INSIDE “today is the control of their own government.”€¦ · Five Gateway Center Pittsburgh,...

I N T E R N AT I O N A L E X E C U T I V E B O A R D

Leo W. GerardInternational President

Stan JohnsonInt’l. Secretary-Treasurer

Thomas M. ConwayInt’l. Vice President

(Administration)

Fred RedmondInt’l. Vice President

(Human Affairs)

Ken NeumannNat’l. Dir. for Canada

Jon GeenenInt’l. Vice President

Gary BeeversInt’l. Vice President

Carol LandryVice President at Large

D I R E C T O R S

David R. McCall, District 1

Michael Bolton, District 2

Stephen Hunt, District 3

William J. Pienta, District 4

Daniel Roy, District 5

Wayne Fraser, District 6

Jim Robinson, District 7

Ernest R. “Billy” Thompson, District 8

Daniel Flippo, District 9

John DeFazio, District 10

Robert Bratulich, District 11

Robert LaVenture, District 12

J.M. “Mickey” Breaux, District 13

C O M M U N I C AT I O N S S TA F F :

Jim McKay, EditorWayne Ranick, Director of CommunicationsGary Hubbard, Director of Public Affairs, Washington, D.C.Aaron Hudson and Kenny Carlisle, Designers Lynne Baker, Jim Coleman, Deb Davidek, Gerald Dickey, Connie Mabin, Tony Montana, Scott Weaver, Barbara White Stack

Contributors: Norm Garcia

Official publication of the United Steelworkers

Direct inquiries and articles for USW@Work to:United Steelworkers Communications Department

Five Gateway CenterPittsburgh, PA 15222phone 412-562-2400

fax 412-562-2445online: www.usw.org

Volume 06/No.2 Special Issue 2011

USW@Work (ISSN 1931-6658) is published four times a year by the United Steelworkers AFL-CIO•CLC Five Gateway Center, Pittsburgh, PA 15222. Subscriptions to non-members: $12 for one year; $20 for two years. Periodicals postage paid at Pittsburgh, PA and additional mailing offices.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to: USW@Work, USW Membership Department, 3340 Perimeter Hill Drive, Nashville, TN 37211

Copyright 2011 by United Steelworkers, AFL-CIO•CLC. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the written consent of the United Steelworkers.

F E AT U R E SSpeaking Out

O N T H E C O V E RCover illustration by Fred Carlson03

I N S I D EU S W @ W O R KThe great issue before the American people today is the control of their own government.“ ”Robert La Follette

1912, Former Wisconsin Governor and Senator

WHAT DEMOCRACy LOOKS LIKESteelworkers are standing shoulder to shoulder with other workers from Wisconsin to Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Pennsylvania and beyond to fight the growing assault on workers.

RIGHT TO FREELOADRight to Work legislation being pushed in several states isn’t what it sounds. The correct name for the legislation should be Right to Freeload. It en-ables workers benefiting from union negotiations to shirk paying their fair share of the cost.

WE’RE NOT THE PROBLEMYou can blame Wall Street, global capital and bad trade deals for our economic mess. But don’t blame workers and their unions. Yet that is what’s happening in state capitols across the country.

STAND AND FIGHTThe attack on workers’ rights is coordinated, well-funded and coming from many directions. The future of the middle class is at stake. We must stand and fight back.

04 08

12 14

2 U S W @ Wo r k • S p e c i a l I s s u e 2 0 1 1

USW active and retired members and their

families are invited to “speak out” on these

pages. Letters should be short and to the point. We reserve the right to

edit for length.

Mail to:USW@Work

Five Gateway Center, Pittsburgh PA 15222

or e-mail:[email protected]

U S W @ Wo r k • S p e c i a l I s s u e 2 0 1 1 3

Paid for by the Working ClassTax breaks for the rich, paid for by the working

class. Bailouts for the rich, paid for by the work-ing class. Bonuses for executives, paid for by the working class. Corporate subsidies, paid for by the working class. “Shared sacrifice,” paid for by the working class. Notice a pattern here?

Alvin Blanton, AK Steel retireeCatlettsburg, Ky.

Shame on Them!How do the Republicans think their benefits

will be paid for if we keep losing our paychecks and jobs? What happened to the president’s help for the middle class and under-privileged Ameri-cans? All I see is help for banks and politicians helping themselves to my family’s money. Shame on them!

Rick Wood, Local 715LWoodburn, Ind.

Born to be UnionWhy am I standing and fighting against at-

tempts to destroy workers’ rights? I was conceived union. I was born union. I am union.

Nancy Wood Nicholas, Local 12751Elkhart, Ind.

