This year’s Labor Day Holiday should be a time for reflection about the conditions of working people and our economy at the household, community, state and national level. This past June I retired from Bath Iron Works after a 47-year career, all of it spent as a union member. June also marked the 80th anniversary of BIW workers organizing a union to advance and protect their interests. In that time workers built more destroyers than Japan during World War II, delivered hundreds more ships in multiple classes to the Navy and built dozens of commercial ships.

The workers, through their unions, raised wages, secured benefits and created a safer shipyard. All of this helped the Midcoast to prosper and become a better community for all to call home. I’m grateful to those who created our union and proud to have been a member for all these years.

Unfortunately, union membership and the ability to improve workers’ lives have steadily declined. But that’s not because workers don’t want to unionize. Research from MIT shows that nearly 60 million people would join a union if given the opportunity. And therein lies the problem. The stated purpose of the 1935 National Labor Relations Act is to encourage collective bargaining. Yet policymakers have consistently passed laws that have made it more difficult for workers to form unions.

Consider this: Between 1948 and 1973, when New Deal-era laws expanded and enforced collective bargaining, hourly wages rose by more than 90 percent and the middle class flourished. Since then hourly wages have increased by just over 9 percent while productivity has gone up 74 percent. Workers are not getting a fair share of what they produce. Meanwhile, the federal minimum wage set at $7.25 in 2009 has not been raised since then. In the same period, billionaire wealth has increased an average of 11 percent a year. Billionaires who thank their workers (that they deny the right to organize) for their joy rides in space or build yachts as large as some of the navy ships I worked on.

Clearly, Congress needs to provide workers with the tools to form unions so they can collectively bargain and have their voices heard. The Protecting the Right to Organize Act (PRO Act), which is currently stalled in the Senate, would restore balance in the workplace by empowering workers to exercise their freedom to organize. It would outlaw state “Right to Freeload” laws that seek to weaken and undermine unions. It would ensure that workers can reach a first contract quickly after a union is recognized. The PRO Act would prevent employers from retaliating against workers for exercising their rights to organize under the National Labor Relations Act.

In the past year, we were repeatedly told about the essential nature of workers all across our economy. Let’s act on these values and demand that the Senate empower workers by passing the PRO ACT. As I mentioned earlier, Labor Day — which was signed into law by President Grover Cleveland on June 28th, 1894 — should be a time of reflection. For me that’s not just about looking back at a long career of labor. I’m proud of my union and what it has done for me. I am also looking forward and I want future generations of America’s workers to have the same rights and protections I’ve had.

John Portela is a retired shipbuilder and member of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Local S6.

Comments are not available on this story.