Do public and community-based programs actually raise poor people out of poverty?
The answer is: sometimes. After  decades of effort, many programs still succeed only in raising them from poverty to the working poor. Workers and families  with the lowest incomes have seen their earnings erode dramatically over the past twenty years. Millions of low-income  workers remain stuck in low-wage, dead-end jobs with a life for their families that is still in or near poverty.

Union Innovations:

Moving Low-wage Workers to Middle-class Jobs

This lack of traction occurs because most anti-poverty programs have no continuing relationship with employers and jobs. Once a new worker gets a job, he or she has no assurances that the job will continue to exist or will provide opportunities for advancement. If we want to raise low-skilled, low-income, unemployed and underemployed workers out of poverty and into the middle class, worker-centered systems must be built that link low-skilled workers to career and wage ladders in the workplace. In providing a voice for workers on the job and in their communities, American unions are positioned to do just that. Unions and their community allies are now developing new ways to provide education, skill upgrading and job placement that actually reach low-wage workers.

Changing Times

America's new labor market features new challenges for workers with few skills. Training opportunities at work have been cut back, and traditional career ladders inside firms have crumbled. New "work-first" policies and the erosion of many employer-based training programs have cut access for the working poor to good jobs with a future. To make matters worse, federal welfare-to-work and other welfare "reform" initiatives have pushed hundreds of thousands of former welfare recipients into the workforce without adequate preparation.

Even for workers who gain jobs, low skilled work -- as documented by numerous government and private reports over the past twenty years -- has become increasingly unstable and pays far less than it did ten or twenty years ago. What this means is that traditional pathways to the middle class have been cut off for many low-wage workers and their families. Not only individuals, but entire communities risk being left out.
 

If unions are not actively and creatively involved in job creation and training programs, reforms are likely to fuel "low road" trends, forcing wages down and increasing competitive pressures against responsible employers that are paying livable wages. In response, unions and their community allies -- often through new high road partnerships -- are turning this threat into an opportunity for introducing a new generation to work in ways that help strengthen the economy and help broaden the base of high road communities.

Unions are helping low-income working families meet the challenges of a new economy.

By reshaping traditional apprenticeship and training programs--and by creating innovative new opportunities--unions are helping low-income working families meet the challenges of a new economy. The traditional apprenticeship programs and the thousands of training initiatives operating under collective bargaining agreements don't always meet the needs of new workers or workers with low skills. Historically, many union-sponsored programs have focused on the needs of incoming or dislocated union members. But new approaches within old types of programs, as well as completely new union-sponsored programs, are creating opportunities for different kinds of workers, including many who want to move up from low-skill jobs with low pay and benefits.

The Union Way

Union-based training and placement programs work. Union-sponsored programs, combined with formal collective bargaining agreements, can provide the career ladders, wage progression and upgrade training to help low-skilled workers move up in competence and income. Equally important, unions have power in the workplace to see that these job enhancements actually take place and take place fairly. Where union-based programs are in place, they work.

Unions can provide even more opportunities for low-skill workers by partnering with community allies. Unions have found that they gain more power to take workers off the poverty treadmill when they upgrade or rebuild the natural alliances between labor and the broader community in high road partnerships. When they do, jobs and training opportunities are extended to immigrants, minorities, people who have been out of the paid labor force for extended periods, and young people who are entering the workforce for the first time. For example:

• Thanks to initiatives by Hospital and Health Care Workers Union 1199 in Philadelphia and New York, union members and members of their families can get training in using computers, as well as ESL and other basic skills.
• Through a variety of public job training funds, such as Welfare-to-Work grants, JTPA funds and HUD monies, dozens of unions are providing former welfare recipients, dislocated workers and other low- income workers with access to quality job training programs linked to a concrete job, as in the Milwaukee Jobs Initiative (see article).
• Other unions have worked with the Department of Labor and the Veterans Administration to provide ex-military personnel with access to training, skill certifications, and job placement.
• Still other unions are forging relationships with local school systems to provide students with productive work experience and with job placements upon graduation, as in Seattle and other cities.

