Right-to-work law wrong for workers
“Here we go again” as someone once said. Ever since the New Deal and the passing of the Fair Labor Standard Act of 1935 (Wagner Act), unions have had the right to exist, strike and bargain for wages and benefits.
Collective bargaining was seen as a fair and sane way for labor and management to negotiate. Periodically, there has been an effort to abrogate the right and power of organized labor. The Wagner Act came only after a long, harsh and hard-fought struggle to gain this right.
The history of the labor movement is one of inequality between labor and management. From the Industrial Revolution on, labor was subjected to harsh conditions including the use of child labor that endangered underage children’s health and welfare. As labor gained improved pay and working conditions in the workplace, afforded by the Wagner Act, labor was able to push for improved conditions overall, including health, education and general welfare for working families.
It is important to note that as organized labor’s lot improved, so did that of non-union workers. The end of child labor also came at this time, which insured that underage children would be in school rather than in mines and factories, insuring a better future.
It is ironic that we are now hearing prominent GOP candidates advocating the return to child labor as they also work to weaken labor’s position overall by turning back the clock to pre-New Deal days. We thought we had put such inequities behind us, but we see goods sold in our stores made by exploited children in other countries where children are not protected by law.
The middle class evolved as a result of the working class gaining purchasing power giving stimulus to the economy. This same dynamic is under attack politically now as GOP-controlled states are pushing to take away collective bargaining rights, further weakening labor’s position. At the same time, we have a majority in the Supreme Court that says a corporation is the same as a person and that unlimited sums of financial contributions can be made to candidates without identifying the source.
These sources are not friendly to labor and they seem to be more interested in gaining more wealth and power. So, again, we have the generational assault on labor with the labor-breaking gimmick called right-to-work, which will take away a worker’s right to stand on an equal basis with management and to fairly bargain for pay and benefits.
In conclusion if the right-to-work law is passed, the standards for pay will be lowered and benefits eliminated.
—John Daniel
West Terre Haute
Put labor law on the ballot
The right-to-work law should be decided by the people on a ballot. Think before you vote. If you don’t want to pay union dues, don’t become a teacher, city worker, steel or iron worker, construction, sheet medal worker, factory worker, etc.
There are many non-union places. Go there.
Unions work hard for the people. United they stand, divided they fall. Everything is voted on in a contract.
Anyone working under a contract pays dues. If they do not want to pay dues, they are scabs and nobody wants to train or work with one.
You vote on the people who negotiate a contract. They work hard and then you vote on the contract. Couldn’t be any more fair.
I would not want to work without a union and never said a word about the dues in 46 years of work. I worked every day and a lot of overtime.
Places do not want to come here, and many have left because of taxes and utilities.
In the ’80s Midland Glass paid $125,000 a month on light bills, and $160,000 a month on gas bills, and taxes were over $150,000 quarterly.
South Dakota and Florida are two of the states where they don’t even file state taxes, only federal.
Ask people from other states. They laugh at a wheel tax. They never heard of it. Alabama doesn’t pay the property taxes we do.
In one state I know of, after age 65 you don’t pay property taxes at all. Several retired in North Carolina because when you retire you don’t pay taxes on a 401k when you draw on it.
These are a lot of reasons people don’t move here or start a business, not right-to-work.
Right-to-work is garbage. Make phone calls as I have. If legislators are for the right-to-work, they have lost my vote and many others’. Make calls and think before you vote.
— Roberta Hedge
Terre Haute
State smoking ban
makes no sense
I read in the Tribune-Star the other day an editorial praising the Indiana General Assembly for taking up a smoking ban statewide. To that I must say: Bravo!
The state has every right to restrict smoking since it doesn’t profit from it. What’s that you say? The state DOES profit from smokers?
Surely you jest. There is no way a state government would impose a nearly 100-percent surtax on a product then tell those paying the tax that they cannot use the product. Would they?
They do and they are. The cigarette tax in Indiana is $1.55 per pack. The most recent data show there are 1 million adult smokers in this state. Averaging one pack per day, that’s $1,550,000 a day.
Doing the math, it comes out to over $565 million a year. Over a half a billion dollars and they want to make it illegal to smoke in any public place? (Excluded are private clubs.)
There are restaurants in Terre Haute that constructed special areas where only smokers were affected by smoke. This was done at considerable expense to those establishments.
The county now tells them that isn’t good enough either.
Let me give you an example that maybe even a nonsmoker can understand. Right now, Margaret Avenue is being rebuilt. It will be a wonderful thing if it ever gets done.
Let’s, just as a for instance, say the county commissioners decide that the New Margaret Avenue is far too nice to allow cars to actually travel on it. Even though Vigo County charges a wheel tax. Same logic would apply.
Folks, I am a smoker, and I make every attempt to not impinge on others’ right not to smoke. I understand that not everyone enjoys an after-dinner cigarette.
That being said, even nonsmokers would likely agree that the state should not profit from a tax on a legal product and not allow the legal use of that product in controlled environments.
Now about that right-to-work bill …
— Mark Bender
Shelburn
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