Obama takes on union fight in Michigan

President Barack Obama speaks on the economy and fiscal cliff negotiations after touring the Daimler Detroit Diesel Plant in Redford, Michigan, December 10, 2012. / Getty Images

President Obama told employees at Daimler's Detroit Diesel in Redford, Mich., today that lawmakers shouldn't be trying "to take away your right to bargain for better wages."

The comment prompted sustained applause from the largely supportive audience, and came just one day before Michigan's Republican governor, Rick Snyder, is likely to sign so-called right-to-work legislation in the face of union protest.

"These so-called right-to-work laws, they don't have anything to do with economics, they have to do with politics," continued Mr. Obama, who assailed the laws as being about the "right to work for less money."

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Obama takes on union fight in Michigan

Right-to-work is the name that proponents have given to legislation that prevents agreements in which employees are required to pay union dues.

Snyder is planning to sign right-to-work legislation Tuesday, making Michigan the 24th state with right-to-work laws on the books, and protesters are set to descend on the state capitol in Lansing. Members of the United Auto Workers Local 600 engaged in civil disobedience training over the weekend, reports the Detroit News, and members of the Michigan Nurses Association plan to gather on the capitol steps with duct tape over their mouths.

UAW President Bob King says that if the measure does pass, the union will consider efforts to recall state lawmakers as well as Snyder, a first-term governor, in a potential repeat of the recall fight that took place last year in Wisconsin.

Supporters of right-to-work laws - largely Republicans and business interests - say workers should have the right not to pay union dues if they don't want to. (They also call the laws "freedom to work.") They also say that right-to-work laws are good for business.

Critics - largely Democrats and unions - say the laws are designed to weaken unions. They argue that if employees are not required to pay union dues, it hurts the union and thus limits the ability of workers to successfully engage in collective bargaining. That results, they say, in lower wages and worse working conditions.

[bart2013]

We need unions, but not unions that think its about getting more money than the average worker. Unions are suppose to be about fair play, being treated equally, no favorites, no unnecessary harassment.. When it becomes about money, then all that goes out the window. You can't expect a company not to play favorites when the union protects those that don't produce, thereby creating favorites (union paying favorites). A company has to compete, and they can ,if its not about paying more money than the average competitive pay, creating a work environment that is safe to work in, and fair treatment concerning seniority and no favorites if you can do the job. Todays unions are about power, and being able to hold companies hostage over the people that invested and provide the jobs.

[realtimecoffee]

And for the record, Rip Ravi

[htophet]

It goes without saying the ruination of workers to make a fair wage and have benefits is being destroyed by homegrown corporations,& international corporations, therefore I believe the battle they have started with the american workers requires reciprocation, revenge in the work place, taken up in dead earnest. The workers in the surrounding states from Michigan and Wisconsin should welcome all their citizens shopping in their states, just because they still respect their workers. A boycott of all businesses in Michigan and Wisconsin by their citizens, as well as citizens in other states that back any of these gop-5th columnists-traitor organizations and their members personally. No Wisconsin Cheeses in California!
If all the bank accounts by democrats and other concerned americans left the banks in Michigan and Wisconsin, right now that are supporting these union busters, their bottom line would change their perspective over-night. And corporations are not people, so cruelty should used starting tomorrow by wreaking all their businesses means of income. Like a phone base that hunts for other businesses to hire these states employees away! Finding other companies that are american to bid contracts to under mind them as well. To get customers to switch over by siting complaints filed in newspapers. To use only word of mouth to families and others to boycott all businesses even remotely connected to these anti-American, corporate, foreigners and their stateside bought dogs. If we treat them as we treated the Torrie's among us early in the republic, they will leave, or join, but we must aim at sending them packing! If no one will do business with these 21st lepers of our societies they will leave on their own accord, their just looking for a free ride anyway. Joe6pK

[realtimecoffee]

No Wisconsin Cheeses in California!
Hey the way trueblue California is going there won't be any food at all, once the riots start and the food stores get looted. It's not about Republicans, it's not about Democrats, it's about the ever growing provider-government Ponzi, the Dem/Rep scam that
has been screwing this country for generations. Either dominant party could have put a stop to any of it, neither did.

[167irishboy]

The sleeping giant of Anti-Republican voters is being awakened. Fiscal cliff? No, extinction of the Republican Party Cliff. American workers are tired of the baseball bat we have stuck in our rear ends and WE ARE going to remove them at each and every election day from this day forward.

Our hero is a lowly carpenter, not a corporate raider. And even though you greedy Republicans underestimate us and overestimate yourselves, we will show you that the underdog is alive and well in America. Just like he was at the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics when the USA Hockey Team defeated the Russians.

[darkhorseky]

The Sleepy giant? 350 Million people in America. 65 Million voted for Obama. Around that voted to Romney. So what 120 million people voted in the Presidental election. Does not give a mandate to anyone. Where is the rest of america?

[realtimecoffee]

at the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics when the USA Hockey Team defeated the...Soviet Union*. You might want to use a different success story.
and
* No longer exists.

[167irishboy]

Either we are going to vote the Republicans out of office over and over and over again, or going to work in America is going to be like working at Walmart. Maybe we should rename the country, The United States of Walmart.

Keep your mouth shut(forget about freedom of speech), be overly friendly to the bully boss, so he won't fire you because your personalities don't click. If you're a woman, don't say anything about harassment at work by management employees(remember you can't afford a lawyer while the company has a army of them). That worker who hates you and is a friend with the boss, you better get ready to kiss that persons rear end too. Keep getting the bad jobs while the butt kissers "whistle dixie?" Sorry, you're going to be tired when you get home.

VOTE REPUBLICANS OUT OF ALL POLITICAL OFFICES ACROSS AMERICA

[tqmbill]

None of that guy's business. He better be watching his own backyard and make some serious cuts to the deficit (i.e. entitlement spending). How can he go on vacation... again???

[bbglow]

To which one of the Koch brothers are you referring?

[bbglow]

To which one of the Koch brothers are you referring?

[bbglow]

Converting "right-to-work" into "right-for-workers":

If the unions put their thinking caps on they can turn this around ...
1. Negotiate an employer "employee-appreciation-fee" into all contracts moving forward.
2. Target the fee to offer free union membership to "all" employees, new and existing.

Appreciation of the American worker is long overdue.

[bbglow]

Increase in CEO annual compensation from 1978 to 2011 = 726.7%
Increase in S&P 500 from 1978 to 2011 = 349.1%
Increase in worker annual compensation from 1978 to 2011 = 15.7%

Source: Economic Policy Institute Report, published May 2, 2012 (inflation adjusted).

[Dragos111]

Unions are killing our country. The pendulum has swung too far. They are simply too powerful now and abusing there positions.

[htophet]

Dragos111, Another Nazi, what is this site doing? Sending requests to the fix-news? It is funny, the most retarded intelligentsia in this country owning computers and learning enough of our language to bring stupid into the mainstream! You get a A for effort, but a F for substance, as nothing you propose has a single fact or reality based, it is just crap memo's from Rove. Union haters must be independent monied folks or they would realize international corporations are trying to turn America into a third world country, they have already taken away our Independence with selling off all out manufacturing, if tomorrow the China connection broke, we would have nothing to seel in WalMart!

[TimeToEvolve]

I guess this billionaire fools who are the greedy morons behind these laws don't remember what happened in Wisconsin in 2010. Maybe they don't care because they have theirs (and yours and mine too). But this is War on Wall Street and there is a lot more of us.