From the desk of Stephen Cabot:

Though Republican congressional representatives have expressed their displeasure at the overtly pro-union rules and regulations issued by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), they failed to cut the Board’s budget.
The vigorously negotiated budget deal that was recently agreed upon has exempted the NLRB from the budget cutter’s scalpel, thus leaving intact a major obstacle to the economic well-being of Corporate America. There had been vigorous lobbying to cut the Board’s budget, but union lobbyists may have outspent their opponents, leaving former union attorney Craig Becker to direct the NLRB’s actions in accordance with the wishes of organized labor.
The Wall Street Journal had reported earlier this year that the GOP intended to cut the Board’s annual budget by $50 million, which would have amounted to 1/5 of its overall budget.
Not only has the proposed budget cut not materialized, but the Board has actually experienced an increase in funding. The result, unfortunately, will be that that Board will be energized by the unfulfilled threats of its opponents and its increased budget; it will continue on its pro-union, anti-management war path. Its actions, no doubt, will prove pernicious to the economic growth of the country.

anti-management · budget · cabot institute · congress · corporate america · craig becker · funding · Labor Relations · National Labor Relations Board · nlrb · pro-union · stephen cabot · Steve Cabot · union · Unions · workers

From the desk of Stephen Cabot:

President Obama’s recess appointment of Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) drew immense amounts of criticism from corporate America, for Becker had been an attorney for the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and his objectivity and sense of fairness were called into question.
Now Mr. Becker is living up to corporate America’s suspicions. He wants to overturn the 2007 Dana decision. What is the Dana decision?
When the NLRB comprised less ideological members than it does now, it had decided that card check was not only inferior to secret ballot elections; it also stated that when a company recognizes union representation of its workers via card check, the workers have a subsequent right to a secret ballot election to determine if they freely chose union representation or if they were coerced into their choice.
True to form, Mr. Becker not only suggested that the NLRB can impose card checks on corporate America without the approval of congress, but he and his fellow board members, in a 3-2 decision, have agreed to revisit the Dana decision. The Wall Street Journal (www.wsj.com) reports that “[Mr. Becker] filed a brief for the AFL-CIO in the original Dana case, arguing that there is no essential difference between card check and secret ballots and calling Dana-style protections ‘bad labor-relations policy.’ Mr. Becker is clearly biased against Dana…and should not rule on it.”
We absolutely agree and urge the forthcoming Republican congress to make Dana the law of the land. It’s good for workers, for corporate America, and for the U. S. economy.

afl-cio · cabot institute · craig becker · Dana · Dana decision · employees · Labor Relations · National Labor Relations Board · nlrb · President Obama · SEIU · Service Employees International Union · stephen cabot · Steve Cabot · Unions · worker · workers

From the desk of Stephen Cabot:

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is weighing the advantages to workers of reversing a rule that provided for a 45-day window to file election or decertification petitions, so that workers may not be influenced in their decisions by their employers. It’s obvious that the NLRB wants to increase the number of unionized workers by limiting the amount of time that employers will have to educate workers about the disadvantages of unionization.
Craig Becker, a dyed-in-the-wool union advocate, says that he has not reached a final decision. Yet, for a man who has vociferously promoted unionization, it’s difficult to believe that he will not shorten the 45-day window of opportunity. Craig Becker has labored diligently to ensure that employers’ abilities to influence union elections be minimized, if not eliminated.
In the spirit of the question, “Do you want to buy the Brooklyn Bridge?” Craig Becker had told a senate hearing that he would recuse himself from decisions that would benefit his former employers, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the AFL-CIO. And now that Republican-appointed, NLRB member Peter Schaumber’s term has expired, the Craig Becker pro-union agenda is about to shift into high gear and speed up decisions that will benefit big labor. If there is any governmental institution whose actions will further drive manufacturers to foreign countries, it is the NLRB.

afl-cio · big labor · cabot institute · craig becker · employee · employees · employers · Labor Relations · National Labor Relations Board · nlrb · SEIU · Service Employees International Union · stephen cabot · Steve Cabot · union · unionization · Unions

From the desk of Stephen Cabot:

During the current recession when unemployment hovers near 10%, President Obama and his hand-picked ideologues on the National Labor Relations Board are using all their wiles and power to effect a pro-union business landscape. The combination of Executive Orders (which I have written about in previous blogs) and the decisions of NLRB member, Craig Becker, (a decidedly radical pro-union advocate and former SEIU official), have resulted in union friendly policies that are injurious to Corporate America and are driving up unemployment.
It has been a well-established fact that unions reduce the numbers of employed workers by mandating wages that move in an ever increasing upward spiral. (The average union wage is 28% higher than a non-union wage). In such situations, cash for hiring new workers diminishes as does cash for R&D and capital improvements.
Furthermore, those high union-mandated wages result in increased prices for manufactured goods. It has long been an established fact that as labor costs increase, demand for consumer goods diminishes and the pool of consumers shrinks.
Faced with such an economically unattractive scenario, corporations will choose to reduce their labor costs by outsourcing work, replacing workers with machines, and/or moving manufacturing facilities to low-labor-cost nations. One need only look at the iconic American manufacturer of motorcycles, Harley Davidson, which announced that it might have to leave its home town of Milwaukee, where it has been an essential manufacturing presence for more than 100 years. And why will it have to move? The simple answer is its union-mandated cost of labor.

