Unions offer tools to battle income inequality

[TexasTowelie]

By D. Taylor, president of UNITE HERE, the North American union that represents over 270,000 workers and over a million of their family members in the hospitality, culinary, food service, and transportation sectors.

I believe in America, in equality and in the women and men who work hard and play by the rules to provide a better life for themselves and their family.

So with summer coming to a close and Labor Day just around the corner, it seems the right time to take a look at the state of organized labor and the difference having a union can make in the life of ordinary Nevadans and Americans. When workers organize, they take their fate into their collective hands and seize the best opportunity of achieving the American dream of prosperity and justice.

Since its high-water mark in the 1950s, membership in unions has gradually declined as income inequity grew and laws were passed limiting the freedom of Americans to organize for a voice at work. Today, with the cards stacked against them, far fewer workers are organized, and economic injustice runs deep through our nation — a feeling so many have of being left behind or participating meaninglessly in a system rigged against them. The reality is, the catastrophic increase in economic inequity in this country is a direct result of the attack on the rights of workers to have a say in their wages, hours and working conditions. By organizing a worker union at their place of employment, workers begin to directly affect and combat income inequality.

I’m proud that my union, UNITE HERE, is growing, not dying: In fact, UNITE HERE is the single fastest-growing private sector union in the AFL-CIO. And as we grow, we are changing lives and closing the income inequality gap.

Read more: https://lasvegassun.com/news/2017/aug/20/unions-offer-tools-to-battle-income-inequality/