Hyde Park Urbanist

Housing the Builders of Beijing

The men (and they're almost all men) building Beijing in a bricks and mortar sense are less than full citizens in this city they're building.  That's another thing China has in common with the United States. 

American laborers are often undocumented migrants from another nation, while Chinese laborers are almost always migrants from another region in China.  In the U.S., they live under the threat of deportation while their children receive free public school educations.  China's hukou system means that laborers can work where they choose, but their children will have to go to school in the mother's hometown.  Migrants' rights are improving in China, but they're improving slowly.  Still, families are often separated, with parents working in cities and a child staying behind with grandparents.

The first photo shows a construction site in Beijing.  The two buildings with blue roofs to the left of the site are temporary housing for the construction workers.  There's some efficiency in this.  Without the company housing, the workers would probably have to live a great distance away and face long commute times.  I haven't been inside a building, but from what I hear it's probably small rooms with bunk beds.  For summer, I think I'd prefer life in a tent (second photo).  These guys are working at a smaller project in central Beijing.

I don't mention these conditions to evoke pity for them because that's the last thing these laborers would want.  They're a long way from home working in tough conditions because they want to make a better future for their parents & wives & children and there's nothing in the world they could be prouder of.  But I do worry about the people they've left behind.

Until I was about ten years old, my family moved around a lot.  My father worked as a fast food restaurant manager (when he was starting out, that meant 7 days a week, ten hours a day, with Thanksgiving and Christmas off) and he elected to move up by transfering from one small town to another.  Our family had a mobile home, a trailer, which was convenient.  Whenever we moved, we'd just tape stuff down and call a trucker.  We had a roof over our heads and food on the table and a mom who kept close tabs on us.  And we got to see our father everyday.

Pickets at the Del Prado

Kate Hawley in the Aug 19 Hyde Park Herald noted that "a handful of union workers" staged a picket last week against Padilla's Demolition, Inc, a company Mac Properties/Silliman Group/Antheus Capital hired to work on the Del Prado.  Padilla's is unionized, which is good, but Laborers International Union Local 6 picketed because Padilla's union workers were not being paid standard wages for the area, according to the Herald.

Hawley ends the short article by indirectly quoting Peter Cassel, director of community development for Silliman, to the effect that the issue is between Padilla's and Local 6.  That's one way of looking at it.  However, if Silliman contracted out the work to Padilla's because they were low-priced and Padilla's is low-priced because they pay substandard wages, then everyone who cares about labor has an issue with Silliman/Mac Properties/Antheus Capital, which is applicable to everything Mac contemplates doing in the future.  That's the way I look at it.

One picketing is not a huge issue, but I'm just saying...

Jagdish Bhagwati on Card Check

Columbia University Professor Jagdish Bhagwati, known as an ardent free trader, published a short article in The New Republic arguing for passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, common known as the card check bill.  Bhagwati subtitles his article "Union-loving free traders unite".  The article jumps from one subject to another: card check, the difference in strategies between AFL-CIO unions and SEIU and the attitude of developing countries toward labor standards in trade bills.  In the end, I didn't feel convinced on anything.

Ezra Klein does a good job explaining why SEIU has a different focus than the AFL-CIO unions, but I wanted to make a couple assertions about Bhagwati's thoughts on labor standards in trade bills.  First off, practically everyone agrees that international trade is a net positive, or at least would be under certain circumstances.  "Trade is good" is a consensus value.  It's also a consensus value that businesses need some regulation-- only oddballs would have us completely deregulate everything everywhere.  Generally, regulation takes place at the national level, unless subordinate governmental units are given regulatory authority by the national government.  The European Common Market and GATT and NAFTA also derive their authority from national governments.  So, these international trade deals represent a handing-off of regulatory authority for the good, not of the world as a whole, but rather for the good of each signatory nation to the agreement.

So, each trade deal represents a give and take, with signatory nations arguing over which regulations should exist internationally.  Past American presidents could have chosen to press to make environmental and labor regulations international, providing a more level playing field for corporate competition.  Instead, our government has put much more muscle into extending copyright & patent protections internationally, much to the benefit of Hollywood and the pharmaceutical industries.  Bhagwati should be clear that copyrights & patents are every bit as protectionist as environmental & labor standards.  (And developing nations have fought both sets of protectionist schemes.)

The international political elite represents thinkers & researchers much more strongly than it does the masses.  If international non-govermental organizations had more power, environmental & labor concerns, which affect the many (not just a few) would get a fairer hearing.

