Before the start of the pandemic, the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II said that the Poor People's Campaign had stress-tested and could put 1.3 million people into the streets on short notice.
It seems like non-union groups like this could support / play a role in unionization.
I just want to say something about a very old, pre-NLRA labor concept - "volunteerism." Volunteerism said everything the government does and touches is to the detriment of labor. All those injunctions; support for yellow-dog contracts. The militia and police shooting down strikers. Complete self-reliance; go and organize your workplace or locality or industry or craft and just slug it out with management. Power vs. Power.
Now, of course, you can see how volunteerism as a strategy was effectively rejected as unions embraced the NLRA. Nor did they stop embracing it even after Taft-Hartley substantially changed the terms of the equation and enabled the government to intervene on the side of the employer - no solidarity strikes, for example.
I don't think we need to wholly abandon political action. If you can get legislation passed that raises the minimum wage or prohibits Clopening in workplaces you can't organize, that's good. But, really, government is SO against us and worse is coming. Yet if you look on the AFL's website, their big plan for the end of federal union collective bargaining is to get Congress to pass a law prohibiting that!!!!!
Workers need to talk to each other, and big unions need to do the same. If subway workers go on strike, the buses and the taxis need to go out too. I've had occasion to help organize some bookstores in the Bay Area for the IWW. We contacted unionized bookstores throughout the country for help and advice, regardless of their union affiliation. Helps a lot. We need to recognize the importance of sympathy strikes, Taft Hartley be damned. Our strength comes from our ability to withhold our labor.
Trump does pull some union voters but it’s important to remember that even blue collar unions are 50-50ish red and blue, the vast majority of them endorsed Harris, and union voters overall are strongly democratic. Our issues are deeper than just pointing fingers at Trumpy construction workers.
Democracy is a union for all citizens. Organized citizens can balance the power of those in business and government who are misusing their power for the benefit of the few at the cost of the many. An independent, non-partisan Informed citizens Commission can require a moral and ethical purpose for business and government and require reporting to hold them accountable to it. See www.informedcitizens.com
Naw brah. it’s purely another victim of white supremacy. Most senior leadership of most unions are majority white. We use laws to protect white people, but use the same laws to extract, bind and punish everyone else who isn’t white. Not one white person in America will give up their privilege without fighting to the death to keep its benefits. America is screwed, white people SCREWED themselves by screwing all of us. Unions will be destroyed because A MAJORITY OF AMERICANS WANT THE MOST STUPID IGNORANT RACIST WHITE MAN AS PRESIDENT. Until you as a white man with massive privilege acknowledges that, you’re just part of the problem! But keep preaching unity, lol.
I seriously doubt unionization is the solution. There's only ~60% labor force participation rate, which means ~30% of the population is unemployed and potential "scabs". What's the point of giving people who already have jobs (the lucky ones) MORE wages and better working conditions? Sure, it's a good thing, but it's not big enough. Union participation rate is like 10%. Even at its peak I think it was ~40%. Why would it be worthwhile to double it to 20%? Is that worth the cost? I strongly doubt it.
I think monopoly is the problem, and unions are just a (labor) monopoly. Fighting monopoly/monopsony with monopoly seems wrong. Fighting monopoly/monopsony with government regulation and breaking up market power seems right.
This article is insightful, and correctly observes a longstanding crisis in organized labor. It overlooks, however, three crucial points.
First, the idea that public sector labor organizing eclipsed private sector labor organizing due to the decisions of labor unions mistakes the dynamics on the ground. Private sector employers relentlessly retaliate against workers seeking to unionize their colleagues, and without a functioning NLRB, there are no legal protections currently in place for workers trying to assert their rights to workplace organizing. Union membership in the private sector eroded not due to decisions by unions, but due to retaliation by employers.
Second, and perhaps seeming to indicate some tension with the first point, labor unions in both the private and public sector have largely abdicated their roles as organizing units, and been reduced to cheerleaders for a corrupt Democratic party beholden to corporations, Wall Street, and the Pentagon. It’s not just electoral politics in the abstract that corrupted unions, but the Democratic Party, in particular.