And, unions are linking community members with innovative training and placement programs. In Philadelphia, Seattle, San Francisco and Las Vegas union-based initiatives are succeeding:

• Hiring halls and employment centers provide community members--regardless of any prior connections to unions--with training and job placement in telecommunications, hospitality, carpentry and other building trades, administrative services, and health care. The Carpenters Joint Training Institute in Las Vegas has emerged as a notable success.
• Pre-employment training programs are now linked to concrete jobs through a variety of negotiated agreements with employers (one example, the Culinary Training Institute in Nevada) including first-source agreements, new apprenticeship programs, and project labor agreements.
• Union-negotiated career ladders and internal mobility policies require employers to provide entry-level workers with opportunities to advance to secure, good- paying jobs--as has happened in negotiated training and upgrading programs in health care, hospitality, construction and other sectors.

People who are new to the workforce face the same problems as other workers--training, childcare, transportation, health care--but they face them with fewer resources. Dozens of union-sponsored welfare-to-work efforts and related programs aimed at low-income workers are underway around the country. Some highlights:
 

California, the nation's most populous state and largest job market, shows a wide range of union-sponsored programs. The Alameda Corridor Jobs Coalition in Los Angeles brought together community groups and the Carpenters Union to train local workers for union jobs on a $2.2 billion construction project. Also in Southern California, SEIU Local 660 has become a major player in the Los Angeles County Vocational Worker Program, training adults on welfare for union jobs, and SEIU Local 347 has negotiated a Vocational Worker Program with the City of Los Angeles to train part-time employees, including welfare recipients, for full time civil service jobs.

The Modesto Poverty Reduction Project involves a community-wide effort to get more Latinos into the construction trades. In Sacramento the Teamsters and California Emergency Foodlink, a nonprofit group, provide job training and placement in trucking and other industries for people facing the loss of welfare benefits. In San Francisco, the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 2 have secured state funding to train former welfare recipients for union jobs in the hospitality industry. The San Francisco Labor Council, the Building Trades Council, and the Carpenters Regional Council are working with local government and business partners to provide transitional employment job training, basic skills education, substance abuse and mental health counseling, child care, and transportation to welfare recipients. AFSCME local and regional councils are actively engaged in many areas to train and place welfare recipients in union jobs. From New York (see article) to Hennepin County, Minnesota, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, Baltimore and the state of Pennsylvania, AFSCME councils provide training, job placement and mentoring by union members for workers leaving welfare.

Welfare-to-work offers the union movement the opportunity to educate, train and recruit a new generation of workers   Milwaukee Jobs Initiative New York Consortium Des Moines Labor Institute

The International Association of Machinists, through its IAM CARES program, is working with state and local government and employers to provide counseling, education and training, support in transitional employment, and access to union jobs with long-term support in many parts of the country, including Ohio, Missouri, Oregon, Alaska, Kansas, and Washington. Their priorities are workers with disabilities or serious health or substance abuse problems.

The cases in this article are based on presentations at Working for America's 1999 National Conference by:

Laura Dresser, Research Director Center on Wisconsin Strategy University of Wisconsin - Madison 1180 Observatory Drive, #7122 Madison, WI 53706-1393 Fax: 608/262-9046  E-mail: ldresser@ssc.wisc.edu

Karey Larkin, Peer Outreach Specialist The Labor Institute for Workforce Development 5806 Meredith Drive, Suite E Des Moines, IA 50322 Fax: 515/253-2626  E-mail: klarkin3@aol.com

Joe McDermott, Executive Director Bob Medlock, Director of Development Consortium for Workers Education 275 7th Avenue, 27th Floor New York, NY 10001 Fax: 212/647-1915  E-mail: rmedlock89@hotmail.com