Card Check

T. A. Frank at Washington Monthly uses a union organizing campaign at a Rite Aid distribution center as an example of why we need tougher laws to protect pro-union employees from employer harassment.  Frank writes that the Employee Free Choice Act will do that:

...if Rite Aid had been found guilty of making illegal threats or of spying or of intimidation, it could have faced a monetary penalty—up to $20,000 per incident in cases of repeated violations. If Rite Aid had been found to have illegally fired a union supporter, it would have been required to pay not just the back wages, but three times the back wages. And if contract negotiations were being conducted without results, either party could seek federal mediation after ninety days. If, after thirty additional days, negotiations were still stalled, then an arbiter would be able to impose a contract settlement that would last two years. This would prevent employers (or employees) from running out the clock with bad-faith talks.

Those provisions certainly help.  I'm not a lawyer, but it seems to me that if a group of corporate executives plus hired consultants works as a group to break the law, then they should be prosecuted under racketeering laws.  If corporate executives were usually people of color, I'm sure we'd see anti-gang prosecutions flourish in this area, too.

It doesn't look like the EFCA addresses another ruse employers use to delay elections-- fighting over the bargaining unit (the employees the union will be allowed to represent).  Employers are allowed to keep some employees out of the bargaining unit, generally managers and others who either keep confidential information on other employees (like human resources personnel) or who are responsible for rooting our employee malfeasance (like security guards).  The National Labor Relations Board definition of a manager is a bit murky, so employers often use challenges to the bargaining unit as a way to put off elections.  My suggestion would be to put the onus on the corporations to file an exempt-employee list every year with the NLRB.  The list should be limited to a certain percentage of total corporate employees, maybe 15%.  If the corporation doesn't file an exempt list, then the default should just be the top-paid 10%.

Frank believes the card check portion of EFCA is relatively unimportant in the big scheme of things, really not worth fighting for if push comes to shove.  (I've previously stated that I'd add a provision to EFCA mandating secret ballot elections for first contracts.)  I generally agree with Frank on the card check provision, but I think he's being very optimistic to believe that the NLRB will be able to conduct representation elections in a matter of days after a union files.  Nor do I believe that the EFCA will do enough to remove employer coercion from union elections.

And now we have Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) laying out the party line on card check.  McConnell pretends that he's worried that employees will buckle to peer pressure if there's not a secret ballot.  Sadly, he voices no worry over coercive employer actions.  I wonder why.
 

McConnell's on to one thing, though.  He must have been reading my articles on how we can make Hyde Park even more like Paris because he claims that folks on my side want to “Europeanize America".  He's right, to a degree.  European countries actually have surpassed us in some areas, like health insurance and labor laws.  There's no shame in recognizing the brilliance of others and then stealing their best ideas.

I'd like to see a reporter ask this question:  "Sen. McConnell, you've complained that card check will make America more like Europe.  Is it your goal and the goal of the Republican Party to make the rest of America more like Kentucky?"

EFCA & First Contracts

The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) would be the biggest change in union organizing since Taft-Hartley.  EFCA is sometimes called the card check bill because the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) would no longer necessarily call for a secret ballot election in cases where a majority of employees at a business had signed union authorization cards.  IMO the more radical change to existing law under EFCA would be the provision calling for binding arbitration for first contracts-- if the union & company cannot agree on a contract within 120 days, an federal arbitration panel would institute a 2-year binding contract.

I've personally played a leadership role during a union organizing drive and I can tell you that the process is far different than most people imagine it.  In the first place, union membership (in almost all cases) begins only after a first contract is agreed to.  That's when dues begin to be deducted.  That's when the grievance procedure begins.  That's when wage gains go into effect.  The first contract also binds the union and employer together in a relationship that's difficult to unbind.  Yet, surprisingly, there's no secret ballot guarantee for contracts either in present law or under EFCA (as far as I can tell).  While union representation elections are murky events-- most people have very little idea what representation will lead to-- a contract is pretty much cut & dried, black & white. 

Having been in a position where I was trying to talk coworkers into singing union authorization cards, I believe I can knowledeably predict that it would be easier to get cards signed if employees have the right to vote in a secret ballot election on the first contract.

I want to be clear that I support EFCA because it improves current federal law and, more importantly, the enforcement of federal law thru larger penalties for malfeasance. 

Judge Rules Starbucks Violated Union Organizing Laws

From a Dec 23 Business Week article:

An administrative law judge found Starbucks Corp. engaged in unfair labor practices at several of its New York coffee shops, the company said Tuesday.

The ruling by Judge Mindy E. Landow, dated Friday, states that work rules were unfairly imposed on Starbucks' workers who supported a union that has been attempting to gain a foothold at the gourmet coffee retailer.

The specifics of the case illustrate that federal labor law cannot currently protect employees' right to organize.  Baristas at New York City Starbucks began to talk about choosing to unionize.  The company fired or disciplined several employees for violating new, previously unenforced and/or illegal workplace policies.  The union, in this case the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), filed charges at the National Labor Relations Board.  Now, over two and a half years later, the federal government agrees that the workers have indeed proven their case.  And what's the penalty?

