A man with whom I worked in 1987-88, who owned his own plumbing company, once told me how he made so much money. It was because he was willing to stick his hands into other people’s [insert slang term for feces here]. My 5’0″ tall wife used to be a nursing assistant, and is now a registered nurse, so she has had to be willing to do the same thing, albeit not in clearing out plumbing lines.

So, I had to laugh when I saw this main editorial in The Philadelphia Inquirer:

Diversifying the building trades would be a win for Philadelphia | Editorial

Likely mayor Cherelle Parker and union chief Ryan Boyer must work together to open up good-paying jobs long denied to people of color.

by The Editorial Board | Saturday, September 2, 2023 | 5:45 AM EDT

When Labor Day 1963 was celebrated, most of organized labor in America was on the right side of history as a firm ally in the civil rights movement. A few days earlier, unions had been an important part of the broad coalition that made possible the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, organized by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

I will admit to being wryly amused that the editors of the Inquirer chose to make this editorial available to paid subscribers only, since that is going to limit its message to people who are already making enough money to be able to afford the $285.48 I waste spend every year to get the newspaper in digital form. $285.48? That’s a week’s worth of groceries for many families, and the very families that the newspaper is saying should have better jobs are the ones who can’t spend extra money on the paper!

The United Automobile Workers provided funding, while the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, led by the iconic A. Philip Randolph, helped with transportation for the hundreds of thousands who attended the march. At the time, Randolph had been seeking support for such a march for decades.

Yet, on Labor Day 2023, Philadelphia’s dominant building trades unions representing the city’s skilled laborers remain disproportionately white and male. The most recent data from 2012 puts the union workforce at 99% male and 76% white. The situation may have improved since then, but it’s impossible to know since the local building trades have refused to share demographic information.

Sixty years after King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, in a city that is more than 40% Black and where other major unions are predominantly African American, this is a disgrace — one that not only limits opportunity for a group of people but the whole of Philadelphia.

This is where I come to my introductory paragraph. Do you know how you become a plumber? The easiest way is to hire on as a laborer or plumber’s helper with a non-union plumbing company! I am not a licensed plumber, but I have replumbed three separate houses, with everything working and not leaking, because I listened and learned and have been willing to work in basements and ughh! crawl spaces, to do the work.

Do you know how to become an electrician? The easiest way is to hire on as a laborer or electrician’s helper with a non-union electrical company! I am not a licensed electrician, but I have rewired two separate houses, with everything working and not shooting out sparks, because I have listened and learned and been willing to work in basements and crawl spaces. Not being licensed, I had to hire a sparktrician^[1]“Sparktrician” is a Picoism, one which a couple of my friends have adopted. The last concrete plant electrician with whom I worked was nicknamed ‘Sparky.’ We worked on … Continue reading to install the circuit breaker panel in my new garage, to get it hooked up by the electric company, but everything from the panel into the garage, except for one circuit the electrician had to add himself to pass inspection, I have installed myself, because I learned what I needed to do.

And yes, my wife and I are living in one of the homes I replumbed and rewired!

This is where the Editorial Board’s argument fails: if the building trades unions who have dominated the city’s politics for decades, and who were the prime supporters of current Mayor Jim Kenney’s electoral success, have been secretive about their membership demographics, it’s good to remember that those unions are controlled by, and are very loyal to, the Democratic Party. Democrats completely dominate the City Council, and Philly’s last Republican mayor left office while Harry Truman was still President of the United States.

This racial hoarding of jobs goes beyond what work crews look like in the city. Union construction jobs are one of the few remaining well-paying jobs available to people without a college degree. Closing off this traditional pathway to the middle class has kept many families of color from achieving the kind of financial stability that strengthens communities. A litany of systemic issues in Philadelphia, from generational poverty to gun violence, are compounded by decades of lost opportunities.

Here is what the Editorial Board haven’t told us: how are the building trades unions “hoarding” those jobs? Have they declined to allow ‘people of color’ to enter apprenticeship programs? Do they not allow non-white applicants to take whatever tests are required to get into a union? Surely, surely! a solidly Democratic group like trade union members would not do anything like that?

Or, is it possible, just possible, that there haven’t been all that many non-white people applying for these jobs, for union membership? That question has to be asked, and answered, for the Editorial Board’s screed to make any sense at all.

Philadelphia’s likely next mayor, Cherelle Parker, describes herself as an unapologetic pro-labor Democrat. Parker, who would be the first Black woman to lead City Hall, is a strong ally of Ryan Boyer, the first Black man to head the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council. Together, they represent a distinctive opportunity to establish generational change in the city’s unions.

Of course, even with the ostensible commitment of these two leaders, the task will not be easy. The skilled trades have long resisted efforts to diversify their ranks. In fact, the federal government’s affirmative action “Philadelphia Plan,” which launched in 1967, fell apart a few years later after tradesmen rioted rather than comply.

The city’s decades of stagnation have also played a role. If there are only a few jobs available for painters, pipe fitters, and electricians, it is likely those jobs will go to the sons and nephews of the current painters, pipe fitters, and electricians. It is much simpler to end nepotistic and discriminatory practices when an industry is growing, rather than declining.

Are the Board saying that the unions have been giving memberships to unqualified “sons and nephews” of current trade union members, or is it possible that those union members have been teaching their “sons and nephews” their trades? And is it any surprise that workers, that family, favor their own family members above strangers? Is Inquirer reporter Jesse Bunch the son of Inky columnist Will Bunch?^[2]The photos of the older and younger Messrs Bunch look as though they could be father-and-son, but I have been unable to verify that. The Inquirer is a unionized company which recently had a new … Continue reading

There’s significantly more to the editorial, 359 words more in seven paragraphs, but it all fails in one respect: with Philly’s great support of union labor, the city has both increased the costs of construction and repair in the City of Brotherly Love, and given to the unions the ability to restrict the size of the unionized workforce. Don’t complain that the unions are doing the things which benefit their members and members’ families while concomitantly giving that power to the unions in the first place!