Paul Edwards reports from a recent visit in the USA 

I was staying in North Virginia in a place called Falls Church, probably due to all the Churches around there!!  Falls Church is just south of the District of Columbia in which is situated Washington, known locally as the ‘District’.  I was staying with a guy called Clayton and his family.  He works for a labourer’s trades union organising in the construction industry.  The membership is increasingly coming from Latino workers.

Clayton took me to meet some of these undocumented workers who where standing on the street corner at 7am in below freezing temperatures. They were waiting in the hope that someone would employ them for the day. A guy from Guatemala told me he had not worked in more than a month. He and 10 other guys share a one room apartment for a cost of 800$ per month.  I was also told that even when ‘chosen' for hire employers frequently refuse to pay them at the end of the day.  You can imagine how difficult it is for undocumented workers to pursue these employers. It reminded me of the parable of the workers in the vineyard. Immigration is a major political issue in the USA, and the Network and the Catholic Church are supporting legislative change to bring about the recognition and integration of undocumented workers.

I came to Washington DC to attend the meeting of the Catholic Labor Network of the USA.  I met trades union activists from all over the USA.  They told it like it really is.  At this meeting Clayton Sinyai, my host gave a presentation on his recently published book on trades union and labour history and its contribution to the development of democracy in the USA.*

In the land of the free, and the home of the brave, workers are suffering the same consequences of globalisation as workers everywhere.  Every year since 2000 the income of workers has slipped back to below inflation which has increased by 2% whilst wages of the lowest paid workers have dropped to almost 6% below inflation.

More than 38 million people are recognized in official statistics as living in poverty some 35% of who are under the age of 18 years of age. The minimum wage was fixed ten years ago at a rate of 5$ per hour.  However, to afford an apartment in Washington DC today a worker needs a minimum hourly rate of almost 24$.

There is no benefit system for those without work, except for the old and the disabled.  It costs a family between 8,000$ and 20,000$ to have a child, so if you do not have health insurance, you are in trouble.  There is no universal health care coverage, and the private health care system does not cover all health care needs. This shortfall was more than illustrated when I met someone called John from the North of Ireland who lives in the states. He and his wife recently had a child.  It cost them 6,000$ above the cover they had from health insurance.  When his wife was in labour, the Doctor said he needed to give her another pain killer, and John found himself thinking, not about the possible consequences for his wife and child, but rather the cost of the drug and its administration. 

Some 44 million documented workers do not have health insurance and an estimated 10 million undocumented workers and 9 million children are not covered. These alarming statistics are a timely reminder to us all in the current debate about the future of the National Health Service in the UK, and especially the role of private medicine.

I also met two workers who are trade union activists, who cannot see themselves retiring until well into their seventies because they are having to fund the education of their children, the health and social care costs of their parents and other family members.  This is happening to millions of American workers.  Although, as everywhere in western countries the participation in trades unions is falling, the fact remains that those workers in USA unions enjoy better salaries and conditions.  I was told that 30,000 workers a year are sacked for trying to form a trades union. All this is happening in the land of the free and richest country in the world.

The contact I have had with workers in the USA, has reminded me that there are millions of people in the US who also share our views: They are struggling for a universal health care system; they are demonstrating against the war in Iraq and US foreign policy, and they want a different society in the US, based on justice, and international solidarity. 

The Catholic Labor Network of the US expressed its desire to become part of the WMCW.  This is a great sign of hope. 
 

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* ‘Schools of Democracy, A Political History of the American Labor Movement' Clayton Sinyai, 2006, Cornell University Press. Link: click here: >>>>>http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/ilrpress/titles/4472.html