MIM Notes #225 January 1, 2001 U.$. Labor Aristocracy Complacency Hits All-Time High by MC12 The complacency of the labor aristocracy hit an all-time high in 1999, with fewer employees participating in major strikes than at any time in the last 52 years -- as far back as figures go.(1) In 1999, only 73,000 employees participated in strikes that involved 1,000 employees or more. The number of employees participating in large strikes is not a bad indicator of the complacency of the labor aristocracy, because even though it misses many small strikes, it identifies the major movements that would characterize an active class. MIM believes that there are some genuine members of the international proletariat within U.$. borders. These include undocumented immigrant workers who are paid less than minimum wage and working prisoners. These relatively small groups are not represented in these figures, because they have no big unions to organize strikes of 1,000 workers or more. So this is really about the labor aristocracy. There were two periods of much greater strike activity, in the early 1950s and early 1970s, during which time the number of employees in large strikes was around 2 million for a number of years. Those previous times of high strike activity were times when the economy was doing well and the official employment rate was high. During those times, the big labor unions could get bigger wins from striking because there weren't as many unemployed workers to be hired as replacements, threatening the strikers. The accompanying figure shows that in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, the number of strikers tracked the employment rate pretty closely. That pattern itself shows a pretty complacent workforce, because they are striking when times are GOOD, when there is a chance to get more, instead of when times are bad and they are desperate. That's the labor aristocracy responding to its conditions. But the close association between employment rates and big strikes ended after the recession in the early 1980s. What happened? Labor aristocracy boosters claim that the capitalists broke the unions in the 1980s, starting with the firing of striking air traffic controllers by President Reagan. After that, striking was too dangerous and the "working class" was on the defensive. That and the number of unionized employees continued to fall as manufacturing work moved to other countries. MIM disagrees. We see that during the earlier period the organized labor aristocracy showed the signs of its decadence: striking when times were good. Now we see that labor aristocracy decadence has metastasized so that there are almost no big strikes for any reason. So during the early 1990s recession there was nothing, and during the economic boom there was nothing. Neither crisis and "desperation" nor economic boom and increased opportunity produces a pulse from this so-called class of "workers." This lack of organized activity is a problem for those who still say they want to organize them, as a class, for revolutionary goals, and those who say the labor aristocracy is genuinely exploited. That's just getting to be a harder and harder story to tell. There has been much brouhaha recently about the "renewed militancy" of the Amerikan "working class." Liberals, social- democrats, and other apologists for the Amerikan labor aristocracy point to protests in Seattle and strikes like the janitors' strike in Los Angeles as proof of this. Again MIM disagrees. Not only do these people exaggerate the importance of a few anecdotes, they misinterpret these anecdotes. The tens of thousands of AFL-CIO members who marched in Seattle, for example, were not marching in support of the struggle of oppressed peoples for liberation from imperialism -- rather they were marching in defense of "their" privileged jobs.(2) J. Sakai argues that the AFL-CIO's apparent militancy in Seattle - - some stodgy hacks in the notoriously anti-Communist union suddenly started spouting Marx quotations -- reflects a conflict between the labor aristocracy and the imperialists. "How do we understand this new emulsion," of apparent protests against imperialism and the resurgence of Amerikan nationalism and neo- fascism? "We can see how this plays out in real class politics by zooming in... on the trade unions, which played such a large role in Seattle N30." These trade unions represent the Amerikan labor aristocracy, "a class above the oppressed proletariat of the world. And has politics to match. A labor aristocracy that today is shrinking in importance in the metropolis. And, as an old middle class, is maneuvering with desperation above and below it."(3) This is why MIM does not mourn the lack of organized class behavior from the labor aristocracy, since we know that when they were more militant it was usually to protect their own position and in opposition to the international proletariat. As H.W. Edwards pointed out in his discussion of this issue,(4) "even if the 'lower echelons' of U.S. workers now enter the fray and demand their proper share of affluence -- never mind how derived -- it will still not be necessary - or correct -- to hail any 'revolutionary class struggle' by American workers. For they will be FAR from challenging capitalist rule; it will be sheer self- delusion to read aggressive behavior on purely economic demands the 'revolutionization' of the American working class. "What is crucial is not numbers per se; it is not behavior per se. It is the GOALS pursued; their purposes; their aims." Notes: 1. Data are from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Strike data are from February 24, 2000, http://www.bls.gov/news.release/wkstp.t01.htm. Employment rate data are from November 30, 2000, http://www.bls.gov/cpsatabs.htm. 2. MIM Notes 201, 1 Jan 2000. 3. J Sakai, "Aryan politics and fighting the WTO," http://www.savanne.ch/right-left-materials/sakai-aryanwto.html 4. H.W. Edwards, ITAL Labor Aristocracy, Mass Base of Social Democracy. END Stockholm: Aurora, 1978. MIM Distributes sells this book for $10. Send check or M.O. made out to "MIM Distributors" to the Ann Arbor address on page 2.