Trumka sees the Light — 30 years of Stagnation

The AFL-CIO has been toying iwth the idea of organizing nonunion workers for a while now.  On Thursday, Richard Trumka announced intentions to put this idea into action by courting left-wing ideological groups.  It seems the Sierra Club is considering “aligning” itself with the AFL-CIO.  How long will it be until Sierra Club members are forced to pay dues — to Sierra AND the AFL-CIO?  Only time will tell.  Sean Higgins has the story in the Washington Examiner.

“Will it dilute us? Look, here’s the way I look at it: What we’ve been doing the last 30 years hasn’t worked real well. We need to do things differently,†Trumka told USA Today. Only 11.3 percent of the US workforce is currently unionized, down from more than 20 percent in 1980. Only 6.6 percent of that is in the private sector, according to the Labor Department.

The new members would include people the AFL-CIO would have little hope of organizing, such as students, retirees and the unemployed. Instead these people would take part in grassroots pro-union activism at the state level.