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Conservatives and business groups are up in arms over proposed changes to labor laws governing union elections. Two days of public hearings earlier this week at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) drew both union and business advocates on opposite sides of an increasingly caustic debate over the length of campaigns for union representatives. Currently, when employees of a company petition the NLRB, they vote in a secret ballot on whether they want to be represented by a union. But workers have complained that employers benefit from the lengthiness of the process. Among the proposed amendments being considered by the NLRB, is one that would shorten the time between the petition and a pre-election hearing to 7 days. Businesses are complaining that that gives them too little time to consult lawyers and respond to the workers’ petition. The NLRB has recently come under fire in a case involving Washington workers at Boeing who charged that they were retaliated against when the airline manufacturing giant moved operations to South Carolina after the Washington workers had attempted to exercise their right to strike. The NLRB voted in favor of the Boeing workers, prompting threats of de-funding by Republicans.

GUEST: David Bacon, labor writer, photo journalist and former union organizer