police officers, they are not interested in the fact that you didn't have your traffic signal on. they are not interested in it. what they want to do is have a reason to stop you to then engage in conversation and maybe then search your car. the u.s. supreme court has said to police officers, that's just fine. you can make these kinds of stops, and it doesn't matter that that's not really what you are really interested in. and i think what has to change is that the very nature of policing has to change, and we need to take that role out of policing. police should be used to investigate crimes and certainly to help prevent crimes, but i think traffic stops are major problems, because they disproportionately focus on people of color. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span. you can listen to "q&a" and all of our podcasts on our new c-span now app.

>> "washington journal 'continues. >> "huffington post" labor reporter dave jamieson joins us now to talk about the wave of worker strikes taking place across the country. can you start by explaining what this term striketober means? dave: sure. this term popped up on twitter by people who are frankly excited to see workers pushing back and going on strike, or threatening to go on strike. and so, you know, this hashtag came about largely because john deere workers moved to go on strike and eventually did. also in hollywood, we see all the film and television crews were threatening a strike that was 60,000 people there. there are also nurses in southern california who have authorized a large strike. so we see kind of large numbers of, in some cases, workers going on strike, but in more broadly,

workers threatening to go on strike. these are pretty large numbers for one month, so i think that's kind of what's fed this excitement about striketober. host: how many are we talking about and is this a historic level strikes? dave: i would say it's not a historic level strikes. you know, the numbers are, when people ask, are they really huge numbers? they are and they aren't. there are large numbers in workers authorizing strikes. if this strike in hollywood were to come to pass, and it's not completely off the table now, that would be the largest strike we have seen in the u.s. in almost 15 years. if all these workers with john deere, the nurses and other health care workers were to go on strike, that could feasibly be over 100,000 workers in one month. that would be very significant. to give a little, you know, kind of broader perspective on this, over the past decade, each year in large strikes, we've averaged

around 150,000 workers going out on big strikes each year. so, that number is actually quite small historically. if we go way back and kind of broaden this timeline to, you know, the post-world war ii years when union density was very high in this country, around one third of workers belonged to unions, those were years where you might have a couple million workers go out on strike. the way i would explain this is kind of in the broad sweep of history, these are small number's, because union numbers have been trending down for a long time now. but kind of in this moment, i think something is happening where workers are recognizing that they have leverage now. we see this kind of tight labor market happening, we tight -- weirdly tight and a lot a pockets of the economy. workers sense the winds shifting in their favor a bit and they feel like right now is a good time to strike for a better bargain. host: you mentioned union numbers trending down.

to put some numbers specifically to that from the bureau of labor statistics, 18 million union members back in 1983. that represented about 20% of the population. in 2020, that number was 14 million workers but just 11% of the population. we will talk more about those trends this morning, but we are talking about these labor strikes around the country. let me invite viewers to join into the conversation on phone lines, split as usual. a special line this morning for union members, we want to hear your stories, especially if you are in one of the situations where there is an active strike. 202-748-8003 is that number for union members. you've mentioned a few of these strikes at every strike has its own story. but what are the ones to watch?

and what are the workers demanding at some of these biggest strikes? dave: so, the john deere strike is pretty fascinating for a few reasons. i say the biggest is because this strike is, the workers, it's kind of a repudiation to john deere. they are very unhappy with what the company has offered. but it's also a repudiation of the worker's own union, the united autoworkers. the uaw has represented these workers for decades. they've been frustrated with what they feel like our concessionary contracts in recent years, essentially, the union giving things back to the company and not getting a line return. the union in this case, the uaw negotiated a tentative agreement with john deere. the bargaining folks ticket to the union members and said we think this is a satisfactory deal, and the workers voted it down in astounding numbers. 90% voted to reject it, preferring to go out on strike. they said go back to the table,

this is not good enough. since they couldn't improve on it, that's why the workers came out on strike. that's a very interesting scenario where we see kind of rank-and-file members really pushing back on the entire system. you know, one big feature in that fight and this is a very common theme and a lot of the strikes we've seen, elsewhere, places like kellogg's, where workers at the cereal maker have gone on strike, is this concept known as the two-tier agreement where essentially, workers are treated differently as kind of separate classes. and this is kind of a common thing that companies try to get in contracts where new workers who come in under the contract are basically going to get lower pay or lesser benefits down the legacy employees who are currently there. i talked to a bunch of john deere workers about this. the company had proposed eliminating the defined-benefit pension for anyone who comes on after this contract. there ready have a two-tier

