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Unions are not necessary at all in any country that has decent and enforced labor laws. In developed economies they only serve as a levelling mechanism, which a

Unions are not necessary at all in any country that has decent and enforced labor laws. In developed economies they only serve as a levelling mechanism, which also make it impossible to fire anybody. The only people they serve are unproductive and incompetent employees.

enraged_camel 8y ago
Laws aren’t permanent. They can be, and in fact often are, rolled back or abolished. See Glass-Steagall Act and the much more recent Dodd-Frank rollbacks as examples. The fact of the matter is that when you make progress in an area you can’t just sit back and relax. You have to continue to work hard to prevent regression, especially when there are strong economic pressures in that direction. This is why unions are as important today as they were in the mid-19th century.
- adventured 8y ago
  The perpetual cruft stacking seems to be a far greater problem of passing large laws like eg Dodd Frank. In terms of regulation, the biggest problem the US has, is a century of cruft having built up, and the rarity with which it gets fully removed or even looked at + questioned for whether it should be on the books at all. The perpetual, hilariously absurd expansion of the number of pages in the Code of Federal Regulations is a nice example of that in action (180,000 pages). My favorite example, that does a wonderful job of pointing out the absurdity of this endless stacking, is the Twitter account A Crime a Day: https://twitter.com/crimeaday https://twitter.com/crimeaday Who is going through and removing all of that trash? Nobody, it's perpetually expanding. They almost never actually remove large bills like Dodd Frank from the system, they stack more cruft forever on top. If you want to roll back a section, you add 20 more pages of cruft to do it.
  - PhasmaFelis 8y ago
    May 17: "18 USC §§2340 & 2340A make it a federal crime for a person acting under color of law to commit torture overseas." ...That doesn't seem to fit the general "frivolous law" theme...
    - adventured 8y ago
      The point was hardly that every law on the federal books is bad. If you read the first 100 tweets on that account, my opinion is maybe 90 are bullshit that shouldn't be on the books. Nobody is going through all of those and removing the trash. Every little thing doesn't need a law, everything shouldn't be a federal crime. eg "18 USC §1465 makes it a federal crime to produce an obscene, lewd, lascivious, or "filthy book" for sale in interstate commerce." "10 USC §2674(c) & 32 CFR §234.11(a) make it a federal crime to drink alcohol at the Pentagon without written authorization." "40 USC §6307 & 36 CFR §520.4(h) make it a federal crime to play a ball game at the National Zoo, except in an officially-designated ball game area." "21 USC §§331, 333, 343(g) & 21 CFR §139.150(b) make it a federal crime to sell "egg noodles" that aren't ribbon-shaped." "18 USC §46(b) makes it a federal crime to knowingly barter for out-of-state water chestnuts." "16 U.S.C. §§707(a), 718g & 50 C.F.R. §91.14 make it a federal crime to submit an entry in the Federal Duck Stamp contest that you copied from a picture on the internet."
      - perl4ever 8y ago
        I disagree with treating every specific refinement or implication of an age-old law as some irrelevant newfangled detail we don't need. I looked up "21 USC §§331, 333, 343(g) & 21 CFR §139.150(b) make it a federal crime to sell "egg noodles" that aren't ribbon-shaped." 21 USC §331 is just about regulating fraud in commerce. It starts: "The following acts and the causing thereof are prohibited: (a) The introduction or delivery for introduction into interstate commerce of any food, drug, device, tobacco product, or cosmetic that is adulterated or misbranded. You could show that to someone a couple thousand years ago, and nothing would prevent them from understanding the purpose of it. You could probably get someone from the time of Hammurabi to understand the concept. 21 CFR §139.150(b) doesn't make it illegal to sell egg based pasta that isn't ribbon shaped, it defines "egg noodles" as such, as opposed to tubular shapes which are not "egg noodles". Standards to facilitate commerce are normally considered legitimate even by libertarians who wish to radically shrink the federal government. So unless you are an anarchist or particularly wish to abolish egg noodles or inhibit commerce in them, I don't understand where you're coming from.
forapurpose 8y ago
> Unions are not necessary at all in any country that has decent and enforced labor laws. I suppose no political organizations are necessary in places where there are decent and enforced laws, not even political parties, but that's not how humans work. Decent laws aren't the result of generosity from those in power - decent labor law isn't a result of corporate altruism - but of political struggles between different elements of society. Democracy doesn't work magically; it works by the people who have a seat at the table competing and negotiating. Those without a seat are ignored - their obvious needs, their priorities (you can always identify those without a seat: the others say about their needs: 'they're exaggerating; it's not that big a deal'), and needs that only they have the experience to know or anticipate. Individual factory workers don't have a seat, but their union does. The rest of the parent is just hyperbole.
- AmericanChopper 8y ago
  This comment sounds a lot like hyperbole to me. People have a seat at the table, that’s how democracy works. People also have an incredible amount of entitlements and protection in the labor market. The labor laws in the west are generally quite good, most of the reasonable criticism you could direct at them comes down to enforcement. If you have a problem with them, then participate in your democracy. In economies where minimum entitlements are sufficient to protect workers from exploitation, unions serve no useful purpose at all, they are simply leveling mechanisms. Meaning the do not protect workers from getting less than their worth, they simply pull people down and prevent people from advancing themselves beyond the average. Worst of all they make it nearly impossible to fire the incompetent, which itself seems like exploitation to me, forcing the component to pick up the slack of those who aren’t.
  - jackvalentine 8y ago
    > In economies where minimum entitlements are sufficient to protect workers from exploitation, unions serve no useful purpose at all They serve the purpose of making sure workers get their legal entitlements. For example, Unions right in Australia are tackling the problem of underpayment of legally mandated wages “wage theft” and have succeeded in getting a state government to adopt as policy the treatment of deliberate underpayment as a criminal matter with criminal penalties.
geezerjay 8y ago
> Unions are not necessary at all in any country that has decent and enforced labor laws. You clealy have no idea about what you're saying. For your comment to make any sense you need to believe that any worker acting exclusively by himself has the resources to enforce those laws agains any company and suffer no repercussion during the process. This idea is utterly absurd. Meanwhile, unions do offer specialized legal services and do pressure managers to not overreach or overstep their authority, and do so as a proxy to any employee and even while preserving his anonymity if needed. In fact, if anything you've said made any sense then unpaid overtime or unpaid weekend work would be unthinkable, but instead it's the norm in some abusive companies without any union.
- AmericanChopper 8y ago
  >you need to believe that any worker acting exclusively by himself has the resources to enforce those laws Yes because that’s how laws work, it’s up to the individual to enforce them... Literally no laws work this way.
  - geezerjay 8y ago
    > Yes because that’s how laws work Again, you clearly have no idea about what you're talking about. It's quite obvious that a law means nothing if you have no way to enforce it or if there are serious repercussions if you try. The moment a lone employee acting alone creates a problem for his immediate supervisors or higher ups, he singles himself out as a target. In jurisdictions that follow an at-will employment doctrine, where any employee can be immediately fired without any justification, then any employee that raises any problem to the company's managers can be fired just for being a nuisance.
    - AmericanChopper 8y ago
      How can you accuse me of not knowing how labor laws work, and then try to suggest that it is up to employers to enforce employment law/regulation? It is employers role to comply with the law, the department of labor enforces it. You don’t need your employers permission to report law violations to the department of labor.
qw 8y ago
The corporations also organize themselves to influence politicians. Big companies even have their own lobbyists. In addition you get all the "retirement" packages where former politicians are hired by the companies they were supposed to regulate. Why shouldn't the employees have the same right?
- AmericanChopper 8y ago
  It sounds like you’re comparing cartels to unions in respect to corruption and inefficiency. Well, I certainly agree with you there. Both are a threat to an efficient free market.

