VALLEY STREAM, N.Y. -- Workers at a Target store in Long Island have a different twist on the discount retailer's famous catch phrase, "Expect More. Pay Less." "'Expects more, pays less,' that's how we say it," said Averail Bracey, a Target employee for 7 years who is among those seeking to unionize the store in the hopes that life as a big box employee making less than $10 an hour might get better.

In February, dozens of workers at the Valley Stream store contacted the United Food and Commercial Workers to seek representation. This Friday, a government-supervised election will determine whether store employees become part of the union, marking the first time in more than two decades that Target has confronted such a vote.

But the fight at Valley Stream is about more than the fate of one store, or even the fate of America's second-largest retailer, say labor historians. Hanging in the balance, they assert, is nothing less than the future of worker compensation in what remains the world's largest economy. In the wake of the Great Recession, corporate profits have rebounded but most rank-and-file employees are still waiting for the benefits, with wages stagnant and unemployment high. For organized labor, the election at Target is shaping up as a crucial battleground in a campaign to claim a share of the spoils.

For the labor movement, the vote also amounts to a challenge as unions struggle to retain relevance in the face of waning membership and mixed public sentiment. Target occupies a central

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/16/target-union-labor-movement_n_877741.html