As long as the boss will try to avoid payments to employees to which they are entitled, there is a need for unions. Three years after leaving King County Metro as a bus driver, I received a check for $16 from Metro. The accompanying note indicated that the local amalgamated Transit Union had won an arbitration having to do with the improper underpayment by Metro for a certain type of bus run between two particular dates. The $16 was what the company owed me for having driven those runs during that time frame. I had not paid dues to the union in three years and they still fought for all drivers' rights to proper pay, mine included.

As long as the boss allows and encourages unhealthy work conditions, there is a need for unions. On a staff-only work day, there had been a power failure overnight and we had no heat in our school building. The principal ordered us to remain until our contracted 2:50 p.m. leave time. When the temperature in the building dropped below 60, our union approved our leaving the building to protect our health. The boss would have put us at risk of illness.

When the boss fires workers because of their union activities or because they are trying to organize a union or he thinks they are (with no evidence), there is a need for unions. Historically, unions have pressed for limits on the length of the work day, a decent living wage, paid sick leave and vacation, the elimination of child labor, the rights of labor to organize and the duty of the state to regulate workplace conditions. Some nonunion corporations are currently eliminating worker rights in the name of increased profits. In so-called "right to work (for less) states" (primarily in the South), the minimum wage is lower, workers have fewer rights, and the number of people living in poverty is greater.

Unions are certainly relevant in spite of conservative claims to the contrary, a tactic used to misinform and threaten potential union workers.

-- Richard Reuther, Richland