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Things were better "back then". Wages for bottom 90% have not risen, in real terms, since the 1970s. Income for the top 10% has gone up a lot, by contrast. U

Things were better "back then". Wages for bottom 90% have not risen, in real terms, since the 1970s. Income for the top 10% has gone up a lot, by contrast. Union jobs raised wages for everyone: even though only a third of private-sector jobs were unionized, the threat of unionization pushed most employers to pay well. In the 1960s, one person could get a blue-collar job and keep a family going in a suburban house, with a car. This was all due to unions. We have been subjected to thirty years of propaganda about how unions kill jobs, how regulation is bad for jobs, how you should have "freedom to invest your money" (ie a 401-k rather than a company pension). This propaganda is now taken as gospel, and we don't realize it's just a ploy by those with inherited wealth to get a bigger share of the wealth. BTW, that's how we ended up with Trump. Yes, he's a narcissistic windbag, but people who voted for him had real grievances.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
pnathan 10y ago
A major part of the 50s & 60s boom was the fact that most of the industrial nations had been turned into rubble in the 40s and the US hadn't. Once the 70s rolled around, the US manufacturers came to grips with serious competition. Some did better than others. Further, housing for GIs in the 40s and 50s was subsidized, thus changing the entire housing equation, and, further, women had not entered the workforce in large numbers, and, further, we require many more safety features on cars. These factors all are major portions of the story when comparing against your prototypical factory worker story, and mean that a simple narrative of Unions => Better Life doesn't work. Although unions do need to become much stronger in American life, they won't unspool us back to the prior era. and, tacking a paragraph on in my edit: probably want to talk to some black people about how great those years were. It's entirely plausible that some of the White American prosperity was due to heavily underpaying the Black Americans and treating them very poorly.
- rm_-rf_slash 10y ago
  As I often argue, America has been laden with unfair advantages for centuries. Vast land was easy to steal when 9/10 natives died from disease. The others lacked equivalent technology and weaponry. Slavery ensured the newly established federal government made good on its debts. A good credit score means a SHITTON for the success of any state. Abundant (stolen) land with loads of natural resources settled at the time industrialization ramped up. Lucky. Literal boatloads of immigrants from all over the world prop up the population, increase production, and suppress wages. Great for industrial growth (like china recently). And that's all before the 20th century.
- Apocryphon 10y ago
  Well, what about the post-Cold War prosperity of the '90s then?
  - pnathan 10y ago
    That's a good question, and I haven't really read enough history/economics regarding that time period to piece together an intelligent answer with the nuances needed. Among other things, I think it's too soon to really look back and see how the threads connected and disconnected with any dispassionate analysis. Once the signal figures of the era die off with their passions, we can start taking breaths that aren't colored by their factions. That said: one factor is that computers started really becoming available to businesses, so you really had an automation boom. one factor is the cold war ended, which changed... a lot of things, including capital flows. That capital shuffling may have helped prosperity. one factor is the boomers hit their financially most productive years.
John23832 10y ago
The "gig workers" "back then" were minorities and women. Progress is determined by your viewpoint.
- jordanb 10y ago
  They're not better off now. Besides a small class of professional women. For minorities, the post-2008 economy has been absolutely savage. What's happened is that things have gotten very very good for people at the very top. For everyone else, we've just seen everyone move down a peg. This is not to say there hasn't been wonderful progress in social justice. But from an economic justice perspective the modern economy is a disaster. http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics/ http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-t...
prostoalex 10y ago
> In the 1960s, one person could get a blue-collar job and keep a family going in a suburban house, with a car. Even if this person happened to be female or non-white?
Dirlewanger 10y ago
Another prerequisite for the good ol' days: way higher corporate tax rates. 52% during the 50s. I find it funny Republicans always leave that one out.
- cmdrfred 10y ago
  That is the marginal tax rate not the effective rate, it was really about 30% - 40% depending on how you were set up. Now its about 20% - 25% effective rate.
smsm42 10y ago
Unions do kill jobs. That's simple economics - if you force an employer to pay more (and that's the reason you need a union), less jobs would be available at higher rate. If you sell something at higher price, you sell less of it. You can argue that these jobs are better and there are other benefits, but denying basic economic laws is not going to get you very far. With regulations it's more complicated - some regulations may make economic sense, especially externality-related ones , some are explicitly aimed at killing jobs - such as licensing regulations which are explicitly designed as a barrier to prevent non-licensed people from having certain jobs and thus reduce the number of people in certain occupation. It's in its explicit design, and no matter how many times you say "propaganda" it's not going to change. > it's just a ploy by those with inherited wealth to get a bigger share of the wealth. By blocking access to good jobs to lowest tier - people without union connections, without union seniority, without ability to complete complicated licensing requirements, etc. - you are doing exactly this. You are making harder to gain footing on the job market for people that do not have a base to complete complicated licensing requirements, that can not deliver enough productivity to be hired at the above-market rates set by unions, who may not fit the job descriptions and requirements set by unions, etc. You benefit a narrow sliver of the population (1/3 at the highest times, much less now) at the expense of everybody else.
- waisbrot 10y ago
  > Unions do kill jobs. That's simple economics - if you force an employer to pay more (and that's the reason you need a union), less jobs would be available at higher rate. Simple economics is right. In _real_ economics, things are a lot more complex and unions don't "kill jobs". Software salaries are higher in SF and lower in Jackson, Mississippi. Do you believe there are more programmers per capita in Mississippi?
  - smsm42 10y ago
    You are doing a wrong comparison. To see if factor X has an influence, you need to compare two similar situations differing only in factor X and see the outcome, not compare two outcomes from different situations both not having factor X and conclude since there's a difference factor X does not matter. So, if a unionized company in SF with higher salaries would be consistently hiring more people than essentially similar company with no unions and lower salaries, in the same environment - that might be a counter-example or at least a beginning of one (one still needs to consider the confounders - maybe CEO of the former one is a genius and of the second one is an idiot and had run the company into the ground, and that explains hiring differences). Of course in SF and Jackson salaries are different - those are different markets. That has nothing to do with my argument. > things are a lot more complex and unions don't "kill jobs". Making a claim is not proving it. I've provided an argument why I think they do. If you want to argue against it, the least you could do is providing your own counter-argument. And no, "it's complicated" does not count as one. You have to point out which part of the complication, in your opinion at least, makes the conclusion wrong.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