system at john deere that has proved very contentious. people feel that they are not treated equally and it kind of sows resentment. a lot of workers told me we are tired of these systems, we are tired of being treated different. we want equal pay for equal work, and we don't want to be divided in. and that's a factor we are also seeing in this health care dispute in california, where some 30,000 workers have authorized a strike against kaiser permanente. that strike has not happened yet but it's possible. like i said, it's also been a factor, you know, in kellogg's and some of these smaller strikes we've seen in food production where people are tired of this two-tier system. host: coming back to that john deere strike, a picture from axios from this past week. the picture is with uaw workers on the picket line welcoming in agriculture secretary tom vilsack there to join the picket line. how unusual is it to have a

cabinet member join a picket line? dave: it's quite unusual. a lot of people have been pushing the biden administration to be more aggressively prolabor. biden, somewhat famously, very early on, i cannot remember whether this was -- i think it was actually shortly before he won the election, he said he would be the most prounion president ever. we've had unions kind of positioning themselves to get biden to be more aggressive. and really, he has been quite aggressive. you might remember earlier this year when workers in alabama at amazon were moving towards a union vote. people had pressured the administration to speak out and biden eventually did, addressing it directly. he did not name amazon, but he alluded to this big election that was happening in out them. he said no company should be

telling workers whether they should or shouldn't unionize. he kind of gave this speech blasting companies for pressuring workers not to form unions. and that was really historic, kind of a direct address that we had never seen from a sitting president. when it comes to the strikes, i think, you know, a lot of union supporters do want to see him come out and directly say, you know, john deere, give your workers a fair contract. he hasn't done that. i would frankly be surprised if he did. that would be fairly unprecedented. precedents -- presidents, while they have in the past tried to help workers, it's usually behind the scenes, you know, through mediating, you know, with the company and that union trying to get some kind of agreement together, especially when it impacts big things like the supply chain on the broader economy. but usually, we don't see presidents wading in directly. he hasn't done that here. i think a member of the cabinet going out there and standing on a strike line, and you know, visually stranding -- standing

with workers i personally think was quite significant. host: how aggressive was president joe biden, when he was vice president joe biden during the obama and restoration? dave: it's interesting. we've seen a big shift in the democratic party over the last few years, kind of a more progressive shift. and i think unions are having a bit of a more renewed power within the party. and i think there is a lot of frustration under the obama years that, you know, unions feel like they did not really get ahead. on the numbers, they didn't. as a share of the economy, they got smaller. and so, there was this kind of growing sense that democrats hadn't really done much for unions. and so, i think biden has, and i thinksmart politically, smartly, has kind of leaned into this and kind of tried to carve himself out as much more, you know, openly prounion than kind of

the democratic establishment has in the past. it still remains to be seen whether unions are going to win major reforms that help grow their ranks. democrats have been pursuing this legislation, this really big, sweeping law that would essentially make it easier for workers to form unions. filibusters have gotten in the way of that. not all democrats are on board yet. you know, a couple of, kyrsten sinema, for one, has not signed onto that. they are trying to maybe get some of this through on the big reconciliation bill that democrats are still trying to corral. this could come to pass where we see some fairly significant, maybe even, you know, the most significant labor reforms in a couple of generations, if democrats can pull it off. unions are doing everything they can to make that happen. host: the proactive, protecting the right to organize act of 2010 when, past the house back in march, introduced by

congressman bobby scott, the democrat from virginia. and a lot of discussion on that. when we have these conversations on labor and unions, dave jamieson a great person to ask your questions on that front to. he's with us for about the next half hour. remember the special line for union members. we will start in mcbee, south carolina. bridget is out first, republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i am very thankful to live in south carolina, right to work state. and i've sort of been antiunion, to tell you the truth. during my time working. but i wanted to know how much of the vaccine mandates are playing in these strikes, what is the role of the vaccine mandate? and also, i wanted to ask about the bureau of labor statistics.

