How Labor Unions Shape Society | Margaret Levi | TED

It's easy to imagine a world without labor unions.

We're essentially living in that world now.

And we are worse off as a result.

Few of you probably belong to unions,

but almost all of you benefit from them.

It was unions that brought us the weekend.

More importantly, unions built the middle class

by ensuring that workers had the incomes to support families,

to buy homes and cars,

and to dream that their children could do better than they could.

It was union power and advocacy that helped us win Social Security

and health insurance upon which almost all of us depend.

In the 1950s,

33 percent of private-sector workers belonged to unions.

Big labor stood proudly beside big business and big government.

No more.

Today, only six percent of private sector workers

are members of unions.

With their decline in numbers came a decline in political and economic power.

And the result?

A significant increase in inequality.

A significant deterioration in the possibility of a middle life --

A middle class lifestyle for this generation or the next.

And a receding chance to own a home or afford retirement.

We need unions to regain the power

so that we can regain what we have lost,

build a better future

and help forge democracies

that are built on a decent social contract between citizens and government

and among citizens themselves.

Yes, we need unions today as much as ever.

As a professor of political science,

and someone who has studied labor unions for a long time,

I can tell you that one of the most important things that unions do

is to counterbalance the power of corporations.

They even the playing field.

Yes, we need unions.

But we need better and different unions

that are more attuned to the 21st century.

Let's picture the world before unions.

Small children toiling all day and even into the night

in noisy, polluted factories.

Or immigrant women workers jumping from a burning sweatshop

because the fire escapes were locked

so that they could not take breaks.

That was New York City in 1911,

that's Bangladesh now.

But unions changed that

by winning protections for workers.

They transformed lives.

They enabled even the worst off to achieve the American dream.

Consider the longshore workers, those who load and unload ships.

In the morning,

the boss came and yelled all along the shore --

thus the name longshore.

They pleaded for the scarce jobs,

just as migrant day laborers do today at places like Lowe's and Home Depot.

It was humiliating, degrading.

But when the unions won the right to organize and won contracts,

the wharf rats became lords of the dock.

They became middle class.

They could marry.

They could support families,

they could send their children to college,

they had health insurance and benefits.

They had dignity, respect.

They were full American citizens.

Unions enabled others to attain the American dream

by raising wages generally

and by reducing wage disparities between men and women

and among the races.

My research has shown me

that with every transformation in the economy, the technology,

the way we work,

there has been an evolution in the labor movement.

Craft unions,

think construction work or even beer making,

emerged from medieval guilds.

With the rise of industry -- auto, steel --

new forms of organization emerged.

When white collar workers in offices, in government, in health care

in professions,

won voice and representation,

yet another kind of union developed.

In my mind, in my ears,

is Dolly Parton singing "9 to 5",

inspired by a real-life union of that name.

When you hear that song,

thank the unions for a decent working day.

History shows

that unions helped people get dignity, rise out of poverty,

inhibit workplace dangers and harassment

and improve health and well-being of us all.

These are not yesterday's problems.

Workers of today still need and want unions.

An MIT survey revealed that 50 percent of the non-union workforce

would join a union if given a chance.

So, Margaret,

if unions are so great,

why are they in such serious decline?

Because the odds are stacked against them.

Many of you have read about the Amazon warehouse workers

who failed to win a union representation election in Alabama.

They failed because of concerted employer opposition.

Indeed, there are many employers and politicians

who are preventing the reform of labor laws

passed nearly a century ago in another era

and another economy.

These are laws

that inhibit agriculture and domestic workers from organizing,

largely Black and brown workers.

They make it hard for workers in the gig economy to organize,

those we call forth with our apps:

rideshare, delivery service, specialized tasks.

There are employers and politicians who are pushing states

to pass “right-to-work” laws:

laws that abolish the requirement

that those who are covered by union contracts have to pay union dues.

This effectively kills the unions.

Many workers in 27 states

do not have to pay for the benefits the unions provide for them.

States that include Michigan, Indiana and Wisconsin,

former union strongholds.

And society loses big.

A recent study revealed that in right-to-work law states,

there is slower economic growth,

higher consumer debt, lower wages,

worse health outcomes and lower civic participation

than in states without such laws on the books.