The ruling requires Starbucks to, within 14 days, give three former workers their jobs back and compensate them for any lost earnings. The company must also post a notice telling workers it will allow them to discuss the union while off-duty, post materials related to the union and wear more than one pro-union button at a time. The notice also informs workers they will not be fired for supporting the union.

Those requirements are pending appeal so it may be some time before they are instituted, if ever.

That's right.  At some future point, but not just yet, Starbucks may have to pay these workers the paltry wages they would have been entitled to if their basic rights had not been violated (minus any wages they earned elsewhere during these two years).  And the company has to post a notice that they will, from now on, operate in a legal manner.  That's it.

Is this the only NLRB complaint pending against Starbucks?  No, there are pending complaints in Grand Rapids and Minneapolis.  I ask my readers to consider whether such a disrespectful corporation is worthy of their patronage.

Employers must have the authority necessary to run their firms, but the choice of a collective bargaining representative is none of the employers' business; it's a conflict of interest.  At the point where employers merely state a preference in union organizing campaigns, their assumed authority crosses an important line.  From that point forward, a non-coercive decision is impossible.

Marshall Order

I was just mindlessly reading along in this article about how Pres.-elect Obama is taking his time naming a Secretary of Labor when I was suddenly reminded of a regret I'd forgotten:

(T)he power of the position had risen and ebbed since the days of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s high-profile labor secretary, Frances Perkins, reaching lows of obscurity in Republican administrations, and perhaps its highest modern point under Jimmy Carter, whose labor secretary, Ray Marshall, was a well-connected union figure and an important inside player.

I took an undergrad class from Ray Marshall at the University of Texas in the early eighties.  Or, more accurately, half a class.  I'd started out with six classes, figuring I'd drop one and that was the one I ended up dropping-- for a stupid reason, really.  It was almost mid-term and we hadn't had any tests yet, so I was uncomfortable because I didn't know how I was doing.

I remember Secretary Marshall being a little unsure what he had to do to drop me from his roster.  Apparently, it hadn't come up for him yet.  And he didn't try to talk me out of it, probably figuring correctly that anyone who dropped his class wasn't worth wasting breath on. 

So, that's how I became a member of what's probably a very small-- yet definitely not elite-- group of people who've dropped a class taught by a former United States cabinet secretary.

Anti-Union Liberals

A labor union is opposing a Hyde Park Progress-favored development project.  Commence the search for villains!

Richard Gill, auxiliary HPP contributor, covers meetings well and generally maintains an even tone while arguing in favor of seemingly all development projects in HP.  But here he wanders into subject matter that's beyond his expertise:

The union is playing its own members for suckers. How can they try to unionize a hotel if they prevent the hotel from being built?  ...The dry vote is a union strong-arm tactic, plain and simple. Not smart. Talk about tilting at windmills.

Like most Hyde Parkers, Richard probably thinks he's a liberal who cares about hotel workers.  But he finds himself opposing the hotel workers' union on a local issue, so what are his choices?  He could simply ignore the labor angle.  He could argue that he cares about unions & workers, but he thinks this development is more important than their concerns.  Maybe there are other thoughtful rationales we could come up with, but Richard decided to argue that the union's leaders are misrepresenting their members.

Union leaders are not perfect beings.  There's certainly a time & place for critiquing union strategy, examining whether leaders are faithfully & competently representing their members.  But there's zero evidence that Richard has spent any time trying to understand the union's philosophy or the effectiveness of their tactics.  His choice of this moment suddenly to be concerned about UNITE-HERE's members makes it hard to stifle guffaws.  Could it be that the welfare of the union's members is secondary to his desire for a hotel?  Maybe, just maybe?

Are Richard's self-serving complaints about UNITE-HERE's leaders singular at HPP?  No, I'm afraid not.  Peter Rossi, as usual, takes the cake:

I'm not against unions. What I am against is something that is unique to the history of labor: building a movement by driving jobs away. Historically, labor has organized and fought over jobs that already exist.

Unique?  In the literal sense?  Well, let's see if we can possibly find another example of a union protecting its members from non-union competition during the sweep of labor history on our fine globe.  Yes, I have!  Oh, I had to go way back, way way back, all the way to 2004 in far off, exotic Chicago, Illinois, to find such an example.  But I managed.  Behold, Peter, the campaign against Wal-Mart-- UFCW's zoning fight and Big Box Ordinance locally and the national campaign, too!

In any case, the organizing tactics that worked in 1937 are difficult to replicate today.  Peter wants to paint unions into a corner, prohibiting the tactics necessary to keep up with the international corporations of 2008.  Of course, if they took his advice, many people, including me, would complain that they're acting like dinosaurs, refusing to adjust to the 21st century.   Peter, if you work to confine unions to an outdated organizing mode-- in practice-- you're against unions.

