Restoring the Promise of the American Dream
The promise of America is that if you work hard, you will be rewarded. You will be able to provide for your family, own a decent home, afford quality health care, and enjoy a secure retirement. It is that promise that built a thriving middle class. It is the American Dream, and it has inspired generations of women and men who helped make this country great.
Today we are living through a period of profound economic change. We have new ways of communicating, new methods of production, new means of generating wealth, new global competition. And while many of the ways we used to do business have changed, the American Dream has not.
Today, in 2007, that dream is at risk. We stand at a moment of unprecedented economic opportunity, but that opportunity is not being extended to all. Tens of millions of Americans are working harder than ever just to stay afloat. The latest Census Bureau report shows that wages are dropping and more people lack health insurance.
On the other hand, a handful of incredibly wealthy people are prospering beyond all comprehension. Private equity CEOs are making on average more than $650 million -- or more than 22,000 times what the average American worker brings in. Put another way, it takes the average American worker one full year to make what a wealthy buyout CEO makes in only ten minutes.
The buyout industry and the big banks are cutting the heart out of the American economy. Global buyout corporation the Carlyle Group is taking over one of the nation's largest nursing home chains, ManorCare. As part of the deal, ManorCare's CEO Paul Ormond will personally profit up to $186 million dollars, money that could have gone to hire more nursing home aides to care for our loved ones. Even worse, ManorCare will pay no corporate taxes while it is owned by Carlyle. The lost federal, state and local tax revenues over the next five years? More than $600 million. There's a credit crunch on, and massive lenders like Bank of America are using their size and market dominance to run up fees and credit card rates, deny loans to working families and minority communities, and lay off workers.
This Labor Day, a greater percentage of the economy is going to profits than to wages, and a majority of parents believe their children will be worse off economically. Tens of millions of people in the U.S. are working harder than ever before, but they're still falling behind.
We are at a crucial moment, a moment that makes us ask what kind of country we want to be.
The answer to that question must include more workers uniting in unions -- the labor movement. Unions have always been the best anti-poverty, best pro-health care, best pro-family program around. Unions have done more to help working people experience economic success than any other program.
This week, a new report by the Center for Economic and Policy Research and Inclusion showed that workers in the lowest-paying jobs make about 16 percent more when they are members of a union, and they are 25 percent more likely to have health insurance or a pension plan.
Now, more than ever, as new technologies and new ways of thinking about efficiency have reduced workers to a line item on a balance sheet, unions are not only relevant -- we are indispensable.
As the economic landscape has shifted, the labor movement has needed to adapt to these new realities. I am proud to report that the 1.9 million workers united in SEIU stand at the forefront of the evolving labor movement. In recent years we have pioneered new models of organizing, like uniting workers in nontraditional employment situations. Since 1999, 400,000 home care workers have changed state laws throughout the country to give them the freedom to unite in a union.
We have established new relationships with employers who are willing to reward work, while continuing to hold accountable those who are not. We are acting on new ways to secure health care and retirement security that reflect rather than deny the new economic reality.
The bottom line is this: the American economy is not a zero-sum game. There is no good moral or economic reason why all workers cannot or should not share in the success and prosperity they helped create. We need to restore the promise of the American Dream. And that means choosing what kind of country we want to be.
-Andy Stern, President, Service Employees International Union
Also from SEIU this Labor Day, check out Cincinnati janitor Craig Jones' "Just Work" blog about turning minimum wages into livable wages.
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About SEIU: The 1.9 million-member SEIU is the fastest-growing union in North America. SEIU members are winning better wages, health care, and more secure jobs for our communities, while uniting their strength with their counterparts around the world to help ensure that workers, not just corporations and CEOs, benefit from today's global economy.
