Every Bargaining Agreement Is The Work Of Labor And Management

To the Editor:

Over 75 years ago, the National Labor Relations Act was enacted to mitigate the onerous and oppressive power of corporations in the private sector allied against the working man — and for many good reasons. Leveling the playing field in the public sector for many of those same reasons was only a matter of time.

It has become very disconcerting of late to read about the backlash directed toward unionized workers in public sector employment because of the inability of towns, counties, and states to fund hard-won wages and benefits that were secured at the bargaining table. We have seen these great confrontations in many areas such as Wisconsin, Michigan, New Jersey, California, Connecticut, and many towns throughout our country.

It seems that the anger, fury, and frustration is primarily directed at the employees involved and their various collective bargaining agents. This anger is misplaced and does a great injustice to the collective bargaining process. We must remember that there are two sides to the process of bargaining. For every labor agreement that was negotiated in good faith and agreed to, there was a “management” side which agreed to the terms and conditions of employment.

The tango is a dance of two. Many of these agreements required the agreement of legislatures both at the local and state levels.

Where was the foresight and fiscal discipline of the managements that agreed to these very expensive and crushing obligations that were entered into? Why is there no anger directed to them?

This is not just a public sector problem, but also a private sector one. We have all seen how labor costs in the American auto industry have hobbled an entire sector of our economy when more cost-effective competition surfaced. In the public sector we have, in many instances, very high salaries and truly massive underfunding of future obligations for pensions and medical benefits that are so large we now see efforts to reduce, forestall, and, in some cases, eliminate hard-won gains that were achieved in good faith bargaining negotiations. This is truly a blow to many who rightly counted on these benefits to be there as they were promised. Who knows, years later, what quid pro quo was in force when these agreements were reached?

We must hold accountable for those unjustified and, in many cases, extravagant future obligations not only to organized labor but also their counterparts in the negotiations — the managements — which we hear and read so little of. Every negotiation must be entered into with a strategy, integrity, honesty, fairness, and the willingness to resist demands that will eventually be unsustainable. We should not and must not take the easy road that requires future generations to bear the burden of our current decisions.

Sincerely,

Paul J. Mangiafico

15 Kent Road, Newtown                                                      July 4, 2011