Friday, September 04, 2009
2009 Labor Day message: The cause of our lives
By Ron Gettelfinger
Our Labor Day celebrations this year will be touched by sadness for the loss of our great friend Ted Kennedy.
Sen. Kennedy celebrated the dignity of labor not just one day a year, but every day. A frequent visitor to UAW local union halls, he liked to tell us about his first day as a senator in 1963. When asked what committee assignments he preferred, he gave the same answer as his brothers: "I want the Labor Committee."
Unlike his brothers, Ted Kennedy had the opportunity to serve in the U.S. Congress for more than four decades, compiling an unparalleled record of service to our country.
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| Sen. Ted Kennedy celebrated the dignity of labor not just one day a year, but every day. |
The catalog of Kennedy's legislative accomplishments -- which runs to more than 50 pages -– doesn't fit into the jurisdiction of any one committee. He passed laws that put food on the tables of needy families, freed dissidents from the Soviet Union, raised the minimum wage, and gave millions of children the chance to see a doctor.
Universal health care, Kennedy wrote in Newsweek the month before he died, "is the cause of my life." He shepherded dozens of measures through Congress, finding ways to expand coverage for children, seniors and the unemployed. All the while, he kept his eyes on the ultimate prize: A comprehensive insurance plan for every man, woman and child in the United States.
Born to wealth and privilege, Kennedy devoted his long career to fighting for those who had no such advantage. He often had to sail against the wind, as the pendulum of American politics swung away -- sometimes far away -- from his progressive, people-oriented philosophy. He succeeded, on health care and other issues, by forging new alliances, always with a plan for fighting the next set of battles.
This Labor Day, our union and America's entire labor movement find ourselves sailing in a difficult sea. Auto companies and other manufacturing firms where our members work have faced severe financial crises -- in no small part because of the ever-escalating cost of America's patchwork health care system.
The painful sacrifices made by UAW members to give these companies relief have resulted in a reduction of tens of thousands of good-paying jobs and a reduction in union membership. The route to renewal is through new organizing. But a fierce and often illegal campaign of resistance by employers frequently silences the voice of workers who want to exercise their democratic rights in the workplace.
The Employee Free Choice Act -- which Ted Kennedy strongly supported -- is intended to give workers a fair chance to organize and bargain. Millions of American workers want this opportunity because American workers can count. They know the difference between a secure union job with good wages and decent benefits and a non-union job which offers less.
According to recent data from the U.S. Department of Labor:
• A union paycheck is worth $7,700 more per year than a non-union one.
• Eighty-six percent of union workers have retirement benefits funded by their employer, as opposed to just 51 percent of non-union workers.
• Union workers are 59 percent more likely than non-union workers to have employer-paid health insurance.
During the recent debate about the future of America’s auto industry, many union members and concerned citizens were astonished when the success of our union in raising living standards for ordinary workers was attacked as somehow "un-American." 
In fact, by building a broad middle class in this country, UAW members and our brothers and sisters in the labor movement have contributed to a shared prosperity which benefits union and non-union members alike.
It's easy to sneer at a mythical "overpaid" auto worker. But for anyone who earns a living selling homes, cars, clothes, appliances, groceries or other consumer goods, it's good news when union members have enough money in their pockets to be active consumers.