Brave New World Of Workers--Bob Fletcher--Black Commentator

Tweet "A recent article in, of all places, Parade magazine [Lynn Brenner, “How did you do?” April 15, 2007] helps to put “Bob’s” story into context. Despite the fairly conservative bent of Parade, they put their finger on critical issues of the day:

Workers’ productivity has grown 18% between 2000 and 2006,
yet people’s real wages (factoring in inflation) have grown only 1%.

2/3 of those polled said that despite an allegedly booming economy,
they do not believe that their children’s generation will be better off
than they are.

47+ million people lack healthcare.

"There is a declining living standard for the working person, in part because employee benefits have been steadily shrinking.

"In 2005, the average CEO made 369 times as much as the average worker, whereas in 1993, it was 131 times.

"So, for the average working person, live is unraveling and a tremendous amount of wealth is being captured by those at the top of the wealth pyramid.

"The only things that the article failed to mention were that:

(1) the attack on labor unions by the corporations and their
right-wing political allies helps to explain part of the decline
in the living standard, and

2) for those of us of color—and particularly for African
Americans—in every category, we continue to be hit harder than the white population.

“'Bob”, like too many other people in the USA, recognizes that he is being stepped upon. After years of denial of the health issues he confronts, he is finally trying to come to grips with them. Yet, in one of our discussions, it was very clear that he had to weigh paying for medical treatments—which might prevent a stroke or heart attack—against his other survival costs. For “Bob,” however, the choices he confronts are choices he believes he must make on his own.

"My fury with the system rose after my last discussion with “Bob.” He, like millions of others, finds himself being squeezed on all ends and he also feels very much alone. I asked him whether he had ever thought of unionizing his company. He sighed and not surprisingly said that he wished that there was a union at the company.

"But that was not quite answering my question. There was no union at his company, so in order to get one, he and his co-workers would need to join together to form one. “Bob” had not a clue about how to do this, which affected me as well, since it spoke volumes regarding the state of workers today and of the union movement.

"Opinion polls over the last ten years have repeatedly noted that more than 50% of non-union workers would join or form a union or employee association if they could. These workers generally do not do so because of:

(1) fear of employer retaliation, since employers regularly
ignore the National Labor Relations Act [which gives workers
the right to form or join unions], and

(2) the union movement is largely stuck and has not developed
the internal political will, strategies and organizational forms to
address workers like “Bob”, who fall into the category of being
members of a growing unstable, insecure workforce.