[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 121 (Monday, July 12, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4819-S4820]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                            Economic Growth

  Mr. President, for the first time in decades, workers are beginning 
to gain some power in our economy.
  Because of President Biden's leadership, because of the American 
Rescue Plan, America's economy is roaring back. We have had record job 
creation. We gained more than 3 million jobs since this President took 
office, more jobs created in the first 5 months of any Presidency in 
modern history.
  It is not only the jobs numbers--those are important--but those, of 
course, don't tell the full story. It is the quality of those jobs.
  We are starting to see signs of increased bargaining power for 
American workers: power to negotiate higher pay, solid working 
conditions, better benefits, more control over their schedules, 
opportunities for career advancement, all the things that turn into 
good, stable, middle-class careers.
  I want to see employers competing for workers. That is a good thing. 
It is how you get rising wages, which get spent in the community and 
then create growth for everyone, whether in Sante Fe or Columbus.
  For decades, corporations have had all the power in our economy. It 
is going to take a lot of work to undo those decades of bad trade and 
tax policy that gave corporations every single day the upper hand.
  We are starting to see glimmers of progress. Wages are starting to go 
up. Wages have been rising all year. They are surging for workers who 
have been paid too little for decades, working tough jobs in 
restaurants and hotels and other service jobs.
  Last week, the Washington Post declared ``Welcome to the year of wage 
hikes.'' They reported, in the past 3 months, rank-and-file employees 
have seen some of the fastest wage growth in 40 years. Think about 
that, the fastest wage growth since Ronald Reagan said it was morning 
in America.
  It is what should happen--what happens when you invest in people who 
make this country work, not the CEOs, not multinational corporations, 
not money that never really trickles down.
  We invested in America's greatest asset, our workers. Putting money 
directly in people's pockets, putting kids back in school, putting 
workers back in jobs, that is starting to unleash the true potential of 
our economy.
  We don't stop here. On Friday, President Biden issued a sweeping 
Executive order to increase competition in the economy. It is one more 
way we start to tilt the job market toward workers. Capitalism without 
competition is just exploitation.
  It is just common sense, when you have a tiny number of corporations, 
a shrinking number of corporations that get bigger and bigger, that 
control entire industries and huge portions of the economy, it drives 
up prices, and it drives down wages.
  Research shows that industry consolidation decreases worker pay by as 
much as 17 percent. Companies force workers to sign noncompete 
agreements as a condition of getting a job, even in jobs like fast food 
and construction. They tuck them into the fine print of job contracts, 
making it harder for workers to switch to better paying options.
  Sometimes they are not even enforceable, but employers put them in 
there anyway because it scares workers away from taking another job.
  We are putting a stop to this. No company should be allowed to tell 
you you can't take a job offering higher pay. President Biden is 
cracking down

[[Page S4820]]

on corporate mergers. Towns all over Ohio have seen what happens when 
companies merge and create just one employer in a community. It often 
means plant or store closures. It means workers have no competitors in 
town to go to for higher wages.
  Rural towns in Ohio and across the country watch companies come in, 
knowing they are the only game in town, and they offer workers a take-
it-or-leave-it offer at rock-bottom wages that don't even pay the 
bills, but it is the only place to go.
  Sometimes that is the whole point of the merger, to cut what 
corporations call labor costs, what the rest of us call jobs, 
paychecks, or livelihoods.
  Now the President is making it clear that when we review mergers, we 
need to look at and take into account whether they will lead to lower 
wages for workers.
  All actions come down to the same goal, increasing workers' power by 
cutting through redtape that keeps workers' wages down.
  We build on this progress, these important steps, by passing the 
Protect the Right to Organize Act. To have a strong, growing middle 
class, we have to have strong unions. The Protecting the Right to 
Organize Act would start to level the playing field and finally give 
workers a fighting chance against corporate union-busting tactics.
  We all saw what happened with Amazon this year. One of most powerful 
corporations in the world, and they would not be raking in profits 
without the hard work and dedication of its hundreds of thousands of 
American workers. Yet it unleashed all of its billions and billions and 
billions of dollars' worth of power to fight its own workers.
  When workers try to organize in 21st century America, it is never a 
fair fight. This bill would strengthen the punishment against companies 
that violate workers' right to organize and that retaliate against 
union organizers.
  It would close loopholes that allow employers to misclassify their 
employees as supervisors and independent contractors, often stripping 
them of their overtime they have earned and avoiding paying their fair 
share and giving workers the benefits they deserve.
  A union card is a ticket to middle-class life. We just need 
corporations to let workers organize to take control over their career 
and their families.
  In closing, last week, I was up in the far northwest corner of my 
State in Bryan, OH, visiting the Spangler Candy Company. It is a 
family-owned business more than a century old. They have had success 
for all those years by treating their workers and the Teamsters Union, 
which represents their workers, as partners. They have the same goal: 
to make a great product, to make the company successful. They work 
together.
  We in this body, with the American Rescue Plan, saved their union 
pensions in that plan. Now the company is expanding production and 
hiring 40 more union workers. That is what we can achieve when we 
invest in the people and places that make this country work.

  When you love this country, you fight for the people who make it 
work. That is what President Biden is doing. It is what all of us must 
continue to do to respect the dignity of work, so all work pays off and 
workers finally have real power in this economy.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Florida.