Finally, while it is fair to describe the crisis in organized labor as generally placing the movement on its heels, there have been important recent victories to observe, particularly in the realm of union members re-learning what solidarity means, beyond organizing around their shared interests. I wrote about this theme recently, in the wake of the detention and abuse of labor leader Chris Smalls at the hands of Israeli authorities when visiting Gaza to deliver humanitarian aid. https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/return-of-the-jedi
“What is the plan for organized labor to wield power when the courts do not offer us any help, and when the avenue of electoral politics is foreclosed?” My friend, this is the entirety of my Substack: macro-level labor movement strategy.
Another problem with an over-reliance on the public sector is that it’s been the worst possible rhetorical setting.
“We create value, we deserve our fair share of the rewards” — A government with return on investment would be a predatory gov’t without legitimacy. Not the best to link union demands with public resentment of taxes and fees.
“Bosses are just lining their pockets” — See above, plus, empirically not really true on the labor extraction side.
“We are public servants, our moral value means you should treat us better” — Workers in private enterprise serve no greater good and therefore deserve what they get?
Public sector organizing not only hasn’t inspired private sector organizing. Rhetorically, it can’t.
Take a look at that photo posted at the top. What's the message here? Classic union guy, picketing in the sunset? And what does his sign say? Scorn, contempt, resentment, shaming somebody else, right? This is the poison pill that labor has been sucking on for three generations. The lines drawn between "us" and "them" by the NLRB have eaten into our consciousness. Spit it out.
Before the start of the pandemic, the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II said that the Poor People's Campaign had stress-tested and could put 1.3 million people into the streets on short notice.
It seems like non-union groups like this could support / play a role in unionization.
I just want to say something about a very old, pre-NLRA labor concept - "volunteerism." Volunteerism said everything the government does and touches is to the detriment of labor. All those injunctions; support for yellow-dog contracts. The militia and police shooting down strikers. Complete self-reliance; go and organize your workplace or locality or industry or craft and just slug it out with management. Power vs. Power.
Now, of course, you can see how volunteerism as a strategy was effectively rejected as unions embraced the NLRA. Nor did they stop embracing it even after Taft-Hartley substantially changed the terms of the equation and enabled the government to intervene on the side of the employer - no solidarity strikes, for example.
I don't think we need to wholly abandon political action. If you can get legislation passed that raises the minimum wage or prohibits Clopening in workplaces you can't organize, that's good. But, really, government is SO against us and worse is coming. Yet if you look on the AFL's website, their big plan for the end of federal union collective bargaining is to get Congress to pass a law prohibiting that!!!!!
So useless...
Workers need to talk to each other, and big unions need to do the same. If subway workers go on strike, the buses and the taxis need to go out too. I've had occasion to help organize some bookstores in the Bay Area for the IWW. We contacted unionized bookstores throughout the country for help and advice, regardless of their union affiliation. Helps a lot. We need to recognize the importance of sympathy strikes, Taft Hartley be damned. Our strength comes from our ability to withhold our labor.
It would be nice if blue collar unions would stop voting for the same people who destroy them. There’s a start!
Trump does pull some union voters but it’s important to remember that even blue collar unions are 50-50ish red and blue, the vast majority of them endorsed Harris, and union voters overall are strongly democratic. Our issues are deeper than just pointing fingers at Trumpy construction workers.
https://open.substack.com/pub/howthingswork/p/to-unfuck-politics-create-more-union?r=5d10r&utm_medium=ios
Thoughts?
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/08/11/teamsters-donations-00502709
Even 50 percent red is very bad.
I am continually shocked by their short sightedness. I don't know how to fix that.
Amen.
