my union negotiated pay raises of roughly $2000 per teacher this year. Everyone was so excited about this, but as usual the devil is in the details.What they did was reduce the dollar amount of several incentives that are provided to teachers for taking on extra duties beyond their normal scope of work. For example, I teach an extra period beyond my required workload that is calculated by contract at 1/6 of the employees base salary which in my case equates to exactly $7600. Our wonderful so called union in collusion with the district negotiated a flat rate payout of $6,000 for all teachers taking on these extra duties. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that if you grant me a raise of $2000 and reduce my supplement payout by $1600 you really provided me with a raise of $400. All of this after 6 six years of no raises at all and union membership fees of $800 per year. Thanks but no thanks! They also made high school teachers teach an extra period for free by changing the high school schedule from 6 to 7 periods. This was eventually challenged in court and the judge sided with the teachers and ordered that they be payed for the extra period that they taught. Here’s the kicker though the Union “negotiated” with the District and allotted them a time frame of 5 years to repay the teachers for the flat out robbery they forced upon them. This is ludicrous! These criminals are obviously in bed with each other and sadly many are still too ignorant to see the writing on the wall. These crooks are robbing Peter to pay Paul. It is a shell game plain and simple. Our Unions have been compromised for many many years now and I for one refuse to fund the corruption. You should really stop attacking individuals and think before you post because you really cast a picture of yourself that reflects an unintelligent and bitter individual; especially when someone disagrees with your opinions which are in many cases illogical and misguided.
Harlan Underhill is doing a jig, madly giggling, cavorting all over the landscape with joy in his heart. The right wingers won’t be happy until they have turned the USA into a 100% right to work (for less) nation from coast to coast, top to bottom.
Seems bizarre to me that anyone could seriously argue that someone must reap the benefits that the unions fight for and win without making any contribution to said union. Hey, if you hate unions so much, start your own business or work for a non union shop like Walmart or Target.
First of all, that’s a pretty slippery slope. There are all kinds of groups that win “benefits” for all of us (whether a particular person likes said benefits or not) all the time. Should we all be required to pay dues to all such organizations, even when we didn’t ask the union to fight for anything? Might get kind of expensive.
Second, the case in question involves the public sector. Are you suggesting that the plaintiff in this case should be forced to move to a different state to escape the dues requirement?
Meant to say: “…even when didn’t ask the organization to fight for anything?”
The plaintiff in this case is being paid by the state to stay home and take care of her son. If she doesn’t want the benefits of the union contract then she can stop accepting government handouts and pull up her bootstraps and care for her son by earning money herself.
That’s the Tea Party/Conservative/Republican argument in a nutshell, Oops, she’s white Christian middle class though; the majority of people who will be harmed by this ruling are women of color who fought very hard for the right to collectively bargain for better pay.
Typical Tea Party (keep your hands off my Medicare/Social Security benefits you government moochers!), conservative (the ends always justify the means — if I can get something for nothing, it’s not stealing it it I say it isn’t), and Republican (To hell with the workers! If they have to work they are poor and therefore they are losers who don’t matter anyway!) rhetoric, Jack Talbot.
“The plaintiff in this case is being paid by the state to stay home and take care of her son.”
Priscilla, what are you basing that statement on? Both you and WT (and maybe others) have said it, so I assume you’re looking at something I’m not looking at.
That’s pretty weak tea, Priscilla, no pun intended. If the state entitles this woman to receive pay for caring for her mother, there is no reason she should have to pay dues to a union she is not a member of and had nothing to do with.
As for “hurting minority women”… yikes, is there not anything safe from the race card these days? Said minority women are free to continue paying their dues and fighting for whatever, same as they did before.
I can name any number of organizations that “fight for the rights of all Americans” (according to them) every day. Maybe we should all be forced to pay dues to them.
Jack – it was *because* of the unions that this mother is entitled to collect state money for caring for her own son.
I don’t believe the state law in question was created at the behest of the union. If you have a source saying otherwise, that would be interesting to see. Even if that is the case, however, it doesn’t change the central problem with this coercive line of thinking. Anything to protect union power, I guess.
The key interest in this analysis isn’t the non-union members’ interests, or the union’s interests, but the government’s interest. If the government’s interest is compelling enough, it can enforce laws that have coercive effects, even if the coercive effects include restrictions on First Amendment rights. The key constitutional question, therefore, is what is the government interest behind laws like this? The answer (see the Abood decision) is a question of economics.
There is a video interview with the plaintiff on her lawyers website that she did for Fox “News” (of course it was Fox), FLERP!
