(WJBC file photo)

By Mike Matejka

Poverty and cutting wages is not the foundation of economic development.  Too bad our new billionaire Governor doesn’t understand that.   Governor Rauner, despite his fondness for Carhartt’s, made his billions not with working with his hands, but investment banking and speculation.

In Decatur on Tuesday, Rauner proposed cutting wages as economic development.  How did he do that?  Through saying he would advocate “right to work zones,” in economically depressed areas.  A so-called right to work law really means a right to work for less, as it would make union membership optional, but still require unions to represent non-members.

There is a lot of misconception about unions in our society.  A fatal flaw in Rauner’s logic is that unions just appear and require people to join.  Unions exist where workers vote, in secret ballot elections, for union representation.  Those workers then elect leaders and those leaders negotiate contracts, which then hopefully improve conditions for workers.

The challenge in economically depressed areas is not worker organizations, but a lack of education, investment, infrastructure and training.  In our economically hard hit parts of Illinois, you will not find masses of union workers.  You will find masses of unemployed people.  What those areas need are job training, day care and economic incentives for businesses to locate.

In this case, Rauner is simply using poor people as a shield to attack working people.  His real goal is not creating better paying jobs, but trying to change laws to weaken worker organizations.  Why would he want to do that?  Because at election time, worker groups organize and educate their members about candidates and he wants to disarm that outreach.  If he can undermine labor unions he will gain politically, but average people will suffer.

In a nation where we have the 10 percent wealthy and the 90 percent struggling, we need to boost average people.  Boosting average people economically means more dollars spent in stores and car lots.    More wages at the bottom will eventually create more billionaires at the top.   If Governor Rauner really wants to economically enhance Illinois, he would realize our long term hope is not only a trained and educated workforce, but also a decently paid one.   Unions are one ingredient in boosting wages for workers and our Governor should stand for middle class America, not pull the rug from under it