The unionization of employees, especially in the private enterprise sector, seems to be in terminal decline -- and for a certainty the fight for union representation, for the laborers that make up the industries, that would certainly seem to benefit from such, suffers from the apparent futility in trying to accomplish such a long, arduous, and interminable process. The blame for why there is so much difficulty in establishing present-day unions, is mainly because corporations are provided with all of the tools that they so need to successfully counteract union activity, fair or foul, and are subsequently very effective in the implementation of such; while our government, of, for, and by the people seems to idly just sit by, and to do little or nothing, in return, to help, the common laborer.
The importance of unions being able to provide its members with better pay, better benefits, better job security, and better overall working conditions should not be discounted, for that is the very thing that will help those that struggle the most from unsteady income to firstly stabilize their lives, and secondly this will provide them with the good opportunity to thus improve their lot in their respective lives. One would think, then, that this government, would actually be on the side of the common laborer, or in lacking such forthrightness, would be, at least, at a minimum, desiring to see that the rights that each one of us is fairly entitled to, would be well represented, in the workplace -- but that does not seem to be the case, at all.
If unions are not to be of any real relevancy in the United States, then the replacement for the lack of having those unions, has got to be the Federal government. The first step that this government needs to therefore make is to establish a living wage as the new definition of what a minimum wage so represents, and further to that point, to tie that wage, so of, with the annual cost of living index. The second step is to see that employee hours are actually consistent week to week, and therefore not subject to being at the beck and call of management. That is to say, full-time employees should be entitled to a minimum of thirty-five hours of work each week, of which, the hours so being worked should have an established schedule, and of which, hours worked outside that established scheduled, should be paid at a wage of time and a half of one’s stated pay. The third step is for this government, to actually enforce the laws that are on the books in regards to work and safety standards, overtime, and discrimination.
The fact of the matter is that those that do not have union representation and work within industries in which, their voices are effectively silenced as well as having no say in regards to the overall working conditions that they are a part of, must be aided and abetted by their government so as to reduce substantially the exploitation that they so suffer from, so that they thus can have a fair hope of achieving some reasonable semblance of the American dream.