What is a union?
A union is a group of workers who come together to win respect on the job, better wages and benefits, more flexibility for work and family needs and a voice in improving the quality of their products and services. Workers in unions counter-balance the unchecked power of employers.
Why join a union?
People who work for a living know about the inequality of power between employers and employees. Workers want to form unions counter-balance the unchecked power of employers. With a union, working people win basic rights, like a say in their jobs, safety and security. Unions help remedy discrimination because union contracts ensure that all workers are treated fairly and equally. When there’s a problem on the job, workers and management can work together as equals to solve it.
How do people form a union?
When workers decide they want to come together to improve their jobs, they work with a union to help them form their own local chapter or join an existing one. Once a majority of workers shows they want a union, sometimes employers honor the workers’ choice. Often, the workers must ask the government to hold an election. If the workers win their union, they negotiate a contract with the employer that spells out each party’s rights and responsibilities in the workplace.
Does the law protect workers joining unions?
It’s supposed to—but too often it doesn’t. Under the law, employers are not allowed to discriminate against or fire workers for choosing to join a union. For example, it’s illegal for employers to threaten to shut down their businesses or to fire employees or take away benefits if workers form a union. However, employers routinely violate these laws, and the penalties are weak or nonexistent.
What kinds of workers are forming unions today?
A wider range of people than ever before, including many women and immigrants, is joining unions—doctors and nurses, poultry workers and graduate employees, home health care aides and wireless communications workers, auto parts workers and engineers, to name a few.
How do unions help working families today?
Through unions, workers win better wages, benefits and a voice on the job—and good union jobs mean stronger communities. Union workers earn 25 percent more than nonunion workers and are more likely to receive health care and pension benefits than those without a union. In 2001, median weekly earnings for full-time union wage and salary workers were $718, compared with $575 for their nonunion counterparts. Unions lead the fight today for better lives for working people, such as through expanded family and medical leave, improved safety and health protections and fair-trade agreements that lift the standard of living for workers all over the world.
What have unions accomplished for all workers?
Unions have made life better for all working Americans by helping to pass laws ending child labor, establishing the eight-hour day, protecting workers’ safety and health and helping create Social Security, unemployment insurance and the minimum wage, for example. Unions are continuing the fight today to improve life for all working families in America.
What challenges do workers face today when they want to form unions?
Today, thousands of workers want to join unions. The wisest employers understand that when workers form unions, their companies also benefit. But most employers fight workers’ efforts to come together by intimidating, harassing and threatening them. In response, workers are reaching out to their communities for help exercising their freedom to improve their lives.
Organizing
Majority Sign-Up, or "Card Check"
These illegal acts often succeed in discouraging workers from supporting the union, so without real penalties for violators, retaliating against workers is a cost-effective business strategy. In this climate, workers often feel powerless. They fear employer reprisals if they support the union and they lose faith in the process when they see how easy it is for the employer to abuse the rules.
Majority sign-up, or “card check,” is a better way for workers to choose whether or not to join a union. Under majority sign-up, workers have the chance to talk to each other about the union without facing the same kind of employer harassment. Instead of waiting months or even years for an election while the employer runs an anti-union campaign, workers who want a union simply sign cards asking the union to represent them in collective bargaining. This is a fair and democratic process that respects the will of the majority.
How does majority sign-up work?
Majority sign-up, or “card check,” allows workers who want to join a union to sign a card authorizing the union to represent them in collective bargaining. If a majority of workers sign cards, the cards are submitted to the National Labor Relations Board (private sector) or the Public Employment Relations Board (public sector). If the Board finds that the majority of workers want a union, the union is entitled to recognition. In California, public sector employees already have the right to majority sign-up; all workers should be able to organize under this fair and democratic system.
A majority sign-up organizing campaign:
- Step 1: Workers want a voice on the job so they decide to form a union in their workplace.
- Step 2: Workers talk to co-workers about the union and ask co-workers to sign cards if they want a union.
- Step 3: The signed cards are submitted to the state or national labor board to determine if there is valid majority support.
- Step 4: If the board finds that the majority of workers want a union, the union is entitled to recognition.
What are workers doing to win a real right to organize?
States across the country are expanding majority sign-up rights to public employees, while cities and counties regularly incorporate majority sign-up provisions for private sector workers into local development agreements. In the past ten years, eighty percent of new organizing has been done outside of the ineffective and outdated NLRA process. But a piecemeal approach is not enough - we need reform at the national level. The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), which would provide a majority sign-up option and provide real penalties for employers who break the law, was introduced in Congress with bipartisan sponsorship in 2007. As we fight to pass EFCA at the federal level, we must continue to protect and strengthen the right to organize here in California, so that all workers have the opportunity to gain a voice at work.
What really happens during union elections?
- 92% of employers whose workers try to organize force workers to attend anti-union meetings and workers are disciplined or fired for leaving.
- 78% of employers force employees to meet with their supervisor to be interrogated about whether they want a union and asked to reveal which co-workers are union supporters.
- 75% of employers hire union-busting consultants to advise them on how to run an effective anti-union campaign.
- 52% of employers who have undocumented workers threaten to call immigration authorities to deport workers who are trying to organize.
- 51% of employers threaten to close the plant if workers vote for the union.
- 25% of employers actually FIRE at least one worker for supporting the union, even though it is against the law.