ND Supreme Court To Rule On Whether Locked Out Sugar Workers Can Get Unemployment Benefits

North Dakota state law prohibits unemployment benefits for those involved in labor disputes, for obvious reasons. Allowing government unemployment benefits for striking or locked out workers would amount to a de facto subsidy for the workers, prolonging their ability to resist signing a new contract.

That would be an unfair advantage.

The locked out American Crystal Sugar workers, however, argue that state law only applies to striking workers not locked out workers. Lower courts have disagreed with them, and now the matter is before the state’s highest court.

One would hope that the state Supreme Court would uphold the law as lower courts have, but if they don’t it’s a matter which would need immediate fixing by the legislature. Because, again, the last thing we want is a subsidy for labor disputes.

If unionized workers don’t want to sign their contract, if they want to hold out for something better, that’s fine. That’s their choice, and they have the right to make it. But the rest of us shouldn’t have to pay them benefits while they fight it out with management.