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A union is not an abstract entity - it's a body of workers. The union "cares about your position" because it is their position, by definition. A union has inter
by ivanbakel 10y ago
A union is not an abstract entity - it's a body of workers. The union "cares about your position" because it is their position, by definition. A union has interests because its members have those interests, and when you join the union, it adapts to your interests.
Admittedly, workers already in the union have a reason to encourage you to join, but it's not sensible to suggest unions don't care about workers, because that's their only defining purpose.
- skybrian 10y agoThe leadership or representatives of a group don't necessarily have the same interests as the group. This isn't specific to unions. It's also true of representative democracy and corporate governance. For more see [1]. (That is, in theory it's certainly possible. I don't know how bad this is in practice.) [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal%E2%80%93agent_problem https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal%E2%80%93agent_prob...
- Apocryphon 10y agoA flawed representative democracy is better than corporate feudalism, which is what happens when workers at a company have no leverage, whether via unions or equity.
- skybrian 10y agoSure, but politicians don't go around telling people there is no way even in principle that they'll fail to represent your interests, because nobody will believe them. Instead, they actually try to make the case that they'll do a good job. Also, saying workers have no leverage without a union is another exaggeration. How much leverage you have depends very much on the circumstances. It's not a knock on unions for those of us who have found ourselves in a relatively fortunate position to admit it. It means there is room for a more subtle, nuanced conversation.