• abbadon420@lemm.ee
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    13 hours ago

    A quick Google search:

    In the context of labor law in the United States, the term right-to-work laws refers to state laws that prohibit union security agreements between employers and labor unions.

    And I still don’t know what right-to-work laws are.

    • LethalSmack@lemmy.world
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      5 hours ago

      Edit: I’m mixing up a at will employment with right to work. Sorry for the confusion. See updated comment below:

      Right to work: Joining a union and paying union dues can no longer be a requirement of employment. This slowly degrades the power of the union and ultimately reduces wages and benefits of the workers

      Right to work At will employment is: A right to be fired at any point for any reason or no reason at all

      The goal is to get around any union protections that require things like a legitimate reason to be fired from a job.

      It also has the added bonus of drastically reducing the benefits of unions and making them much easier to prevent.

    • Bronzebeard@lemm.ee
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      12 hours ago

      They prevent you from having to join a union to work at a company. And you don’t have to pay dues either.

      You can effectively benefit from the unions bargaining without supporting the union - which if enough people do that kills the union (the goal of the law).

    • bluGill@fedia.io
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      13 hours ago

      right to work means you can have a job in a union shop without joining the union.

      My grandpa was a snow plow driver for the state of MN (retired sometimes in the 1990s), but as a republican was always opposed to the union. He still paid union dues, but they were reduced and kept in a separate fund by the union and only used for contract negotiations (important for him - he was a big republican and the union political funds of course donates to democrats). Since he wasn’t a member of the union he couldn’t vote on union leadership, but the leadership called him one of their best people there because he always attended the union meetings where contacts were discussed. As you can start to see not being a union member when there is a union is really complex weird. I’m sure there is more about this that I don’t know about (one obvious thing - what if they voted to go on strike)

      • rockSlayer@lemmy.world
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        11 hours ago

        I’m a union organizer, and by coincidence I live in MN, so this is my bread and butter.

        You pretty much nailed it, with the only exception that right-to-work laws allow everyone in the workplace, even members, to avoid paying dues entirely. As the map shows, MN is not one of those states though. We have different terms in organizing circles. We call states with right-to-work “free rider” states, and those without are called “fair share” states.

        Every union decides how they want to handle nonmembers outside of their legal obligations. My union is CWA, we don’t allow nonmembers to have any say at all on union matters. This means no input on the bargaining survey, no bargaining update emails, no electing the executive board, no voting on the contract, no participation in committees, no admittance to most meetings, etc.

        one obvious thing - what if they voted to go on strike

        In both cases, regardless of free rider laws, nonmembers are not entitled to the strike fund. The dues equivalency your grandpa paid excluded the few cents for the strike fund and a few other union governance things like that. However, they can still participate in the strike.

        • BadmanDan@lemmy.worldOP
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          8 hours ago

          That’s great insight from someone on the ground with type of stuff. Do you think the GOP is gonna attempt to do it Federally again?

          • rockSlayer@lemmy.world
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            7 hours ago

            Honestly, it’s hard to say. I think it’s quite possible, however there’s a surprising twist with the upcoming admin: the nominee to chair the NLRB isn’t shit and has an outstandingly ok labor record as a Republican.

            Edit: fwiw I know exactly how much that actually means. It just means we might get some weak pushback against the destruction of the NLRB, but the labor movement has worked with less.

    • CMDR_Horn@lemmy.world
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      13 hours ago

      Hopefully, I’m not wrong, but basically unions typically require Members Pay dues out of income. Right to work essentially forbid that practice making do payments optional. Which drives down the union revenue

    • WolfLink@sh.itjust.works
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      12 hours ago

      Unions typically have an agreement where employees don’t have to join the union but they still have to pay a fee equivalent to union dues, and the employer can’t pay non-members more than union members, or other similar restrictions.

      The idea is to remove the ability for the employer to offer an advantage to non-members.

      TLDR it’s an essential part of making a functional union.

    • modality@lemmy.myserv.one
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      12 hours ago

      Right to Work means you can have a union job but not join the union. You have the right to”right to work” without being a union member or paying any union dues. Generally it means you get all the benefits without contributing but also unions are usually a lot weaker since so many people opt out, so also the benefits are lesser. Because it is governed by state-level laws, details vary from state to state.