Source: Chris Brooks, In These Times, December 22, 2017
One of corporate America’s next big goals might surprise you: passing legislation to prevent unions from having to represent workers who don’t pay dues. This is just the latest of many business-friendly labor law reforms proliferating across the country. ….
….Some union supporters have argued that the way to solve the free-rider problem is by allowing unions to simply kick out the “freeloaders.”
For example, in a Los Angeles Times op-ed, professors Catherine Fisk and Benjamin Sachs advocate for reforming labor law so unions in open shop states would not be required to negotiate on behalf of all workers, but would instead only represent dues-paying members.
Labor activist Shaun Richman has written for In These Times about the benefits of “members-only” unionism, which, he says, would allow unions to “cede exclusive representation and kick out the scabs.” Now, employer-backed groups are making similar arguments.
The State Policy Network (SPN)—a coalition of corporate-financed right-wing think tanks—is also advocating for laws that would eliminate the requirement that unions represent non-members in a unionized workplace.
What do right-wing advocates of this strategy hope to accomplish? For an answer, we can look at the case of unionized teachers in Tennessee…..
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