But it's not just employers and politicians

that are holding unions back.

Unions are a cause of some of their own problems.

Some unions are extremely bureaucratic,

stifling debate and innovation.

Some union leaders are corrupt.

Rigging elections, paying themselves humongous salaries,

even when they represent very low-income workers.

And some commit felonies.

Jimmy Hoffa is the notorious example of a labor leader who went to prison.

But just this year,

several high-ranking officials in the United Auto Workers

were sentenced for embezzlement.

Now, many critics, possibly some of you,

blame unions for inflation.

When wages go up, consumer prices go up.

True enough,

but so does the standard of living for workers.

And we as taxpayers benefit

from higher standards of living by workers.

The pandemic gave us the term "essential workers."

If those in grocery, warehousing, food processing, delivery,

had strong unions, indeed any unions at all,

there would have been no need for federal programs

for those who have jobs to feed their families and prevent evictions.

Now there are many reasons for union decline,

including structural ones.

The decline in union jobs in manufacturing.

But a major reason is public lack of awareness,

even misinformation about the value of unions.

Well before President Reagan

fired the striking air controllers in 1981,

there has been concerted and continuous opposition by employers and politicians

to undermine unions.

Employers no longer suppress unions

by hiring private armies,

like US Steel, Ford and the coal companies did.

Now they hire very high-priced consulting firms to do that work.

Elected officials may no longer call out the police

and the National Guard to cart labor organizers off to jail.

Now they pass legislation that restricts union organizing and power.

But workers are beginning to fight back

as the headlines reveal.

They are building solidarity across racial, ethnic,

religious, partisan divides.

Martin Luther King [Jr.] exhorted us to enwrap ourselves

in a single garment of destiny.

I have observed several unions that I've studied

build expanded and inclusive communities of fate

in which large numbers of others recognize

that their destinies are entwined

despite differences and distances.

This doesn't always happen,

but it can and it must.

If you took my class, or gave me another hour,

I could give you numerous examples.

We need as employees and citizens

to build solidarity through communities of fate

that crosses geographies and differences.

But to do that, we need to reimagine labor unions for now.

The labor movement must evolve as it has in the past,

even producing possibly alt unions, alternatives to unions.

Alternatives to traditional unions.

Workers in gig professions, tech,

don't necessarily want a traditional union,

but they do want influence over their wages,

working conditions

and even the policies of their companies.

And they are reimagining old approaches

and coming up with new ones

in order to build worker voice and power.

Some are reconfiguring worker cooperatives:

employee-owned businesses,

in which the workers determine wages,

working conditions

and distribution of profits.

This is not a pipe dream.

Mondragon in Spain has over 80,000 employee owners,

takes in over 13 billion dollars a year

and redistributes its profits to build worker skills and capacities

among its member cooperatives.

A newer approach is to use platform technologies

to teach workers their rights.

In our global, hyperconnected and socially isolating world,

platforms such as coworker.org or Unit

recognize and address the fact that there is a mobile workforce

that no longer has water coolers or lunch rooms

around which to gather and strategize.

These platforms provide workers with a way to share experiences,

access organizing resources

and build networks at scale across geographies and employers.

Coworker.org had a huge win with Alphabet,

the parent company of Google,

a giant among tech firms.

Alphabet workers recognize that they are part of a community of fate

that crosses large distances.

They have been protesting Google's contracts with the Pentagon

and with immigration authorities.

They have normal run-of-the-mill economic union demands,

but they also have the political demand

that they should have a say over company policies

that affect them and us.

Now, whatever you thought of unions in the past,

I hope --

I hope that these examples have revealed to you

what they can be today and for tomorrow.

Unions once significantly reduced income inequality,

the gap between the rich and the poor.

They can again.

These graph lines came together when unions rose.

I'd like to see those lines permanently converge

and inequality reduced once and for all.

Billionaires are building rockets to explore outer space.

This is so exciting,

but equally exciting

are the workers who are providing the goods and services

on which those billionaires [and] we all depend,

exploring new ways to gain power and voice.

If even some of these explorations succeed,

workers will gain dignity,

economic security

and the power to challenge employers and politicians.

The result?

The resuscitation of the middle class

and a far more equitable society.

Thank you.

(Applause)