A Fight for All UnionsThis is a fight for all unions and I believe for

everyone. This (assault on workers) will hurt the economy by getting rid of the middle class. The unions have always fought for fair wages and af-fordable benefits. Without the middle class, there is no economy.

In Ohio, controversial Senate Bill 5, which is designed to restrict collective bargaining by state employees, is not about the money. It’s about get-ting rid of the opposition.

That has been the Republicans’ agenda all along. They want to take all our rights away - rights that our great grandparents and grandparents fought for.

Glen Dunaway, President Local 735Cleveland, Ohio

Preserve Our FutureI am a proud USW retired member and mayor

who believes we all must fight for the future of the middle class and our country.

I have been glued to the USW’s Facebook page to get information and updates and found this quote posted there very interesting:

“We must close union offices, confiscate their money and put their leaders in prison. We must reduce workers’ salaries and take away their right to strike.” That was said by Adolf Hitler in 1933 but you could guess it was from one of today’s anti-worker politicians!

John Veer, Mayor of Strawberry, Ark.Retired, Local 745, Freeport, Ill.

We Stand Strong TogetherUnited, we stand strong. God bless the union

worker!Russell Hamilton, Local 7-1 Whiting, Ind.

Stand with Unions or LoseUnions have always fought for the working

people...union or not! Because of unions, more workers enjoy paid holidays, paid vacations, 40-hour work weeks and whatever hourly wage you are making. Even the minimum wage was raised because unions fought for it. Stand with the unions or lose what little you have left. CEOs and their politician buddies are slowly chipping it away.

LuAnn Wright, Local 1538Salem, Ohio

Working Families Under AttackThis is an attack on working families every-

where, regardless of your home country. Anyone who believes this won’t spread like wildfire has their heads buried in the sand.

Unity, Solidarity and Strength will bring us Victory.

This is history in the making and we have every opportunity to make sure that we are the gen-eration that stood up and said, ‘We are not going to take anymore from this government!

Chad Young, President Local 7580South Porcupine, Ontario, Canada

We Must Fight BackIt looks like we have a lot of work ahead of us.

We are under attack and must fight back with all means available to us.

Arthur J. Boudreaux, Local 13-447Luling, La.

Editor’s note: We asked visitors to the USW’s online Facebook page to let us know what they think about the ongoing attacks against the middle class. A selection of their comments follow. You are wel-come to join the conversation. To get started, please “like” the USW’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/steelworkers.


An attack on one is an attack on

all and we can’t let Wall Street

get away with it.Leo W. Gerard

Leo W. Gerard stands with District 2 Director Michael Bolton, left, and International Vice President Tom Conway at a rally in Madison, Wis.

Photo by Elizabeth Laux

“

”

A joke spreading through cyberspace goes something like this: “A CEO, a Tea

Party member and a union worker are sitting around a table. In the center sits a tray holding a dozen freshly baked cookies. The CEO quickly snatches 11 of the cookies, points to the Tea Partier and says, ‘Watch out for that union thug. He’s trying to steal your cookie.’”

Laughable? Yes. But it should also make you angry because it’s not just funny, it’s true.

From Wisconsin to Ohio to Indiana, Michigan, Pennsylvania and beyond, corporate conservatives and the politicians who support them are coming after American workers, trying to finance their tax breaks and other wish lists for the rich with our hard-earned dollars.

“This assault is being disguised as budget balancing, cost cutting and government shrinking, but it’s really an attempt to bust unions and destroy the middle class,” said International President Leo W. Gerard. “Our elected officials should be focused on creat-ing jobs, but instead they’re intent on punishing families and bailing out the ultra-rich. This is wrong and every single one of us needs to stand and fight.”

USW members, retirees, families and supporters have been doing just that: packing rallies across the country, sleeping on the marble floors at the Wisconsin Capitol, speaking out for workers in the media and lobbying

lawmakers on behalf of workers everywhere.

“This is a critical time. We have to ensure that we’re educating each and every member about these fights. Every local needs to have a well-operating Rapid Response program to make sure that updates and information are being shared – and that we’re ready to go as action is needed,” said Rapid Response Director Kim Miller. “There has never been a more important time to build or rebuild these networks at our locals.”

Americans are waking upThe attack on workers’ rights to

collectively bargain and freely associ-ate with unions comes as GOP-led legislatures nationwide gouge budgets – cutting everything from education and health care for sick and poor chil-dren to slashing funding for retraining programs for workers displaced by unfair trade deals. These cuts come as businesses and the rich get tax breaks and other benefits.

Nationwide, hundreds of thousands

of working Americans and students have shown their disgust for this over-reaching. In some states such as Wisconsin, where the Republican governor and lawmakers targeted the bargaining rights of public employees, voters are begin-ning recall efforts against elected officials.

