This article was written by Sue Doro, editor of Pride and a Paycheck . Ms. Doro and other contributors to the website and newsletter offer their experiences, ideas, and knowledge from being women in the trades. If you have not checked out Pride and a Paycheck yet ~ you really should.
Why do we support labor unions? What about unions should be of interest to you?
First of all we want you to know that while this newsletter supports unions, it is not published by unions. We have received support and/or donations from unions as well as individuals and companies because this is still the only national publication by and for tradeswomen. But neither unions nor companies influence what we print. Pride and Paycheck is an independent publication. We support the union concept because in our experience overall it is a great help to women in the trades.
Unions have won many benefits because the heart of the union contract is collective bargaining. A hundred or thousand workers speaking as one gets the attention of management faster than one person talking to her/his boss…alone, and that’s the main reason why collective bargaining is under attack. It is a powerful tool in the worker’s hands and as some would say…it cuts into the soaring profits enjoyed by many companies. The typical workweek was much more than forty hours until unions won the forty-hour week in the late 1800’s. It didn’t come easy. In 1886 seven workers were killed by State Militia in Milwaukee Wisconsin during a peaceful march to establish the eight hour work day. (This event is historically known as the Bay View tragedy.) The concept of a “week-end”, overtime, holiday and sick pay, workers compensation, disability pay, family leave and many other paycheck issues were won in later years by unions and are now enjoyed by many other people who are not union members. The vast majority of businesses did not give these to workers until unions fought and won them.
For people in the trades, the presence of a union often means better working conditions, more safety procedures and clearer guidelines about work assignments and promotions. For women in the trades, the presence of a union gives us another mechanism for making sure we are treated on an equal basis with our male co-workers. The editor of this newsletter would have been harassed out of a job at a large tractor manufacturing plant by a woman-hating co-worker if the union hadn’t intervened. And this was before the term “sexual harassment” came into being! The company did nothing about the verbal and physical abuse, although it was informed of the ongoing harassment in writing, but the union saw it as one member mistreating another member and ordered the abuser to stop or be charged with “conduct unbecoming a union member” and risk losing his job.
Read the complete article – HERE
Check out the Pride and a Paycheck website – HERE