pnathan 10y ago

A major part of the 50s & 60s boom was the fact that most of the industrial nations had been turned into rubble in the 40s and the US hadn't. Once the 70s rolled around, the US manufacturers came to grips with serious competition. Some did better than others. Further, housing for GIs in the 40s and 50s was subsidized, thus changing the entire housing equation, and, further, women had not entered the workforce in large numbers, and, further, we require many more safety features on cars. These factors all are major portions of the story when comparing against your prototypical factory worker story, and mean that a simple narrative of Unions => Better Life doesn't work. Although unions do need to become much stronger in American life, they won't unspool us back to the prior era. and, tacking a paragraph on in my edit: probably want to talk to some black people about how great those years were. It's entirely plausible that some of the White American prosperity was due to heavily underpaying the Black Americans and treating them very poorly.

rm_-rf_slash 10y ago
As I often argue, America has been laden with unfair advantages for centuries. Vast land was easy to steal when 9/10 natives died from disease. The others lacked equivalent technology and weaponry. Slavery ensured the newly established federal government made good on its debts. A good credit score means a SHITTON for the success of any state. Abundant (stolen) land with loads of natural resources settled at the time industrialization ramped up. Lucky. Literal boatloads of immigrants from all over the world prop up the population, increase production, and suppress wages. Great for industrial growth (like china recently). And that's all before the 20th century.
Apocryphon 10y ago
Well, what about the post-Cold War prosperity of the '90s then?
- pnathan 10y ago
  That's a good question, and I haven't really read enough history/economics regarding that time period to piece together an intelligent answer with the nuances needed. Among other things, I think it's too soon to really look back and see how the threads connected and disconnected with any dispassionate analysis. Once the signal figures of the era die off with their passions, we can start taking breaths that aren't colored by their factions. That said: one factor is that computers started really becoming available to businesses, so you really had an automation boom. one factor is the cold war ended, which changed... a lot of things, including capital flows. That capital shuffling may have helped prosperity. one factor is the boomers hit their financially most productive years.

