AT PRO Act CP - Michigan 7 2023 CPSW

Affirmative
No Solvency – Inequality
PRO Act exacerbates inequality—more discrimination towards minorities and threatens livelihoods of millions
Alfredo Ortiz, 21, Alfredo Ortiz is the president and CEO of the Job Creators Network, a small business advocacy organization. “Radical labor legislation threatens to wage war on small businesses and workers,” The Hill, 9-6-2021, https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/569716-radical-labor-legislation-threatens-to-wage-war-on-small-businesses-and/, 7-15-2023)//AAlmand
Labor Day is an opportunity to celebrate the incredible contributions ordinary workers make to the economy. Nearly 150 million Americans work to create the most advanced economy the world has ever known. Yet this prosperity is threatened by radical labor legislation known as the Pro Act that amounts to a Democratic declaration of war on small businesses and workers. The Pro Act would especially hurt Hispanics, who are disproportionately entrepreneurial and more susceptible to the legislation’s harmful regulations. President Biden and Democrats in Congress have included aspects of the Pro Act, which passed the House of Representatives in March, in their pending $3.5 trillion budget framework. Senate budget reconciliation rules prevent the worst aspects of the Pro Act from becoming law. But the bill’s fiercest congressional champion, Senate Budget Chairman Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), will try to include as much of it as possible. The Pro Act would subject independent contractors to strict labor criteria that involves proving that their jobs aren’t under the direction or control of those who hired them, among other burdensome rules. This new scrutiny could make millions of independent contracting positions illegal, threatening the livelihoods of nearly 60 million entrepreneurs who earn some or all of their income through contracting. Hispanics, who start businesses nearly 40 percent more often than Americans as a whole, are especially vulnerable. Since contractors can set their own hours and working conditions, this form of work is particularly attractive for single mothers who are trying to balance work and family responsibilities. The Pro Act also wages war on America’s successful franchise system, which has offered approximately 775,000 Americans a ticket to the middle class as small business owners. The bill codifies an Obama-era joint employer standard that makes franchisors jointly liable for their franchisees’ employment decisions. To ward off potential lawsuits as joint employers, franchisors would have to curtail franchise opportunities, limiting them to the most qualified applicants and reducing business opportunities for Hispanics who often have to work harder for the same credentials. Minority-owned franchisees tend to operate in minority-owned neighborhoods and hire minority workers, meaning this Pro Act provision also would reduce minority job opportunities. The Pro Act also would eliminate right-to-work provisions, which allow employees in 27 states to keep their jobs even if they don’t want to belong to a union and pay dues to union bosses. Right-to-work protections are especially important for minorities who long have faced union discrimination. Right-to-work protections offer them the freedom to be judged by their employers based on merit and work ethic, rather than sclerotic union seniority agreements. Right-to-work states have more economic opportunities, offering lifelines to job seekers in underserved communities. Why do President Biden and Democrats in Congress support legislation that would hurt Hispanic small businesses and workers by curtailing independent contracting, franchising and right to work? Because their labor boss paymasters demand it. Big labor unions donated over $200 million to Democrats and liberal groups in the last election cycle, including $27.6 million to Biden’s election campaign alone. The Pro Act is their return on investment. The Pro Act would line union bosses’ pockets at the expense of small businesses and employees by 1) turning independent contractors into unionizable employees, 2) making it possible to unionize entire franchise brands (rather than merely independent franchises), and 3) forcing employees who don’t want to be part of a union to pay dues. The Pro Act allows coercive unionization practices such as card check, exposing vulnerable workers to Chicago-style organizing tactics. No wonder unions have made the Pro Act their top priority, going so far as supporting the elimination of the filibuster to pass it. The only thing preventing Democrats from selling out small businesses and workers to union bosses by passing the Pro Act is Republicans. Senate Republicans should campaign — especially around Labor Day — on defeating this anti-worker, anti-small business, and anti-Hispanic legislation that would strike a devastating blow to the opportunity economy and devalue American labor.
