Jerry Tucker: The Man Who Could Have Saved Organized Labor | The New Republic.
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Jerry Tucker: The Man Who Could Have Saved Organized Labor | The New Republic
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A superb article and a clear explanation of exactly why the labor movement is dying – the labor bureaucracy has sold out the working class and the working class is acutely aware of that betrayal. To be fair, this started shortly after WWII with the passage of Taft-Hartley, a law that Labor has never made a concerted effort to repeal. As the saying goes, “with friends like this, who needs enemies?” When enough workers embrace the ideas of Tucker, there will be a renaissance of the labor movement. I don’t see it happening soon, but if there is to be any social justice in this country, the working class has to organize for their benefit. Capital is not interested in the fate of the working class. For capitalists, the working class exists as a source of “surplus value” to expropriate.
I saw this first at Naked Capitalism. I believe Lambert Strether found it and posted it. I don’t usually read “The New Republic” and was surprised at how it got into such a main stream big media publication. I am encouraged that this story and others are starting to get a little traction. Maybe the Michigan vote opened a can of worms with workers voting against the idea of mandatory dues. Dues are voluntary in Europe, as I understand it. The French unions don’t have much money, but they can shut down the whole country. The rank and file, as you say, know they have been sold out.