Over the last century, our nation’s commitment to collective bargaining—allowing employees to unite and have a voice in their workplace—has served this country well, creating the middle class that has powered our democracy. And the types of laws challenged in Friedrichs have both improved our public schools and opened the doors of opportunity to people of color, women, and immigrants. The Court should reject the invitation in Friedrichs to slam that door shut.
There are discussions going on right now among union leaders about what our organizations should do if, as they fear, the Roberts Court rules against us.
Agency fees, also known as Fair Share, requires employees to pay the cost of union representation regardless of whether they choose to join or not.
It also requires the union to provide representation whether the employee is a member or not.
It must be said that over the past couple of decades the NEA has looked less and less like a union and more concerned with presenting itself, one IEA leader said to me, “as the face of advocates for quality teachers.”
But he was arguing this in opposition to being organizers for collective bargaining rights.
And so, in many ways, we are now disarmed for the fight to come.
Some current leaders are proposing a vision of the NEA if we lose Friedrichs that would have us look more like the AARP than the AFL-CIO, providing insurance discounts and movie passes.
Anything to keep members.
Up in suburban Prospect Heights teachers have just settled a two week strike. Teacher strikes are actually pretty rare since we won collective bargaining in Illinois thirty years ago.
Teacher strikes were fairly common before that. Collective bargaining rights brought stability to the school systems throughout the state.
If a decision by the Roberts Court returns us to those days before we had collective bargaining rights, will we see an increase in instability? And if so, a well-organized labor union with a collective bargaining focus is what teachers and education workers will need more than ever.
Will it be the NEA/IEA?
Or somebody else?
Fred Klonsky 
“[This article by a Northwestern finance professor] shows how the projected day of
reckoning varies by state. Under 8% realized returns, seven states run out of money before the
end of 2020, including Illinois (2018), New Jersey (2019), and Connecticut (2019). 20 states
have run out by the end of 2025, and 31 states by the end of 2030.
The damage inflicted by this problem depends upon how large the benefits owed to
workers actually are relative to the state’s revenues. In Illinois, obligations already recognized
today under the ABO will result in $11 billion in average annual pension payments in 2019-
2023, the five years after the funds run dry. Projected payments (i.e. those under the PVB) will
be $14 billion during those years. Tax revenues for the state of Illinois were $31.9 billion in
2008, according to recent U.S. Census Bureau measures. Moving to a pay-as-you-go system
would therefore be a catastrophic shock to the revenue needs of the state of Illinois. As shown in
the second column from the right, the benefits in the five years following run-out are 35% of
total annual state revenue flows, considering only ABO benefits promised as of 2008 and
benchmarking to 2008 revenues. The final column assumes 3% revenue growth and shows that
projected annual benefit payments for Illinois will be 32% of projected 2019 revenues.
at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1596679&
Check the date on the study and the assumptions. You, and your conclusions, are way off. Before demanding any further comment, please list your name and qualifications to interpret this data. Anonymous is insufficient.
Anonymous,
I have seen that flawed argument before. Assuming EVERYBODY retires today, no new employees are hired, and NO money is paid in by the state, then would the pension fund eventually run out of money? Yes, but all those assumptions are false, (incorrect assumptions in=incorrect answers out). The employees will be there today, tomorrow, next year, next decades. They will be paying in every paycheck, as they always have, every penny due. The state needs to pay what is due from the state as the state’s theft of the deferred compensation of teachers and other public employees is the ENTIRE reason the funds are not fully funded. If you have difficulty understanding that, ask a math teacher to explain it to you.
Anon
The union should be prepared for defeat and have the lawyers find a way to legally charge a representation fee in its place.
This has always struck me as undue interference in contracts, and I can’t understand how any courts could justify interfering in contracts between corporations and unions in ways that would raise howls of protest on all sides if they did the like between two corporations.
I agree. By accepting employment you enter into a contract with your employer. Why is government interfering with your employment contract? If you were offered two choices of health insurance in your employment package with both offering health care but one cheaper than the other would the courts strike down the cheaper plan?
The NEA was around long before the right of collective bargaining for public employees in Illinois. They would lobby in state legislatures and sometimes lawmakers would listen to them, sometimes not. The federal government specifically excluded public employees from federal labor laws. The question of representation of public employees was strictly left up to the states. Illinois did not prohibit collective bargaining, but allowed it strictly on a voluntary basis on the part of the employer. The employees had no protection or legal right to engage in strikes, unions had no legal rights to represent workers or even be recognized by the employer. Teachers could be fired without recourse for going on strike. In Illinois, the NEA was an association, not a union.
The passage of the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act leveled the playing field to an extent, allowing workers to vote for representation, and unions to represent them, and to go on strike as a last resort if an agreement was not reached. The question of fair share was allowed to be agreed upon in the contracts between the employer and the employees. It was allowed, but not mandatory. It is in almost every contract. The NEA became a union in Illinois.
The federal labor laws covering the private sector leaves the question of fair share up to the states. A state can opt out. Illinois has not opted out.
I can’t see how the federal court can claim jurisdiction, as the federal labor laws say public employees are strictly OUT of federal jurisdiction, and are totally under state jurisdiction.
Article cited was not a personal opinion of the writer but a quotation from a 2010 paper by Joshua D. Rauh (then a professor of finance then at Stanford Graduate School of Business). I am not aware that Illinois situation has improved since the publication — most accounts say pension underfunding has increased and continues to do so.
Fred prints the facts. Prof. Rauh made projections from 2010 facts. Opinions won’t count that much in 5 MORE years.
Anonymous: Avoiding the obvious again. Still no name and no qualifications. Yet everyone is supposed to listen to you. Why would anyone anonymously quote a discredited study about pensions in a comment section about fair share? Perhaps you haven’t given up on pension theft yet?
Your comment does nothing but provide meaningless drivel. I guess you will be a perpetual victim of your own confirmation bias. The entire insurance industry is based upon math that you deny. Yet somehow they manage to survive and turn a profit.
Perhaps you should save future comments about pensions for places that share your bias. Try to have something meaningful to say when you post here. Also, here we use our names.