January 5, 2025 – RE: “How to avoid a “How to avoid a labor union meltdown in 2025”, December 22 editorial

Your recent editorial makes a strong pro-business argument against organized labor by cautioning against changing the Labor Peace Act.

I would like to break down your argument and reframe the discussion. First, referring to unions as big business and those who disagree as spin doctors is a one-sided endorsement of the status quo.

Here’s the status quo; all reliable sources confirm that corporate profit margins are the highest they have been in seventy years despite inflation, the pandemic, and record homelessness levels.  CEO pay is literally off the chart.  Economic inequality could be considered a global crisis.  It is a fair point that unions often sell out the cause of organized labor with groupthink and act solely  as self-serving entities, but that is a separate issue.  The issue is that American exceptionalism has become an extreme definition of economic royalty.  

But this legislative debate should not be isolated to the private sector or just for-profit business.  Non-profit organizations and municipalities routinely prevent the right to organize. It is not just about money.  It is about just cause, the right to formally disagree and self-efficacy.   People join unions for the same reason businesses join the Chamber of Commerce, to improve their lives.  Many government agencies are dangerously short-staffed.