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Critics: Right to Work "Undermines Middle-Class Jobs"

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Monday, January 18, 2016   

CHARLESTON, W. Va. - As West Virginia lawmakers debate a so-called right-to-work bill, critics charge it's designed to undermine a basic source of middle-class jobs.

Supporters admit that the half of states with the laws have lower average wages. But they argue those states, many in the south, also have lower costs of living. Unions and the laws' opponents argue that's the same as saying those states have lower standards of living and less union power to protect the middle class.

Steve Meador has long worked for Kroger in Roanoke, Virginia, a right-to-work state.

He says he gets paid a lot less than a similar Kroger worker here.

"Big time difference," says Meador. "Same job, and the people here, because they're a non-right-to-work state, make more money. It's almost $2 an hour more."

Without a right-to-work law, everyone covered by a union contract has to pay for the cost of keeping the contract in place. They don't have to pay for other union activities, such as political contributions. With a right-to-work law, an employee is free not to pay any kind of union dues.

Jonathan Williams, communications manager for Meador's union with United Food and Commercial Workers in Virginia, says that takes away funding for important union functions, such as safety and grievance committees. He points to the case of a long-time meat cutter working on a faulty saw.

"As she was slicing meat, it slipped and her hand went into the saw," says Williams. "She almost lost her finger. She feels very strongly that if she wasn't a member of the union, she might have just been fired on the spot."

Supporters say the laws increase job growth by reducing the power of unions. Economists strongly disagree as to whether that is true or not. But Meador says the right-to-work arguments often are built on a false assumption about how unions work where the laws are not in place.

"Anybody can be not a part of the union, if they don't want to be a part of it," Meador says. "You just have to pay the dues to get the services. They don't get something for nothing."

Last week, the right-to-work bill, Senate Bill 1, passed the Senate Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote.


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