PRO Act can’t protect workers or solve inequality—threatens privacy, forces dues, and kills free speech
Sean P. Redmond, 21, Sean P. Redmond is vice president of labor policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. “A Good Example of Bad Legislation,” 3-5-2021, https://www.uschamber.com/employment-law/unions/good-example-of-bad-legislation, 7-15-2023)//AAlmand
As the economy continues on the path of a K-shaped recovery, Congress should be pursuing policies that will elevate businesses and workers on the bottom part of that K. Instead, Democrats are pushing legislation designed to help their friends in organized labor and cause more damage. This legislation is called The Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, but there is nothing positive about it. To put it succinctly, the PRO Act represents a radical rewrite of American labor law that would threaten worker privacy, force workers to pay union dues or lose their jobs, and undermine free speech rights. The bill first surfaced in 2019, although it failed to advance beyond House passage. Now that Democrats have unified control, the prospect of the PRO Act becoming law has become more realistic. The rationale for organized labor’s push for this legislation is fairly simple. Union membership has been steadily declining since the 1950s, and rather than attract new members by convincing people to join, labor leaders want Congress to stack the deck in their favor by disrupting the careful balance in U.S. labor law. The PRO Act would do so in many ways. At the top of the list, the PRO Act would effectively overturn right-to-work laws that have been democratically passed in 27 states. Under right-to-work laws, workers in unionized businesses can opt out of paying unwanted union dues. Under the PRO Act, a worker who makes that choice is likely to be fired. The bill also would do an end-run around the current system of private ballot union representation elections. Instead, it would encourage “card check” voting where union organizers would approach individual workers and demand that they publicly sign a card in favor of the union. Even worse, when unions “win” such a rigged process, the federal government is empowered to impose a collective bargaining contract on an employer. Should that occur, workers would be denied the opportunity to approve the agreement, even though it impacts their wages and working conditions. Incredibly, the employees who would have to live with that contract would get no vote on it. And if you don’t want to pay union dues to support an unwanted contract, well, see the paragraph above about keeping your job. Employers also would be stripped of fundamental legal rights under the PRO Act, losing their standing in cases before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Yet, if they fail to follow an NLRB decision they could also be fined—up to $100,000 in some cases—and their officers held personally liable for alleged violations. And worker privacy would also come under threat, as the PRO Act would put into legislation a requirement that employers give unions personal information about their workers, such as home addresses and phone numbers, cell phone numbers, e-mail addresses, shift locations, and work schedules. As for those working as independent contractors, the PRO Act would turn most of them into employees by adopting California’s disastrous new law on worker classification. Independent contractors would lose flexible work arrangements and see fewer earning opportunities. They would, however, suddenly be eligible for union card check campaigns and subsequent payment of union dues. Put simply, the PRO Act would be bad for workers, employers, and the economy. It’s a union wish-list, a grab bag of harmful policies that would completely undermine today’s balance in labor law. Members of Congress who support this bill will certainly have a lot to answer for if it should ever become law.
