COLLECTIVE BARGAINING UNDER DURESS Case Studies of Major U.S
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS ASSOCIATION SERIES COLLECTIVE BARGAINING UNDER DURESS Case Studies of Major U.S. Industries Edited By Howard R. Stanger Ann C. Frost Paul F. Clark COLLECTIVE BARGAINING UNDER DURESS: Case Studies of Major U.S. Industries. Copyright © 2013 by the Labor and Employment Relations Association. Printed in the United States of America. All Rights Reserved. No part of the book may be used without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. First Edition ISBN 978-0-913447-06-2 LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS ASSOCIATION SERIES Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (published electronically beginning in 2009) Annual Research Volume (published in the summer/fall) LERA Online Membership Directory (updated daily, member/subscriber access only) LERA Newsletter (published electronically 3–4 times a year) Perspectives on Work (published once a year in the summer/fall) Perspectives on Work Online Companion (published twice a year as a supplement) Information regarding membership, subscriptions, meetings, publications, and general affairs of the LERA can be found at the Association website at www.leraweb.org. Members can make changes to their member records, including contact information, affiliations, and preferences, by accessing the online directory at the website or by contacting the LERA national office. LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS ASSOCIATION University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign School of Labor and Employment Relations 121 Labor and Employment Relations Building 504 East Armory Ave., MC-504 Champaign, IL 61820 Telephone: 217/333-0072 Fax: 217/265-5130 Websites: www.leraweb.org www.employmentpolicy.net E-mail: [email protected] CONTENTS Introduction: Collective Bargaining Under Duress: Case Studies of Major U.S. Industries ...................................................................1 Ann C. Frost Chapter 1—Context, Process, and Outcomes of Collective Bargaining in the U.S. Airline Industry .............................................9 Andrew von Nordenflycht and Jody Hoffer Gittell Chapter 2—Crisis and Recovery in the U.S. Auto Industry: Tumultuous Times for a Collective Bargaining Pacesetter ................45 Harry C. Katz, John Paul MacDuffie, and Frits K. Pil Chapter 3—Hotels and Casinos: Collective Bargaining During a Decade of Instability .....................................................................81 C. Jeffrey Waddoups and Vincent H. Eade Chapter 4—Health Care: Collective Bargaining’s Growing Role in a Time of Transition .................................................................115 Paul F. Clark Chapter 5—When Chickens Devoured Cows: Union Rebuilding in the Meat and Poultry Industry ..................................................161 Jeffrey Keefe and Mathias Bolton Chapter 6—Hard Times and Hard Bargaining in the Newspaper Industry ........................................................................................197 Howard R. Stanger Chapter 7—Public Sector Collective Bargaining: Tumultuous Times ........................................................................251 Robert Hebdon, Joseph E. Slater, and Marick F. Masters Chapter 8—Professional Sports: A Tale of Conflict and Accord .....293 James B. Dworkin and Richard A. Posthuma Chapter 9—Commentary: Union Practitioner Perspective ............345 Iain Gold Chapter 10—Commentary: Management Perspective ...................353 Martin (Marty) J. Mulloy About the Contributors .................................................................361 Introduction Collective Bargaining Under Duress: Case Studies of Major U.S. Industries Ann C. Frost Western University For several decades, the Labor and Employment Relations Association (LERA; previously, the Industrial Relations Research Association) has periodically published research volumes that review the state of collective bargaining in the United States. The most recent volume was published in 2002. Since that time, the U.S. economy has experienced the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression. Beginning in December 2007 and progressing to a full-blown crisis in the last quarter of 2008, the Great Recession was marked by high rates of unemployment, the near collapse of the banking sector, and the bankruptcy of a host of venerable firms. The economy reeled from bankruptcy to bankruptcy during 2009 and has only slowly recovered over the intervening years. Throughout this time, the labor movement has faced numerous challenges—among them, declining union membership, lackluster organizing performance, and difficulties at the bargaining table. The chapters in this volume highlight the state of collective bargaining during this period in eight different industries across both private and public sectors. The chapters document the struggles common throughout this period in new organizing, securing viable collective agreements for members after winning election, and protecting earlier hard-won gains in the face of increasingly aggressive employer opposition. Each chapter describes the state of competitive conditions and collective bargaining in its industry during the past decade. This introduction sets the larger context in which the parties found themselves during this period: the pre- and post-financial crisis economy, union organizing success over this period, the state of labor law reform, and the responses of the American labor movement as it tries to adapt. THE UNION MOVEMENT RESPONDS As is well known, the American labor movement has been in decline since the 1950s and has been in precipitous decline since the early 1980s. From its peak of 28.3% in 1954 (Mayer 2004) and 20% in 1980 (U.S. BLS 2013), union membership in 2012 comprised just 11.3% of the workforce, 1 2 COLLECTIVE BARGAINING UNDER DURESS with only 6.6% of the private sector workforce being organized (U.S. BLS 2013). The drop in union membership over time can be attributed not only to changes in the economy as union-heavy manufacturing jobs have been lost (and their union status with them) and subsequently replaced by non-union service sector jobs but also to unions’ failures in the face of employer opposition to organize successfully or to negotiate first contracts in workplaces where they have successfully gained collective bargaining rights. Over the past decade, the American labor movement sought to reverse this tide with a two-pronged attack: backing the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act to reform what many consider outdated labor law and placing a renewed emphasis on union organizing with the forma- tion and breakaway of Change to Win from the AFL-CIO. In 2005, seven unions broke away from the AFL-CIO to form the Change to Win Federation. The objective of the breakaway unions was to direct significantly more resources into new organizing, with the goal of bringing thousands of new workers into the union fold. The Change to Win unions were drawn largely from the service sector (and consequently represented a higher proportion of women, immigrants, and workers of color), where growth in union membership was perceived to exist. The traditional AFL-CIO–affiliated unions were seen to represent the old guard—relatively more privileged older, white, male manufacturing workers. Change to Win undertook a number of ambitious campaigns—efforts to organize farm workers and Walmart employees among them— but faced difficulties in achieving its goals of large-scale organizing; the right to affordable, quality health care for all workers; and the right to retirement security (Change to Win, no date). By 2009, two of the original coalition partners had left the new federation, while a third member returned to the AFL-CIO in 2010. Given the enormity of the organizing task and the economic and political climate that Change to Win has faced during its brief existence, it appears that its presence has made little progress in changing the fortunes of the American labor movement. In March 2009, at the same time that Change to Win was losing several of its founding member unions, the labor movement turned its attention to the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA). The purpose of the EFCA was threefold: to allow union organizing without the need for a (often delayed) secret ballot election; to find ways to mediate and, if necessary, arbitrate a first contract within 90 days of a successful union election; and to impose more significant penalties on employers who commit unfair labor practices during an organizing drive. INTRODUCTION 3 The impetus for the EFCA came from the growing recognition that U.S. labor law was sorely outdated and no longer responsive to the needs of working Americans. Kochan and Ferguson (2008) analyzed the 22,000 National Labor Relations Board election filings occurring between 1999 and 2004 and reached four main conclusions. First, few units make it from the initial petition for a vote to a first contract—only 20% ever do, with only 12.9% reaching a first contract within a year of filing for elec- tion. Second, the presence of employer unfair labor practices reduces the chances of workers securing a first contract by 30%. Third, the presence of employer unfair labor practices reduces the chances of an election even being held by 25%. And fourth, even after a majority of workers vote for union representation, only 56% of those successfully certified bargaining units ever are able to negotiate a first contract (and only 38% of those do so within the first year). In 2007, Senator Ted Kennedy introduced the EFCA