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I want to start a union of IT professionals if they do not already have one. IT pro's are like mechanics, except unlike mechanics we are always here, on-call or somewhere inbetween. They've made almost all positions in IT "management". This is ludicrous because there are actual job titles with "manager" or "supervisor" or "director" in them. Computers used to be a niche market. Now, computers control everything you see, hear, taste, touch and smell. And this will only increase with time. Soon, the former sentence won't seem as absurd as it just sounded. Think about it. Computers pwn. And there will ALWAYS be a need for people to maintain, troubleshoot, upgrade and install. There has been a massive IT outsource to places like India and other "exotic" locales. This was a huge reason why we are in this situation we are in today. There were literally 10's of thousands of workers who went from making a comfy living to scratching and clawing their way to barely living. If unions had a say in the outsourcing of those jobs this would have never happened. And think about the power of an IT union. If IT pros walk out, the whole world shuts down. This is why a union for IT pros must be started. If we don't they will continue to outsource, step on and threaten termination to any and all IT pros. If anyone (Andy Stern?) could possibly give me information on what lawyers and whoever else I would need to talk to about getting this thing started I would greatly appreciate it. My email addy is gmail.comve@gmail.com Thanks.
Get over it. This is America. Companies have a right to manage their business in the way that benefits their customers and employees. They compete in a free market. You have the right to start a company to compete with them and since your unionized company will attract all the best people you will run these others outfits out of business. Bring them to their knees. That's the American Way. Someone above wrote about unionizing associates in a law firm who work 60-80 hours per week. These young lawyers are investing in their futures. They don't have to work there. Young CPAs do it. So do IT people. My brother-in-law was a CPA and he chose to leave public accounting. Family time was more important to him. That was a choice he made--the American Way. It's a global economy. America has to compete. CEOs make too much but only the market place should control that. remember, before the congress passed a law limiting the deductibility of executive salaries, we didn't have the abuses of stock options which is where these outrageous incomes are from. The solution--a government control--was worse than the problem.
So you are against unions and for everyone creating their own companies to bring other companies to their knees by offering a unionized work force? You're f'ing insane. Why am I even typing a response. I work for a 3 billion dollar a year insurance company. How in the fuck do you expect me to "bring this company to its knees"? Get your head out of the clouds, or maybe its your ass. Do you know how hard it is to compete with establishment? Do you have any idea? If you want to compete in this market you need a new idea. You can't just go start up any fucking company you want! Thats ludicrous.
Alas, I will go further in responding to your retarded response. I guess you support whatever is good for the company as opposed to what is good for both the company and the people who make the widgets. I guess you're a big fan of Reaganomics aka corporate fascism. Man, I'm so done responding to you. I dont know why I bothered.
Andy Stern has revitalized the labor movement, but only for a specific segment. He has broadened the focus from heavy industry to low-paid service jobs. This was something that was long overdue, but it ignores the vast middle of the work force.
Many people these days work in "knowledge" industries. Think of people in IT, lawyers, accountants or "creative" types who work in advertising or PR. These people don't perform routine tasks, but are called upon to design their own work schedules and routines. The concerns of the traditional unions over work rules, seniority, benefits and wages are not their primary issues.
These people are concerned with things like portable health care and retirement plans, professional development and networking to help make new contacts and assist in moving to new jobs. It's hard to think of a lawyer who is making $100K+ being abused, but the stories of junior lawyers putting in 60 hour weeks keep emerging. So there is still a need for some control of actual working conditions.
The traditional industrial (and now service) unions are not prepared to deal with these issues. I have proposed an organization modeled on AARP, a worker's affinity group. Here's a brief outline:
http://robertdfeinman,com/society/safe_proposal.html
Barbara Ehrenreich has started something similar for freelancers.
The problem is the leadership of some unions grow corrupt with money and power. The unions themselves can become greedy and unrealistic.
About 10 years ago, a manufacturing company left town because the union demanded too much. Raises became automatic instead of merit based. Union rules created a disciplinary system easy to exploit and made it difficult to fire bad employees. The union convinced its members to push for more, so the company closed up shop and left town.
Collective bargaining is one thing; excessive demand is another.
If your union leadership is corrupt, vote them out at the next election. If you keep voting the same corrupt individuals back into office, then the problem lies with the union members. That your particular union may have corrupt leadership is in no way reflective or representative of what the union concept is about. Funny you say the company left town but you don't say where it went. Overseas perhaps? Unions are the people's way of keeping their standard of living, a standard that by any calculation can be seen as dropping. It used to be that American societal standards were far superior to any other country. We now have telecommunication and electrical substations and lines across the country in a state of continual disarray and dis-repair, repaired only because of Federal guidelines, crumbling bridges, a nation's highway system in the worst condition of the last 50 years. Corporations going overseas, operating here and yet paying no taxes here only contributes to less jobs here.