“Tax breaks for the rich, paid for by the working class. Bailouts for the rich, paid for by the working class. Bonuses for execu-tives, paid for by the work-ing class. Corporate subsi-dies, paid for by the working

class. ‘Shared sacrifice,’ paid for by the working class. Notice a pattern here?” said USW retiree Alvin Blanton of Catlettsburg, Ky. “Enough is enough.”

Local 7-669 member Lindsey Horn, who is among the members locked out for nearly a year from the Honeywell uranium processing plant in Metropo-lis, Ill., agreed.

“Stand and fight? Hell yes” she wrote on the USW Facebook page. “It is time for a labor revolution, to recall government officials and fire greedy corporations for padding their own pockets from the sweat off our backs.”

“It’s about dismantling the middle class in America. That’s what this fight’s about,” said International Vice President Tom Conway. “It’s not just Madison or public employees. This re-ally is all Americans beginning to say, ‘This country has been misdirected for far too long, and we’re sick of it. We’re not going to do this anymore. We’re going to turn it around.’”


Editor’s Note: The attack on workers’ rights

raging through our country is coordinated, well-

funded and coming from many directions. The

future of the middle class is at stake. This special

edition of USW@Work lays out what’s happening

and why, and most importantly, what you can do

to fight it. This is one of those moments that will

define us. Will we make history, or be history?


Blame Wall StreetConservatives continuously and

wrongly try to blame teachers, firefight-ers, police officers, Steelworkers and other workers for the nation’s budget problems, but as “Inside Job” movie director Charles Ferguson said at the recent Academy Awards, “Three years after a horrific financial crisis caused by massive fraud, not a single finan-cial executive has gone to jail. And that’s wrong.”

Besides the financial meltdown caused by Wall Street in 2008 that left millions unemployed and our nation still recovering, some of the country’s wealthiest companies are not paying their fair share of taxes, causing big revenue problems for our state, local and federal governments.

“This nationwide attack on workers is being financed by Wall Street and cor-porate executives – the very people and companies who created our economic

crisis in the first place. We don’t have a spending crisis in this country. We have a revenue crisis because the wealthy want to have their cake and eat it, too, while leaving nothing for workers,” Gerard said.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) found that corporate tax revenues are now at historical lows as a share of the economy, at a time when the nation faces deficits and debt that are expected to grow to unsustain-able levels.

CBPP noted, “the corporate tax now contributes considerably less to fed-eral revenues than it once did: between 2000 and 2009, 10.7 percent of federal revenues were collected through the corporate tax, down from 29.8 percent of revenues in the 1950s.”

Using loopholes and tax breaks, many corporations, including Boeing, General Electric, and Wells Fargo, have paid nothing to the U.S. government in recent years. Other corporations, like Google, Pfizer, and Coca-Cola

dramatically lower their effective tax rates, often by 20 points or more. Ac-cording to the Government Accountabil-ity Office, Citigroup has 427 subsid-iaries in identified tax havens, while Bank of America has 115, Morgan Stanley has 273, and Goldman Sachs has 29.

“It’s about priorities,” Gerard said. “Do we want governments that bail out multibillion-dollar corporations and let them get away with not paying taxes while the rest of us are left holding the bill for our schools, essential services and other needs? Or will we demand that our elected officials stop blaming ordi-nary, tax-paying workers for our troubles? We must stop using the money mess Wall Street created as an excuse to bust unions – the only entity left to stand up to corporations


and give workers a voice at work.”The next time you hear politicians

or some Fox television host blame workers and unions for our nation’s troubles, consider these facts from CBPP:

• Corporate taxes as a percent of the gross domestic product are at historical lows. Mean-while, corporate profits per employee are the highest on record.

• The top 1 percent of the popu-lation had 17.1 percent of the total after-tax income in 2009, the highest figure for at least 30 years.

• Workers’ wages have been stagnant or falling for at least 30 years.

“An attack on one is an attack on all and we can’t let Wall Street get away with it,” Gerard said. “We must keep up the pressure, keep standing up against this corporate agenda and keep fighting for our future.”

We constantly share information on legislative actions, rallies, as well as news important to members and families on our various online networks. Visit www.usw.org and click on the social media graphic for

a step-by-step guide on how to join the conversation. You’ll also find a library of videos recapping various USW appearances on media, at rallies and other

events. If you missed them the first time, catch up online at: www.usw.org/videos.

• Call the District Rapid Response coordinator at your district office to help start or get information about a local program. (or find your coordi-nator online: www.usw.org/rapidresponse).

• Sign up for the Rapid Response e-mail list by sending your name, local and contact information to: [email protected].

• Join the Rapid Response texting program by texting uswrapid to 69866.