their third quarter review of average weekly wages, the year over year comparison, it is actually showing a decline in wage earners, in wage growth, a decline. the wages are going down. so, if you could speak to that, if you can? thank you very much. host: thanks for the question. dave jamieson, where do you want to start? dave: thanks for the call. first thing i'd say is if you a fan of south carolina's right to work law, you are not going to like the pro-act, because it would essentially ban right to work laws. we would basically see those off the books a lot of states if democrats managed to pass the pro-act. the vaccine mandate is really not playing a role in these strikes we are seeing. it is playing a role in some of the bargaining that we are seeing between unions and employers. there's been kind of a lot of

attention on unions that have opposed vaccine mandates when they've been proposed by their states or by the biden administration, which is looking to do through osha. it's really been, you know, may be a bit overhyped, the opposition. there's been quite a few police unions, the firefighters union has opposed to them. they don't want to see mandates for employees. they think this stuff should be voluntary. in most cases, most unions are open to them, they just want to be able to bargain over the particular's and they have successfully done that in a lot of cases. a lot of states have not implemented the vaccine mandates with the cooperation of the unions after fairly quick bargaining. that's the best case scenario you can see. as to what you said about real wages, that's a really important point. wages are going up in a lot of places. but of course, we are seeing really high inflation, so the inflation is eating into the

wage gains that a lot of people are making. i think the inflation is playing a role in the strikes we are seeing, and displaying a direct role at john deere, where workers were offered raises over the course of five or six years, 11 or 12%, which that would not keep up with the inflation we are seeing. workers are very unhappy to see that, especially when they see, you know, social security administration, you know, revising the numbers that, you know, increasing the percentage boost that people would see. people are looking around, they are saying the cost of milk, my groceries is going up, cost of gas is going up, my wages need to go up more than they are going up. you look at what's going on in hollywood with the strike that was considered there, workers i have talked to are not pleased with the 3% annual increase proposal that has come back. they feel like it needs to be way higher due to inflation. that is the real wage issue that bridget brought up as a really important factor in a lot of

this. host: that john deere strike taking place at the john deere factory outside of the morning, as i understand it -- outside of des moines, as i understand it. don is in des moines and a union member. you are next. go ahead. caller: hello. yes, i'm here. hello. host: you are on with dave jamieson of the "huffington post ." go ahead. caller: i wanted to talk about the wages, particularly about the john deere. wages, i have been there for 38 years, ok. i was a union member for 38 years. host: you just got to turn down your television and talk through your phone. you are at john deere for 38 years and you are retired now? caller: yes. and i was making an excess of

$30 an hour on incentive work. they cut my wages to $26 an hour when they had the new pay scale. i was wondering why they cut that pay scale when they doubled their profit just in one years time by double. and so, i took a lesser job at john deere, and i'm retired now, but i'm getting a pension. the people that were hired after they cut the wages were hired in at about $12 an hour. i was making in excess of $30 an hour for the work on incentive work. host: i will let dave jamieson answer your question. have you made it out to the picket line out there at the john deere factory? caller: yes, i was at the ankeny plant. host: have you walked at the picket line since this started?

caller: i wondered then why my wages were cut when they were. when they made twice as much money this year as they did last year. dave: do you know what your, which contract you are talking about when you're wages got cut? caller: i'm sorry, i didn't hear you. dave: do you know which year, which contractor you are talking about that cut your wages? caller: yes, the contract, it was the contract that was cut. host: what year was that? dave: at john deere. host: what year did that happen to you? dave: 1989 -- caller: 1989. host: a while ago. dave jamieson? dave: thank you for the thoughts. that's going back a long way. i am not familiar with what happened in that contract. what i can say is that 1997, there was a contract at john deere that workers are still talking about to this day.