enraged_camel 8y ago

Laws aren’t permanent. They can be, and in fact often are, rolled back or abolished. See Glass-Steagall Act and the much more recent Dodd-Frank rollbacks as examples. The fact of the matter is that when you make progress in an area you can’t just sit back and relax. You have to continue to work hard to prevent regression, especially when there are strong economic pressures in that direction. This is why unions are as important today as they were in the mid-19th century.

adventured 8y ago
The perpetual cruft stacking seems to be a far greater problem of passing large laws like eg Dodd Frank. In terms of regulation, the biggest problem the US has, is a century of cruft having built up, and the rarity with which it gets fully removed or even looked at + questioned for whether it should be on the books at all. The perpetual, hilariously absurd expansion of the number of pages in the Code of Federal Regulations is a nice example of that in action (180,000 pages). My favorite example, that does a wonderful job of pointing out the absurdity of this endless stacking, is the Twitter account A Crime a Day: https://twitter.com/crimeaday https://twitter.com/crimeaday Who is going through and removing all of that trash? Nobody, it's perpetually expanding. They almost never actually remove large bills like Dodd Frank from the system, they stack more cruft forever on top. If you want to roll back a section, you add 20 more pages of cruft to do it.
- PhasmaFelis 8y ago
  May 17: "18 USC §§2340 & 2340A make it a federal crime for a person acting under color of law to commit torture overseas." ...That doesn't seem to fit the general "frivolous law" theme...
  - adventured 8y ago
    The point was hardly that every law on the federal books is bad. If you read the first 100 tweets on that account, my opinion is maybe 90 are bullshit that shouldn't be on the books. Nobody is going through all of those and removing the trash. Every little thing doesn't need a law, everything shouldn't be a federal crime. eg "18 USC §1465 makes it a federal crime to produce an obscene, lewd, lascivious, or "filthy book" for sale in interstate commerce." "10 USC §2674(c) & 32 CFR §234.11(a) make it a federal crime to drink alcohol at the Pentagon without written authorization." "40 USC §6307 & 36 CFR §520.4(h) make it a federal crime to play a ball game at the National Zoo, except in an officially-designated ball game area." "21 USC §§331, 333, 343(g) & 21 CFR §139.150(b) make it a federal crime to sell "egg noodles" that aren't ribbon-shaped." "18 USC §46(b) makes it a federal crime to knowingly barter for out-of-state water chestnuts." "16 U.S.C. §§707(a), 718g & 50 C.F.R. §91.14 make it a federal crime to submit an entry in the Federal Duck Stamp contest that you copied from a picture on the internet."
    - perl4ever 8y ago
      I disagree with treating every specific refinement or implication of an age-old law as some irrelevant newfangled detail we don't need. I looked up "21 USC §§331, 333, 343(g) & 21 CFR §139.150(b) make it a federal crime to sell "egg noodles" that aren't ribbon-shaped." 21 USC §331 is just about regulating fraud in commerce. It starts: "The following acts and the causing thereof are prohibited: (a) The introduction or delivery for introduction into interstate commerce of any food, drug, device, tobacco product, or cosmetic that is adulterated or misbranded. You could show that to someone a couple thousand years ago, and nothing would prevent them from understanding the purpose of it. You could probably get someone from the time of Hammurabi to understand the concept. 21 CFR §139.150(b) doesn't make it illegal to sell egg based pasta that isn't ribbon shaped, it defines "egg noodles" as such, as opposed to tubular shapes which are not "egg noodles". Standards to facilitate commerce are normally considered legitimate even by libertarians who wish to radically shrink the federal government. So unless you are an anarchist or particularly wish to abolish egg noodles or inhibit commerce in them, I don't understand where you're coming from.