It’s not just Madison or public em-ployees. This really is all Americans beginning to say, ‘This country has been misdirected for far too long,

and we’re sick of it. We’re not going to do this anymore. We’re going to

turn it around.Tom Conway

“

”

International Secretary-Treasurer Stan Johnson and International Vice President Fred Redmond participate in a Wisconsin rally.Photo by Scott Weaver


As tens of thousands of protes-tors converged on Madison, Wis. to fight Republican Gov. Scott Walker’s assault

on public workers, voices frequently rose above the din, demanding, “Tell me what democracy looks like!”

The large but peaceful crowd replied in rhythmic unison: “This is what de-

mocracy looks like!” Democracy in action quickly

became a theme of protests that began in Madison and spread to others states where workers are threatened including Ohio, Indiana, Michigan and Pennsyl-vania.

While Wisconsin got much of the national media coverage, workers gath-

ered for weeks at the Indiana Statehouse in Indianapolis to protest a variety of anti-worker proposals pushed by House Republicans.

In addition to the state actions, thousands of USW members nationwide joined events in their own communities to show solidarity with workers in those targeted states.


From the first day, steelworkers – both rank and file and international leadership - stood shoulder to shoul-der with teachers, firefighters, nurses, engineers, librarians and others to fight the growing assault on workers, their unions and bargaining rights.

“There are students and workers. There are seniors and children, and

we’ve all joined together,’’ said District 4 Director Michael Bolton, speaking by phone to a support rally at the USW headquarters in Pittsburgh on the 11th day of the Wisconsin protests. “The students are beginning to realize that it’s pretty cool to be a union member, and that’s a great thing.”

Heather Elmer, a member of Local

2-1822 in Neenah, Wis., spent four days at the protest and would have stayed longer if her job had allowed. She said it was important for her to be in Madi-son for the simple fact that what Gov. Walker is trying to do is wrong.

“This bill isn’t about money. It’s about stripping the middle class of ev-erything that we work for – our rights,”

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she said. “In Madison, there are people in every type of profession protesting because we know right from wrong and this bill is all wrong. This is about union busting. It doesn’t matter which union is affected immediately, this will hurt all of us.”

Protest signs in Wisconsin attacked wealthy industrialist brothers David and Charles Koch, conservative donors who helped to bankroll Walker’s campaign. For years, the Koch billionaires have made extensive political donations to Republican and right-wing organiza-tions, including the Tea party.

Their money has helped to under-mine President Obama and stall pro-gressive legislation including the Health

Care Reform Act.Americans are catching on to the

fact that right-wing billionaire extrem-ists are out to destroy unions and the middle class. It’s becoming clear that this fight is about principles and freedoms that should not be bought and sold.

At the rallies on Madison’s capitol square, there were many clever signs including ones that read, “Screw Us and We Multiply.” And as Gov. Walker’s connection to the Koch brothers and his plan to kill collective bargaining rights became public, that’s exactly what

happened. The protests grew. There were days when the crowds

reached 100,000 in Madison. In Colum-bus, Ohio, where workers are protesting legislation curtailing public sector bar-gaining rights, and in Indianapolis, Ind., where workers are protesting a bill re-stricting private and public sector rights, tens of thousands rallied. Thousands of steelworkers have participated in the demonstrations in Madison, Columbus and Indianapolis.

In Wisconsin, the legislation Walker rammed through included $82 million in corporate tax cuts, nearly double the amount of money he wanted to trim from the state budget by cutting em-ployees’ pay, pensions and benefits, not

to mention the elimination of bargaining rights.

Together with other tax cuts for the wealthy enacted earlier this year, the total revenue loss to Wisconsin is about $200 million over the next two-year budget cycle.

Walker proposed covering another $40 million of this shortfall by scaling back the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit for low-income working fami-lies. A single working parent with two kids and earnings of $25,000 would see his or her annual income tax bill about double, from $193 to $394.

“Reverse Robin Hood!” began an-other popular chant, alluding to the fact that Walker is filling the pockets of his rich friends with money from workers and the poor.

Stand and fightDuring a trip to Madison, Interna-

tional President Leo W. Gerard urged the thousands in attendance to stand up and fight back against Walker.

“If tax cuts for the ultra-rich people in America created jobs, we’d have full employment after eight years of the Bush regime,” Gerard said. “Scott Walker has perverted the Robin Hood mythology and turned it on its head.”

The USW and other unions are

leading the fight because the future of the country hangs in the balance, and the next generation of workers deserves at least as good a chance to make the American dream their reality, Gerard said.

Gerard said that Republican gov-ernors, legislators and their billionaire financiers view labor unions as the last remaining organized competition, and they are not wrong. It is why they are willing to spend so much money to make labor organizing extremely dif-ficult, if not illegal. Money, however, is their only advantage.

