Immigration Reform
Floor Speech
IMMIGRATION REFORM -- (Senate - June 25, 2007)
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, there is a widespread perception among the people of our country that things are getting worse, not better. Polls seem to indicate that people feel that life for the middle class in the last 10 years is not as good as it used to be. By very strong numbers, the people of our country believe the economy is getting worse, not better. We are the greatest country in the history of the world, but there is something wrong when, if current economic trends continue, the young people in our country will have a lower standard of living than their parents. We are moving in many respects in exactly the wrong direction, and it is our job as Members of the Senate to turn that around and to begin making government work for all people rather than just the wealthy and the powerful who have so much power over what goes on in this institution.
I rise in strong support of the Employer Free Choice Act. I commend Senator Kennedy for his leadership on this issue.
Year after year, millions of American workers have been working longer hours for lower wages. In Vermont, it is not uncommon for people to work two jobs and on occasion work three jobs in order to cobble together an income in order to cobble together some health insurance.
Consider the facts: Since 2001, median household income has fallen by nearly $1,300; wages and salaries now make up their lowest share of the economy in nearly six decades; the number of Americans who lack health insurance has grown by 6.8 million since 2001, to over 46 million Americans without any health insurance today; the number of Fortune 1,000 companies that have frozen or terminated their pension plans has more than tripled since 2001. Indeed, the middle class itself has shrunk. Over 5 million more Americans have slipped into poverty since the year 2000.
So what we are seeing is the average American worker working longer hours for lower wages.
Today there are millions of Americans who work who scarcely have any vacation time whatsoever. People are losing their health insurance, they are losing their pensions, and they are sitting around looking at the reality that if we do not turn this around, their kids will be even worse off than they are--all at the same time technology is exploding and worker productivity is increasing.
Meanwhile, while the middle class shrinks and poverty increases, corporate profits today make up their largest share of the economy since the 1960s. While the middle class is shrinking, millionaires and billionaires in this country have never had it so good since the late 1920s.
Today, the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans own more wealth than the bottom 90 percent. The CEOs of our largest corporations now earn 400 times as much as the average worker. This is not just an economic issue, this is a moral issue. Is this what America is supposed to be about, the wealthiest 1 percent owning more wealth than the bottom 90 percent, and the gap between the rich and the poor growing wider every day, as the middle class continues to shrink. I do not believe that is what America is supposed to be.
At the same time, workers are seeing a decline in real wages, are being forced to pay more for their health insurance, and are seeing their pensions slashed. The CEOs of large corporations are making out like bandits.
Just one simple example: Several years ago, the former CEO of ExxonMobil, Lee Raymond, received a $400 million retirement package--while we are paying over $3 for a gallon of gas, and ExxonMobil, last year, enjoyed the highest profits of any corporation in the history of the world.
But it is not just CEOs such as Mr. Raymond. At a time when big banks are ripping off American consumers by charging outrageous interest rates and sky-high fees, Richard Fairbank, the CEO of Capital One Financial, received over $300 million in total compensation over the past 5 years.
While consumers have been getting ripped off at the gas pump, Ray Irani, the CEO of Occidental Petroleum, raked in over $500 million in total compensation over the past 5 years. And on and on it goes, CEOs making out like bandits, workers paying $3 for a gallon of gas, losing their health insurance, losing their pensions, losing their homes.
The middle class is shrinking, poverty is increasing, and millionaires and billionaires have never had it so good. It is our job to turn that around. There are a lot of reasons for the growing inequality in our economy, and economists may differ, but there is clearly agreement on some of the basic reasons the gap between the rich and the poor is growing wider and the middle class is shrinking.
The failure, up until very recently, to raise the minimum wage is an obvious example. Millions and millions and millions of workers today--before the new minimum wage goes into effect--are making $5.15 an hour. Yes, the U.S. Congress has provided hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks for the wealthiest 1 percent, but we could not raise the minimum wage until a few weeks ago. That is certainly one of the reasons poverty in America is increasing.
Another reason is that unfettered free trade, which forces American workers to compete against desperate workers in China, Mexico, and Vietnam, is also responsible for an increase in poverty and a lower standard of living for millions of American workers. No, American workers should not be forced to compete against desperate workers in China who are making 30 cents an hour. That is not a level playing field. That is wrong, and that is another reason the middle class in this country is in decline.
But perhaps the most significant reason for the decline in the middle class is the rights of workers to join together and bargain for better wages, better benefits, and better working conditions have been severely undermined over the years.
