• Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Home
  • About

Radio America Online News Bureau

labor unions

Right to Work Wins Again, Students Clueless on Free Speech, ‘Top Gun’ Ad Flops

September 20, 2017 by GregC


Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America cheer a court decision that upholds Wisconsin’s right to work law and rejects the argument of organized labor that it has a right to part of workers’ paychecks.  They also shudder as a new study shows students of all political stripes evenly divided on whether “hate speech” should be protected speech, whether it’s OK to shout down speakers they don’t like, or even whether uncomfortable views should be allowed on campus.  And they have fun with a political ad that is a horrible parody of a famous scene from “Top Gun.”

Share

Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: college students, congress, Free Speech, labor unions, Martini, National Review, right to work, surveym Top Gun, Virginia, Wisconsin

Big Labor Loses Again

August 8, 2017 by GregC

http://dateline.radioamerica.org/podcast/8-8-semmens-blog.mp3

Organized labor leaders are licking their wounds after workers at a Mississippi Nissan plant overwhelmingly voted to reject unionization and maintain a direct relationship with their employers, and that’s view that’s becoming more and more attractive to employees in Right to Work states.

By the lopsided vote of 2,244-1,307, Nissan employees resisted the high-dollar effort by the United Auto Workers, or UAW, to become the voice for all workers at the facility.  And while labor officials are protesting the vote, Right to Work activists are cheering a major win.

“I don’t know that the UAW ever made a case for why joining the union and having the union have monopoly control over all these workers’ situations and their contract and everything else was a good deal for the workers in Mississippi,” said Patrick Semmens, vice president for public information at the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.

He says the UAW leaders seemed to focus mainly on why unionization would be good for them.

“It was very clear why the UAW, from an organizational standpoint, wanted a victory in the South in a Right to Work state to show that they can organize a plant that wasn’t part of the traditional Big Three (of General Motors, Ford and Chrysler),” said Semmens.

“The fact that that’s in the institutional interest of the UAW from their headquarters in Detroit doesn’t do much for workers in Canton, Mississippi, where they see these jobs as far better than any of the other options in their community,” added Semmens.

In the end, the UAW lost the vote by more 25 percent despite spending huge amounts of money and bringing in pro-union figures to help make the sale.

“We don’t know exactly how much they spent on Nissan but I would not be surprised if it’s seven figures.  They’ve been working there for years.  They flew down Bernie Sanders and Danny Glover just in the past couple of weeks.  This is an all-out, full court press but obviously they didn’t make the case to workers, who ultimately voted against the UAW,” said Semmens.

And what would be the impact if the workers did choose to unionize?

“If this vote had gone the other way, the UAW would have been installed as the monopoly bargaining representative.  That means they represent every single worker, not just those who voted ‘yes’ but all of them, including those who don’t want anything to do with the union and think they’d be better off representing themselves,” said Semmens.

“A worker’s freedom is being taken away, where they’re told you can no longer go into your boss and say, ‘Hey, maybe I have an idea for how to make things work better,’ or ‘Here’s a problem I have.  I’d like to work to find a solution.’  Instead, you have to go through the union as an intermediary between the worker and management,” said Semmens.

Semmens points out that UAW membership, which is now a bit more than 400,000, is a about a quarter of what it was a few decades ago.  And he says it’s not because of a lack of jobs in the auto industry.  He admits times are tougher for the Big Three, but that’s only part of the story.

“In the Right to Work states, we’ve seen a booming auto industry: Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Volkswagen, all these foreign-based automakers are creating massive investment and tens of thousands of jobs,” said Semmens.

However, the results in Canton are not official.  That’s because the UAW accuses Nissan of pressuring workers to reject unionizing and the National Labor Relations Board is now investigating the issue.  Semmens says the overwhelming vote should put an end to the protest but he acknowledges that the process has to play out.

“It’s certainly true that this is not completely over yet, but obviously the margin of victory for those who opposed the UAW in Mississippi is pretty substantial.  It’s certainly going to make it more difficult for union organizers to get this election overturned,” said Semmens.

Semmens also finds the accusations against Nissan curious given what he says are frequent heavy-handed tactics from the unions themselves in these votes.  He says a recent ordeal when workers tried to get rid of their UAW affiliation in neighboring Alabama is a good example.

“It took them five votes because the UAW kept overturning the vote to actually vote out and remove the UAW.  In one case, they even got the vote overturned because a worker from another facility owned by the same company came and told the workers, and this was totally truthful, factual information, that he made more money than workers under the UAW contract,” said Semmens.

Semmens says the UAW would be smart to encourage voluntary unionization, but he says the thirst for power inside big labor makes that impossible.

“Unfortunately, organized labor as a whole, and the UAW as one of the major unions, has embraced the idea that what they need is more government power to compel workers to be part of the union, to make it easier to organize workers and that sort of thing,” said Semmens.

“So they’ve focused far too much on getting the government to give them power over workers and over companies instead of actually convincing workers that joining voluntarily would be a good decision for them and that paying dues might actually be a good use of their money,” said Semmens.

Standard Podcast [ 13:27 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download
Share

Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: labor unions, Mississippi, news, Nissan, right to work, UAW

Primary Sidebar

Recent

  • Israel Targets Iranian Nukes, How Trump is Navigating Israel-Iran, Sen. Padilla’s PR Stunt
  • Gov. Newsom’s LA Riot Money Trail, Is Iran Conflict Imminent, Mayor Bass Floundering Again
  • ABC Boots Moran Over ‘Hate’ Tweet, Gabbard’s Nuclear Alarmism, Rep. Green’s Guyana Gamble
  • Massive Immigrant Shift to GOP, Organized Chaos in LA, Hawley’s Wage Hike Plan
  • Fire & ICE in LA, Media Calls Riots Fun & Flames, Gillibrand’s Midterm Misdirection

Archives

  • June 2025
  • May 2025
  • April 2025
  • March 2025
  • February 2025
  • January 2025
  • December 2024
  • November 2024
  • October 2024
  • September 2024
  • August 2024
  • July 2024
  • June 2024
  • May 2024
  • April 2024
  • March 2024
  • February 2024
  • January 2024
  • December 2023
  • November 2023
  • October 2023
  • September 2023
  • August 2023
  • July 2023
  • June 2023
  • May 2023
  • April 2023
  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • September 2009
  • August 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • December 2008
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008

Copyright © 2025 · News Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in