U S W @ Wo r k • S p e c i a l I s s u e 2 0 1 1 1 1

“We are the multitudes,” Gerard said, “and together we will tear their castles down to make our voices heard if necessary.”

USW member Gerry Miller, a lead welder at mining equipment maker Bucyrus International, traveled several times from his home to Milwaukee to Madison. On one of those trips, he brought his sons, Benjamin, 10, and Justin, 15, with him to see history un-fold through their own eyes and not the biased lens of corporate media.

“What’s going on now just disgusts me,’’ Miller said of the Walker’s push to take away bargaining rights for state workers and reduce their wages and benefits.

Miller’s wife is a special education teacher and a member of the Wisconsin Education Association Council, the larg-est teacher and nurses union in the state and a target of the governor’s wrath.

“I think it’s going to demean our whole society. We’re going to have more poverty. Education will suffer. It’s going backwards. It’s horrible, and it’s just a political ploy to destroy the Democratic Party,” he said.

Some protestors wore hardhats. Others were dressed for school. On one day, two young girls huddled close to

their mother with hand-printed signs that read, “My mom and my teachers deserve respect!” and “Don’t take their unions!”

Overall, Miller said the protests were peaceful. “It’s been a cool effort,’’ he said. “It has really been a beautiful thing with solidarity across the board – working class, union and nonunion, and students. It was just amazing.”

Carol Vetter, president of Local 850 at the Regal Ware cookware factory in Kewaskum, Wis., joined the Wisconsin protests with her sister, a nurse. She called the attack on the right to bargain a devastating event.

“My sister is a nonunion nurse working in the private sector and she

joined me in the overnight experience, sleeping in the Wisconsin capitol, because she understands that everyone will eventually feel the same pain,’’ Vetter said. “My own state senator made the public comment that smelly slobs were stinking up the building. The only thing I smelled was solidarity.”

Stripping away rightsAndy Voelzke, an active member

of Local 2-209 and a CNC operator for Harley-Davidson in Wisconsin, spent at least eight days in Madison participat-ing in the protests.

Voelzke met many nonunion work-ers at the rallies and said they too recognize “that when politicians begin stripping away rights of their constitu-ents for political gain, under the guise of budget shortages and the false pretense of being broke, something is definitely wrong in America.”

One February weekend, 14 members of Local 7-669 traveled to Madison from Metropolis, Ill., where they are eight months into a lockout at a uranium processing plant operated by Honey-well. On March 10, another Local 7-669 contingent traveled to Indianapolis where public workers are similarly under siege.

“After all the support we have seen

from around the country, it would be a disservice not to join our brothers and sisters in Wisconsin and give some of that support back,’’ said Darrell Lillie, Local 7-669’s president.

The USW atomic workers returned home pumped up from the experience, said John Paul Smith, a spokesman for the local during the lockout.

“It was a morale booster to know we’re not the only people fighting for what’s right and that there are other people out there standing up for what is right,’’ Smith said.

Photos by Scott Weaver


Corporate potentates and conserva-tive politicians across America are

conspiring to strip workers of their collective bargaining rights and cripple unions’ ef-forts to elect lawmakers who promise to protect workers and the middle class.

Right-wingers have at-tempted to withdraw funding for the National Labor Rela-tions Board, reverse a new National Mediation Board rule that makes union elec-tions fairer for transportation workers and strip public sec-tor workers of the right to bar-gain over anything but wages. In addition, they’ve launched a campaign with a counterfeit name, Right to Work (RTW), in nine states with more likely to come.

In the midst of nine per-cent unemployment, politi-cians guaranteeing a right to work sounds like a godsend to millions of jobless work-

ers. Making jobs a right for willing workers, is not, however, the intent of this legislation.

The correct name for the legislation is Right to Freeload. It enables workers benefiting from union nego-tiations to shirk paying their fair share of the cost. The freeloaders get the higher pay and benefits. They get rep-resentation from the union if they have a grievance against the employer. But the legisla-tion allows them to stiff their co-workers by refusing to pay dues or even fees in lieu of dues.

It would be like billionaire right-wing benefactor David Koch enjoying golf, tennis and dinner daily at a swanky country club but never pay-ing for membership. For a country club, users dodging dues means too little money to trim the golf course, repair the tennis courts and maintain the restaurant. Eventually,

freeloaders would bankrupt the club.

The intent of the Right-to-Freeload legislation is bankrupting unions.

Federal law requires unions to provide services to all workers, not just those who pay dues. So for unions, shirking dues means insuf-ficient funds for health and safety training, preparing officers for contract negotia-tions and hiring good lawyers to argue grievances.