that was the contract that set up the second lower tier, which i think don may have alluded to their, where workers that came in were making quite a bit less money and had lesser health and pension benefits than the previous employees. i was talking to one worker last week who said, you know, we are not so young that we don't remember 1997. you know, we are not up for more of this two-tier business. john deere wants to create a third-tier where all the new workers wouldn't have the pension at all. they said we are sick of getting divided like this. i think what don was saying, when he had wages above $30 an hour, was that this was always traditionally seen as a really good job, right. you know, john deere, as workers have told me, kind of felt like they always have the pick of the litter. if you got in at john deere, you

had a good career. there were people who spent generations there, whose father worked her and whose son went to work there, too. so, there's this fear that the job is being degraded over time, that it is not what it used to be, and that what comes after this could be worse than what they have now. and i think that's why, you know, workers there are trying to make this stand now. they don't want to see this job degraded more than they feel that it was in past contracts, where they gave away concessions. host: lake geneva, wisconsin. good morning. caller: thanks for taking my call. like mr. jamieson said, there's been a change in a generation. there was a lot of bad things going on -- back when unions were first design, there was a

lot of bad things going on with employers, 80 hour work weeks. i think companies have come a long way, a very long way, as far as all the government stuff. i was in a union back in the 70's briefly, late 70's, early 80's. and it wasn't a very strong union, but i went to a nonunion place, and i had a good job. when i retired, i was making $28 an hour, and that was just in the not too recent past. the previous caller said he was making $30 an hour in 1989. that's huge money in 1989. that's upper-middle-class to almost, you know what i'm saying. really excellent wages. that doesn't even factor in the amount of benefits they got. i think unions have their place in time. right now, i think it's more political than anything else. if you're making john deere people, right now, they're making $50 an hour more, it's

like, what are you striking for? host: dave jamieson? dave: first off, i'd say the john deere workers do not make that much. there are, you know, quite a few workers who say they make, you know, and the $40,000 range, depending on our end bonuses and all that. this is a common theme i see, where, you know, some people are not necessarily, like our caller here, onboard with striking workers who they feel already have a pretty good deal. and we see this, you know, view a lot towards kind of, you know, i would say legacy unions in places like manufacturing, where, you know, people sometimes feel like the workers are asking for too much. but, you know, at john deere, the workers and the community there certainly don't see it that way.

the consensus that there needs to be a floor in these things. you talk about the issue of the pension. there are still some out there who have it, but most of us, if we have anything, are in a 401(k). people may say, well, i don't have a pension, why should that guy have a pension? what i would say is, you know, more people would probably have pensions if the attitude was that, you know, people deserve them to begin with. i think that's why we see, you know, workers like the deere workers fighting to maintain to what they admit have been solid middle-class jobs, because they feel like it creates a floor underneath the economy and their community, and that it helps keep the standards up, not just for themselves, but for everyone. and that, you know, just because an amazon worker at a warehouse doesn't get a pension doesn't mean that a john deere worker shouldn't have one. host: coming up on 8:30 on the

east coast. dave jamieson is with us. he's the "huffington post" labor reporter and easy enough to find on twitter. dave jamieson, you are talking about legislative efforts when it comes to capitalizing on these wave of strikes happening around the country. that was a topic that congresswoman alexandra ocasio-cortez brought up in her conversation this week with bernie sanders, a wide-ranging conversation, on the budget reconciliation bill. this is what she had to say about these union strikes and the legislation that congress is trying to move. rep. ocasio-cortez: i think one of the most exciting stories this year in our country is the increased militarism of the labor movement in the united states. we are seeing strikes. it started off in january right here in the bronx. we had the teamsters threatening to walk off the job in order to get a raise. we won. after that, we started seeing

organizing happening all across the country. mary kay had mentioned the amazon, the amazon drive in bessemer -- strike in bessemer. we are starting to see john deere strikes. iatse, they have their demonstration. you have kaiser, cwa. there are strikes happening around the country with existing members of unions. now, what would happen if we allowed people all across the united states to unionize and collectively bargain the way that these unions are doing right now in order to elevate their quality of life? that is why these provisions are so incredibly important for us to fight for. right now, you know, i am heading up to buffalo this weekend. i know you endorsed's india walton -- cynthia walton. there are starbucks workers

