Despite Scot Lehigh’s column to the contrary (“When unions box out competition,’’ Opinion, May 4), unions don’t restrict competition. Unions work to ensure that competition is fair. Unions advocate for project labor agreements, prevailing wage laws, responsible employer ordinances, and other policies that raise standards for all workers, regardless of union affiliation.

Yes, advocating for middle-class wages, health insurance, retirement benefits, safe working conditions, and apprentice training can cost money. Massachusetts’ building trades unions, for example, invest $40 million annually in training alone.

Does Lehigh really believe that we should be forced to compete with contractors that pay low wages without benefits? Or contractors that pay cash under the table and misclassify workers as independent contractors so as to dodge taxes, workers’ compensation, and unemployment insurance? Or contractors that hire vulnerable, undocumented workers and threaten them with deportation if they speak up? Is that how he defines competition?

Union contractors compete every day on bids against nonunion contractors that do play by the rules. We can hold our own in a fair competition, and that’s why we will never stop advocating for the protections and standards that all workers deserve.

Francis X.

Callahan Jr.

President

Massachusetts

Building Trades Council,

AFL-CIO

Malden