As it stands now, 22 states have adopted Right to Freeload legislation. Con-servatives and their corpo-rate sponsors are pushing the legislation in nine more –Wisconsin, Indiana, New Hampshire, Maine, Michi-gan, Minnesota, Missouri, Pennsylvania and Ohio. And they’re threatening in addi-tional states.

Though the rate of union-ization in this country has steadily declined from about

30 percent in the 1950s to less than 12 percent now, the public knows that benefits won by collective bargaining accrue to all workers – from pay increases to the 40-day workweek. In addition, polls indicate the public is un-willing to strip rights from workers and hand them to big business three years after Wall Street banking corporations took down the economy with reckless gambling.

Despite public sentiment against Right-to-Freeload leg-islation, Republican governors like Scott Walker in Wiscon-sin and John Kasich in Ohio insisted on passage.

With right-wing billion-aires like the Koch brothers pulling their strings, these conservative politicians sing the praises of freeloading. The statistics, however, tell a different story.

States permitting free-loading – those with fewer unions and in some cases no

Left: Workers in Wisconsin protest the governor’s attempt to strip public sector workers of their collective bargaining rights.

Center: Indiana workers rally to protest a Right-to-Freeload bill.

Right: Workers in Ohio protest a bill eliminat-ing collective bargain-ing for state workers and preventing municipal employees from negotiating for health insurance.


public sector unions at all – have budget deficits as high or higher than states barring freeload-ing. For example, in Indiana, Ohio and Wisconsin, where governors claim public sector workers must lose bargaining rights to relieve state debts, the shortfalls are significantly lower than the national average of 20 percent, according to research by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. In Indiana, it is a miniscule 2 percent; in Ohio 11 percent and Wisconsin 12.8 percent. The Right-to-Freeload state of Nevada has the most serious shortfall in the nation at 45.2 percent, so clearly permit-ting freeloading does not solve state budget problems. Employers don’t value it

Permitting freeloading doesn’t attract employers to a state either. The state with the highest unemployment in the nation by far is Right-to-Freeload Nevada at a whopping 14.9 percent. The state with the third highest unemployment is Right-to-Freeload Florida at 12 percent.

In addition, in those 22 states where unionization rates are low because of the Right-to-Freeload laws, wages are similarly low. Workers earn an average of $5,500 less a year in freeloader states.

Citizens of Right-to-Freeload states are less likely to have health care coverage and their workplaces are more danger-ous. Workplace deaths are 52.9 percent higher in freeloader

states. That’s because the collec-tive voice of organized workers is stronger in protesting hazards and seeking health benefits than the voices of individuals. Corporations win, workers lose

The state that most recently adopted Right-to-Freeload legis-lation – Oklahoma in 2001 – did not experience benefits that pro-moters promised, according to a recent study by the Economic Policy Institute.

Authors Gordon Lafer and Sylvia Allegretto, noted that former Oklahoma Gov. David Walters, who served until 1995, has said in his discussions with scores of companies, not one mentioned Right to Freeload as a significant consideration. Still, Right to Freeload was promoted as a way to lure manufacturers to Oklahoma, somehow giving it an advantage over the 21 other Right-to-Freeload states. The EPI study found, however: “Not only has manufacturing employ-ment failed to rise in Oklahoma, but, after increasing steadily in the previous 10 years, it has fallen steadily in every year” since Right to Freeload was adopted in 2001.

Freeloading legislation doesn’t solve state budget woes. It doesn’t attract manufacturers. It doesn’t improve employment. It does, however, wound labor unions and lower wages and benefits for workers. Workers lose; corporations win – that’s the intent of the campaign to institute freeloading nationwide.

Republican lawmakers and governors across the country are claiming a broad mandate from last year’s elections to take on public employee unions under the guise of cutting

government spending. But the public says no you don’t.In poll after poll, most Americans say they oppose

efforts by Republicans to weaken or eliminate collec-tive bargaining rights of public employees in Wiscon-sin, Ohio, Indiana, New Jersey and other states where those rights are under attack.

A New York Times/CBS News poll, for example, found Americans oppose reducing bargaining rights of public employees by a nearly two-to-one margin of 60 percent to 33 percent.

While a slim majority of Republicans favored tak-ing away some worker rights, they were outnumbered by large majorities of Democrats and independents who oppose weakening them.

Similarly, a USA Today/Gallup Poll found 61 percent of Americans oppose taking away collective bargaining power of public employees in their state.

In that survey, Republicans supported the limiting of bargaining rights by 54 percent to 41 percent while Democrats (79 percent) and independents (62 percent) overwhelmingly opposed restrictions.

