Please note the latest development on the card check debate:
Conservative Sen. Jim DeMint (R.-S.C.), warned conservative bloggers in a conference call earlier this year he fears Democratic leadership would push both provisions to rile Republicans and then strike secret ballot language.
“They could load it up to begin with and fight everyone and then pull a few things to say they’ll compromise,” DeMint said.
As he put it, Democrats could “go out with a secret ballot and be magnanimous and withdraw it. Then some Republicans may breathe a sigh of relief and vote for arbitration” which “could actually be worse in the way it slows decision making.”
This is because the arbitration process is long and complicated. Arbitration rulings in Michigan take, on average, nearly 15 months to complete, according to the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.
As currently written, the arbitration clause dictates the businesses are given a strict, 120 time period to come to an agreement with unions once negotiations begin. If no agreement is reached within the 120 day window a federal arbitrators from Washington D.C. would then come into the workplace to determine wages and benefits. Employees and employers would lose all negotiating power at that point.
If labor officials did not like the way negotiations were heading during those 120 days, they would have the option of waiting it out to have the federal arbitrators settle compensation agreements. This scenario is considered Big Labor’s “trump card,” since a federal arbitrators is likely to be more sympathetic to labor’s priorities, especially under the Obama Administration.
EFCA critics, like DeMint, insist this “trump card” threatens workplaces just as much as the elimination of secret ballots and eliminating that provision is no compromise. And, it looks like he may be right about Obama’s strategy.
CLICK HERE TO READ The Card Check "Compromise"
Amanda Carpenter
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
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