No Solvency – Unions
PRO Act only aids huge unions at the expense of workers
Eric Boehm, 21, Eric Boehm is a reporter at Reason who covers economic policy, trade policy, and elections. “The PRO Act Empowers Union Bosses, Not Workers,” Reason, 6-16-2021, https://reason.com/2021/06/16/the-pro-act-empowers-union-bosses-not-workers/, 7-15-2023)//AAlmand
Labor unions spent more than $27 million to help get President Joe Biden, a self-described "union man," into the White House. Now, they're looking for a return on that investment. Specifically, passage of the Protecting the Right to Organize Act (PRO Act), which cleared the House earlier this year but remains stalled in the Senate with all Republicans and three Democrats refusing to support it—despite Biden's calls for its passage as part of his infrastructure proposal. The bill is a grab bag of big labor agenda items that would extend some of California's awful independent contractor regulations nationwide, abolish so-called "right to work" laws in the 27 states that have passed them, and expand the powers of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), among other things. Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, has described the legislation as a "game-changer" for labor unions. And several major unions have threatened to withhold all future campaign contributions from the Democratic senators who continue to be the main stumbling blocks for the bill. Unions are playing hardball over the PRO Act because they see it as a vital lifeline—a way to extract more revenue from America's workforce at a time when the overall number of unionized workers continues to decline. A high-profile defeat earlier this year in the first attempt to unionize an Amazon distribution center only makes it more clear: given the choice, workers mostly don't want to be part of a union. So why not remove the choice? "Labor unions want the PRO Act to stop plummeting membership and increase revenue from dues," says Sean Higgins, a research fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free market think tank. He's also the author of a new report that digs into the depths of the PRO Act, concluding that the legislation "empowers unions at the expense of workers." Backers of the PRO Act say the bill is about empowering workers. In a joint op-ed published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette shortly before last year's presidential election, Biden and Trumka argued that the PRO Act was necessary to "dramatically enhance the power of workers to organize." They touted aspects of the legislation to beef up the NLRB's authority to "actively encourage collective bargaining." But if workers were as eager to join unions as Trumka and Biden seem to think, they wouldn't need a powerful federal bureaucracy to encourage that outcome, Higgins argues. Less than 7 percent of American workers are members of a union right now, down from a high of 35 percent in the 1950s. What's happened in recent decades? Unionization hasn't been outlawed. The NLRB wasn't abolished. But faced with more economic opportunities and an increasing number of states passing laws that free workers from being required to join a union to hold certain jobs, workers have voluntarily opted out of unionization. The PRO Act is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for unions to stomp out those trends. By duplicating California's disastrous rules that significantly narrow the definition of independent contracting work, the bill would smother workers' flexibility to set their own hours. By forcing employers to turn over private information about their employees, the bill would invade workers' privacy. And by giving the NLRB the power to overturn the democratic results of workplace union elections in some circumstances, the bill would allow unions to "win" elections they'd actually lost. Perhaps most significantly, given Biden's expensive infrastructure spending dreams, the passage of the PRO Act would significantly hinder the completion of large-scale infrastructure projects, as Stephen Sandherr, CEO of the Associated General Contractors of America, an industry group, has warned. The PRO Act isn't really about empowering workers or changing the dynamics of the American workplace or building modern infrastructure. It's about directing federal power and resources to boost flagging labor unions, which have invested huge sums of money in the political system to get to this moment. "Federal labor policy should be aimed at maximizing worker freedom," says Higgins, "not growing union power."
The Pro Act is insufficient to solve for decades of union decline
Matthews 6/10. Dylan Matthews has since 2018 served as a senior correspondent and head writer for Future Perfect, Vox’s section that tells stories about people and institutions trying to do the most good for the world they can. "Labor unions aren’t "booming." They’re dying." Vox, June 10, 2023. https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/6/10/23754360/labor-union-resurgence-boom-starbucks-amazon-sectoral-bargaining // MYH
I am, like all non-management Vox staff, a Writers Guild of America, East member, and a former member of Vox’s union bargaining committee, so I empathize with the urge to be optimistic about the future of organized labor, especially at a time when my comrades in the film and TV industries are striking for a better contract. I stand in solidarity with them and hope they get an excellent contract.
But I think it’s even more important to be honest about the situation. Organized labor is not booming, rebounding, or in a resurgence of any kind. Instead, it is in decline, as it has been for many years.
Official data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics starts in 1983. That year, 20.1 percent of all workers were in a union. That’s down to 10.1 percent as of 2022 — the lowest it’s ever been in that time frame. The decline has been basically continuous, with brief interruptions in 2008 and 2020 as non-unionized workers lost jobs faster than those with union protections. While public-sector unionization has fluctuated a bit (it fell from 36.7 percent to 33.1 percent from 1983 to 2022), by far the sharper decline is in the private sector, where rates fell from 16.8 to 6 percent.