A Pew Research Center poll found that a plurality of people nationwide sided with labor unions over Wis-consin Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican who eliminated collective bargaining rights even after the public em-ployee unions agreed to wage and pension reductions.

Calling this the “fight of our lives for the middle class,’’ AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka accused Republican governors in the battle states of targeting middle class workers when they should be creating, not destroying, good jobs.

Wall Street executives and the politicians they finance are taking advantage of the economic mess they created by using the troubled economy as an excuse to attack and weaken working people, Trumka said.

“This is about all Americans having the basic right to use the strength

of their numbers to pursue the American dream,’’ he said.

“It is the law of the land not just to protect but to encourage the process of collective bargaining in this country.”

Spend $2,671 less per pupil on education Have higher workplace fatalities – a rate 52.9 percent higher than in non-RTW states Have lower living standards

Earn 28 percent more per week than nonunion workers 78 percent have access to medical insurance through jobs, compared to 51 percent of nonunion workers 77 percent have access to retirement plans, compared to 14.2 percent of nonunion workers

Freeloader States:

Union Members: Source: New York Times/CBS News


Blame Wall Street and lax regulation. Blame global capital and bad trade deals. Blame banks and an overzeal-

ous mortgage industry. But don’t blame workers and their unions for the mess our economy is in.

But that’s exactly what is happening in state capitols across the country where the conservative right has targeted public sector workers in a large-scale campaign to strangle or end collective bargaining rights.

Republicans are repeatedly talking poverty. “We’re broke in this state,” Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin declared before Republicans in his state rammed through legislation taking away bargain-ing rights. “New Jersey’s broke” added its governor, Chris Christie.

It’s all a scare tactic employed for political ends, an excuse to break unions and kill programs that Republicans never liked even in good years.

The ruse, of course, is that public employee salaries and benefits are the underlying cause of budget problems that have gripped state and local govern-ments across the nation.

Public employees didn’t deregulate the financial services industry or pro-mote complex and risky investments like derivatives. Their pensions didn’t push Wall Street to a crisis.

“The people who do the work – those who take care of our kids and try to give them a good education, the firemen who run into burning buildings to save us, the policemen who patrol our streets at the risk of taking a bullet, the nurses who fight for patient care or the steelwork-ers who are fighting to keep their plants open – we’re not the problem,” said International President Leo W. Gerard.

It was the September 2008 collapse and bankruptcy of the Lehman Brothers investment bank that signaled the start of what is now called the Great Recession.

Lehman had borrowed significant amounts of money to fund its invest-ments, much of it in housing-related assets that made it vulnerable to a down-town. When the subprime mortgage cri-sis hit, Lehman faced an unprecedented loss and filed for bankruptcy.

Less than a week after Lehman’s filing, the Bush administration asked Congress for powers to buy bad debt and mortgages. On Sept. 29, after the House rejected a $700 billion rescue bill, the Dow fell 777 points, its largest one-day point loss in history. The Senate passed the bailout on Oct. 1. The House approved it on Oct. 3 and Bush signed the bill.

By the end of October, it was very clear the country was in recession as consumers cut back on their spending by the biggest amount in 28 years.

The recession led to unsustainably high unemployment, which still exists today, and continued bad economic con-sequences, including budget problems at state and local governments.

For an explanation of the crisis and its aftermath, watch this episode of the Rachel

Maddow Show online. Go to http://www.usw.org/blamewallstreet.

Much of the problem can be traced to tax revenues that have fallen because of the recession and political decisions to give huge tax breaks to the rich.

Consider, Gerard said, that 53,000 factories were closed during the Bush administration, throwing millions of people out of work. Another 2,500 facili-

ties closed after the 2008 financial crisis, bringing the total of shuttered factories to more than 55,000 in a decade. Some 45 million Americans were unemployed for three months or more during the recession

Those idled plants no longer pay taxes. Nor do the 27 million people who are still unemployed or underemployed. Add to that the enormous trade deficits that grew as manufacturing moved off shore and the high costs of two wars.

Although conservatives would like you to believe that state and local budget problems are caused by the pensions and wages earned by teachers or municipal workers, it’s simply not true.

There was no sharp rise in union con-tracts to provoke this attack on collective bargaining. There were no major reforms of the country’s labor laws or dramatic changes in how union elections are held.

To justify the assault on public employees and eliminate their bargain-ing rights, the conservative spin machine falsely blames employees and unions for the dismal conditions of public pension funds.

Public sector workers did not lose trillions of dollars in risky Wall Street in-vestments. Wall Street money managers did that, not ordinary working people.

But Republicans and their allies would rather go after public employees than have us look at the pay of Wall Street traders, private equity funds and hedge fund managers whose practices caused the economic collapse in the first place.

