Trong thời đại hiện tại của một sự cân bằng thâm hụt thương mại khổng lồ ở Mỹ, Mỹ không thể duy trì một đồng đô la cố định, nếu vốn nước ngoài chảy ra nước ngoài, áp lực cho đồng USD giảm sau đó sẽ là rất lớn. | 142 Making Economic Sense and Huelga for strike and made it veritable radical chic to boycott grapes in support of his five-year strike against the California grape growers. The Chavez farm worker encampments attracted almost as many short-term priests nuns and young liberal idealists as the sugar cane-cutting Venceremos Brigade in Cuba. In 1970 the boycott finally forced the grape growers to sign with UFW five years later Chavez reached his peak of seeming success when his newly-elected ally Governor Jerry Brown pushed through the Agricultural Labor Relations Act for the first time compelling collective bargaining in agriculture. Indeed the new California act came perilously close to imposing a closed shop its good standing clause permitted union leaders to deny work to any worker who challenged decisions of union leaders. Yet despite the hosannahs of the nation s liberals and the coercion supplied by the state of California Cesar Chavez s entire life turned out to be a floperoo. Whereas he dreamed of his UFW organizing all of the nation s migrant farm workers his union fell like a stone from a membership of 70 000 in the mid-1970s to only 5 000 today. In the UFW heartland the Salinas Valley of California the number of union contracts among vegetable growers has plummeted from 35 to only one at the present time. Only half of the meager union revenues now come from dues the other half being supplied by nostalgic liberals. The UFW has had it. What went wrong Some of Chavez s critics point to his love of personal power which led to his purging a succession of organizers and to kicking all savvy non-Hispanic officials out of his union. But the real problem is the economy stupid. In the long run economics triumphs over symbolism hoopla and radical chic. Unions are only successful in a market economy where the union can control the supply of labor that is when workers are few in number and highly skilled so that they are not easily replaceable. Migrant farm workers on .
