With union contributions to state races in November?s elections exceeding $4 million, you can count on bills to allow NC government employees to collectively bargain, i.e. form a union, to resurface when the General Assembly re-convenes in January. Representatives Dan Blue (D-Wake), Lorene Coates (D-Rowan), Bruce Goforth (D-Buncombe) and Larry Brown (R-Forsyth), who sponsored House Bill 1583 in 2007 that would have dropped the prohibition for government employees to collectively bargain, were all re-elected and will be back for the 2009 session. Senator Larry Shaw (D-Cumberland), sponsor of Senate Bill 1543 that would have allowed for collective bargaining and established a public employee labor relations commission will also be back. Both of these bills failed to win approval in the 2007 session but expect the same or very similar bills to be filed early in the 2009 session.
Logan Robinson, in A Wall Street Journal editorial ,explains what unions and collective bargaining have done to the auto industry and offers us a peek at what they would do to state government if the expected collective bargaining bills were to become law in North Carolina. George Leef has written extensively on unions and their impact on business and workers. For a sampling see here and here and here.
