Unions Help Fight Poverty
May 30, 2007
A major American research organization has released a report that calls for the rebirth of unionization in the United States. In From Poverty to Prosperity: a National Strategy to Cut Poverty in Half, the Center for American Progress argues that the United States should set a national goal of cutting poverty in half over the next ten years, and proposes several steps to achieve this objective.
The report says that 37 million Americans – one citizen in eight – live below the official poverty line. More than 90 million Americans - one third of the population – are struggling to make ends meet because they are poor. Persistent childhood poverty is estimated to cost the nation $500 billion each year, or about four percent of the Gross Domestic Product.
In 2006, the Center convened a group of national experts and leaders that examined the causes and consequences of poverty in America and made recommendations for national action. Although the report notes that the US has seen periods of dramatic poverty reduction at times in the past, the last six years have seen the country move in the opposite direction. The number of poor in the US grew by five million during that time, and inequality grew to historic levels. Poverty in the United States is in fact far higher than in many developed countries.
In order to achieve the goal of reducing poverty by half in 10 years, the report recommends measures that include raising and indexing the minimum wage to half of the average US wage and guaranteeing child care assistance to low-income families and promoting early education for all. The unemployment insurance system would also be adjusted so that part-time workers and others currently not eligible would be better able to access assistance.
Most interestingly, one of the report’s key recommendations is that the government enact the “Employee Free Choice Act.” This would require employers to recognize a union after a majority of workers sign cards authorizing union representation and also establish stronger penalties for violations of employee rights. The authors of the report argue that such an act would increase union representation and thereby lead to better jobs and less poverty for American workers.
It is estimated that the report’s recommendations would cost approximately $90 billion a year, which sounds incredibly expensive until one realizes that the current annual costs of tax cuts enacted by the United States Congress in 2001 and 2003 are in the range of $400 billion a year. The cost of implementing these recommendations could be covered simply by bringing a better balance to the US federal tax system and recouping some of the tax cuts of the last few years.
Unionization has been on the wane in the United States for some time now. But it is certainly interesting to see a large public policy organization argue for a return to a more labour friendly environment as a means of addressing an ever-growing poverty problem.
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I question the poverty line. 1 in 8 people ? That is alot of people. I think the reason the USA has more "poverty" than in many other developed countries is because those other countries don't have such a high poverty line. Who makes up these "poverty lines" anyway ? There is no question lots of poverty exists, and having more unions may or may not help. I think unions will help with wages of people who are TRAINED for something, and those people don't exactly come from poverty. However when the best job you can get is min wage, chances are there is no union .
JimCotton - 2007-05-31 11:37