Planet Money’s Greg Rosalsky put it well in a piece earlier this year: “While there was an uptick in labor organizing in 2022, we’re hardly witnessing a rejuvenated movement strong enough to dramatically reverse unions’ long-run decline.”
What’s driving the decline in unions?
Starting the data at 1983 gives a misleading picture: The decline of unions began well before then.
Harvard economist Richard B. Freeman has put together data on union membership going back over 100 years. It shows that the share of households with a union member was around 10-11 percent going into the Great Depression. Starting in 1937 (not coincidentally the year the Supreme Court upheld the pro-union National Labor Relations Act passed two years earlier), you see a dramatic rise in membership. The rate went from 13.2 percent in 1936 to 26.6 percent in 1938. The rate peaked at around a third of households, and stayed in that range for decades. But by the mid-1950s, a slight but perceptible decline was already starting, which has continued ever since.
I’ve seen two major theories for why this happened. The first emphasizes politics: Countries with more left-wing governments have seen smaller declines in unions. In Canada, for instance, the share of workers in a union has fallen, but the fall is less stark than in the US, which might be explainable by its more pro-union laws.
The second emphasizes the fact that union firms tend to expand their workforces less quickly than other firms. That makes sense: Unions raise wages, so union workforces cost more. But over time, this effect means a greater and greater share of the workforce is non-unionized because non-unionized firms are able to grow faster.
In a landmark 2001 paper, economist Henry Farber and sociologist Bruce Western credited this as a major factor behind union decline in the US. They estimated that unions would have to increase their organizing rate sixfold just to keep the US membership rate constant. To increase unionization, they’d need an even more dramatic and improbable explosion in organizing.
I lean toward the latter theory. It helps explain why you didn’t see a collapse in union rates when hostile governments (like those of Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush) came to power, but instead the same gradual decline as occurred under Democrats.
Laws, not vibes
Whatever explanation you choose, any attempt at union revitalization will require much more than organizing a few Starbucks locations. It will require wholesale change to labor law.
The political scientist David Madland’s book Re-Union gets into the details well, but the gist is you need to find ways to organize unions across whole sectors, not just workplace by workplace. In many European countries, firms don’t pay a penalty for paying good union wages; union contracts are “extended” to whole sectors. If UPS drivers win a good contract, FedEx would then have to abide by those terms too, even though it doesn’t have a staff union.
This would be an ambitious change. The PRO Act, the labor movements’ big priority in Congress (which is currently dead in the water given Republican control of the House), wouldn’t do much to further it; that act would mostly strengthen the existing workplace-based system, which is valuable but insufficient. Some states like California are experimenting with sectoral bargaining, but we’re in very, very early days yet.
The future of labor, I think, lies much more heavily in legal reform efforts meant to enable that kind of broader bargaining than it does in a few heavily publicized elections at individual companies. It’s not sexy work, but it’s the only thing that could return organized labor to the power it once had in the US.
Right to Work Good
Right to work laws are good---key to sustain corporate innovation.
Justin Hung Nguyen & Buhui Qiu, 22, Nguyen is a senior lecturer (assistant professor) in finance at Massey University. Buhui Qiu is Associate Professor of Finance and Director of Doctoral Studies at the University of Sydney Business School. He received his PhD in Finance from the University of Cincinnati in July 2009. "Right-to-Work laws and corporate innovation," Journal of Corporate Finance Volume 76, October 2022, 102263. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0929119922001067
The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 allows U.S. states to enact the highly controversial Right-to-Work (RTW hereafter) laws, which permit employees to enjoy the benefits defined in the collective-bargaining agreements negotiated by labor unions without having to join unions or pay union dues. Despite the controversy over the RTW laws and the strong resistance from unions,1 27 states have adopted the RTW so far. The RTW recognition is shown to significantly weaken labor unions' bargaining power and their activities (Chava et al., 2020; Ellwood and Fine, 1987; Hirsch, 1980; Warren Jr and Strauss, 1979), and enhance employment, but have mixed effects on wages (Chava

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