Looking for the union label has long been second nature to Deb Paulin, a member of the Alden Central School Employees Association since 1986.

Then, as more companies started moving production facilities overseas to cut labor costs, she added Made in America to her "do-buy" list to reward those companies staying in the states.

"I want to support my union brothers and sisters and I want to support American-made companies," said Paulin. "Living in western New York, we've just watched company after company move to Mexico."

But that has only toughened her resolve.

While she drives both in-district and out-of-district bus routes, Paulin became president of her local union more than 10 years ago and has served on NYSUT's Board of Directors since 2002.

She and her husband John, an electrician and member of UAW Local 424 at American Axle and Manufacturing, raised four children in Alden.

Now they have two grandchildren to buy presents for.

"Just like I did for my own kids, I have been searching out what I thought were good American companies like Fisher-Price and Mattel. I thought that not only was I buying toys made in America, I was supporting American workers," Paulin said during a report at NYSUT's annual School-Related Professional leadership conference.

"I couldn't believe when I started reading about the recalls of toys for excessive levels of lead," Paulin said. "Then I found out the toys I bought were not made in America. They were all made in China."

In two months alone, more than 13 million toys were recalled after tests indicated lead levels that sometimes reached nearly 200 times the federal safety limit.

"Nothing is more important than keeping my family healthy, so I'm angry as a mother and grandmother," Paulin said. "To see so many jobs and companies go overseas, I became angry as an American worker."

Now, with lead-covered toys in our homes, Paulin hopes everyone else gets angry.

"We've got to stop this toxic trade," she said. "One way to do it is to give to VOTE-COPE, NYSUT's political action fund, because it supports candidates who are pro-labor and pro-education."

Another way, she said, is to vote. "We need to vote in all our elections — especially on Nov. 4, 2008."

Spotlight

NYSUT Executive Vice President Alan Lubin said the toy recall, which by late November, was up to 22 million, has increased the spotlight on corporations that put profits over safety.

Among those testifying in October at hearings of the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation was Bama Athreya, executive director of the International Labor Rights Forum. He reported to lawmakers that virtually every American toy company — Mattel, Hasbro, Fisher-Price, Toys R Us and Disney — has production facilities in the Pearl River delta area of southern China.

Athreya provided proof of deplorable working conditions, including samples of contracts that stipulate 12-hour days, seven days a week, with no exceptions.

The penalties are harsh for any worker who fails to complete a full work week.

"If a worker is severely maimed on the job and must leave her post (for) emergency medical treatment, she is regarded as terminated and has signed away her rights to bring a case forward for any damages," Athreya said.

Lubin said Athreya's testimony and a new report from the labor rights forum should wake people up to the real cost of cheaper products.

The report, Ethical Standards and Working Conditions in Wal-Mart's Supply Chain, concludes that the retailing giant has not invested the necessary resources nor taken the necessary actions to ensure that its ethical-standards program is enforced.

Retailers like Wal-Mart — the nation's top importer of Chinese-made products — put so much pressure on suppliers to produce cheap goods that health, environmental and labor protections get brushed aside, the report concludes.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, the growing U.S. trade deficit with China has cost 2.1 million U.S. jobs between 1997 and 2006.

The deficit with China reached a whopping $233 billion last year, and imports for Wal-Mart alone accounted for $27 billion — 11 percent of the growth in the U.S.

Border talk

Drawing from his recent experience as part of a Border Witness delegation to the U.S.-Mexico border, Lubin said the solution is clear.

"The U.S. must insist that American companies not exploit workers even if they work in foreign lands," Lubin said.

"We have to demand," he said, "that products sold in the USA be made by workers — wherever they are in the world — who are paid a decent wage and who are shown the respect we demand in the workplace."

While the problem will require action at the federal level — changing trade policies and increasing regulations on imports, Paulin noted — there is something union brothers and sisters can do right now: shop union-made.

"It's the only way you'll know that products weren't made by prison labor, child labor or terrorized workers," Paulin said. "Somebody is getting rich off our babies and they are threatening not just our jobs but our families' lives."

Recently, American Axle and Manufacturing announced plans to move its production facilities from Buffalo, Cheektowaga and Tonawanda to Mexico and Detroit. John Paulin and his coworkers received their separation notices.

"It's very discouraging, but we had the good fortune to have two union jobs in the family for a long time," Deb Paulin said.

In a free marketplace, Lubin suggested, others should follow Paulin's example and look for the union label.

"We must be willing to pay a few cents more for products appropriately made by workers who earn a living wage and benefits," Lubin said.

— Betsy Sandberg