Economic Inequality
Floor Speech
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Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak about the Janus v. AFSCME Council 31 Supreme Court case and economic inequality.
The issue of our time is economic inequality and the challenge of the middle class being left behind. We know that 81 percent of American households between 2005 and 2015 have not had a raise. They have actually either had their wages stagnate or decline. This is an issue that goes to the core principles of our Nation.
As every American knows, in 1968, Dr. King marched with sanitation workers in Memphis, with AFSCME local 1733. The march was not just about racial justice. The march was about economic justice. The march was about the freedom of sanitation workers to earn what Dr. King called a decent living. It was about the dignity of work. It was about the right to join a union.
They fought against so-called right-to-work legislation. They fought for collective bargaining so that people who work hard, who rode on trucks and picked up the trash and did hard labor, earn a decent wage.
Dr. King talked about the importance of economic justice, much as he talked about the importance of racial justice.
Here are the facts that we know. Unionized African American women earn about $21.90 an hour. That is not a bad wage. Nonunion African American women earned almost $4 less, on average. That means $4 per hour is the difference between unionized and nonunionized work for African American women.
Seventy-two percent of African American women in unions have health insurance.
Guess what? Less than 50 percent of nonunion African American women have health insurance.
Some of us have read the horrific studies about how pregnant African American women still face huge issues with infant mortality and problems with child labor. Part of it is because they lack health insurance. If they have health insurance through a union, that is not as much of an issue.
Latinos who join a union see their median weekly income increase by almost 38 percent. They are 41 percent more likely to have employer- provided health insurance. Caucasian working-class families have seen a raise of nearly 20 percent when they are in union jobs compared to nonunion jobs.
Unions are more important now than ever, because the question is: When 81 percent of this country hasn't had a raise for the past 15 years, do we need to have more policies favoring corporations and executives or do we need to figure out how we give Americans a raise? The one institution that gives Americans a raise is unions.
We didn't invent this. We know collective bargaining works in other nations. We know that cooks in Germany make almost $25 an hour.
The Danish Ambassador was visiting me today, and I said: How much would someone make if they worked at Starbucks in Denmark?
He said: Almost $20 to $22 an hour. My jaw dropped.
I said: How is that possible? Is it government prescribed?
He said: No, it is strong union movements across other countries.
It is not that they discourage entrepreneurship or innovation. It is that they believe that working families should have the dignity to earn an honest living; that they can afford rent, that they can afford food, that they can afford healthcare, that they can afford a job.
This is what FDR talked about with the right of a job and healthcare and housing; that the positive rights were necessary to truly have freedom in democracy.
Collective action raises the standard of living for everyone. Guess what? Henry Ford knew it. It led to economic growth. That is why he paid workers more. He said: Someone has got to earn a living to buy the cars.
If we don't have a middle class that can earn, then who is going to buy the iPhones, who is going to buy the new cars and the Teslas? Who is going to buy and have the money to set up new bank accounts?
Our economic growth is dependent on the middle class. That is what America has gotten and China has never understood. China doesn't care about their middle class. They care about the elites.
We have believed in the middle class from FDR to Dwight Eisenhower. We believed that every person in this country is extraordinary; that our success is based on ordinary Americans earning enough to buy things; that every American matters, not just in our democracy but to our economy. It is what makes us different from the Chinese model, and it is why unions matter so much. Unions are what allow ordinary Americans to get the wages they deserve.
Union workers are more likely to have healthcare and retirement benefits. We know that the decline of the middle class is directly correlated to a decline in union membership.
Let me give you this staggering statistic: It used to be, in our GDP, that 90 percent of GDP went to income, of our GDP. That statistic has fallen to the high 50s or low 60s. Most of the loss now goes to capital, to automation, to machinery.
Here is the irony: Corporations, you would think they would invest in human capital. You would think they would invest more in the workforce. But their incentives are not to do that. The Tax Code incentivizes research and development, if they want to open up plants or have automation; but they don't incentivize the investment in actual human capital so that workers and human beings get more of the GDP and not less.