Today, if an employee is engaged in a union organizing campaign, that employee has a one in five chance of getting fired.
Today, half of all employers threaten to close or relocate their business if workers choose to form a union.
Today, when workers become interested in forming unions, 92 percent of private sector employers force employees to attend closed-door meetings to hear antiunion propaganda; 80 percent require supervisors to attend training sessions on attacking unions; 78 percent require supervisors to deliver antiunion messages to workers they oversee; and 75 percent hire outside consultants to run antiunion campaigns.
In 2005 alone, over 30,000 workers were discriminated against, losing wages or even their jobs, for exercising their constitutional right of freedom of association--a right guaranteed under the Constitution of the United States.
Further, Human Rights Watch has said:
Freedom of association is a right under severe, often buckling pressure when workers in the United States try to exercise it.
The right to come together to form a union is a constitutional right. It is under severe, unprecedented attack today.
Even when workers--who are faced with all of these enormous obstacles--win union elections, more than one-third of the victories do not result in a first contract for workers.
Today, corporate executives are routinely negotiating obscenely high compensation packages for themselves, but then they deny their own employees their ability to come together to create better wages and working conditions and better lives for themselves. That is wrong. This Senate has to stand up for those workers.
It is time to turn this around. It is time to stand up for the working people of this country. That is what the Employee Free Choice Act is all about.
The House of Representatives did the right thing when it passed the Employee Free Choice Act by a vote of 241 to 185 earlier this year. Now it is time for the Senate to act.
This legislation is very simple. The Employee Free Choice Act would simply allow workers to join unions when a majority sign valid authorization cards stating they want a union as their bargaining representative. As Senator Kennedy has correctly pointed out, card check recognition was the law of the land in the United States from 1941 to 1966. In other words, all this legislation does is give workers the same rights they had 41 years ago.
More than half of the U.S. workforce--nearly 60 million workers--say they would join a union right now if they had the opportunity. Yet only 12 percent of the workforce has a union. This is much different from other industrialized countries around the world.
In Canada, where card check is the law of the land, twice as many workers belong to unions than in the United States. In Britain, where card check recognition is the law of the land, 60 percent of workers belong to unions.
What has strong union participation meant for workers in other countries? This is an important point to be made because it is terribly important we in the Senate see what is going on in the rest of the industrialized world, see and note the benefits workers around the world are receiving that our workers are not.
Just a few examples. In Finland, where two-thirds of workers belong to unions--guess what--unlike college graduates in the United States who are graduating $20,000 in debt, Finland provides a free college education, including law and medical schools, to all qualified citizens. That is pretty good. They encourage young people to go to college and graduate school tuition free.
While the cost of childcare in the United States is skyrocketing--millions of American families cannot afford quality childcare--in Finland, day care is free to all citizens.
Unlike the United States, where the 2-week vacation is becoming a thing of the past, in Finland, workers are guaranteed 30 days of paid vacation and 60 days of paid sick leave.
In Norway, where the union participation rate is about 60 percent, women receive 42 weeks of maternal leave at full pay--full pay--while U.S. workers only receive 12 weeks of unpaid maternal leave.
In Belgium, France, and Sweden over 90 percent of workers belong to unions. Workers in those countries all have much stronger pensions, health care, childcare, and vacation benefits than American workers.
In addition to the card check provision, the Employee Free Choice Act would also stiffen penalties against employers who illegally fire or discriminate against workers for their union activity during an organizing or first contract drive.
Perhaps most importantly, this legislation will make it easier for workers who win union elections to negotiate a first contract. We will end the situation where, when workers decide to form a union--they go to negotiate--the employer simply refuses to negotiate.
In order to strengthen America's middle class, we have to restore workers' rights to bargain for better wages, benefits, and working conditions.
After all, union workers in this country earn 30 percent more, on average, than nonunion workers who are performing the same jobs.
Madam President, 80 percent of union workers have employer-provided health insurance; only 49 percent of nonunion workers do.
Madam President, 68 percent of union workers have a guaranteed pension through a defined benefit plan; only 14 percent of nonunion workers do.
Madam President, 62 percent of union workers have short-term disability benefits; only 35 percent of nonunion workers do.
Union workers have, on average, 15 days of paid vacation; while nonunion workers, on average, have fewer than 11 days of paid vacation.
Again, I thank Senator Kennedy for his leadership on this issue. We have to do everything we can from a moral perspective to reverse the decline of the middle class, to lower our poverty rates, to improve the standard of living of American workers, and passing the Employee Free Choice Act is an important step in that direction.
Madam President, thank you very much.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
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