Jack Lessenberry: Worried about jobless

Jack Lessenberry

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Lessenberry

October 9, 2011

By Jack Lessenberry ---- The Record Eagle Wed Feb 22, 2012, 12:13 PM EST

From the start, Mark Gaffney was a somewhat unusual choice to head Michigan's AFL-CIO. Though labor to the core, his background was not with the autoworkers, but the National Maritime Union, the United Steelworkers and the Teamsters.

He's a heavyset, almost burly man with graying, swept-back hair whom one can easily imagine on the docks or the loading docks. Gaffney, who turns 56 this month, has worked those jobs, and does, indeed, live and breathe union. But he also holds degrees in philosophy and labor relations from Michigan State University.

Last week, he turned over his gavel and his job to Karla Swift, after the United Auto Workers union demanded someone new. Gaffney was disappointed, though "I won't miss the constant stress." But he is deeply worried about the plight of the unemployed -- and the future of American workers in a climate where, in some states, politicians seem openly determined to destroy unions.

For a dozen years, he led Michigan's biggest labor federation through some of the toughest times in its history. Nationally, the AFL-CIO was rocked by a split that saw some of its unions form a rival federation, Unite Here. Michigan, like the nation, suffered steadily declining union membership, even before the auto crisis.

The UAW lost tens of thousands of members and then was forced to make previously unmanageable concessions to keep their employers alive. The automakers survived, barely.

But the Democrats, who in Michigan are wedded to the AFL-CIO, were devastated at the polls last November. Analysts agreed that something like half a million normally Democratic voters -- many of them union members -- simply didn't show up.

And somebody had to pay the price. After the Boston Red Sox's historic collapse this fall, their manager was fired. And Bob King, the embattled president of the United Auto Workers' union, let Gaffney know last month that he wanted somebody new.

"Some of the unions said they felt they needed a significant change," Gaffney said over lunch. "I don't take it personally." To replace him, the giant labor federation Monday elected King's choice, Swift, a longtime UAW functionary.

She promptly pledged to make lawmakers who have been casting anti-union votes pay in next year's elections.

"People know that Lansing really has the wrong priorities. We're going to stay focused on helping working people regain power," she vowed.

Speaking in standard phrases, the 57-year-old Swift promised the AFL-CIO's state convention in Detroit would be "an extremely unified fight against any kind of right-to-work in Michigan."

What's not clear is whether that will make any difference. Unions have been sounding much the same notes for years, and their membership has continued to shrivel. Michigan voters gave solid control of both houses of the Legislature to Republicans -- some of whom ran openly anti-union campaigns.

By a landslide, the voters also elected a governor who vowed to reduce business taxes by any means necessary. While he has not shown the open hostility to unions that his fellow GOP governors in Ohio and Wisconsin have, the test may be coming soon.

The Legislature is expected to pass a "right-to-work" law that will mean no teacher or school employee has to join a union, and the state is waiting to see if Gov. Rick Snyder signs it.

Gaffney has nothing negative to say about his successor, and praises her skill as an organizer. But unlike some in the labor movement, he is fully aware that 1936 isn't coming back.

Nor, for that matter, are the prosperous 1990s. Labor has to learn how to be relevant in an age of globalization. He's convinced that, despite the difficulties, workers and society need unions more than ever, to preserve the balance necessary for democracy.

That task is getting harder. During the recession of the early 1980s, Gaffney told me he stood in line to apply for unemployment at a converted supermarket in Saginaw with hundreds of other guys. They compared notes, bucked each other up. And, "the state had workers who treated us like human beings.

"You know what you do nowadays?" he said. "You apply for unemployment by phone, with an automated program. You never see a person. You are isolated and alone. It makes it easier to feel that being unemployed is somehow your fault."

Gaffney more than suspects some politicians like it that way. Nor has he ever seen politics this nasty.

"Before, you figured out a way to get along. OK; their side won. I accept that. But you each try to see the other side. Yeah, you disagree about how to do things. But the government in this state and in this country should be in the business of raising living standards.

"The purpose of our Legislature should not be to reduce the living standards of working people."

While Gaffney admits he's looking for a job, he seems more concerned with America's 14 million unemployed, some of whom may never work at a good wage again.

"Somebody has to do something with and for the unemployed. There were a vast number of skilled and semi-skilled manufacturing jobs that just aren't around any more."

Nobody doubts that. But the real tragedy may be that neither Mark Gaffney nor anyone else knows how to replace them.