Excessive demand?? Are you talking about the excessive demand of the average CEO making 22,000 times the average income of a worker? Did you not read the article? The average CEO makes what the average worker does in a year in ten minutes. TEN MINUTES! The average CEO makes almost two million dollars a day - every day, including weekends and holidays. Now THAT is 'excessive demand'!
Mr Stern:
I would humbly implore you to endorse John Edwards, in order to have the best chance to not only GET a Democrat in the White House to pass the employee free choice act, prevent illegal trucking, allow solidarity picketing, and all the issues HE alone understands as someone from a union/workingclass family, but also, incredibly, he is the most electable of the three top candidates. You can put a Democrat in the White House--please help our country by using your power to do so.
I notice that one of the first names in this article exposing the destruction of the American dream and the working people of this coountry is CARLYLE GROUP. Does no onw remember that CARLYLE IS THE BABY OF GEORGE H. W. BUSH???? The bush family have been out to kill this country since the days of PRESCOTT BUSH, (bushit's grandfather)and the rape of the American people will not stop until these things are driven out, stripped of their assets, and imprisoned, as criminals should be. Everything that is going on is the end result of the republican ideal of control of the many by the republican-selected few. The entire republican party needs to be banned from holding any position of power in this nation if we are to survive. The corruption they have fostered has destroyed everything but the decency of thinking people.
Littleblackcat.
I couldn’t agree with you more. Class warfare on the grand scale.
In the 30s it was Prescott Bush financing Hitler and his war machine. Why? Because the industrialists feared communism more than they feared Hitler.
Industrial Germany!
For every factory, iron mine, coal mine, salt mine or defense plant there was a labor camp. FREE LABOR!
Sound familiar?
Auschwitz, was a Free to Corporate/Industrial workers labor camp!
LONG before it was a DEATH CAMP!
“Work shall set you free."
What can we expect from this New World Order, these Neo-Conquerors, the Next Eugenic Society members?
“Stay the course. More of the same!”
Contrived wars, for resources, masked by non-existent aims and fear, hate and vengeance and GOD as their primary tools of manipulation of the masses.
Doubt me? Just listen to them! Listen to their rhetoric of fear and divisions,
“Mexicans are invading America.”
“Muslims are evil and hate freedom.”
“Advocates for peace are traitors.”
“You are either with us or you are against us.”
“The Constitution is just a piece of paper.”
“The United Nations is irrelevant.”
“Criminals should be forced to work.”
“Poor people are lazy and don’t deserve any help.”
“Entitlements are breaking the back of Industry.”
“Intelectuals are confusing our children.”
“The working class is a drain on our economy.”
“Blacks are all lazy and should be quiet.”
“Ideas are dangerous in the wrong hands.”
“Gays are destroying our culture and threaten our youth.”
“Music is debasing our culture and corrupting our youth.”
“The Jews are to blame for our economic woes.”
“Science is not to be trusted and goes against God.”
“The inner workings are too complicated for the common man to understand.”
“We will keep you safe, do not ask how, just know it is true.”
BY THEIR OWN MOUTHS!
The CAMPS, there are always,,,,,, THE CAMPS!
What to do?
VOTE! Vote as though America and the Constitution depended on it!
VOTE!
All the best
Knute
True words will not be said on this day. I hear people say unions are no good. But without them we would not have a 40 hour work week, no overtime, no holiday pay, no vacations, no healthcare, even no days off. (Sound like some comapnies today huh!) We would not have child labor laws, or saftey regulations (though Bush has doner his best to ignore them along with everything else). The CEO's the stock holders must realize that it is on OUR backs that they have earned a profit, not theirs. In fact I'll bet most do not even know how to do the job of anyone of their employees unless it's to push a broom.
