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While many public-safety workers joined prounion protests, Walker sidestepped some of the backlash that bruised Ohio's John Kasich in his attempt to curb collective bargaining.

“My father was prounion, so for me, this was something I was willing to entertain,” he said.

Italian industry is bound hand and foot by prounion laws that make it virtually impossible to lay off workers in slack periods, mandate extensive and expensive fringe benefits and tie official factory wages to soaring prices; unionized workers further stage incessant strikes and have horrendous rates of absenteeism.

Prounion physicians like Harness believe that organizing is an idea whose tune has come.