attempting to unionize in buffalo. we have been seeing what's happening out there. these starbucks locations, they are requiring mandatory antiunion meetings while their workers are on the clock. how is stuff like this legal? how is it legal? or you have amazon that was lobbying to kind of put up usps kind of postal boxes, which is why that whole election got overturned, the abuse of power in order for them to intimidate workers. so these key provisions from the pro-act and reconciliation on the act overall would really protect workers and really penalize workplaces that use these tools to try to dismantle the labor movement in the way that they have tried to, and the way that they have eroded it over the last 20, 30, 40 years. host: congresswoman alexandria

ocasio-cortez earlier this week. dave jamieson, she talked about the pro-act. we are at a time when things are being cut from budget reconciliation as democrats try to come up with a deal. is there any chance this is left on the cutting room floor? and what else is in that very large bill being put together for unions? dave: so, there's a chance that some of the pro-act stuff does survive reconciliation. most of is not in there. there are reconciliation rules. you've got to pass muster with those. a lot of the pro-act stuff does not do enough with the budget to really survive. one thing democrats and unions are pursuing is putting in monetary penalties against companies that commit unfair labor practices. on the idea being since that is something that would raise revenue, would therefore pertain to the budget, that it could somehow get through in this package. that, i think, would actually be

a pretty big deal. because right now, the penalties for a company if they tried to bust a union are pretty small to nonexistent. if an employer fires a worker who is leading and organizing effort, if they did it illegally, they generally just have to pay them back pay. there's no damages. they want to create damages to create a disincentive, you know, for companies to not do this sort of stuff. that is one possibility. still remains to be seen whether that will get through. one other thing they have been considering, these kind of, you know, smaller pieces, one is a juicier tax credit for electric vehicles that are made in union factories. so the idea being there, that were kind, you know, steer customers towards companies that have unionize factories here in the u.s. that is good for, you know, the

big three out of detroit, ford, gm, still lantus. other companies, the transplants, the foreign-based automakers that have factories in the u.s., are not happy about that. you know, talking about toyota, companies like that, because they feel like it would create a unfair competition for them because their facilitiesn are nonunion. this is all stuff that is being haggled over on the hill. maybe some of it will survive, maybe it won't. host: to hazard, kentucky. this is robert waiting on our line for republicans. good morning. caller: do you think the vaccine is causing most of the strikes? what is the percentage you think of the people that are on strike for more powers or for more insurance? do you think it's mostly the vaccine? what's the mix on that, do you

think? and is it the vaccine mostly? thank you. host: dave jamieson? dave: i would make clear to anybody watching that the vaccine is essentially a non-issue in these strikes we are seeing. these fights are essentially over compensation, over wanting, you know, equal pay for everyone within the union. the vaccines are really not a big issue. you did mention hours. are they striking for more hours? in a lot of cases, it's the opposite. we see a lot of the workers in these strikes, they are saying they are tired of working mandatory overtime, especially in the food production, kellogg's, frito-lay. a lot of workers said they were working back to back shifts, 16 hour days, that sort of thing, working literally every day of the. part of that is maybe, you know, companies might say they are having a hard time finding

workers. they don't want to hire more people who they are going to have to give good health care benefits to and may be a pension, so they would rather just work their current workforce, you know, the extra overtime and pay that penalty. we see a lot of workers are exhausted. this is not only among the union workers who are striking. we see this in nonunion places, too, where workers feel like event employers are not staffing up enough right now and they are expecting them to come in and work sort of crazy hours. huge issue in hollywood, may be the center to that labor fight among these tv and film crews, who are saying we have no time to see our families, we are not getting enough sleep at night. i talked to a lot of workers who say they regularly work 14 hour days. you throw in the coming, driving all around l.a., you know, you might have, you know, literally eight hours off of work to get home, go to sleep, you know, and do all that stuff.

