Rachel Philipson

Andy Stern

Lack of planning by the United States is putting China in charge of global wages and other world issues, the president of North America's biggest union said at an ILR School presentation March 4.

"Our jobs have all gone to China ... we really have an issue this country needs to come to grips with," said Andy Stern, president of Service Employees International Union and the ILR School's Alice B. Grant Labor Leader in Residence.

China, he said, has an economic plan aimed at the future. It dominates manufacturing, has been able to lift more than 800 million people out of poverty and is poised to take more control of the world economy.

Meanwhile, America is directionless and increasingly burdened by its deficit, said Stern, who leads a union of 2.2 million janitors, health care workers, child-care providers and others. "Team USA has had a bad year ... China has had a really good year. We don't seem to have a plan," he told 150 students, faculty, staff and community members in Ives Hall.

A corrupt political system has blocked President Barack Obama from implementing reform, Stern said, and political antics during the health care reform debate squandered an opportunity for change and underscored the nation's lack of planning during what he called the "Third Revolution."

"What is our way out of here? [Despite] all the economic dislocation that we will continue to face ... unions still can be a viable way to rebuild the American economy," Stern said.

"Unions, in fact, have been the best long-term anti-poverty, the best jobs, best welfare, best health and safety, best on-the-job training program that America has ever had -- when bargained by a strategic, pro-quality and competitive, sensitive union. And, more importantly -- particularly right now, it does not cost the government a dime."

The most profound economic changes in world history are occurring now, Stern said, and the changes are happening swiftly. "We are the first generation to live through an entire economic revolution from start to finish ... it is a breathtaking moment of history."

Within a 30-year period -- an astoundingly short window compared to the 3,000-year agricultural revolution and the 300-year industrial revolution -- nation-driven economies have been absorbed by a corporate-driven, globally interdependent economy.

The American dream of leaving the next generation better off has been upended, Stern said. Job tenure is a remnant of the past -- most Americans will have nine to 12 jobs by the time they are 35, Stern said. In 25 years, two-thirds of today's employers will no longer exist.

Stern also met with students, faculty and local union members while on campus.

Mary Catt is the ILR School's staff writer.