While President Obama and his designated pro-union advocate, Craig Becker, would like to do all that they can to help unions, Harley Davidson and other manufacturers will have no choice but to move the states or countries where unions will have no influence. And if that happens, one will see a rise in unemployment greater than 10%, a further diminishment of consumer spending, and a worsening economy.

cabot institute · corporate america · corporations · craig becker · economy · employees · employment · Executive Orders · Harley Davidson · Labor Relations · Milwaukee · National Labor Reltions Board · nlrb · organized labor · outsourcing · President Obama · seui · stephen cabot · Steve Cabot · unemployment · unionization · Unions · workers

From the desk of Stephen Cabot:

Union ideologues, supporters of President Obama, have created a pair of public relations problems for him that not even his political enemies could have created. One involves the Hyatt hotel chain and Unite Here, the hotel and restaurant workers union. The other involves former SEIU attorney, Craig Becker, who is now a member of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).
In fifteen cities, Unite Here members are protesting what it calls “recessionary” contracts offered by Hyatt that, it claims, limit salary and benefits for years to come.
In an apparent effort to embarrass the president, Unite Here is focusing its protests on Penny Prizker, whose family owned Hyatt prior to taking it public last year. The family still owns a controlling interest in the hotel chain. Ms. Pritzker is one of President Obama’s biggest fund raisers and was finance chair of his presidential campaign. She now serves on the president’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board. Of course, unions also raised considerable funds for the president’s election campaign, and Unite Here was one of the campaign’s major fund raisers. To which of these warring parties does President Obama owe his greatest allegiance? After all, he will need enormous fund raising not only for the mid-term elections this fall, but also for his own re-election campaign in 2012.
Making matters worse, Unite Here is in a battle with the Services Employees International Union about which union is the legitimate representative of workers in various locals. That issue may be settled by the NLRB, where Craig Becker could cast a deciding vote, never mind that he served as attorney for SEIU and refuses to recuse himself from ruling on SEIU cases which come before the Board.
In fact, there are more than a dozen SEIU cases before the Board for which Craig Becker’s recusal has been requested by the National Right to Work Foundation (NRWF). He has, as one might have expected, refused to recuse himself.
One can envision beads of sweat of the president’s brow as he takes two aspirins, hoping his headache vanishes before the midterm elections.

cabot institute · contracts · craig becker · Hyatt · Labor Relations · National Labor Relations Board · nlrb · Penny Pritzker · President Obama · recession · representation · SEIU · Service Employees International Union · stephen cabot · Steve Cabot · Unions · Unite Here · workers

From the desk of Stephen Cabot:

According to research conducted by Lee E. O’Hanian, a professor of economics at U.C. L.A., increased unionization will increase unemployment, reduce productivity, and depress economic growth. Increased unionization is the goal of President Obama’s appointees on the NLRB. Its most notorious member, Craig Becker, wrote in 1993 that the NLRB can re-write union election rules without getting the approval of both houses of congress.

In a recent Wall Street Journal editorial (www.wsj.com), Professor O’Hanian wrote: “My research suggests that if unionization rates returned to 1970s levels…and if new unions could achieve the same wage premium as existing unions have achieved over non-union workplaces, then employment would decline by about 4.5million and real GDP could fall by about $500 billion per year.”

The professor provides an apt analogy: When businesses become monopolies, they fix prices. When unions establish base wages and benefits, they force other companies to meet artificially inflated union standards. The effect is to cause small business to hire fewer workers, thus reducing profitability and productivity. Professor O’Hanian points out that “about 55% of union elections occurred at businesses with 30 or fewer employees between 2003 and 2006.” When such small companies become unionized, their profit margins shrink and there is little or no opportunity to hire new workers.

It is a shame that President Obama, who appointed Craig Becker and other pro-union advocates to the NLRB, does not understand how injurious his actions will be to workers, corporate America, and the overall economy.

benefits · cabot institute · craig becker · economy · Labor Relations · National Labor Relations Board · nlrb · organize labor · productivity · profitability · small business · stephen cabot · unemployment · unionization · Unions · wages · workers

From the desk of Stephen Cabot:

Without having to get congressional approval, President Obama is determined to give union leaders everything they want. It is apparent that unions will soon have many new opportunities to organize formerly unaffiliated workers, and governmental agencies will provide all possible assistance.

