Nonunion Workers Can Save Unions. We Just Need to Reimagine How We Collect Dues.
IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN A MOMENT OF TRIUMPH. The writers at DNAinfo and the Gothamist network had voted to form a union. But a few days later, on Nov. 2, 2017, their sullen jerk of a CEO decided to fold operations in perfectly legal retaliation. Our peculiar labor relations system bases whether or not you are protected by a union contract on whether you can survive a campaign of threats, harassment and outright lies to prevail in a winner-take-all vote. Even then, a union contract can still be voided by a crybaby boss picking up his marbles and offshoring, subcontracting or “shutting down” operations entirely. A workers’ rights system that can be so baldly circumvented by billionaires and soulless corporations is clearly and inalterably broken. Many of the best ideas currently on the table for labor law reform transcend workplace-based contract unionism. We could revive the New Deal model of […]