Right- to- Work

When it comes to unionization in the workplace there are many policies in position to protect the worker, not only from the employer but from the union itself. One of these laws is called the right- to- work law which was brought on by the signing of the Taft- Hartley Act of 1947. There are 22 states in the U.S. that have right- to- work laws and in this paper I will be discussing what this means and whether or not it is a desirable public policy. I will also cover what it means to the employee, employer and the union. I’m going to start by defining what right- to- work means. Some people may misinterpret the meaning by thinking that it means that every person is ensured work or may be fired for any reason. This in fact is closer to the meaning of at will employment. This doesn’t ensure work but it does give the employer or employee the right to terminate at any time for any reason as long as it does not violate any laws. The purpose of right- to- work laws is to protect the employee by stating that you do not have to be part of a union to work for a certain company. So what exactly does right- to- work mean? According to the Mackinac Center, Right to Work facts authors Washburne and Kersey: “Right- to- Work is a state law that prohibits employers and unions from requiring an employee to pay dues or fees to a union in order to keep his or her job. While right- to- work laws do NOT allow individual workers to negotiate their own contracts, they do protect a worker from having to involuntarily support a union (Kersey& Washburne, 2007).”

Now that we know what right- to- work means maybe we should look at how and why it came about in the first place. First, the Wagner Act of 1935, which was put into place to help protect the worker from the company. This is known as the National Labor Relations Act, which gives the worker the