The government unions battles across the country to defend unions' privileged bargaining and mandatory union dues protections are coming to a head in Michigan. The state's government unions began a ballot initiative that would place their privileges into the state constitution. Not only would possibly negate a number of laws democratically enacted in recent years, and would empower unelected bureaucrats and union chiefs at the expense of elected officials.
The initiative, which is sponsored by the union group "Protect Our Jobs," is a response to the reforms made in Ohio and Wisconsin, and to a lesser extent in Michigan that have limited union power to collect mandatory dues and direct spending decisions. To counter these reforms, it would protect collective bargaining rights by securing them in the state constitution. While this appears to be a broad protection of unions, the initiative would not much affect private-sector unions in Michigan since they are governed through federal law.
Thus, the initiative is largely a power grab by the government unions. The collective bargaining process in Michigan has been a farce where almost all spending decisions and much local government policy is determined behind closed doors. Unions can argue that almost any policy affects their wages and work environment, so the process of union negotiations involves a lot of discussion about government policy that's better determined directly by elected officials.
To give an example, school collective bargaining agreements can guide the length of the school year, what can be on report cards, even influence what can be taught in schools -- things in the proper province of the school board. Decisions on how much to spend at a local government are largely determined by the terms of agreements with major unions -- most local governments spend the majority of their revenues on labor costs. Expensive pension benefits put in a union contract would be honored even if a state statute mandates less expensive benefits.
These decisions decided at the bargaining table actually supersede other state laws in Michigan. State courts have ruled that these collective bargaining agreements have greater authority than state statutes and even city charters. If a city council, for instance, would like to impose a more stringent police officer job review, courts the terms of the union contract would take precedence over any city ordinance.
Enshrining these into the constitution would be a massive increase in the power that union officials can exercise over the state's elected officials. It's a bad idea to give even more protections to policies that have not served Michigan's residents well.
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