Democracy is a union for all citizens. Organized citizens can balance the power of those in business and government who are misusing their power for the benefit of the few at the cost of the many. An independent, non-partisan Informed citizens Commission can require a moral and ethical purpose for business and government and require reporting to hold them accountable to it. See www.informedcitizens.com
Naw brah. it’s purely another victim of white supremacy. Most senior leadership of most unions are majority white. We use laws to protect white people, but use the same laws to extract, bind and punish everyone else who isn’t white. Not one white person in America will give up their privilege without fighting to the death to keep its benefits. America is screwed, white people SCREWED themselves by screwing all of us. Unions will be destroyed because A MAJORITY OF AMERICANS WANT THE MOST STUPID IGNORANT RACIST WHITE MAN AS PRESIDENT. Until you as a white man with massive privilege acknowledges that, you’re just part of the problem! But keep preaching unity, lol.
I seriously doubt unionization is the solution. There's only ~60% labor force participation rate, which means ~30% of the population is unemployed and potential "scabs". What's the point of giving people who already have jobs (the lucky ones) MORE wages and better working conditions? Sure, it's a good thing, but it's not big enough. Union participation rate is like 10%. Even at its peak I think it was ~40%. Why would it be worthwhile to double it to 20%? Is that worth the cost? I strongly doubt it.
I think monopoly is the problem, and unions are just a (labor) monopoly. Fighting monopoly/monopsony with monopoly seems wrong. Fighting monopoly/monopsony with government regulation and breaking up market power seems right.
This article is insightful, and correctly observes a longstanding crisis in organized labor. It overlooks, however, three crucial points.
First, the idea that public sector labor organizing eclipsed private sector labor organizing due to the decisions of labor unions mistakes the dynamics on the ground. Private sector employers relentlessly retaliate against workers seeking to unionize their colleagues, and without a functioning NLRB, there are no legal protections currently in place for workers trying to assert their rights to workplace organizing. Union membership in the private sector eroded not due to decisions by unions, but due to retaliation by employers.
Second, and perhaps seeming to indicate some tension with the first point, labor unions in both the private and public sector have largely abdicated their roles as organizing units, and been reduced to cheerleaders for a corrupt Democratic party beholden to corporations, Wall Street, and the Pentagon. It’s not just electoral politics in the abstract that corrupted unions, but the Democratic Party, in particular.
Finally, while it is fair to describe the crisis in organized labor as generally placing the movement on its heels, there have been important recent victories to observe, particularly in the realm of union members re-learning what solidarity means, beyond organizing around their shared interests. I wrote about this theme recently, in the wake of the detention and abuse of labor leader Chris Smalls at the hands of Israeli authorities when visiting Gaza to deliver humanitarian aid. https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/return-of-the-jedi
“What is the plan for organized labor to wield power when the courts do not offer us any help, and when the avenue of electoral politics is foreclosed?” My friend, this is the entirety of my Substack: macro-level labor movement strategy.
https://youtu.be/9XEnTxlBuGo?si=Jv_ASKMS_2OwkdHZ
Another problem with an over-reliance on the public sector is that it’s been the worst possible rhetorical setting.
“We create value, we deserve our fair share of the rewards” — A government with return on investment would be a predatory gov’t without legitimacy. Not the best to link union demands with public resentment of taxes and fees.
“Bosses are just lining their pockets” — See above, plus, empirically not really true on the labor extraction side.
“We are public servants, our moral value means you should treat us better” — Workers in private enterprise serve no greater good and therefore deserve what they get?
Public sector organizing not only hasn’t inspired private sector organizing. Rhetorically, it can’t.
The country with the highest union participation, 72%, also pays the highest share of GDP as wages, 58%. Anyone know which country that is?
If an injury to one is an injury to all, why do we not have a general strike now in solidarity with the federal workers?
We are at a hard pass indeed if we are looking at Anton Chigurh as an ally.
Take a look at that photo posted at the top. What's the message here? Classic union guy, picketing in the sunset? And what does his sign say? Scorn, contempt, resentment, shaming somebody else, right? This is the poison pill that labor has been sucking on for three generations. The lines drawn between "us" and "them" by the NLRB have eaten into our consciousness. Spit it out.