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> Unions essentially create a government sponsored monopoly on labor supply, restricting both workers and companies, which is fundamentally in conflict with the
by madgar 10y ago
> Unions essentially create a government sponsored monopoly on labor supply, restricting both workers and companies, which is fundamentally in conflict with the values of economic liberty upon which the country was founded.
Literally every word of what you just said about abolishing slavery. Even the bit about restricting workers, because poor landowners were told that owning a slave would enable upward mobility (it didn't really, slavery was a money sink at such small scales, this was just rhetoric to keep poor whites from questioning slavery).
Our country's history of valuing economic liberty has typically made us tolerate some awful behavior by the economically powerful. I wouldn't put it on a pedestal.
- pc86 10y agoIs there a Godwin's law for slavery? Just because Argument A can be used (improperly, perhaps?) to defend Bad Thing, and Argument A can also be used to defend Questioned Thing, does not make Questioned Thing equivalent to Bad Thing. So rather than saying "yeah but slavery!" perhaps try actually refuting the points made.
- madgar 10y agoI didn't say "yeah but slavery!" I didn't draw a false equivalence between unions and the abolition of slavery. I was responding to someone discussing the role of "economic liberty" in America's founding. When America was founded, that phrase meant slavery. The entire point of building "economic liberty" into the foundation of the country was to compromise on slavery. If you can't stomach slavery being mentioned in a conversation about the historical relationship between business in labor in America, and the history of the principles at hand, then you won't be able to engage the subject matter in any depth.
- mattmcknight 10y agoThis is completely ridiculous comment, and I feel bad providing a response. However, the Sons of Liberty were opposed to the Stamp Act and related measures in 1765, the Tea Act in 1773- that's what the phrase meant. Slavery is not an expression of economic liberty, it is obviously a restriction on economic liberty. Unions unfortunately continued the sordid history of racism in the US, particularly the AFL.
- madgar 10y agoI feel sorry that you needed to include an insult in your comment. You could have just contributed your historical understanding. The Stamp Act and Tea Act were opposed as taxation without representation in Parliament. They were not opposed because Americans didn't believe in taxes on principle. The spread of that belief is very new delusion. In 1776, the freedom to use slaves to run your business was absolutely an expression of economic liberty for half of America. Thomas Jefferson and Democratic Republicans opposed the growth of the budding federal government because of the fear that a federal government could curtail local business practices, namely slavery.
- mattmcknight 10y agoYou made the false claim "economic liberty meant slavery". Freedom to enslave people is not an increase in economic liberty, it contracts the economic liberty of the enslaved persons. It was the pursuit of the economic liberty to democratically determine the disposition of one's taxes upon which the country was founded. The country was not founded to preserve slavery. It is a pitiful and offensive rhetorical trick to suggest otherwise. Where did my comment suggest that there was a disbelief in taxes on principle? That is your delusion, not mine.
- Chris2048 10y ago> Literally every word of what you just said about abolishing slavery Slavery is a noun. So is union. I'll let you draw your own conclusions...