Noam Chomsky - Turning the Tide U.S. intervention in

The Challenge Ahead
Classics in Politics: Turning the Tide Noam Chomsky
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collective bargaining agreements set a record low in 1984, lagging
significantly behind inflation for the third year running. “This dismal
bargaining record,” they note, “reflects the spectacular decline in union
membership over the Reagan years,” with a 22.4% drop in unionization
rates for the private sector. Anti-union decisions of the National Labor
Relations Board more than tripled, to 57% of contested cases, since the
last Republican-dominated board under the Ford Administration. Unions
lost 86% of the cases brought against them. OSHA, which is in charge
of worker health and safety, has virtually ceased to function. The Office
of Technology Assessment confirms that enforcement levels are so low
as to provide virtually no deterrent to violation of legislation on
occupational health and safety—a fact that is not surprising, considering
the President’s stand on the matter: “My idea of an OSHA would be if
government set up an agency that would do research and study how
things could be improved, and industry could go to it and say, we have a
problem here and seem to lose more people by accidents in this
particular function. Would you look at our plant, and then come back
and give us a survey?” 12 The system of private privilege for which
Reagan serves as figurehead demands a powerful state, protected from
scrutiny by citizens, 13 and untroubled by democratic participation, ruling
by violence abroad and intervening massively in the economy at home,
but restricting itself to service to wealth and privilege: modern
“conservatism.” Certainly it cannot be expected to enforce the laws
dealing with health and safety of workers.
1.3 The Attack against Rights
The refusal to enforce the law extends to other domains as well. The
Administration systematically refuses to carry out statutory mandates