You would think that a right to work law would be supported by everybody. Liberals hate right to work laws because they can’t control individual workers like they can union workers. The heads of unions control their members, collect millions of dollars in union dues that go to help Democrats, and only Democrats. Look at the pain the unions inflicted on the people of Wisconsin.

It’s no wonder that many companies are moving out of union-regulated states to right-to-work states. Yes, employees are paid less, but there are no union dues. Generally, these right-to-work states have a lower cost of living.

Unions use their considerable political power and financial backing to blackmail companies to raise salaries and benefits. These union costs are passed on to consumers in artificially higher prices.

Michigan’s House of Representatives passed a right-to-work bill today that is “enraging union activists and leaders, and sparking heated protests in the state Capitol.” Teachers have taken the day off as part of the protest movement. This might explain why “[i]n the public schools in Detroit, Mich., according to the U.S. Department of Education, only 7 percent of the eighth graders are grade-level proficient or better in reading.”

When Republican Governor Rick Snyder signs the bill, which he has promised to do, Michigan will be the 24th right-to-work state in America.

“What we shouldn’t be doing is trying to take away your rights to bargain for better wages and working conditions,” the president said at the Daimler Detroit Diesel plant in Redford, Mich. “We don’t want a race to the bottom, we want a race to the top.”

He urged the state’s GOP-controlled legislature and Republican Gov. Rick Snyder to abandon their efforts to pass the law, which would forbid unions from charging its members dues automatically. Michigan would be the 24th state to adopt the right-to-work law, following Indiana’s passage of a similar law in February.

The idea that we are even discussing whether an industry should be held hostage by unions is maddening.

No one forces anybody to work for a company. If you don’t like the wages and benefits, you have a number of choices: reduce how much money you spend, find another job in your area, move to where the job market is better, start your own business, or a combination of these. What right does anybody have to tell a company how much to pay its workers?

With workers’ salaries determined by what the market will bear, prices for everything will drop everywhere. Look at Detroit today. It priced itself out of the automobile market. It took money stolen from taxpayers to bail out GM in order to save the unions. Michigan and Ohio, two big union states with ties to the automobile industry, went heavily for President Obama. Their union votes were payback for the bailout.

The passage of the right-to-work legislation could be the best thing to happen to Michigan. Companies could move in knowing that they would have a ready workforce looking for jobs no matter what the pay. The goal is to get people jobs.

Unions would rather see a company go out of business than end forced unionism. Eastern Airlines and Hostess come to mind. Consider this from the now-defunct Eastern Airlines:

After 686 days on strike against Eastern Airlines, rank- and-file members of the International Association of Machinists (IAM) and our supporters registered the final piece of our victory against the union-busting drive of the employers when the carrier folded at midnight on January 18, 1991.

“Victory” for a union is destroying a company and the jobs that go with it.