Dead EFCA beaten again

Dead horse beaten for lively political purposes.

Dead horse again

EFCA is a dead horse that keeps getting beaten. If anymore proof is necessary look at what these candidates in close senate races are saying. Truly labor has itself to blame here for insisting on card check as the cornerstone of labor law reform. All that insistence did is create a sound bite for the opposition. "We oppose getting rid of secret ballot elections." By its own insistence labor allowed itself to be portrayed as undemocratic and even unAmerican. There is zero chance EFCA will get passed in a lame duck session.

Dead horse

Despite fears being whipped up by its opponents, EFCA is dead. Not only card check, but any serious labor reform. Labor and Democrats will be playing defense for the forseeable future. But the killer wasn't corporate America, nor was it Rahm Emanuel or Senator Blanche Lincoln. The bill itself inflicted its own mortal wound by allowing opponents to frame it (correctly) as doing away with secret ballot elections. No amount of employer misconduct in the election process or retaliation could overcome the sound bite characterization provided by the fact of removing elections as the preferred way of determining whether a majority of the employees want union representation.

Beating the dead horse that is card check

Politicians continue to provide cover for a compromise on passage of a version of EFCA that does not eliminate secret ballot elections, binding arbitration, or draconian restrictions on employer speech. As we have previously blogged, this only makes such compromise easier by creating a public mindset that card check recognition is the only major issue.