3 ms·

To your first point, non-union companies allow, in fact require each person to bargain for themselves. Generally the power imbalance at a reasonably large compa

To your first point, non-union companies allow, in fact require each person to bargain for themselves. Generally the power imbalance at a reasonably large company means that employees accept what they're offered, because their only alternative is to quit and be replaced easily. This is the reason that groups of workers organize to form unions in the first place. Game theory suggests that each person should want to avoid paying union dues, and yet have everyone else pay theirs, so that the union negotiates good rates for all, including them. The obvious outcome of voluntary dues, then, is for each person to eventually realize this and stop paying their own dues, so that the union collapses, shifting all power back to the employer and making employment worse for all. Humans are short-term thinkers, though, so that would be nigh-inevitable in most cases. Eventually, see point one again. The mandatory dues are an attempt to stop the several-year cycle of shifting back and forth between a union and non-union shop, I believe.

eesmith 8y ago
I'll add a concrete example. My dad worked for a TV station. Of the 5 VHF stations in town, one was public TV, three were network, and one was independent. One of the other stations was union. My dad's company was not. The owner of his company did not want the union. The owner kept the union out by paying everyone $1 more than their counterparts in the union station. My dad thought this was great. He got the benefits of the union - higher wages - without paying union dues. I look at it and think about how Dad could have gotten higher wages by being represented by a stronger union. Union power, like most things, is non-linear. A bigger union can pay for better negotiators than a small union can. That's a simple economy of scale - a larger union can have dedicated, full-time lawyers, for example, who stay on top of the laws and potential changes to the law. When the owner died, and the station got bought out by a private equity firm, the firm did the usual round of layoffs, and it sold off the company into parts. A union might have been able to fight some of those layoffs. But there was no union. But when he boasted about how he made more because he was non-union, such alternatives and futures were out-of-sight/out-of-mind. As you say, "Humans are short-term thinkers".

eesmith 8y ago

I'll add a concrete example. My dad worked for a TV station. Of the 5 VHF stations in town, one was public TV, three were network, and one was independent. One of the other stations was union. My dad's company was not. The owner of his company did not want the union. The owner kept the union out by paying everyone $1 more than their counterparts in the union station. My dad thought this was great. He got the benefits of the union - higher wages - without paying union dues. I look at it and think about how Dad could have gotten higher wages by being represented by a stronger union. Union power, like most things, is non-linear. A bigger union can pay for better negotiators than a small union can. That's a simple economy of scale - a larger union can have dedicated, full-time lawyers, for example, who stay on top of the laws and potential changes to the law. When the owner died, and the station got bought out by a private equity firm, the firm did the usual round of layoffs, and it sold off the company into parts. A union might have been able to fight some of those layoffs. But there was no union. But when he boasted about how he made more because he was non-union, such alternatives and futures were out-of-sight/out-of-mind. As you say, "Humans are short-term thinkers".