The story has a familiar feel. The rich get richer while ordinary people get run over, even blamed and punished for a mess they did not create.


Last year’s landmark U.S. Su-preme Court decision (Citizens United v. FEC) made it easier than ever for wealthy, powerful

corporations to drop virtually unlimited amounts of money into politics.

Under the leadership of former Wis-consin Democrat Sen. Russ Feingold, the newly formed Progressives United aims to stand up to this corrupting influ-ence of corporate power.

Progressive United’s mission state-ment sums up the group’s purpose:

• Empower Americans to stand up against the exploding corporate influence in Washington, espe-cially since the Citizens United decision.

• Hold our representatives ac-countable to every constituent, regardless of economic class or insider access.

• Support national, state and local candidates who stand up for our progressive ideals.

“When those of us who stand for workers rights and the right for all Americans to have a fair shot at the American dream put our resources and voices together, we are a force to be reckoned with,” said International President Leo W. Gerard. “Senator Feingold has always been a champion for the middle class and he continues to stand up against corporate corruption with his new group. We support him 100 percent.”

Feingold said it was an honor to work with Gerard, all the current and retired members of the USW and other groups across the country to highlight the devastation caused by too much corporate power.

“We’ll shine a bright light on every-thing from big companies shipping our jobs overseas to the corrupting effect of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision. Together, our voices will be heard,” he said.

In order to remain accountable, the former senator said the group will report every contribution and will not take any soft money or unlimited contributions. This is unlike many so-called 527 tax-exempt groups like those funded by the billionaire Koch brothers that are behind legislative efforts to get rid of collective bargaining rights.

On Jan. 21, 2010, the Supreme Court issued a historic decision in Citizens United v. FEC that undercut one hundred years of precedent, and declared that cor-porations have the same political rights as individuals. Progressives United aims to empower Americans to take back their right to free speech and fair elections.

The group plans to build a massive grassroots effort dedicated to mitigating the effects of, and eventually overturn-ing, the Citizens United decision.

Progressives United also will be ready to rapidly respond to stories in the news media, giving middle class Ameri-cans a voice in the corporate-controlled, conservative media that often twists things to serve their corporate bosses. (See USW’s progressive media guide: www.usw.org/mediaguide for a list of in-dependent media, or refer to the pull-out guide in the last edition of USW@Work.)

Editor’s note: The USW has never and will never use your dues money for political contri-butions. That’s how it was before the Jan. 21, 2010, Supreme Court ruling and that’s how it is now. Funds raised for the USW Political Action Committee are voluntary contributions and are kept separate from your union’s general fund. Members who wish to contribute to the PAC can visit the USW website for more informa-tion: www.usw.org/pac.

Demonstrators in Wisconsin draped flowers and signs on the marble bust of the reformist politician Robert

La Follette including one that read, “What Would Bob Do.?

“He’d be standing with the protes-tors, screaming ‘Right on!’ ” said Dennis Dresang, professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Madi-son’s Robert M. La Follette School of Public Affairs.

Nicknamed “Fighting Bob,” La Follette, born in 1855, was a founder of the progressive movement. More than a century ago, he sounded the call against corporate power whose commands, he said, are heard and obeyed in the capitols of the state and nation.

Elected governor of Wisconsin in 1900 after serving two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, La Follette’s agenda included the first workers’ compensation system and a minimum wage. He championed mu-nicipal home rule, open government, non-partisan elections, women’s suf-frage and progressive taxation.

While in the Senate from 1906 until his death in 1925, La Follette campaigned for child labor laws, So-cial Security, women’s suffrage and other reforms.

La Follette saw unrestrained corporate power as a great threat to representative government. He described the conflict then as “the fight to maintain human liberty, the rights of all people” – a struggle that remains today.

Former Senator Russ FeingoldAPphoto

Have you Moved?Notify your local union financial secretary, or clip out this form

with your old address label and send your new address to: USW@Work

USW Membership Department, 3340 Perimeter Hill Drive, Nashville, TN 37211

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On April 4, 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, where he had gone to stand with sanitation work-ers demanding their dream: The right to bargain collectively for a voice at work and a better life.

Today, that same demand is electrifying people across America. It’s the demand of all people – black, white, Latino and Asian American – to join together for our common dreams.

THIS APRIL 4, 2011, Steelworkers across the country are participating in actions at every local. We need to stand in solidarity with working people in dozens of states where well-funded, right-wing corporate politicians are trying to take away the rights Dr. King gave his life for. If your local is not yet planning an activity, please contact your District office as soon as

possible to get involved. This is a time to come together. We ARe one.

INSIDE “today is the control of their own government.”€¦ · Five Gateway Center Pittsburgh,...

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