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The problem with unions is they reward seniority over merit. The problem with at will employment is most industries remove the reward for seniority in favor of

The problem with unions is they reward seniority over merit. The problem with at will employment is most industries remove the reward for seniority in favor of merit. There are still industries that value experience over cost for performance but they tend to have their own walled gardens (looking at you American Medical Association). I once thought unions the bane of the free markets existence but I’m now starting to believe that unions are the best tool available to keep Capital in check. We forget how out of control capital distribution has gotten these days. It can help to use time instead of dollars to measure things. 1 million seconds is 11 days. 1 billion seconds is 32 years. Wealth inequality is a good thing. Extreme wealth inequality is destabilizing.

goatinaboat 6y ago
The problem with unions is they reward seniority over merit. Some unions do, some unions don't. It's not an inherent property of union-ness. Case in point: all Hollywood unions.
_qulr 6y ago
> The problem with unions is they reward seniority over merit. I've never seen a company, union or non-union, that doesn't have a relatively narrow salary range and progression for non-management positions. Of course the base salary tends to be much higher in tech companies, but how much non-seniority "merit pay" do non-manager software engineers actually get? The bigger the company, the more well-defined and bureaucratized the salary progression, even when there's no union. AFAICT it seems largely a myth that large amounts of non-seniority merit raises exist in software engineering. Some engineers can advance through the "rankings" more quickly than others, but overall it doesn't seem much different from union scales. The differences due to "merit" are overall small in the whole scheme. The two best ways to increase your salary in a tech company are still seniority and promotion to management, which is no different than union shops. Of course stock compensation can be a big factor in tech companies, but the stock price rises or falls due to market forces rather than individual employee merit.

goatinaboat 6y ago

The problem with unions is they reward seniority over merit. Some unions do, some unions don't. It's not an inherent property of union-ness. Case in point: all Hollywood unions.

_qulr 6y ago

> The problem with unions is they reward seniority over merit. I've never seen a company, union or non-union, that doesn't have a relatively narrow salary range and progression for non-management positions. Of course the base salary tends to be much higher in tech companies, but how much non-seniority "merit pay" do non-manager software engineers actually get? The bigger the company, the more well-defined and bureaucratized the salary progression, even when there's no union. AFAICT it seems largely a myth that large amounts of non-seniority merit raises exist in software engineering. Some engineers can advance through the "rankings" more quickly than others, but overall it doesn't seem much different from union scales. The differences due to "merit" are overall small in the whole scheme. The two best ways to increase your salary in a tech company are still seniority and promotion to management, which is no different than union shops. Of course stock compensation can be a big factor in tech companies, but the stock price rises or falls due to market forces rather than individual employee merit.