John23832 10y ago

The "gig workers" "back then" were minorities and women. Progress is determined by your viewpoint.

jordanb 10y ago
They're not better off now. Besides a small class of professional women. For minorities, the post-2008 economy has been absolutely savage. What's happened is that things have gotten very very good for people at the very top. For everyone else, we've just seen everyone move down a peg. This is not to say there hasn't been wonderful progress in social justice. But from an economic justice perspective the modern economy is a disaster. http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics/ http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-t...

prostoalex 10y ago

> In the 1960s, one person could get a blue-collar job and keep a family going in a suburban house, with a car. Even if this person happened to be female or non-white?

Dirlewanger 10y ago

Another prerequisite for the good ol' days: way higher corporate tax rates. 52% during the 50s. I find it funny Republicans always leave that one out.

cmdrfred 10y ago
That is the marginal tax rate not the effective rate, it was really about 30% - 40% depending on how you were set up. Now its about 20% - 25% effective rate.

smsm42 10y ago

Unions do kill jobs. That's simple economics - if you force an employer to pay more (and that's the reason you need a union), less jobs would be available at higher rate. If you sell something at higher price, you sell less of it. You can argue that these jobs are better and there are other benefits, but denying basic economic laws is not going to get you very far. With regulations it's more complicated - some regulations may make economic sense, especially externality-related ones , some are explicitly aimed at killing jobs - such as licensing regulations which are explicitly designed as a barrier to prevent non-licensed people from having certain jobs and thus reduce the number of people in certain occupation. It's in its explicit design, and no matter how many times you say "propaganda" it's not going to change. > it's just a ploy by those with inherited wealth to get a bigger share of the wealth. By blocking access to good jobs to lowest tier - people without union connections, without union seniority, without ability to complete complicated licensing requirements, etc. - you are doing exactly this. You are making harder to gain footing on the job market for people that do not have a base to complete complicated licensing requirements, that can not deliver enough productivity to be hired at the above-market rates set by unions, who may not fit the job descriptions and requirements set by unions, etc. You benefit a narrow sliver of the population (1/3 at the highest times, much less now) at the expense of everybody else.

waisbrot 10y ago
> Unions do kill jobs. That's simple economics - if you force an employer to pay more (and that's the reason you need a union), less jobs would be available at higher rate. Simple economics is right. In _real_ economics, things are a lot more complex and unions don't "kill jobs". Software salaries are higher in SF and lower in Jackson, Mississippi. Do you believe there are more programmers per capita in Mississippi?
- smsm42 10y ago
  You are doing a wrong comparison. To see if factor X has an influence, you need to compare two similar situations differing only in factor X and see the outcome, not compare two outcomes from different situations both not having factor X and conclude since there's a difference factor X does not matter. So, if a unionized company in SF with higher salaries would be consistently hiring more people than essentially similar company with no unions and lower salaries, in the same environment - that might be a counter-example or at least a beginning of one (one still needs to consider the confounders - maybe CEO of the former one is a genius and of the second one is an idiot and had run the company into the ground, and that explains hiring differences). Of course in SF and Jackson salaries are different - those are different markets. That has nothing to do with my argument. > things are a lot more complex and unions don't "kill jobs". Making a claim is not proving it. I've provided an argument why I think they do. If you want to argue against it, the least you could do is providing your own counter-argument. And no, "it's complicated" does not count as one. You have to point out which part of the complication, in your opinion at least, makes the conclusion wrong.