When I am allowed a voice at the table I will contribute. Why have I never received a raise that is higher than the unions annual dues? It seems to me that my union is failing on all fronts especially in its main objective of bargaining for fair wages. It’s attitudes like yours that have kept the wages of our profession flat for many years now by demanding that an individual pay into something that continues to yield pathetic results year after year without questioning it or demanding some accountability. Teachers need to form their own Unions plain and simple! Look up the Broward County Teachers pay scale and then tell me if you would want to be a part of that union? I’ve been teaching 13 years and make less than 2 grand more than a beginning teacher. As a union or a representative of such, I would be embarrassed at this compensation model that they agreed to. Bye the way who stated that I hate unions? I’m just looking for a real union not one disguised under the premise of one.
Here’s a counter-point from a non-“fair share” person:
I have strong moral and social/political objections to the NEA, our districts choice of national teacher union. I will not give them a penny for the agenda they espouse, particularly the social & political agenda that has nothing to do with teachers in the classroom in particular and nothing to do with with education in general. I have the moral and constitutional rights to object and to withhold my personal funding for things with which I have these strong objections.
I also have very strong political and minor ethical objections to our state’s organization that represents teachers. I refuse to fund the administratively top-heavy, unresponsive machine that most certainly does not represent me or my interests.
I DO support my local bargaining unit. I stand behind the workers and negotiators in my district. They have, at times, been far too adversarial in their relationship to district administration, but even so, I have supported their efforts.
Each year (22+) I explained my objections to members of the local association and the building rep. I have offered to sit on committees, participate in issue education, and perform other member functions. I have served on many committees and served the school and community in union with the local association. I have offered to pay dues equivalents directly to the local association, withholding funds from the state and national associations. Local dues were well under $100, but the state and local brought the total up to over $450 in t5he early years to just under $1,000 more recently. I was offering to pay the entire amount to the local association. This has been rejected. (Over a period of 22+ years, no one seemed to figure out how to work this out.) Somewhere over the years, my state (Indiana) actually made it unlawful for me to join only one unit and forego the other two.
I did, in fact, negotiate my own first contract with the district. After that, I fell into the pay lanes established before I got there and rode them out until I maxed the pay scale for my experience and education…still offering to pay fair share to the local association along the way.
At first, things seemed to be OK, but on the last 5 years, I was turned down for committees for which I volunteered, passed over for in-school improvement efforts that had input by the local association, and essentially placed into a category of “scab.”
This was the advice of the state association and followed by the local association.
Fine. Now you don’t get my freely offered service, my physical help, my experience in policy analysis and policy education, or my “dues.”
I tried.
After the first couple years of rejecting my money, I started sending the entire yearly dues equivalent (for local, state, and national) to a school in Port au Ciel, Haiti that paid the entire SALARY of one of the teachers for most of a YEAR. Actually, four like-minded teachers from different districts supported the full salaries for three Haitian teachers at that school-with our annual union “dues.” I think my money was much better spent educating children than on the 6-figure salaries of the state bargaining officials. (Until I wrote this today, only my closest friends knew that I was doing this. I wanted to avoid a “look at me” kind of thing and the accusation of self-pride that would follow from my more cynical union friends.)
i can’t imagine why a union would reject the offers of seating an anti-union person on their steering committees. Imagine that!
“I have strong moral and social/political objections to the NEA”
Yet you expected to be allowed to be involved in the running of that morally and socially objectionable organization because you supported the local affiliate?
That’s some powerful spin there!
If NEA is going to keep the majority of its members, it is now going to be forced to represent only issues of pay, benefits, and working conditions. All of the other issues will create an environment where a member will say something like “I do not believe in abortion rights or gays rights or some other issue” and they will opt-out because they will still get the benefit of any negotiation for better pay or better health benefits or smaller class sizes and save $1000 a year. The Billionaire Boys club have hired the Best Law firms in the world and they own the Not supreme court, so there are few options and the possible options may lead to another repeat of past experiences that this country had hoped never happen again. I am praying for my grandchildren and I believe all of the 99% should do the same. All employees are now At Will workers.
Just to be clear, this ruling was very narrow and does not give teachers, at this point anyway, the option to opt out of their unions. This ruling applies solely to home healthcare workers.
Of course, I’ll be the first to agree that this ruling sets the stage for subsequent rulings against unions.
Many states allow teachers to not be members of their unions, and there are even alternate groups set up to provide professional development, liability insurance, etc., and yet the NEA lives on in those states. If the unions offer benefits people value, they will pay the dues. If not, they won’t.
You are saying that the free speech rights of the NEA should be limited and reduced?
Again, if you hate unions so much, then work at a private school, non union religious school or the non union charter schools. Or move to the many non union states or right to work states in which unions have been gutted and made powerless and irrelevant. Or go back to school and get enough education to become a hedge fund billionaire, the next Koch brother or the next Eli Broad. Stop your anti-union whining, grousing and carping. No body forces you to work at a union shop. If the majority of the workers want a union then their voice should be heard. The union haters should pay some kind of dues because they are reaping higher wages, better benefits and better/safer workplace conditions. Or do they enjoy being leeches, freeloaders and de facto scabs. There’s no excuse, there are an over abundance of non union jobs at which they can find employment. The union haters are hypocrites on steroids.
