I was surprised to see this editorial in my local newspaper today. While I totally agree with it the piece failed to mention that, here in California, a state with a projected $40 billion budget short fall for next year, the states unions don't want to make any concessions. In fact, they all say "take from the other guys but you need to give more to us." Unions should be classefied as extortionists and outlawed with their leaders ***** slapped and sterilized.

Quote:Bolster unions?

Workers who unionize drastically alter their relationship with an employer and diminish their employer's chance to survive in a global market. Existing law gives employees and employers the right to put union representation to a vote. Congress should reject legislation that would scrap the election.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., signaled Sunday that Congress will reconsider the Employee Free Choice Act this session. The House passed the bill in 2007, but it died in the Senate. The act would allow union certification if a majority of employees sign a card requesting it. No election would be required.

A "card check" mandate from Congress would serve just one purpose: To ease union organizing. Unions claim they need the change because employers keep trying to win elections. They "hire outside consultants" and subject employees to "anti-union propaganda," the AFL-CIO says.

But unions can campaign too -- at the worker's home, for example. And a union organizer putting a signup card in front of a worker, at home, subjects the employee to peer pressure he or she is unlikely to find at work.

Union membership has been declining for decades, but hostile labor laws are not the cause. Union-negotiated wages and work rules have contributed to the demise of unionized industries -- most recently apparent in the collapse of U.S. auto makers.

Unions powerful enough to win lavish wages and benefits -- and then help their employers extract a $17 billion bailout from Congress, as the United Auto Workers did last month -- hardly need more help from Congress.

Labor law should encourage fair treatment of workers and a safe work environment. Unions that want to organize a workplace have the right to try. But ultimately workers should decide for themselves -- by casting a secret ballot in an election -- whether to join the union cause.

http://www.pe.com/localnews/opinion/edit...57526.html