No one can be forced to join a union – that’s banned by federal law. But in 22 so-called “right to work” states, payments to unions aren’t required for employment. The 28 other states require people in workplaces covered by union contracts to pay what are called “fair share dues”, but workers can exempt themselves from union membership. Richard Vedder is an economist at Ohio University with a conservative perspective. He says 5 million people have moved from the non-right to work states like Ohio into the right to work states in the last decade, and 83 Fortune 500 companies done the same since 1984.
“Now there are other things in life besides right to work laws. But I do think this provides an environment that investors feel comfortable with – that is, states with right to work laws where workers are not compelled to join a union or pay dues to a union, where they have complete freedom of choice with respect to their working contract.”
Amy Hanauer is with Policy Matters Ohio, a progressive leaning think tank that does research on labor issues. She says that fair share states have higher median incomes and lower poverty levels than the right to work states.
“Even on the variables that Richard wants to mention, four of the five top growing states are fair share states and ten of the top 15 fastest-growing states are fair share states. So he’s using a very selective use of the data.”
Right to work supporters say it’s about a worker’s freedom to choose to support a union with his money. But those who oppose it say non-supporting workers would turn into freeloaders, benefiting from the union’s work but not contributing to it. There was a provision in Senate Bill 5 that would have eliminated the fair share payments that public sector workers who don’t want to support unions have to make. Hanauer says the overwhelming defeat of Senate Bill 5 in Issue 2 shows Ohioans don’t like this idea.
“This provision was just voted on for public sector workers and Ohio voters made it very clear that they disagree with this kind of approach. And now, having failed to get rid of unions in the public sector, there’s this attempt to hurt them in the private sector. I don’t think it’s the direction Ohio people want.”
But Vedder says the campaign to defeat Senate Bill 5 included other things in it beyond banning fair share payments. The last time a right to work amendment was put before voters was in 1958. And not only was it resoundingly defeated, but Gov. William O’Neill’s support of it cost him his re-election. Vedder says Ohio has changed a lot since then – factory employment is half of what it was then, and more workers view their relationship with their employers as a collegial rather than adversarial.
“I think the political environment, the economic environment is substantially changed. So I think that it is a viable issue to be discussed. And by the way, I would predict in the next year that at least one other state in the northeast might well adopt right to work. In fact, I think it might happen in the next 30 days.”
Whether this will even make the ballot isn’t certain right now, and if it does, it’s unclear what kind of support it might have from Republicans, who are still struggling with whether to reintroduce some reforms in the now-rejected Senate Bill 5. Senate President Tom Niehaus wrote in a statement about the right to work amendment that – in his words – “we need to work to build consensus on the direction we take from here.”