How screwing unions screws the entire middle class

by Dennis Coday

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Today's Must Read: Kevin Drum over at Mother Jones offers this posting Plutocracy Now: What Wisconsin Is Really About. Here's the nut paragraph:

As historian Kim Phillips-Fein puts it, "The strength of unions in postwar America had a profound impact on all people who worked for a living, even those who did not belong to a union themselves." (Emphasis mine.) Wages went up, even at nonunion companies. Health benefits expanded, private pensions rose, and vacations became more common. It was unions that made the American economy work for the middle class, and it was their later decline that turned the economy upside-down and made it into a playground for the business and financial classes.