To begin, the National Mediation Board (NMB) has made a major alteration to its 75-year old rules so that workers at railroads and airlines can easily be organized. For three-quarters of a century, workers who did not vote in organizing elections had their non-votes counted as negative votes; now, under a new ruling, if the majority of votes are pro-union, the union will have won the right to represent workers. This would not have happened if President Obama had not appointed a pro-union advocate to the NMB

Next, all companies that do business with the federal government will have to be union friendly companies. That means that they have to pay union wages, and that rule applies to all federal agencies. If a company received stimulus funds for construction projects, that company must pay standard union wages to its workers. Such a ruling will, no doubt, drive up governmental costs, thus adding to an already burgeoning deficit.

Perhaps the most dangerous element of the new government paradigm is the recent appointment of Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board. Mr. Becker had been the legal counsel to the highly aggressive Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Since he claims that the NLRB can re-write rules, one can expect him to find a way to make “card checks” legal, thus obviating the requirement for secret ballot elections.

The president of the AFL-CIO, Richard Trumka, is optimistic that “card checks” will eventually become law, perhaps by attaching it to an innocuous piece of legislation, or having his ideological comrade in arms, Craig Becker, change the rules.

President Obama campaigned on “change we can believe in.” The changes he is making are ones that reality forces us to believe, but they are changes that will do significant damage to Corporate America and to the American economy.

afl-cio · cabot institute · congress · corporate america · craig becker · Labor Relations · National Labor Relations Board · national mediation board · nlrb · nmb · organizers · organizing · President Obama · richard trumka · Service Employees International Union · seui · stephen cabot · unionization · Unions

From the desk of Stephen Cabot:
It is no secret that a Democratic majority on the National Labor Relations Board would favor unions. If one of those is a former union lawyer who believes that the Employee Free Choice Act should become law, the putative impartiality of the NLRB could be abrogated with the stroke of a pen.

Craig Becker, who was appointed to the Board by President Obama during the spring recess of Congress (an action known as a presidential recess appointment), will decidedly and perhaps aggressively tilt the Board to an unfair and dangerous pro-union position.

Mr. Becker, who was a top lawyer for the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), and Democrat Mark Pearce, will give the Board a three-vote Democratic majority. There had been just one Democrat and one Republican on the Board prior to the appointments of Becker and Pearce. The Board should have five members.

Many in Corporate America as well as students of labor relations and pro-management attorneys believe that the newly composed Board will act to affirm a pending petition that would require employers to bargain with unions that represent less than a majority number of any employer’s workers. In addition, it is also believed that the Board will vote to shorten the period of time from when an organizing petition is accepted by the Board and when a vote is held. While the Employee Free Choice Act may be doomed in Congress, the acts of the NLRB could now advance the mission of unions so that more and more workers become unionized and labor costs skyrocket. It is essential, therefore, that Corporate America invests in strategic action plans for union avoidance as well as plans to achieve decertification of unions already in place.

A dark cloud is hanging over Corporate America, and only if it implements a pro-active battle plan will the sun shine again on our traditional free enterprise system.

cabot institute · corporate america · craig becker · Employee Free Choice Act · employees · employers · Labor Relations · National Labor Relations Board · nlrb · President Obama · SEIU · Service Employees International Union · stephen cabot · Unions · workers

The National Labor Relations Board needs a quorum of three. If President Obama hopes to enact his pro-union agenda, he will need to have another pro-union advocate on the NLRB. He won’t say who is the pro-union advocate; he won’t even say that there is a pro-union advocate.

But as the names are flipped from hand to hand, one name keeps turning up. And if you guessed Craig Becker, you would be right.

According to The Wall Street Journal (www.wsj.com) “In a 1993 Minnesota Law Review article [Becker] said that the ‘core defect in union election law…is the employer’s status as a party to labor representation proceedings’ and that ‘employers should be stripped of any legally cognizable interest in their employees’ election of representatives.’”

If an NLRB member believes that employers should not be permitted to educate their employees about he disadvantages of unionization, he can hardly be considered a fair minded adjudicator of labor issues.

Yet, according to Senator Tom Harkin, President Obama will appoint Craig Becker to the NLRB during the Easter recess. It’s called a recess appointment, and it’s an end run around the Senate. No votes are required.

With his pro-union advocates on the NLRB, President Obama will have won his three card Monte game, for no matter which member Corporate America appeals to, the results will always favor the union.

This article was originally published here

cabot institute · corporate america · craig becker · Labor Relations · national labor relations act · nlrb · stephen cabot · unionization · Unions · wall street journal