people are tired. they want to see a change to that stuff. host: frankfort, illinois. this is lehman, a democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead, sir. you are on with dave jamieson. caller: when you were talking about the john deere and the contract of 1997, i was expecting you to say something about nafta, which i didn't hear you say. you avoided that. and with the outsourcing and rightsizing and on-time that killed labor right there. host: dave jamieson? dave: yeah. nafta, it's a very, you know, salient issue and a lot of these fights -- in a lot of these fights. you take some of these food manufacturers that have, you know, sent jobs to mexico over the years, and that unions are

very frustrated over that. they want guarantees on production in the u.s., and that has been a factor in some of these strikes. and i think the companies having diversified where their workforces are, it does help them manage the strikes, too. these legacy employers, their workers are not all in u.s. factories anymore. they've got stuff going on overseas someone strikes happen, they can kind of supplement the production they've lost by moving it elsewhere. nafta and sort of the movement of a lot of these assorted industrial jobs overseas, i think it does play a factor, maybe an indirect one, but it is a factor here. host: west palm beach, florida. independent, this is stephen. good morning. caller: excuse me, you are going to cut me off, i don't want to speak. you let a lot of people go on and on. you going to let me speak? host: you're on now.

caller: find. i want to mention three things about labor unions. i am a white collar person, as white collar as they get. i double majored as an undergrad in physics and math and got a masters degree in material science. i moved out to california in 1988, and i had to manage blue-collar people for a year. and that's what unions represent, blue-collar folks, all right. that was the longest year of my life, ok. they didn't care about learning. they didn't care about improving their skills and things like that. they could have cared less about that. they were just there to collect a paycheck. of course, the bigger the paycheck, the better. that's obvious. that's basically managing the trailer park trash. that's who joins unions. host: what's your question? caller: it's not a question. these are comments, like you let other people give comments about their histories. second of all, inflation, that's what unions generate, they

generate inflation. i live here at a condo in a high-rise. i couldn't believe the things i was hearing about what i was not allowed to do in my high-rise. i can understand not being able to do structural work, like pulling down concrete walls and things like that, because of weakening the structure, and i should know what that is, given my educational background. about the only thing i am allowed to do now is paint. why is this? simple. because they unions have bribed the town council and the building inspectors to make sure that, like, we are not allowed to do stuff like that. i can't even lay down laminate flooring in my condo. third thing, we hear all the time, and this man over here from the "huffington post" should know this and i don't think he does. we hear this now going back, what, 15 years? how the workers are not getting the benefits of their productivity, and that this started in the 1970's. but has anybody ever asked

whether those workers were overpaid before their real wages started leveling out? host: we will put that to dave jamieson. dave: not sure where to start ther thanks for the calle. as for blaming unions for inflation, you know, we have very high inflation right now, maybe it's temporary, maybe it's not. i think you'd be hard-pressed to find many economists out there who would lay the blame for the inflation we are seeing at the feet of unions. i just don't see that. so, yeah. host: just a few minutes left with dave jamieson taking your phone calls. mention his twitter handle @jamieson. i wanted to ask you about one of your recent tweets. you talk about the 300 flight

attendants at american airlines at the subsidiary, piedmont airlines, that have authorized a strike with 100% backing in their vote. flight attendant unions have their own trademark strike strategy here called the kr strategy. can you just explain what the chaos strike strategy is? dave: sure, yeah. this is the afa, a union for flight attendants. this is a strategy that they have developed over the years where the ideas to carry out sort of surprise, small, intermittent strikes that keep the company on its heels. so, this could mean, you know, one crew of flight attendants walking off a plane so that plane can't operate. they wouldn't do this, or they wouldn't have all their flight attendants walk off at once and create this huge bottleneck, what they would do is have this kind of element of surprise that, you know, could really make things tricky and annoying for the company, but without

sort of bringing the whole system down and creating these ripple effects at different airports, which could really frustrate passengers. it's kind of a clever strategy to maybe get the company in line without sort of disturbing air travel in general, and really annoying a lot of passengers. so, you know, there's a lot of strategy behind strikes and one thing i always tell people is that sometimes there is years of planning that goes into these things. it's not always like, well, we are frustrated, let's walk out of here. you talk to john deere workers, some of them have been wanting to go on strike for several years. they even thought they might do it last time. and they see kind of things in their favor right now so they decide to move. in the case of john deere, not only is there a tight labor market going on with them, there's also, you know, high commodity prices in agriculture. john deere is really profitable right now. there's a lot of demand for

their equipment. if the workers shut things down, shut down production, that's going to hurt john deere. these are all the things that unions and rank-and-file members think about when they decide, you know, should we go out on strike? host: time for one or two more calls. this is allies in philly, a democrat. good morning. caller: good morning, mr. jamieson, and to the c-span family. and i am in a union, local696 district council. i had to fight to keep my pension, because the city took like eight of us out the pension, and i had to literally fight. and with the help of counsel person, i got back in the pension, i won my case. my question is that, should politicians, especially democrats, get more into helping unions? thank you. host: dave jamieson?

