Unions are a way to get ahead
By Rollie Salling | Winona

Like Tom Canlin (“Freedom for sale” letter Winona Daily News, Aug. 28), opponents of the Employee Free Choice Act often represent themselves as defenders of workers and democracy. But in reality, they work to eliminate labor unions and stop employers and unions from working together.

Freedom is not for sale. The EFCA is supported by a bipartisan coalition in Congress. It allows workers to form unions by signing cards authorizing union representation, or if 30 percent of workers want an election to decide to form a union, they can have one. It is the workers’ choice to do so and not that of the employer, as the current law allows. And once they have a union, workers also vote to elect their union representatives.
Though U.S. and international laws are supposed to protect workers’ freedom to belong to unions, employers routinely harass, intimidate, coerce and even fire workers struggling to gain a union so they can bargain for better lives. As many as one-quarter of employers illegally fire workers who try to form unions. Current U.S. labor law is powerless to stop them.

The EFCA establishes stronger penalties for employers when they violate the rights of workers that seek to form a union and during first-contract negotiations. The EFCA also provides mediation and arbitration for first-contract disputes.

See http://www.aflcio.org/joinaunion/voiceatwork/efca/ for more information on EFCA.

We should thank Tim Walz and Barack Obama for understanding that joining together in a union is the best opportunity working people have to get ahead.

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