Unlike my parents’ generation, mine never had much enthusiasm for unions. For right-wingers, the reasons were obvious, but even among many on the left, unions were just mouthpieces for reactionary white men with no interest in addressing the obvious social injustices of the day. If you wanted someone to beat up a Vietnam War protester, the first person you would call was probably a hard hat. The well-documented association with organized crime didn’t exactly help, either. And so, when the GOP came after the unions following the 1980 election, they couldn’t count on much public support.
Today, thinking on the left is very different; unions are given credit for raising wage levels and fighting inequality. There is something of a consensus among Democrats in favor of changing the laws to make unions more powerful. If they succeed, will things be different than they were in the 1960’s?
Yes. Today’s economy is very different, and the frontier for unions is not reactionary white men (some of whom are still union members, and now vote GOP), but groups such as home health workers who are largely comprised of women and minorities. Those organizations will inevitably have different interests than the unions I heard about as a child. And that’s perfectly OK.