Photo by Lil Mayer
How can the ineffective “partnership” mentality infecting almost all of US unions offer anything but tiny incremental and losing choices to the massive problems of outsourcing and AI?
Two recent articles on AI / automation and outsourcing / immigration offer a glimpse of what faces labor unions and the working class as capital, emboldened by the election of Trump and his alliance with Big Tech, sets up to continue its push on automation, subcontracting, outsourcing, and the importing of foreign labor – despite Trump’s tacit claims to support “American jobs”. Organized labor, which, with the exception of the Teamsters, doubled down on its support for Biden and the Democrats in November and clinging to the lost strategy of labor-management cooperation, now appears more on the backfoot than ever to defend against the onslaught.
At least some union members are waking up to this disconnect. Take the railroad industry for example: in the recent edition of The Highball, official publication of the Railroad Workers United described the automation threat facing rail workers and their unions:
“The problem is lack of will to take on the robotization of transportation when the employers and their government partners who are determined to implement it. We should never ignore real complications. But here’s the simple truth: All of our unions have more than enough information right now to know the material problems and dangers ahead. The big question is when are they going to take that information and put it into action?
Meanwhile, on outsourcing, Trump’s 2024 election victory has created fractures in his Republican coalition as his appointees surprisingly proposed removing certain quotas on H1-B visas, beloved by the tech industry, but currently limited by a competitive lottery and quotas. Bernie Sanders was one of the only Democrats to call out the program’s use in lowering wages in a recent Senate speech. And back in 2015, Sanders made similar comments cautioning the progressive embrace of open borders, it “a right-wing scheme meant to flood the US with cheap labor and depress wages for native-born workers”. In response to this, labor doubled down on Hillary Clinton against Sanders.
Organized labor, especially over the past two decades, has joined with the Democrats with enthusiastic support for immigration, mainly due to the growth of its members in heavily immigrant sectors. But now facing Trump’s simultaneous xenophobic anti-immigrant rhetoric with the GOP’s sudden total embrace of foreign labor via H1Bs, labor has no analysis which balances protecting its existing immigrant members while recognizing the role foreign workers have in wage suppression and preventing unionization. Capital has no interest in dropping the draconian 60-day rule, in which an H1B worker is deported if they’re unable to find a job.
Labor management cooperation: a dying “strategy”
US labor and the nation is littered with the effects of the past decades of deindustrialization as capital offshored and contracted out whole industries, destroying millions of decent jobs and decimating communities into “rust belts.” Almost if not all of these destroyed industries were unionized – but a “labor management partnership” mentality prevented unions from organizing a mass fight back against corporate rule on the job and at the ballot box.
The sacrosanct belief in “management rights” and weak US labor law puts limits on unions to negotiate mostly on the “effects” of massive job losses. And because the top union leadership believes the workers’ interests are similar to that of their “employer,” unions never challenged the power of corporate America to dictate terms on the job and the impact of their unilateral power on their communities. This unchecked corporate power left them unable to offer any popular alternative that would give the workers and public interest a voice in the debate.
And beyond the work-site, the power of organized labor is largely limited to insider lobbying, where labor leaders beg Democrats for support alongside much deeper-pocketed business leaders. Any suggestion of public pressure is cast-aside as it may “compromise our relationship with our political allies”.
Yet these same “allies” could not even get their act together to coordinate the nomination of an ostensibly pro-worker NLRB appointee. This was a huge defeat which occurred under an administration repeatedly called the most pro-labor ever by AFL-CIO leaders.
Is there any sign of change among labor? Can they rise to meet the needs of the day?
Individual unions discussing strategies on bargaining around AI and outsourcing with each employer is a good first step and is critical and necessary. But it needs to be coupled with a real mass public educational campaign led by labor and public allies which tie the current workers’ concerns with the growing public acceptance of unions. This type of activity can be a building block for union organizing and real independent political power.
Without this, labor is not reaching or involving the 90% of unorganized workers who are without any voice and are absolutely necessary to win over.
The question for the rank and file in unions and the unorganized is to realize labor needs to shift gears and develop an independent analysis which fundamentally challenges the corporate domination of the workplace and the political arena. Without this, workers will be disabled, confused, and unable to maximize the power necessary to defend and advance.
Only class struggle unions which educate and mobilize workers and public allies into a powerful force for the public good can meet the challenge of the day.