This decline from 90 percent to 60 percent of income is correlated partly with automation but also with the decline of union membership. Guess what: The unions are one of the only institutions in this country that are investing in worker training, that are investing in improving people's human capital.
I know so many apprenticeship programs in my own district you can go in with just a high school degree, no test, no fees required, and become an apprentice to become an electrician, to become a drywaller, a glazer, a painter. These are tough jobs. They are not easy jobs. Once you do the apprenticeship, it doesn't cost you anything. It comes out of the fees of journeymen and other union members. You go and develop the skills, and the unions invest in you.
When you talk to these apprentices, they are so proud of the work they are doing, proud of the investment that the unions are making in them, and they are extraordinary people with an extraordinary work ethic. That is the investment that the unions are making in our workforce.
Don't think that it is just about them making sure people get the wages they deserve. They are making sure that we have the workers that we need in this country to be productive. They are the ones who are investing in the human capital in our society and the ones who are looking at the investments needed for the future.
Union apprenticeships are what closed the skills gap. They are the ones who are teaching folks about 3D printing. They are the ones who are teaching folks the tech skills that are needed as auto repair mechanics. They are the ones who are teaching folks the basic ways that you now need to operate machines and robots.
High-quality training in our unions is why American workers are the most productive in the world: 6 times more productive than China, 6 times more productive than India, 1\1/2\ times more productive than Germany, 1\1/2\ times more productive than Japan. That is partly because of our union efforts and training and because of the grit of the American people.
Now, here is what this Janus case is about. The Janus case is about corporate special interests saying unions should no longer have a role in collective bargaining, that the work unions do to represent workers is no longer important, that every person can go fend for themselves.
Really? We tried that before the New Deal, during the Lochner era, where every person had to go fend for themselves. It was the time that F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote about in ``The Great Gatsby,'' the Gilded Age, the largest economic disparities known in American society. It led to the greatest stock market crash. It led to the Great Depression. It led to huge economic instability in the United States and around the world.
And then we said: This system doesn't work. FDR and Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower said: Let's build an American middle class with unions, to which ordinary Americans can go to get a higher education, to get a wage where they can afford a house and they can afford food and they can afford to have a decent quality of life.
Unions are what provided that. Collective bargaining is what allowed for that. It balanced the corporate interests. It said: people who do work should be rewarded. That is what unions have done.
I know there are all these complex phrases: fee sharing, right-to- work, and all of that. But cut through all the noise, and here is the basic question: Do you think collective bargaining has a role in American society? If you think it does, if you think people should have the right to organize and bargain and that there should be some counterweight to corporate power, then you should be for AFSCME and the union in this Supreme Court case.
If you think workers are doing fine, working families are doing fine--the painters, the firefighters, the mechanics, the teachers, and the nurses--that they are all doing great and the real people we need to be worried about are the corporate executives and the investors and the corporate bankers-- well, if you have that theory, then I suppose you would be for Janus. You would say: Let's not have collective bargaining.
The question is: What is your theory of the case? Are you for workers having a greater say and greater wages in this country, or are you for corporations having even greater power? That is what this case is about.
I know that our Progressive Caucus stands so firmly in the belief that we need to be on the side of the workers. If the Supreme Court decides against collective bargaining, it will be one of the worst decisions in recent American history, a catastrophe for this court to strike a blow to working families across America, to strike a blow to the heart and soul of the union movement. We need to strengthen working families and unions, not weaken them.
Before I turn it over to one of the strongest champions for working families, I want to thank the leadership of AFSCME--President Saunders, Scott Frey--who have done so much to help not just AFSCME members, not just honor the tradition of Dr. King, but to help the fight for unions.
I want to thank Dr. David Madland and Kevin Fox, on my team, for their research about the role of unions and the leaders of the NEA: Mary Kusler and Marc Egan.
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Mr. KHANNA. Jayapal), my good friend.
Pramila Jayapal, before she was even elected to the State Senate, has been a tireless advocate for unions, for working families. She understands that working families and unions have helped not just minority communities, not just women, but all Americans.
