Why unions matter

Yates shows why unions still matter. Unions mean better pay, benefits, and working conditions for their members; they force employers to treat employees with dignity and respect; and at their best, they provide a way for workers to make society both more democratic and egalitarian. Yates uses simple language, clear data, and engaging examples to show why workers need unions, how unions are formed, how they operate, how collective bargaining works, the role of unions in politics, and what unions have done to bring workers together across the divides of race, gender, religion, and sexual orientation.

The new edition not only updates the first, but also examines the record of the New Voice slate that took control of the AFL-CIO in , the continuing decline in union membership and density, the Change to Win split in , the growing importance of immigrant workers, the rise of worker centers, the impacts of and labor responses to globalization, and the need for labor to have an independent political voice. This is simply the best introduction to unions on the market.

Michael D. Yates shows why unions still matter. Unions mean better pay, benefits, and working conditions for their members; they force employers to treat employees with dignity and respect; and at their best, they provide a way for workers to make society both more democratic and egalitarian.

Yates uses simple language, clear data, and engaging examples to show why workers need unions, how unions are formed, how they operate, how collective bargaining works, the role of unions in politics, and what unions have done to bring workers together across the divides of race, gender, religion, and sexual orientation. If you are a union member you are far more likely to have employer-sponsored retirement plans.

You'll be safer, better informed, and more empowered. Unions actively communicate with their members about beneficial laws and ensure that protective regulations are enforced. Unionized workers are more likely to take advantage of workers' compensation, get their benefits faster, and return to work more quickly. Union members are more likely to receive unemployment insurance. Union workplaces are far more likely to receive OSHA inspections. Union workers are much more likely to know about, and benefit from, the provisions of the Family Medical Leave Act.

Union members who are fired or disciplined because they missed work for family-care emergencies can turn to their unions for protection, and in many cases will overturn their punishment. Union members are more likely to receive overtime pay they've earned. You earn more because unions exist. All workers benefit as well from labor's campaign to raise federal and state minimum wage provisions.

Your working conditions and benefits are better because unions have improved them. Unions have been the driving force propelling advances for all workers, like unemployment benefits, workers' compensation, improved treatment of immigrant workers, family leave, and safety regulations. Labor's victories are not for their members only: thanks to a union lawsuit, for instance, all workers who are required to wear safety gear on the job now must be provided that equipment by their employers, rather than paying for it themselves.

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This year the Republican war on unions has returned with a vengeance. Bruce Rauner is pursuing right-to-work legislation — which allows workers to gain the benefits of union representation without paying dues — and looks likely to succeed. Wisconsin became a right-to-work state last month, and its Republican Gov.

Scott Walker looks set to ground a presidential bid in union busting , recently saying his political fight with unions prepared him to take on the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. The Supreme Court appears ready to overrule its Abood v.

Detroit Board of Education decision, which allows unions to collect dues from nonmember public sector workers who nonetheless benefit from collective bargaining. With the enemies at the gate, the liberal elite seems to have finally learned to love unions. But it may be too little, too late. Democrats did little to defend unions when it counted.

Carter then signed into law legislation deregulating railroads and trucking both hobbling powerful unions. President Bill Clinton pushed for the North American Free Trade Agreement against union opposition and deregulated finance, greatly empowering capital. To be fair, some of these pressures came from global trends, but public policy played a key role in tilting the field against labor. Now Republicans are fighting to drive a final spike in the heart of the most effective anti-inequality movement in history.

If liberals do nothing to shore up unions, their decline will only continue. That will have important implications for inequality.