NEWS COVERAGE of the San Francisco strike and contract negotiations between major hotel chains and the UNITE HERE union signals a possible wrinkle in plans for travelers to the Bay Area, Los Angeles and Washington, DC. When 10,000 workers strike and prepare for work stoppages, the focus on the potential inconvenience to consumers obscures the public good of the collective bargaining process.

Collective bargaining is democracy in action at a time when America needs it most. We live in an era where companies have more control over our lives both on and off the clock. Corporate bottom lines dictate where we can afford to live, how much time we spend with our families, how we manage our health, and the quality of care we receive in our golden years.

Rarely do ordinary people have an opportunity to come together in large numbers and help shape the big decisions that impact their lives and indirectly affect all of us. The collective bargaining table requires employers and workers to apply human ingenuity to the challenges of the new economy and reach compromises that serve mutual interests.

Hotel workers are taking a stand to ensure that their companies not only lead the industry in profitability, but in upholding basic American ideals about work. Many of the standards that have defined American jobs and facilitated the growth of the middle class were negotiated at the bargaining table. The 40-hour workweek, the weekend, family and medical leave, and basic safety and health protections are not the result of corporate benevolence, but negotiations between workers and employers.

The decision to strike is one that UNITE HERE members did not make lightly. Beyond fair compensation, hotel workers are fighting for a say on issues such as workload increases and disciplinary processes. "I feel that the risk is worth taking...if it's going to come to us getting a fair contract," said Los Angeles housekeeping employee Steven Whitlock.

Hotel workers shouldn't have to carry the torch of advancing workplace democracy alone. Changing global and domestic economic realities require the participation of more of us at the bargaining table, yet companies fear a level playing field. That's why 75 percent of employers with workforces engaged in organizing campaigns hire consultants to stop unions. And, it's the reason why 20,000 workers in this country are fired and discriminated against every year for participating in union organizing activity.

Polls show that 42 million workers want unions, but corporations would lead us to believe that unions are an antiquated idea. What's archaic is the return of poor working conditions and jobs that can't sustain families. It should come as no surprise that as union membership declines, the number of dead-end, low-paying jobs rises. There is a strong connection between recent overtime pay cuts, the steady loss of jobs to overseas and shrinking spaces for workers and employers to come together and negotiate on equal footing.

Blue collar, white collar, or no collar or at all -- everyone has a stake in defending workers' rights to form unions and collectively bargain. A place at the table for American workers is one bargain none of us can afford to lose.

David Bonior is chairman of American Rights at Work, a workers' rights advocacy organization in Washington, D.C. He also is a professor of labor studies at Wayne State University.