She is our vice chair of the Progressive Caucus. She is one of the strongest progressive voices in our Nation. She is on the front lines, the picket lines, and has traveled across the country standing in solidarity with union members.
It is a real honor now to yield to my friend and colleague, Representative Jayapal.
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Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representative Jayapal for infusing the Progressive Caucus with a new vision, new energy, and, really, making it the strongest caucus in Congress and sharing some of those facts. I didn't know that 67 percent of Americans live on just $1,000-- can't afford $1,000 emergency expenditure. So I think talking about these facts and what this case means to real Americans is important. I thank her for being here.
It is now my real honor to give the floor to someone who really built the Progressive Caucus. You know, the Progressive Caucus used to be a social club where people chatted, before Keith Ellison took over and said: You know, we have got to do more than just talk. We have got to actually act on our values.
If you talk to anyone in this Congress, they will tell you that he took a group of 15, 20 Members that used to get together and has turned that caucus, through his leadership, into the largest caucus on the Democratic side, the most effective caucus, and one that has a bold agenda.
Keith has been an organizer his whole life. He understands the importance of working families and believes in these issues from his heart, and he has been a truly effective leader for the caucus in the House.
It is my honor now to yield to Representative Keith Ellison.
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Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representative Ellison for those words and for explaining so simply and powerfully what is at stake with the Janus case and why the constitutional right is actually with the unions, as he put it, to assemble and not to freeload when someone is getting a benefit. I thank him for his leadership and fight on this.
Mr. Speaker, I want to make one other point before yielding to my friend. One of the contemporary examples of the need for collective bargaining is seen with CWA in their struggle with American Airlines when passenger service agents aren't making a living wage. I don't understand it. I pay so much for these American Airline tickets that I wonder who the money is going to.
Would any American think that the passenger service agents aren't getting a fair wage, given what we are paying in airline tickets?
Yet the truth is many of those workers aren't getting a fair wage, particularly those who are working for Envoy Air and those who are working with Piedmont Airlines.
There are many Members of this House--81 of us--who believe that American Airlines needs to do the right thing and pay a living wage and CWA's ability to bargain, to ask for a fair wage for what all of us pay when we pay for tickets, to ask that the workers benefit from that as well. That is what is at stake in this Janus case: Can CWA organize and get a fair wage so that workers benefit?
He has come out to Silicon Valley. But what I respect about him is he has his values in fighting for working families, for the middle class, for people who have been left out. Those are the issues he is most passionate about.
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Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representative Soto for his analogy that the rules for our corporate shareholders shouldn't be different than the rules for workers. We need fairness. We certainly shouldn't be privileging shareholders. I appreciate the gentleman's advocacy for working families and speaking out today.
Mr. Speaker, I want to close with some simple points. People often say that workers have a negative view of unions or don't want unions to be representing them, but here are the facts: Gallup Poll research shows that 60 percent of Americans have a favorable view of labor unions, and that number has been going up as more and more Americans see that their wages have been going down. More and more Americans are saying they need the unions to level the playing field.
When we look at AFSCME and what AFSCME stands for, what Janus is saying that he doesn't want representing him, I think about the trip I took with Representative John Lewis down to Memphis a few months ago. We went to Mason Temple. In Mason Temple, we heard over the loud speaker Dr. King's voice as he spoke about seeing the promised land.
As that booming voice came over the loud speakers in that temple, there on stage was a man in his 80s who was a sanitation worker at the time that Dr. King marched in Memphis, and he talked about how he still was owed money for his fair work. At the age of 80, Memphis still hadn't paid him.
That person, that man, he didn't shirk from work. He was working still in his 80s. He believed in the dignity of work. He talked about young people needing to believe in the dignity of work. He just wanted to have a fair shot at being paid for that work.
That was AFSCME. That is what AFSCME stands for in this country. That is what is at stake in this Supreme Court fight. Do we stand for the values that Dr. King marched for, and do we stand for the labor union in this Nation? General Leave
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Mr. KHANNA. Mr. Speaker, thank you for your graciousness in giving us this hour and moderating this debate.
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