This page was last updated on October 5, 2011.
Collective bargaining a right; Larry Mason; Beaver County Times; October 5, 2011.
Among previous letters from Mr. Mason were “Many Americans squander an asset,” “Letting the voters have their way,” “When will troops leave Iraq?”, “Build another nuke plant,” “America must disarm Iraq,” “Win the war militarily,” “Defeat on several fronts,” and “Health care haves disdain have nots.”
Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.
“Why shouldn’t our public employees have the right to collective bargain?”
[RWC] Three words: conflict of interest.
“You, your family, friends and neighbors have the right to join a union and collective bargain.”
[RWC] Mr. Mason doesn’t mention the right not “to join a union and collective bargain.” I’ll go out on a limb and guess Mr. Mason likely has no problem with closed-shop laws like those of Pennsylvania that give labor union management the power to force “You, your family, friends and neighbors” to join a union as a condition of employment.
“The only reasons I can think of are it would cost less or you don’t want public employees to financially live well.”
[RWC] So the approximately 93% of private-sector employees not forced to join a labor union do not “financially live well?”
“There are other ways to express your jealousy than to even think you can take away the rights of others. As you enjoy others and your union-gained pension money, you deny others the right to collective bargain.”
[RWC] What did FDR and George Meany (first president of the AFL-CIO, 1955-1979) think of collective bargaining by public-sector unions? FDR (patron saint of lefties) opposed public-sector labor unions. In a 1937 letter to Luther C. Steward (President of the National Federation of Federal Employees), FDR wrote, “… meticulous attention should be paid to the special relationships and obligations of public servants to the public itself and to the Government. All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. It has its distinct and insurmountable limitations when applied to public personnel management.” Likewise, George Meany opposed collective bargaining for public sector employees.
When politicians negotiate with labor union management, they negotiate with people who will return part of what they win to the politicians via taxpayer-funded campaign contributions. It’s called a conflict of interest. There’s a reason 93% of labor union management PAC contributions to federal candidates (over $62 million) went to Democrat candidates in 2010.
“I’m glad you can’t vote yes or no on slavery.”
[RWC] Disallowing government employees from collective bargaining is comparable to slavery? I’m sure lefties will trip over themselves to condemn Mr. Mason for trivializing slavery – not.
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