UNITE-HERE's leaders are smart and they're motivated to represent their members as forcefully as possible.  The tactics they're using to protect their members are not unusual in the modern labor movement.  Oh, you might be able to find people with long biographies of fighting for workers' rights, a few upstanding union folks who would prefer to deploy labor's resources elsewhere, but it's clear that Richard and Peter have another agenda.  The honest thing would be to admit that, on this issue, they're simply anti-union.

I only wish that Peter and Richard were outliers.  Sadly, they're not.  Too many people who consider themselves liberals have taken for granted the role labor unions play in progressive politics.  The minor favors they ask from us-- like opposing a particularly anti-union hotel developer in a neighborhood that could use a hotel-- are a small price to pay when you consider that the unions are out there every election year, fighting to contain the damage wrought on our nation by politicians in the pocket of corporate interests.

Here we are in 2008 and we still don't have universal health insurance, not even for children!  That's criminal.  Simply no excuse for that in a nation as rich as ours.  If the unionized share of the for-profit sector were much larger, as it is in almost all of Western Europe, there's no question we'd have the same universal coverage Western Europe has.

Das Gift

In German and some related languages, the word for poison is "Gift".  ("Das Gift" equals "the poison".) 

A couple years ago, a University trustee & major donor, who'd made big money in the hotel development industry, announced that Hyde Park needed another hotel.  Because he loves the University, he would build that hotel, at great expense, even though his company believed it would be a break-even prospect, at best.  Hence, Das Gift: the White Lodging Doctors Hospital plan.

How could the University possibly turn down this proposal?  What are they going to say to this generous friend of the University-- "yes, we believe our neighborhood needs another hotel but not yours"?  Impossible.

The standard operating procedure for the University would have been to seek RFQs (Requests For Qualifications) and/or RFPs (Requests For Proposals).  Developers would have responded with an array of ideas for building a hotel on the site and the University would have picked from among the top choices.  The community would have been invited into the process early on to comment.  But the S.O.P. here was cut short by Das Gift.

And there's another problem.  Because White Lodging sees this project as break-even, at best, they're unwilling to go much outside their standard Marriott design.  I've heard from folks on the preservationist side that even small changes involving a few feet here and there run afoul of franchise standards for efficiency.  It's not that White Lodging refuses (now) to listen to the community's suggestions; rather, their franchise's efficiency guidelines preclude meaningful modifications.  Preservation or a union neutrality agreement are off the table.

Is anyone arguing that White Lodging is the best possible developer for this parcel?  No.  If the University followed their standard operating procedure, would other developers have bid on the project?  Yes.  What's wrong with a little competition?

(This post is unsourced & developed from background information I've received from a number of people.  If any of the assertions are incorrect, I'd love to hear about it.)

White Lodging/39th Precinct Dry Vote

I have mixed feelings about the current plans to redevelop the Doctors Hospital site and mixed feelings about using local option for alcohol sales to scuttle the plans.  However, I oppose White Lodging's involvement in this project and I'd be happy to see residents of the 5th Ward's 39th Precinct vote dry.

The plans for a hotel (or two) have run into opposition from three groups-- preservationists who want to protect some or all of Doctors Hospital from demolition, people who live near the site and friends of the labor union for hotel workers (UNITE HERE).  I belong to the last group. 

Organizing among low-wage workers in the for-profit sector is an essential part of reinvigorating the middle class, so anything UNITE HERE or the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) requested would be something I'd be predisposed to support.  Both labor organizations are vibrant resources for folks who otherwise get little respect from society.  These unions represent the people who empty our trash cans where we work, clean our toilets when we go to the hospital and change our sheets when we stay in hotels.  I'm proud to join the members of UNITE HERE in opposing White Lodging, which has resolutely declined to sign a neutrality agreement that would allow hotel workers to organize under less coercive circumstances.

As for preservation, a huge percentage-- I've heard a quarter-- of landfill material ends up being construction waste.  I'm not thrilled with carting Doctors Hospital off to the landfill, but I'm also not attached to the building, which I find unremarkable.  I could probably support demolition for a different project.

I'm unimpressed by several of the concerns the site's neighbors have voiced.  Free parking on the street is a subsidy the city should end anyway and it's a terrible reason to opposed development.  Vehicle congestion, should it be substantial (and I'm doubtful of that), would be a sign that this block is popular, which would tend to make it safer and more interesting.  Vista Homes is huge; development next to it should be just as large.  However, the University has strayed from its usual course of involving the community in development decisions.  The zoning changes requested here are considerable and the immediate neighbors deserve a chance to influence the process, which they'll never have as long as White Lodging is the developer.

Hyde Park could use another hotel (and about thirty-seven more places to drink alcohol).  I'd like to see this prominent parcel redeveloped and I believe the University has good intentions here.  So, it's with a heavy heart that I oppose this project and ask my neighbors to vote their precinct dry.