Labor Unions Must Fight Globalization or Become Extinct

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“Two world wars [along with Roosevelt’s] “New Deal” had indeed, made government big.” (Moody, 2007, p. 114) Government became “big” because of its controlling interest in business and labor. The reason for this interest is that government was dealing with a failed economy and had two world wars to contend with. These wars required a continual supply of food and supplies to be produced. In order to guarantee supplies to be free of interruption, it required government gaining control over every major industry and labor in order to keep harmony. Along with this harmony, it became instrumental in creating the steady supply of profits for businesses. It also helped in producing wage equality and social services for workers. With government control over businesses, unions began to build strength. By the 1950’s, government control over business and labor was relinquished. Unions found they had emerged with more members than anytime in U.S. history. However what went unnoticed was the empire of diversified investments businesses had built with their profits, and the power they were about to impose. With this in mind, unions should have realized this would become the start of a steady downward spiral for labor. Next come the 1960’s and 1970’s bringing with it yet another war as well as producing drastic changes in the political arena which resulted in “economic stagnation.” Some of the other factors that helped in contributing to economic stagnation was “the cyclical end of the long post war boom . . . competition from other Capitalist states like West Germany and Japan, [as well as the] domestic class struggle that put pressure on corporate profits.” (Fletcher & Gapasin, 2008, p.41) With all these changes happe... ... middle of paper ... ...to develop an innovative strategy locally and internationally to counter-act this “phenomenon.” Unions must courageously and aggressively continue the fight against neoliberalism in order to regain control. If not, Unions must face the fact, unions extinction will become the inevitable. Works Cited Collins English Dictionary. (2003). Neoliberalism. Retrieved February 22, 2011 from http://www. thefreedictionary.com. Fletcher, B., & Gapasin, F. (2008). Solidarity Divided: the crisis in organized labor and a new path toward social justice. Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press. MacEwan, A. (2001). Real World Macro: Twenty-fifth Edition. Boston: Economic Affairs Bulletin. Moody, K. (2007). U.S. Labor in Trouble and Transition. London: Verso. The New Oxford American Dictionary. (2011) Retrieved March 22, 2011 by Amazon Kindle.

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