I have mixed feelings about unions. I'm very progressive, yet I feel unions have played a great part in forcing the decisions to ship jobs overseas. They keep hiking wages to ridiculous degrees, which passes on the cost to the consumer, who refuses to pay it. The corporations are forced to find cheaper labor, and Americans whose unions were so successful in scoring them those high wages end up losing their jobs.
I had a boyfriend years ago who worked for the Chrysler plant in St. Louis. He said it was common for the guys on the line to go out and drink in the parking lot at lunch. Then, of course, they came back in and built our American cars. No one could fire them because the union protected them. Is it any wonder why American cars are inferior and people buy from Japan?
If corporations continue to move good paying jobs overseas that philosophy will eventually come full circle and bite them in the ass. Unless, the market is transferred to wherever they are shipping the jobs. This would be due to the simple fact that Americans can no longer afford even a can of corn. In such a case, their profit margins would be greatly deteriorated due to labor wages being greatly reduced in the "new" markets. They will continue to scramble to try and find new customers wherever they can find them. All the while operating costs, marketing, advertising and the myriad other costs a company must deal with will hasten the company collapsing under its own weight.
I'd like to see what a global economy is when demand is reduced to nothing but a few beggars asking for handouts. Reaganomics aka corporate fascism will stop at some point. Whether it stops before Americans become third world citizens depends on our leaders vision. Legislation to curb the enthusiasm of corporations run amok must be introduced and a "fair and balanced" approach to business & labor must be agreed upon. It also depends on if we let the conspirers aka Bushco aka Rupert Murdoch aka Big Oil aka Big Pharma aka the rest of that wretched lot continue to rule over us. These people are not only destroying America, they are destroying humanity, destroying the planet and will stop at nothing to obtain power and money (one in the same).
When union leaders become self engrossed in their own needs and neglect the needs of those who put them in office, they stop being a union person and actually become a 'CEO' of an organization. One difference is that they are elected by the rank and file of their union, and with enough solidarity among the members, can be voted out of office, unlike a CEO of a corporation, 'elected' by the board of directors.
The middle class needs solidarity within the union leadership. When egos and personal differences split the solidarity at the top of the union movement (AFL-CIO), it weakens (to say the least) the very fiber of the union movement. This union member is asking for solildarity among our elected leaders. Andy, come back and join the movement. Come back and improve where we need to go from within. You have what it takes. United we stand; devided we fall.
I agree with you wholeheartedly Mr. Stern. As a proud and active union member (PA State Education Association) I've been the beneficiary of what those before me have fought for and they have my gratitude.
I'd like to respond to the several people who have criticized the unions to which they belong: become active. If you don't know what your dues are doing for you, then find out. If you think you local administration isn't doing right by you, get involved and hold them accountable.
Unions are one of the last true institutions of democracy left in the US. The workers have the power, not the union leaders. You have a direct vote on the most important matters: contracts, constitution, leadership. A governing body may run the day to day work of the union (paying the bills, political action, holding seminars) but the overall responsibility of the union lies with the members.
If you don't like that contract, don't vote to accept it. If you think someone else would be a better president, get them elected. Never believe that you don't have a choice.
In a union, you have the power, and responsibility, to choose what is best for you, your family and your fellow members!
Unions are indeed still important. The biggest problem is how they have forced companies to outsource labor in order to still exist since union packages have made many companies less competetive with foreign ones. The UAW package of compensation and health care has increased the costs for cars and helped make Toyota the biggest car manufacturer in the world. The government can't bail out everyone because eventually, people will realize their increased taxes that are making them poor is making other poor people less poor. We still need protection in many areas. But if unions got everything they wanted, China and then India would become the most powerful economies in the world thanks to their non-union practices.
How come you people do not benefit from the growing productivity in the last 30 years ?
We have 5-6 weeks mandatory vacation in Germany and still the companies cannot complain about their profits. Why do you have to work so much harder when our systems are very much the same ?
What I want to know is why Carlyle Group will pay no corporate income tax? The majority of their workers will have to pay income tax on their wages - why do they get a break? A great number of their workers will only make minimum wage and they will work long hours to provide care for those we hold dear. Since when did it become a great thing to outsource American jobs for a companys bottom line and why is our government rewarding people for taking jobs elsewhere. Where is our collective outrage? Why are newspapers now paying people in other countries to report our news? I actually read a story about a person in India being paid to cover city council meetings or something. How is a person in another country supposed to know about things in America?
