3 ms·

Interesting...maybe in an ideal world...but in the real world where business owners currently have the upper hand (and congressmen and congresswomen basically o

Interesting...maybe in an ideal world...but in the real world where business owners currently have the upper hand (and congressmen and congresswomen basically on payroll), I'm perfectly fine with unions acting as a counterweight to corporate power.

randyrand 9y ago
A few points: 1. Unions are not often a counter balance. They are usually just additional monopolies[0] where there was none before. The airline industry is incredibly competitive but yet airline pilots still decided to unionize and price-fix. 2. Monopolies should be fought with regulations targeted at increasing competition and lowering barriers to entry - not with more monopolies. Fighting a monopoly with another monopoly just hurts the consumer and hurts our country in the global economy. 3. unions have congressmen "on payroll" too. In fact in some states some industries have state laws that forbid people from working outside of the union. Only 27 states have right to work laws. [0] Per-company unions are the easiest monopolies to create because the scale of them is much smaller than the scale of the whole industry. Its very easy to get all your coworkers at company X to unionize and forbid company X from hiring elsewhere - and often new hires are happy to join the union too. But its very difficult for your company X to achieve a monopoly itself because it has to dominate an often much larger global market. For an example, see here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16489013 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16489013
- Caveman_Coder 9y ago
  > "People unionize even when their employer is not a monopoly." Nobody said that unions form only when the employer is a monopoly...I'm not sure what "point" you're trying to make here.
  - randyrand 9y ago
    Companies don't always have the upper hand. Unions are not always fighting "unjust" monopolies. They are often the unjust monopoly themself.
    - Caveman_Coder 9y ago
      > "Unions are not always fighting "unjust" monopolies." Nobody said they were...
    - Daishiman 9y ago
      Too bad for the companies. Really, I'm just crying here for the despair of the poor capitalists.
      - randyrand 9y ago
        It's the consumer who loses.
        Daishiman 9y ago
        Consumers gain much because the cost component of wages in most products is not necessarily that significant, while wealthier employees make for a stronger base of consumers.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]

randyrand 9y ago

A few points: 1. Unions are not often a counter balance. They are usually just additional monopolies[0] where there was none before. The airline industry is incredibly competitive but yet airline pilots still decided to unionize and price-fix. 2. Monopolies should be fought with regulations targeted at increasing competition and lowering barriers to entry - not with more monopolies. Fighting a monopoly with another monopoly just hurts the consumer and hurts our country in the global economy. 3. unions have congressmen "on payroll" too. In fact in some states some industries have state laws that forbid people from working outside of the union. Only 27 states have right to work laws. [0] Per-company unions are the easiest monopolies to create because the scale of them is much smaller than the scale of the whole industry. Its very easy to get all your coworkers at company X to unionize and forbid company X from hiring elsewhere - and often new hires are happy to join the union too. But its very difficult for your company X to achieve a monopoly itself because it has to dominate an often much larger global market. For an example, see here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16489013 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16489013

Caveman_Coder 9y ago
> "People unionize even when their employer is not a monopoly." Nobody said that unions form only when the employer is a monopoly...I'm not sure what "point" you're trying to make here.
- randyrand 9y ago
  Companies don't always have the upper hand. Unions are not always fighting "unjust" monopolies. They are often the unjust monopoly themself.
  - Caveman_Coder 9y ago
    > "Unions are not always fighting "unjust" monopolies." Nobody said they were...
  - Daishiman 9y ago
    Too bad for the companies. Really, I'm just crying here for the despair of the poor capitalists.
    - randyrand 9y ago
      It's the consumer who loses.
      - Daishiman 9y ago
        Consumers gain much because the cost component of wages in most products is not necessarily that significant, while wealthier employees make for a stronger base of consumers.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]