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Yes, you raise an interesting solution, and I suppose the union "open ballot" legislation which Mr. Obama favors could get to that in part, although I suspect we would see the American domestic political equivalent of World War III before all those foreign-owned and/or U.S. owned auto and steel firms would put themselves in a position where they could not only be unionized, but dragged "up" to the position of the UAW and similar high end unions.
Of course, doing that would increase costs for the American consumer, and probably decrease the quality of products, on the one hand. On the other hand, many (including me) have worried for years about the race to the bottom internationally, not just with wages, but envirnonmental protections as well.
Short anecdote. I visited the home of President Benjamin Henry Harrison several years ago in Indianapolis -- a long forgotten late 19th century Republican. Little did I know that defending steep tariffs was "the" central platform of the Republican party during that era. Our history books normally treat the tariff as an artifact of the antebellum period (when the South opposed it, and it was deemed to be good) and the Depression era (when it was deemed to be bad). Today, the only tariff proponents I can see on the national scene are Pat Buchanan and Lou Dobbs, and neither one of them appears to be in danger of being drafted into serious political prominence.
So, I would allow that maybe you're right. As I've said in my Sarah Palin defenses (there have been more than one), I have a soft spot for the old guard, business-friendly, civil rights Republicans. (In part, perhaps, because I had a great-great-great grandfather who fought in the western front in the Civil War for an Indiana regiment, ended the conflict in New Orleans to participate in the federal liberation of slaves, and named one of his sons after the abolitionist Republican Charles Sumner). So who knows, maybe you're right about wage and benefit parity, just like the old timers. I think I could live with it, if you were. Still, I don't think I want to subsidize the existing differential, if you're not.
