A new study finds private employers are pulling out more stops to prevent workers from joining a union.
Cornell University professor Kate Bronfenbrenner’s “No Holds Barred: The Intensification of Employer Opposition to Organizing” reveals private sector employer opposition has intensified and become more punitive than in the past.
According to Bronfenbrenner, employers are more than twice as likely to use 10 or more tactics – including threats and actual firings – in their campaigns to thwart workers’ organizing efforts.
The report shows that from 1999 to 2003, 63 percent of private sector employers interrogated workers in one-on-one meetings with supervisors; 54 percent threatened workers in such meetings; 57 percent threatened to close the worksite; 47 percent threatened to cut wages and benefits; and 34 percent fired workers.
Bronfenbrenner says even when workers succeeded at forming a union, 52 percent went without a first contract a year after the election, and 37 percent remained without a contract after two years.
The study, published by the American Rights at Work Education Fund and the Economic Policy Institute, further illustrates the need for Congress to pass legislation that will protect workers and their right to organize and bargain for better wages, benefits and a secure retirement.
The Employee Free Choice Act will put an end to employers’ unfair, and oftentimes illegal, tactics. Click here for more information on the Employee Free Choice Act and to send a letter to your legislator that it’s time to protect America’s workers today.
For more information and an official press release, click here.