Let’s take this to the next step. If there is a union shop in a business that represents that businesses workers and some of those workers refuse to pay union dues, then those workers should be paid whatever the boss wants to pay them as long as it is at last minimum wage with no benefits.
In other words, only dues paying union members get the wages and benefits that labor unions negotiate.
Imagine that, one worker doing the same job as another worker in the same shop would be paid minimum wage without health care or retirement benefits while the union dues paying member doing the same job is paid two to three times as much with health care and retirement.
People shouldn’t have to do anything they don’t want to do, ever. If they have an election and they lose, they should run immediately to a court and exempt themselves from the results, too.
Because it’s all about “choice” and the heck with the effect on anyone else.
“People shouldn’t have to do anything they don’t want to do, ever.”
I don’t want to pay taxes. because I don’t want America to be starting wars all over the world and paying for those wars with one penny of taxes that came from me.
I don’t want women to be treated like second class citizens. I want the Equal Rights Amendment passed.
I don’t want to pay the water bill. I don’t want to pay the phone bill. I don’t want to pay for the food I eat. I want the home owners insurance and car insurance to be free.
Your statement says if no one wants to work and everyone wants to be homeless, that’s okay. If a child grows up and doesn’t want to work, and he expects his parents to support him until they are both dead, then the child should get what he wants.
What about the parents? If the parents decide the throw their son out of the house and disown him at age ten because he refuses to put out the trash, that’s okay.
In the real world, people usually do things they don’t want to do because that’s what it takes to pay the rent, buy food, etc. In fact, surveys have revealed that 80% of working adults don’t like their jobs. They should all quit and become homeless and eat out of trash cans, but then if everyone does what they want, there might not be anyone to buy food that ends up in trash cans. Empty trashcans will feed no one.
Reality is a harsh square shape and idealism is round and doesn’t fit into the real world. In the real world, when one person refuses to do something because he doesn’t want to, then another person has to do it even if that person doesn’t want to do—someone has to clean the toilets and put out the trash.
Life is a trade off. Most people will do what they don’t want to do so they can afford to do what they want to do.
This argument goes back to the child who shouts, “You didn’t ask me if I wanted to be born.”
But obviously if the non-union wage was less than what the union contract required than the employer wuold only hire non-union workers. For union contracts to work the employer’s ability to hire non-union workers has to be greatly restricted. That is one has to have a union shop..
True.
There is one area that I think we might agree on about China. In China, every worker automatically belongs to a labor union. It doesn’t work perfectly, but jobs come with contracts and those contracts spell out in detail how workers can be fired and if the employer breaks that contract by firing a workers without cause as spelled out in detail in the contract, the worker and the union will take the employer to court for compensation.
So in China, the workforce that works above the table is supposed to be protected with a form of due process. If you work below the table, those protections may not apply.
And because the labor unions are linked to the central government, when the CCP decides it’s time to raise the minimum wage, no lobbying from corporations and billionaires will stop them because they don’t have to worry about running for reelection as the leaders are appointed within the 80 million member CCP through the Politburo—currently seven man committee that rules by consensus. The Politburo operates similar to the U.S. Electoral College in deciding who will be the next president. There is corruption in the CCP but most of that corruption is in the provinces and not the top leadership.
The CCP has announced they will increase the minimum wage by 10% in 2014. Because the minimum wage has been climbing the last few years, U.S. manufactures have been moving to Vietnam or bringing their operations back to the states.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-06/china-wages-seen-jumping-in-2014-amid-shift-to-services-.html
FLERP!
June 30, 2014 at 4:44 pm
The key interest in this analysis isn’t the non-union members’ interests, or the union’s interests, but the government’s interest. If the government’s interest is compelling enough, it can enforce laws that have coercive effects, even if the coercive effects include restrictions on First Amendment rights. The key constitutional question, therefore, is what is the government interest behind laws like this? The answer (see the Abood decision) is a question of economics.
The government’s interest in home health care instead of nursing home care is to save money on Medicaid.
That’s why the workers said they’re in the same position as nursing home workers. Because they are.
It’s just appalling to me that a policy decision that was made to 1. save money on Medicaid and 2. grant disabled people the ability to stay in their own homes, was then used as a cudgel to bust up the union of some of the hardest working people on the planet.
ANYTHING can be twisted to take a shot at unions. Anything. Replacing nursing home care with home health aides? Now’s my opportunity to mount my personal anti-labor crusade!
I also love how they lose an election and run immediately to a court. So much for democratic process.