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> One day we will have one big union. The strength of labor unions in Europe is drawn in large part due to the fact that there are a multiplicity of unions rep

> One day we will have one big union. The strength of labor unions in Europe is drawn in large part due to the fact that there are a multiplicity of unions representing workers for the same companies, and workers can choose who they want to represent them. That's not the case for labor unions in the US.

Someone1234 7y ago
That's not the case because the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them. Anti-union propaganda is rampant. It could be the case in the US. Having a single union is a good place to start.
- chimeracoder 7y ago
  > That's not the case because the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them. Anti-union propaganda is rampant. Well, no, the fact that almost all unions in the US use exclusive representation contracts (compared to Europe, where such contracts are range from "unheard-of in most industries" to "illegal") is not due to anti-union propaganda.
  - claudeganon 7y ago
    You're right. It's because Taft-Hartley was put in place to prevent unions from gaining the same workplace and political power as they have in Europe.
  - Someone1234 7y ago
    Unions being weak in the US is due to anti-union propaganda though, which as you likely know was the point I was making. Very few industries have even a single union let alone competition. Complaining about the lack of competition when union representation has been decimated, seems like pointless bikeshedding. I'll happily talk about the lack of union representation, but "unions bad because of [trivial complaint]" is a distraction.
    - chimeracoder 7y ago
      > Complaining about the lack of competition when union representation has been decimated, seems like pointless bikeshedding On the contrary, history shows us clearly that the fact that union membership has declined in the US and the fact that union membership in the US is typically on an exclusive representation basis are deeply linked. In fact, you can still draw your same argument ("the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them") from this fact - it just has little to do with propaganda, as you claimed. > but "unions bad because of [trivial complaint]" is a distraction. If you want to have that argument, please find someone who said that and argue with them, instead of responding to my post, which is saying something different altogether.
      - Someone1234 7y ago
        As I said above I have no interest in diving into these trivial and frankly baseless arguments. Talking about inter-union competition when there are no unions is a huge waste of time and energy. Let's actually have unions first before we worry too much about unions being too powerful. Using it as an argument against creating a single union seems like a distraction.
        chimeracoder 7y ago
        > Talking about inter-union competition when there are no unions is a huge waste of time and energy. The same factors which led to the rise of exclusive representation are the ones which led to the drop in union representation across the board. If you want to ignore that, fine, but don't be surprised or disappointed when you don't end up with the result you seem to want (more union representation).
        username90 7y ago
        Unions in Europe are usually optional and are thriving. Unions in USA are usually forced and are not thriving. Don't you think that USA should learn a bit from Europe about this since they are typically far ahead of USA on worker rights issues?
      - 7y ago
- pathseeker 7y ago
  >That's not the case because the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them. No, it's actually because the government gave them more power and allowed agreements to be structured where all of the electricians in one company must come from the same union. Unions in the US are able to prevent competition from other unions. You can not freely choose different unions if you don't like the one in your company. See every state that doesn't allow "right to work". Unions become mandatory.
luckylion 7y ago
That's not the case in Germany as well, there's practically only the DGB (Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund, German Trade Union Federation) that has member unions that have very little overlap. Yes, there are some small, competing unions (e.g. there is another union representing police officers and another federation for people working in government organisations) and some non-members (e.g. a union representing airplane pilots or medical personel), but there's not a lot of competition, the DGB represents about 85% of all union members and is very closely connected to the SPD, one of the major parties.
- username90 7y ago
  DGB is a choice though, you aren't forced to join it. Every worker at Kickstarter will be forced to join this union, so the situation is very different.
  - luckylion 7y ago
    I didn't mean to imply one way or the other, just wanted to point out that "competition between unions" isn't really a thing in Germany, so "that's why it works that well in Europe" is questionable. I don't know how it works in France or the UK, so Germany might be the total outlier, but it would be an outlier of 80m people.

Someone1234 7y ago

That's not the case because the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them. Anti-union propaganda is rampant. It could be the case in the US. Having a single union is a good place to start.

chimeracoder 7y ago
> That's not the case because the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them. Anti-union propaganda is rampant. Well, no, the fact that almost all unions in the US use exclusive representation contracts (compared to Europe, where such contracts are range from "unheard-of in most industries" to "illegal") is not due to anti-union propaganda.
- claudeganon 7y ago
  You're right. It's because Taft-Hartley was put in place to prevent unions from gaining the same workplace and political power as they have in Europe.
- Someone1234 7y ago
  Unions being weak in the US is due to anti-union propaganda though, which as you likely know was the point I was making. Very few industries have even a single union let alone competition. Complaining about the lack of competition when union representation has been decimated, seems like pointless bikeshedding. I'll happily talk about the lack of union representation, but "unions bad because of [trivial complaint]" is a distraction.
  - chimeracoder 7y ago
    > Complaining about the lack of competition when union representation has been decimated, seems like pointless bikeshedding On the contrary, history shows us clearly that the fact that union membership has declined in the US and the fact that union membership in the US is typically on an exclusive representation basis are deeply linked. In fact, you can still draw your same argument ("the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them") from this fact - it just has little to do with propaganda, as you claimed. > but "unions bad because of [trivial complaint]" is a distraction. If you want to have that argument, please find someone who said that and argue with them, instead of responding to my post, which is saying something different altogether.
    - Someone1234 7y ago
      As I said above I have no interest in diving into these trivial and frankly baseless arguments. Talking about inter-union competition when there are no unions is a huge waste of time and energy. Let's actually have unions first before we worry too much about unions being too powerful. Using it as an argument against creating a single union seems like a distraction.
      - chimeracoder 7y ago
        > Talking about inter-union competition when there are no unions is a huge waste of time and energy. The same factors which led to the rise of exclusive representation are the ones which led to the drop in union representation across the board. If you want to ignore that, fine, but don't be surprised or disappointed when you don't end up with the result you seem to want (more union representation).
      - username90 7y ago
        Unions in Europe are usually optional and are thriving. Unions in USA are usually forced and are not thriving. Don't you think that USA should learn a bit from Europe about this since they are typically far ahead of USA on worker rights issues?
    - 7y ago
pathseeker 7y ago
>That's not the case because the US Government and industry has spent the last 150 years crushing unions and weakening them. No, it's actually because the government gave them more power and allowed agreements to be structured where all of the electricians in one company must come from the same union. Unions in the US are able to prevent competition from other unions. You can not freely choose different unions if you don't like the one in your company. See every state that doesn't allow "right to work". Unions become mandatory.

luckylion 7y ago

That's not the case in Germany as well, there's practically only the DGB (Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund, German Trade Union Federation) that has member unions that have very little overlap. Yes, there are some small, competing unions (e.g. there is another union representing police officers and another federation for people working in government organisations) and some non-members (e.g. a union representing airplane pilots or medical personel), but there's not a lot of competition, the DGB represents about 85% of all union members and is very closely connected to the SPD, one of the major parties.

username90 7y ago
DGB is a choice though, you aren't forced to join it. Every worker at Kickstarter will be forced to join this union, so the situation is very different.
- luckylion 7y ago
  I didn't mean to imply one way or the other, just wanted to point out that "competition between unions" isn't really a thing in Germany, so "that's why it works that well in Europe" is questionable. I don't know how it works in France or the UK, so Germany might be the total outlier, but it would be an outlier of 80m people.