Unions for Nurses: Good or Bad Idea?

There’s a political battle going on in my mailbox and it has nothing to do with John McCain and Barack Obama.

For the past several months, I’ve been bombarded with fliers and pamphlets from the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC) and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU Healthcare). I’m not well versed on this topic, but it appears that the two organizations are dueling it out for members. Their targets are nurses who work in hospitals.

NNOC literature says it is an arm of the CNA that was founded in 2004 to protect nurse-to-patient ratio regulations, pensions and standards after these benefits were challenged by various hospital chains. NNOC has sponsored ratio legislation in Arizona, Illinois, Texas and Maine, and claims 80,000 members in 50 states. It has unions in California, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maine and Nevada.

SEIU claims its membership consists of 1.9 million “workers” (which include medical and non-medical employees) and 50,000 retirees who are “united to improve services and our communities throughout North America.” Within this large organization is a sub-group of health care workers which claims 900,000 members. They include registered nurses, LPNs and LVNs, doctors, lab technicians, nursing home workers and home care workers.

According to what I read in the fliers, NNOC and SEIU are going head-to-head in some hospitals.

The CNA/NNOC says that, as a nurses-only organization, it can represent the profession much better than a union whose membership is so diversified. Other accusations against SEIU include eroding the strength of nurses at the bargaining table, siding with management, endorsing hospital closures—well, it goes on and on.

The SEIU counters that because it has the numbers, it can better negotiate for hospital workers’ demands. The union accuses the CNA/NNOC of trying to push out all other unions, thus limiting the choices for nurses. SEIU also says the CNA is spending the money it collects from its California members outside of the state. The union’s campaign slogan is “Shame on the CNA.”

And so it goes.

What do you think about unions for nurses?

Are they necessary?

Should everyone have to join?

What’s the situation at your hospital?

Tell us what you think.