Why should Coke be allowed to move some of their operations to MX and then pay those workers less than s*** and then we complain about MX not paying their workers so they come here. Why should we reward people who abuse human rights every day? Why reward people who stuff their pockets -CEOs- and leave their workers to pay for everything? Where are our Norma Rays today?
At least 75% of us seem to be OK with the status quo - because I have not seen anyone say "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore." I say this because if 75% of Americans voiced their displeasure and actively made their voices heard CEOs would take notice. Affect their bottom line and they listen.
Sorry about the rant.
Don't apologise for speaking the truth. What puzzles me is why there isn't more said about thesee things on shows like Hardball and Keith Olbermann. Never apologise for the truth.
The rise in productivity in the last 30 years was enourmous in Germany and the USA. Why is it the average American worker does not benefit more from it ? I won't go into the health insurance system, but one other thing: In Germany you have between 5-6 weeks paid vacation annually. But companies make huge profits every year still. How come you people have to work so much harder and get less out of it than we do ?
The American Dream is to be part of the middle class: own your own home, have enough money to pay for the college education of your children, have enough saved to enjoy a comfortable retirement. That dream is dying a not so slow death.
If our country is going to hold on to its middle class, unions will certainly be part of the solution, but a more important part is to make huge adjustments in our trade policies. Due to NAFTA and China PNTR, our country has increasingly lost good paying jobs to other countries. Another nail in the coffin of the American middle class was put in on Friday when a federal appeals court refused a request by the Teamsters union to temporarily halt the DOT pilot program for Mexican trucks. NAFTA requires that all roads be opened to trucks from all three countries which clears the way to replace higher-waged American truckers with cheaper labor. And so, thousands more good paying jobs will be lost.
We must ask all of our presidential candidates about how they will approach these trade agreements. I know that several Democratic candidates have spoken about rewriting these agreements, but I would like to hear more about the changes that they propose (especially from the senator whose husband, breaking with a decades-old Democratic tradition of helping labor, led our country into passing NAFTA and China PNTR).
WE ALL KNOW THAT SOME UNIONS HAVE NOT HELPED THE ECONOMY WITH UNREASONABLE DEMANDS...BUT....WE ALSO KNOW THAT IF IT WASN'T FOR "UNIONS" OUR WORK FORCES WOULD NOT HAVE "FAIR PAY, SAFE WORKING CONDITIONS, AID AGAINST DISCRIMINATIONS OF ALL KINDS...AND SO FORTH AND SO ON...........IT SURE LOOKS LIKE "UNIONS" MAY BE THE ANSWER NOW TO OUR WORK PROBLEMS THAT ARE RAMPANT IN THIS COUNTRY DUE TO "SELF SERVING POLITICIANS AND BIG BUSINESS".............
When union higher-ups realized they held power that could be exploited in their favor, they did so with the result of becoming a micro 'big business' within their own shells. The bit about "power corrupts" is not just rhetoric. In pushing for ridiculous wages for jobs that should have been minimum wage positions they created a groundswell of resentment that resulted in a lack of respect and support for unions. When Reagan (poor soul, already gone far into Alsheimer's when the corrupt rep. party installed him in office) fired, of all union members, the air traffic controllers, there wasn't as much of an uproar as there would have been and that became the thin end of the wedge. Proof of Reagan's lack of judgmental abilities is the choice of target. With our airways as congested as they are, air traffic controllers are among the most vital of personnel. We are now seeing the results of the stupidity of not listening to what they were complaining about. To get back on track, IF, and it is a very large, important IF, the unions have learned from their mistakes and there is a way to make sure the union heads do not look at their positons as guarantees of their right to $25,000 hand-made silk suits and Mercedes convertibles but to focus on the right to working people getting a FAIR wage for their labor, then the unions need to come back in a big way. Fair needs to be fair for everyone as well. Wiping the dust off of the right side of a car coming off the assembly line is a minimum wage job. It should not pay $22.75 an hour.
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