David Leonhard pronounced the death of the Employee Free Choice Act [ECFA] (it was stopped by a Senate filibuster) a good thing. He missed two key points. First, he worried about the fact that the bill could allow unions to be formed without a secret ballot. Actually, unions can already be formed without a secret ballot, if employers agree to recognize a union based on a majority of workers signing cards requesting a union. Unions can also be decertified through this same process. So there is no guarantee at present that workers will have their union status decided by secret ballot. Second, the ECFA still guaranteed workers the right to have an election with a secret ballot, if 40 percent of the workers requested it. So, if workers were being intimidated by union thugs into signing cards that didn't reflect their real attitude, they still could petition to get a secret ballot. Finally, while Leonhardt notes the unfair tactics that employers often use to defeat union organizing drives, he missed the most obvious one -- they fire the organizers. My colleagues at CEPR, John Schmitt and Ben Zipperer, estimated that one in five organizers on average get fired in a union drive. The reason is simple. While it is against the law to fire a worker for union activity, the penalties for breaking the law are so trivial, that employers routinely dump everyone they think is leading a union campaign. It's good business practice.
--Dean Baker
