Mueller Lake Park Outdoor Amphitheater
Black Doesn't Even Know Where the Battlefield Is
RECEIVED Mon., April 11, 2011
Dear Editor,
Regarding Louis Black's defense of unions [“Page Two,” April 8]: Until Democrats in the middle class shed their overly romanticized ideas of organized labor, their eyes will be diverted from the proverbial ball. Mr. Black can enumerate all the good that unions have done in the last century, and I acknowledge that. But this is 2011, and many of the historically legitimate purposes of labor unions, beyond simply negotiating wages and benefits, have been supplanted by federal statutes and regulations. (Mr. Black, as a business person in a predominantly union-free state, should know this.) At this point in our history, unions represent only 11% of the workforce. And this understandably leaves the rest of the middle class workforce in unionized areas scratching their heads and wondering, "Why should I be fighting for someone else to get better pay and perks?”
Put simply, unions hardly represent the middle class. What they do represent is an extremely disproportionately loud voice in the Democratic Party and a source of division among the middle class.
The middle class is disappearing because tax burdens are being shifted away from the wealthy and to the middle class. It is disappearing because of the rapid increases in health care costs (a tax by any other name …). Defense contractors are getting a pass in the most recent proposed budgets, while the Medicare program is getting the shaft. All of this in the midst of the federal government spending 42% more than it's taking in, with Republicans proposing to cut the top income tax rate again from 35% to 25%.
But what is the impetus to cause Democrats in Wisconsin to go to the mat and shut down their Legislature? Public employee unions losing the "right" – not to collectively bargain for wages and benefits – but to micromanage the operation of state government. That is where the political capital of the Democratic Party is being spent. Meanwhile, President Obama is "negotiating" with Republicans to keep the income tax rates on the wealthy at the lowest they've been in 18 years.
The middle class is under attack, but the Democratic Party doesn't even know where the battlefield is.
Regarding Louis Black's defense of unions [“Page Two,” April 8]: Until Democrats in the middle class shed their overly romanticized ideas of organized labor, their eyes will be diverted from the proverbial ball. Mr. Black can enumerate all the good that unions have done in the last century, and I acknowledge that. But this is 2011, and many of the historically legitimate purposes of labor unions, beyond simply negotiating wages and benefits, have been supplanted by federal statutes and regulations. (Mr. Black, as a business person in a predominantly union-free state, should know this.) At this point in our history, unions represent only 11% of the workforce. And this understandably leaves the rest of the middle class workforce in unionized areas scratching their heads and wondering, "Why should I be fighting for someone else to get better pay and perks?”
Put simply, unions hardly represent the middle class. What they do represent is an extremely disproportionately loud voice in the Democratic Party and a source of division among the middle class.
The middle class is disappearing because tax burdens are being shifted away from the wealthy and to the middle class. It is disappearing because of the rapid increases in health care costs (a tax by any other name …). Defense contractors are getting a pass in the most recent proposed budgets, while the Medicare program is getting the shaft. All of this in the midst of the federal government spending 42% more than it's taking in, with Republicans proposing to cut the top income tax rate again from 35% to 25%.
But what is the impetus to cause Democrats in Wisconsin to go to the mat and shut down their Legislature? Public employee unions losing the "right" – not to collectively bargain for wages and benefits – but to micromanage the operation of state government. That is where the political capital of the Democratic Party is being spent. Meanwhile, President Obama is "negotiating" with Republicans to keep the income tax rates on the wealthy at the lowest they've been in 18 years.
The middle class is under attack, but the Democratic Party doesn't even know where the battlefield is.
Steven Baker