forapurpose 8y ago

> Unions are not necessary at all in any country that has decent and enforced labor laws. I suppose no political organizations are necessary in places where there are decent and enforced laws, not even political parties, but that's not how humans work. Decent laws aren't the result of generosity from those in power - decent labor law isn't a result of corporate altruism - but of political struggles between different elements of society. Democracy doesn't work magically; it works by the people who have a seat at the table competing and negotiating. Those without a seat are ignored - their obvious needs, their priorities (you can always identify those without a seat: the others say about their needs: 'they're exaggerating; it's not that big a deal'), and needs that only they have the experience to know or anticipate. Individual factory workers don't have a seat, but their union does. The rest of the parent is just hyperbole.

AmericanChopper 8y ago
This comment sounds a lot like hyperbole to me. People have a seat at the table, that’s how democracy works. People also have an incredible amount of entitlements and protection in the labor market. The labor laws in the west are generally quite good, most of the reasonable criticism you could direct at them comes down to enforcement. If you have a problem with them, then participate in your democracy. In economies where minimum entitlements are sufficient to protect workers from exploitation, unions serve no useful purpose at all, they are simply leveling mechanisms. Meaning the do not protect workers from getting less than their worth, they simply pull people down and prevent people from advancing themselves beyond the average. Worst of all they make it nearly impossible to fire the incompetent, which itself seems like exploitation to me, forcing the component to pick up the slack of those who aren’t.
- jackvalentine 8y ago
  > In economies where minimum entitlements are sufficient to protect workers from exploitation, unions serve no useful purpose at all They serve the purpose of making sure workers get their legal entitlements. For example, Unions right in Australia are tackling the problem of underpayment of legally mandated wages “wage theft” and have succeeded in getting a state government to adopt as policy the treatment of deliberate underpayment as a criminal matter with criminal penalties.

geezerjay 8y ago

> Unions are not necessary at all in any country that has decent and enforced labor laws. You clealy have no idea about what you're saying. For your comment to make any sense you need to believe that any worker acting exclusively by himself has the resources to enforce those laws agains any company and suffer no repercussion during the process. This idea is utterly absurd. Meanwhile, unions do offer specialized legal services and do pressure managers to not overreach or overstep their authority, and do so as a proxy to any employee and even while preserving his anonymity if needed. In fact, if anything you've said made any sense then unpaid overtime or unpaid weekend work would be unthinkable, but instead it's the norm in some abusive companies without any union.

AmericanChopper 8y ago
>you need to believe that any worker acting exclusively by himself has the resources to enforce those laws Yes because that’s how laws work, it’s up to the individual to enforce them... Literally no laws work this way.
- geezerjay 8y ago
  > Yes because that’s how laws work Again, you clearly have no idea about what you're talking about. It's quite obvious that a law means nothing if you have no way to enforce it or if there are serious repercussions if you try. The moment a lone employee acting alone creates a problem for his immediate supervisors or higher ups, he singles himself out as a target. In jurisdictions that follow an at-will employment doctrine, where any employee can be immediately fired without any justification, then any employee that raises any problem to the company's managers can be fired just for being a nuisance.
  - AmericanChopper 8y ago
    How can you accuse me of not knowing how labor laws work, and then try to suggest that it is up to employers to enforce employment law/regulation? It is employers role to comply with the law, the department of labor enforces it. You don’t need your employers permission to report law violations to the department of labor.

qw 8y ago

The corporations also organize themselves to influence politicians. Big companies even have their own lobbyists. In addition you get all the "retirement" packages where former politicians are hired by the companies they were supposed to regulate. Why shouldn't the employees have the same right?

AmericanChopper 8y ago
It sounds like you’re comparing cartels to unions in respect to corruption and inefficiency. Well, I certainly agree with you there. Both are a threat to an efficient free market.