Election Section

The challenge that confronts the working class in America is mounting. Unprecedented levels of military spending and tax cuts for the wealthy have left federal, state and local governments scrambling to address growing budget deficits. The result has been widespread layoffs of public sector employees and the privatization of well paying public sector jobs with union representation. With an emphasis on profits and market share, private sector employers must cut costs to remain competitive, and these costs include workers’ wages, retirement, and health care. Attempts by workers in the private sector to organize are often met with strong resistance by employers who seek to stave off workers’ demands. This shift from public to private and the accompanying “de-unionization” of the workforce has been disastrous for working people: real income continues to decline for workers while the richest one percent in the U.S. now own as much wealth than the bottom 90 percent combined; over 40 million Americans lack basic health care and those with coverage face soaring costs; and retirement security is being threatened for working people across the country.  

The economic inequality, rising health care costs, and attack on retirement security that now confront the U.S. working class did not come to pass in a vacuum. These problems are the result of policies that were planned and implemented by elected government officials, most notably George W. Bush, often in plain view of the very people who are most harmed by them. So, how is it, one might ask, that the person who is responsible for many of the problems faced by the U.S. workforce was just re-elected for another four years? There are many reasons for this discrepancy; let’s examine two of them. First, many Americans remain apathetic with respect to U.S. electoral politics (e.g.; 40 percent of eligible voters did not participate in the 2004 presidential election). The reasons for such apathy are complex. Nevertheless, opinion polls are a good place to begin. Polls taken on the eve of the 2000 elections, for example, reveal that about 75 percent of the electorate regarded the 2000 elections as a game played by rich contributors, party managers, and the PR industry, which they believe trains candidates to project images and produce meaningless phrases that might win some votes. In other words, its likely that large numbers of Americans stayed home on election night because they believe that candidates do and say what they need to in order to get elected but that, in the end, they answer mainly to the “rich contributors” who bankroll their campaigns. 

Secondly, those who do vote are subjected to such a torrent of misinformation and deceit that it is very difficult to accurately extrapolate anything about a person based on the way he or she votes in a U.S. presidential election. As voters correctly assume, electoral campaigns are essentially run by the PR industry, the guiding principle of which is deceit. The goal of the PR industry is not to provide information but to delude voters into supporting a specific candidate. This deceit was rampant in the months leading up to the 2004 elections, with the Bush camp demonstrating an unrivaled mastery in the art of deception. Take Bush’s “tax relief” plan, for example. The relief that was to flow from Bush’s proposed tax cuts would be experienced mainly by middle and low income earners, we were told, and it was on these grounds that workers supported the cuts. Well, here’s how Bush’s tax cuts will actually play out: those with annual earnings of $1 million will receive a tax cut of approximately $135,000 a year, while those with annual incomes less than $76,000 will get about $350 on average. That is, while millionaires will be given a raise that amounts to nearly 13.5 percent of their income, the great majority of Americans will see their incomes increase by about 1 percent. Given the deception that surrounded the selling of Bush’s “tax relief plan” to middle and low-income earners, it is not difficult to understand why this group supported a plan that, in the end, will do very little for them, but will shower huge sums of money upon the richest one percent of the population.  

The deceit that plagued the 2004 presidential campaigns makes it next to impossible to infer anything about a person based on how he/she voted in the election. Opinion polls, on the other hand, can tell us a great deal and despite all the post-election lamentations about a “divided nation”, recent polls suggest that a majority of Americans have a great deal in common. For example, polls reveal that the vast majority of Americans are deeply concerned about issues such as economic justice, health care, and retirement security. In some polls, voters cited “greed and materialism” as the most urgent moral crisis facing this country, while “poverty and economic justice” were a close second (Pax Christi). With respect to domestic programs, mainstream polls reveal that up to 80 percent of Americans favor guaranteed health care even if it would raise taxes (in reality, a national health care system would probably reduce expenses because much of the heavy administrative costs associated with for-profit health care would be avoided). Large majorities of those polled also favor the expansion of social security and other domestic programs such as public education (Chicago Council on Foreign Relations). Although opinion poll results should be interpreted with caution, they suggest that there is the potential to organize vast numbers of Americans around the issues of economic justice, universal health care and retirement security.  

Labor unions are in a strong position to reach out to the millions of Americans who believe they are unable to affect real change in their lives, or who believe that “leaders” such as George W. Bush are truly fighting on their behalf. Unions, which have been at the forefront of campaigns for economic justice, affordable health care, and retirement security, have the potential to rally workers around these three issues which, according to polls, resonate with working people from across the political landscape. Organized labor can offer a message of hope to those who have given up on political action as a means to realize their dreams for a better life, and can counter deceitful campaigns by exposing the lies that are heaped upon voters, while attending to the bread and butter issues that matter most to working people. The impact that millions of working people could have on the U.S. political system if they were to speak with one voice would be profound. Such an impact could yield free quality health care for all, a secure retirement in which retirees worry about where to vacation instead of how they will make ends meet, and a living wage so that all working people can enjoy a quality of life that is currently enjoyed by only a minority of the workforce. Such gains, however, will not come easy. It will take a lasting and well coordinated effort within organized labor to confront the cynicism and misinformation that afflicts many working Americans, and to therefore bridge the gap that divides working people and leaves them unable to affect real change in their lives. 

Michael Marchant