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JULY 2006
Bush's NLRB poised to "promote" many of us to supervisor
by Rick S. Bender, President of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO

In the United States, you don’t have the freedom to form a union if you are in management, or are considered a supervisor.

For decades, employers have been trying to drive truckloads of American workers through that cavernous loophole by swelling their ranks of “assistant managers” and the like.  The simple goal is to prevent them from banding together and negotiating for better wages and working conditions.

Well, the Bush-appointed National Labor Relations Board is poised to expand that loophole, making it big enough for tractor-trailers. 

NLRB rulings are expected this summer in three cases known as the “Kentucky River decisions” that involve charge nurses in a hospital and nursing home and lead workers in a manufacturing plant.  But they represent just the tip of the iceberg.

The NLRB will redefine who can be considered “supervisors.”  Until now, supervisors were generally those who had the power to hire and fire.  But many anticipate a new broader interpretation that will include any skilled or experienced worker who occasionally or incidentally oversees or assigns the work of those less skilled.

The decisions will affect construction workers, painters, welders, electricians -- workers in nearly every industry.  A new Economic Policy Institute analysis estimates the rulings could strip as many as 8 million Americans of their union protection or block them from ever joining one.

In other words, many of us will wake up one morning this summer with the same job and responsibilities we had the day before, but we will have lost our freedom of association with our co-workers.

If you don’t think this threat to your fundamental rights is real, talk to a nurse at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle.  The hospital recently attempted in court to reclassify all 600 of its registered nurses -- every single one -- as supervisors, and therefore not eligible to speak with a united voice about their working conditions and patient care issues through the Washington State Nurses Association.

Hundreds of nurses and their supporters rallied outside Virginia Mason’s front door, and the hospital ended up backing off its legal strategy -- for now.  But a hospital administrator told one reporter they were "waiting and watching" for the NLRB decisions before deciding whether to pursue reclassification again.

Virginia Mason’s reprehensible actions should serve as a wake-up call to all of us.  Some employers are watching these decisions and prepared to pounce.  In fact, there are at least 135 other NLRB cases being held pending rulings on the Kentucky River decisions, 60 of which are union election cases.

It’s a breathtaking assault on union rights and you’ve probably never even heard about it.  One reason is that, unlike previous Labor Boards, the Bush NLRB has refused to allow oral arguments in any of its cases.  Even the Kentucky River cases have not been opened up for oral arguments, despite the extraordinary importance these decisions hold for the future of America’s workers.

Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, along with most of Washington’s congressional delegation, have written the chairman of the NLRB and urged him at least to allow the affected people this opportunity to make their case.

For American workers, the stakes could not be higher.  The right to collective bargaining plays a critical role in lifting wages, benefits and working conditions not just for union members, but for all workers.

“Our nation has long recognized the rights of workers to organize and collectively bargain,” said Rep. Brian Baird, who has urged the NLRB to hear oral arguments in the cases.  “Much of what we take for granted today -- the five-day work week, overtime pay, retirement benefits, health insurance, paid vacation, and more -- came about as a direct result of long and difficult negotiations by organized workers.  Because these cases have the potential to reshape fundamental worker rights and erode the freedom to unionize, workers deserve to be heard on the ‘supervisory’ issue.”

We’re still waiting to see if the NLRB will allow working people to be heard, or if we will simply read about the loss of our freedoms in the morning paper.

Rick Bender is President of the Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO,
the largest labor organization in the state.

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Copyright © 2006  Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO