Labor and Changing of the Guard

John Sweeney retired from his post as the head of the AFL-CIO, and former AFL-CIO Rick Trumka will steer the nation's most prominent labor organization. As Harold Myerson writes in the WaPo, Sweeney presided over a period where labor faced setbacks and declining numbers, some of which produced SEIU and other unions to split and from the AFL-CIO. Sweeney, as Myerson points out, deserves credit for repositioning labor as a central player in the Democratic Party and a liberal coalition as well as the initial gains on EFCA. If EFCA passes--and it has a better shot of doing so now that card check is gone--Trumka's priority must be to be swing the AFL-CIO's field operations into action and commence one of the largest organizing movements in recent history.

If EFCA makes it through Congress and to the president, it will come at a crucial moment. As I commented in conservative opposition to teabag central, the working-class' income shrank during the Bush years and unions represent a powerful way to restore the flagging earning potential of those in many industries which are now working-class that exist outside the traditional conception of the industrial blue collar man. In a piece blasting the Tea Party and its appeal to the working-class, Timothy Egan asks why none of the self-proclaimed patriots opposed the Bush tax cuts, corporate greed and perfidy, the Bush decision to save finance capitalism, or why the majority of Americans failed to benefit after eight years. In essence, Egan ponders why the working-class votes against its interests and empowers politicians and trashy talk show hosts who advocate a system that advances an economic system that limits their ability to prosper. It's a fair question and one that defies an easy answer when anti-government drums are beaten and laced with populist resentment for ratings.