[lbo-talk] More Than Half of SEIU Members Work for Governments

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

I said earlier (at <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/ 
Week-of-Mon-20060116/029353.html>): "Among the overlapping categories  
that you listed, the only sector that's relatively well organized in  
America are government employees.  According to the BLS, "About 36  
percent of government workers were union members in 2004, compared  
with about 8 percent of workers in private-sector industries" (at  
<http://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm>).  That is a huge  
gap.  When the only stronghold of organized labor becomes workers  
whose wages and benefits directly depend on tax dollars, which in  
turn depend on profits produced by the work of unorganized workers,  
organized labor has a big political and economic problem at hand."

SEIU says that "[o]f SEIU's 1.5 million members, more than half work  
for federal, state, or local governments" (at <http://www.seiu.org/ 
mbe/worksite_leaders/stewards_part1a.cfm>).  It seems that SEIU, too,  
is having trouble organizing in the private sector.

Can US organized labor organize private-sector workers, especially in  
industries that give workers power because of their strategic  
positions in the US economy or their fat profit margins?

Yoshie Furuhashi
<http://montages.blogspot.com>
<http://monthlyreview.org>
<http://mrzine.org>