dave: that's a terrific question and an excellent political question, because i think there's a sense among unions that they been taken advantage of. excuse me, that democrats have taken them for granted over the years, that they are a very reliable voting bloc for democrats, and that unions are going to be there for them on election day, whether or not democrats ultimately deliver for them. and so, i think what we are seeing now is this discussion around the pro-act is unions saying, hey, look, we've had democrats on all the levers in washington before and we didn't get sort of the big systemic change we wanted to see, so now is the time to deliver. part of the argument being made to democrats, look, you guys aren't really remaining in power

without us. in wisconsin, republicans have really, you know, declared war with unions, especially public-sector unions. decimating membership, which benefits republicans politically in those states, because unions are a pillar of the democratic party. i think unions are telling democrats are now, look, help us strengthen unions, a, because we think it's good for workers and good for the economy, but also, it's frankly smart politics. because you know, democrats get drubbed when unions disappear. host: dave jamieson with just about minute left. we talked at the beginning about striketober. are we on the downside of this wave of strikes or is it going to become strikevember next month? dave: we are seeing more strike authorizations happening. the strike authorization at kaiser in california has grown. hollywood, strike is not off the

table. you know, those 60,000 workers have a tentative deal right now, and their union is walking them through the context of that you. i've spoken to a lot of workers who are not thrilled and plan to vote it down. i don't know how the vote will go. it may well pass, this agreement. but it is totally possible that this agreement gets voted down, and we have a situation like we had at john deere, where the workers tell the union, this is not good enough, go back to the table, you better get more than this. and a strike could still be feasible. so, i think we are going to see a lot of this spill into november, and probably beyond. what's happening here, as i said earlier, workers are sensing kind of a moment of leverage here. it could be fleeting, if the labor market, you know, changes and workers lose leverage there. you know, then we may not see big strikes. this dovetails a lot with what

we are seeing in the broader economy with nonunion workers who are sitting on the sidelines. millions of workers who are not going into the job market for one reason or another. a big reason probably being they don't like what's being offered. they maybe have savings that they've been sitting on, and they, would rather not go back towardor they would rather quit the job they have and take a better one. they are forcing employers to bid up wages. we are seeing this leverage for unions, we are seeing it for nonunion workers out there. we don't know how long it will last. i think, you know, without some sort of systemic change to how things work, you know, this may well be a temporary thing. if we see something like the pro-act or elements of the pro-act pass, then it may be, you know, more lasting change for unions. host: dave jamieson, labor reporter with the "huffington post." give him a follow on twitter. appreciate your time this saturday morning. dave: thanks for having me. host: up next to this morning

and for the next 30 minutes, we turn the phone lines over to you, as we often do, letting you lead the discussion in our open forum. let us know what public policy, what political issue you want to talk about. republicans can call in at 202- 748-8001. go ahead, start calling in and we will get to your phone calls right after the break. ♪ >> next week on the c-span networks, the house and senate are both in session. watch live coverage on c-span, and c-span 2. on monday at 9:30 a.m. eastern on c-span2, facebook whistleblower frances haugen testifies before the u.k. parliament joint committee. tuesday at 8:30 a.m. eastern on c-span3, the fda advisory

committee meets to consider authorization of pfizer's covid vaccine for children 5-11 years old. that day, we will have live coverage of congressional hearings on c-span.org and the c-span now mobile video app. the senate armed services committee will hold a hearing on the security situation in afghanistan and the region. at 10:00 a.m. eastern, representatives from tiktok, snapchat, and youtube testified before the senate commerce committee on children and social media. then on wednesday at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3, attorney general merrick garland testifies before the senate judiciary committee on issues facing the justice department. and on thursday at 9:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3, the heads of four major oil companies and other industry leaders will testify before the house oversight and reform committee about information the fossil fuel industry publishes on climate change. watch next week on the c-span networks, or you can watch coverage on c-span