(audio) You have 75 years worth of evidence that the greater percentage of the workforce is unionized the better the middle class does. I think that's pretty obvious. I think that now and especially if we win back the White House in 2020, a strategy on ways to make it easier to unionize...easier to collectively bargain...has to be part of our agenda.
That’s Congressman Brendan Boyle on the latest episode of the AFL-CIO’s “State of the Unions” podcast. Brendan comes from a union family and now co-chairs the House Blue Collar Caucus, formed in the aftermath of the 2016 election to better connect with blue collar workers. The podcast also features Blue Collar Caucus Co-Chair Marc Veasey of Texas … (audio) “The jobs that they mentioned every time...were always union jobs whether it was the Miller brewery plant...whether it was Bell Helicopter...General Dynamics...General Motors...it was always a union job because people knew that if you want to be able to put some food on the table and have good steady employment to be able to take care of your family that union wages were going to make the difference.” Catch “State of the Unions” wherever you listen to podcasts. And for the latest on local labor events and actions, go to dclabor.org, and click on Calendar. In today’s labor history, on this date in 1913, some 20,000 textile mill strikers in Paterson, New Jersey gathered on the green in front of the house of Pietro Botto, the socialist mayor of nearby Haledon, to receive encouragement by novelist Upton Sinclair, journalist John Reed and speakers from the Wobblies. Today, the Botto House is home to the American Labor Museum. Today’s labor quote is by Martin Luther King Jr. who delivered his famous "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech in a church packed with union members and others on this date in 1968. He had returned to Memphis to stand with striking AFSCME sanitation workers, and was assassinated the following day: “Whenever Pharaoh wanted to prolong the period of slavery in Egypt, he had a favorite, favorite formula for doing it. What was that? He kept the slaves fighting among themselves. But whenever the slaves get together, something happens in Pharaoh's court, and he cannot hold the slaves in slavery. When the slaves get together, that's the beginning of getting out of slavery.” Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus. If you’ve got Spring Break on your mind, fuel your getaway with a car rental discount. Union Plus gets you up to 25% off at Avis, Budget, Hertz and more. Visit unionplus.org/carrental.
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