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Corporations and their managers care only about making money and maintaining good vibes to produce a positive business environment. Only unions engaging in stri

Corporations and their managers care only about making money and maintaining good vibes to produce a positive business environment. Only unions engaging in strikes and outside pressure can force them to change materially. All these internal committees and such are just PR. By the way, that part about unions and strikes also applies to the joined at the hip government as well.

nickff 6y ago
Unions have historically been some of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in the USA.
- ardy42 6y ago
  > Unions have historically been some of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in the USA. The USA has been pretty racist in discriminatory, and I think it's disingenuous to single out unions for that history. I mean, who instituted Jim Crow and profited from slavery? White voters, government officials, and private enterprise. Unions were definitely not leading that.
  - nickff 6y ago
    Private enterprise was usually castigated for not being racist enough. Economics was the 'dismal science' because it didn't support racism, segregation, and slavery.
    - ardy42 6y ago
      > Private enterprise was usually castigated for not being racist enough. Economics was the 'dismal science' because it didn't support racism, segregation, and slavery. I had slavery in mind with the private enterprise comment. But it's not like businesses are actually run by perfectly rational automatons according to textbook economics. They're run by owners and managers who can be just as racist as the surrounding community, and who can very well prioritize prejudice over a little more profit.
      - tehjoker 6y ago
        Don't forget that creating arbitrary hierarchies among workers is good for business by creating divisions among the working class, which keeps them from banding together effectively against the ownership class.
  - dnautics 6y ago
    That history is not entirely correct. Typically private enterprise has been against segregation: Think about it, it is pretty expensive to have to maintain two sets of facilities for society. The montgomery bus company was AGAINST segregation when the laws forcing bus segregation were passed. Barry Goldwater donated a ton of money in the early days first NAACP chapter in Arizona in part because segregating his department store would be expensive for operations. As for Unions, think about it, their major threat is cheap labor from abroad, so the way that they have historically been discriminatory has been in lobbying for anti-immigration and immigration quota (don't know if they still do that as much).
    - opo 6y ago
      >...Typically private enterprise has been against segregation Unclear why you were downvoted. Another example of this was Plessy v. Ferguson where the railroad worked with a civil rights group to bring the case: >...On June 7, 1892, Plessy bought a first-class ticket at the Press Street Depot and boarded a "Whites Only" car of the East Louisiana Railroad in New Orleans, Louisiana, bound for Covington, Louisiana.[11] The railroad company, which had opposed the law on the grounds that it would require the purchase of more railcars, had been previously informed of Plessy's racial lineage, and the intent to challenge the law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plessy_v._Ferguson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plessy_v._Ferguson
- tehjoker 6y ago
  That's a crazy idea. There are sometimes unions that have racist members, and sometimes unions that are no good, but anyone paying attention to history has seen that unions are what fight for progressive change - material change that improves the lives of workers, who have always been multi-racial. Often they tackle racist structural problems. For example, in the Sanitation Workers' strike. https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/memphis-sanitation-workers-strike https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/memphis-sani...
- roflc0ptic 6y ago
  This is so unhelpful and dumb. The US has historically been one of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in North America. Does that mean we shouldn’t engage the US? Does that mean the US can’t be less racist? Does that mean the US isn’t a tool we can try to use to make the world a better place? Unions provide countervailing power to corporate power. Racist people are racist. Sometimes these can overlap.
  - f154hfds 6y ago
    Unions historically in America have been massive front organizations for mobsters and mafia. Check out the Teamsters - there are many many other examples. Does that make them racist? Of course not. But they have absolutely been discriminatory. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Brotherhood_of_Teamsters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Brotherhood_of_T...
    - tehjoker 6y ago
      Sure some of them have, but their foundational democratic and working class structure makes it possible for them to have a progressive effect on society. By contrast, the corporations that they are in conflict with supported the Nazis and planned a coup against FDR because their foundational interests in a regimented, nationalist, power hungry, and elitist society were aligned. https://newspunch.com/american-companies-nazi-germany/ https://newspunch.com/american-companies-nazi-germany/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot EDIT: to respond to comments below: 1. Union busting since the New Deal era resulted in one of the most oppressed working classes in the world. Hence, low union enrollment. 2. FDR saved capitalism. I'm not his biggest fan. I'm a socialist. 3. Serious money was offered during the business plot. It didn't come to fruition, but the danger was real. Corporations are the real power in America.
      - busterarm 6y ago
        And yet the most unionized industry in the US (at like 75% of overall union membership) is white-collar federal employment. There's nothing working class about that.
- cool_dude85 6y ago
  Compare unions to corporations and I think unions come out ahead on that front. Any large American unions who directly worked with Nazi Germany like IBM did, for instance?
  - macinjosh 6y ago
    My violent collectivist group is less violent than your violent collectivist group!
- alistoriv 6y ago
  That is irrelevant. Pointing out that unions have effected negative changes or engaged in discrimination internally in the past is not an argument against the idea that they're necessary to force positive change.
- bwestergard 6y ago
  "Unions have historically been some of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in the USA." You're telling much less than half the story, and taking the latter half of the twentieth century in isolation without considering what came before. U.S. unions with communist and socialist leadership were universally anti-racist in word and very often in deed. Employers often interfered with employee choice of leadership to the benefit of conservative, racist, union leaders as opposed to leftists with anti-racist commitments. In one of the most flagrant violations of the First Amendment in U.S. history, the Taft-Hartley Act[1] criminalized membership in all manner of left-wing political organization. With the cooperation of union leaders ready to sell out their membership, many of the strongest voices for integration were purged. Employers and union officials alike had relationships ranging from extortion to open cooperation with organized crime. The relationship between the Hoffa Sr's Teamsters and the mafia was complex, and notorious in part because it was so exceptional. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taft%E2%80%93Hartley_Act#Anti-communism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taft%E2%80%93Hartley_Act#Anti-...
  - tehjoker 6y ago
    I'm just so happy that HN has lost its hard edged anarcho-captialist bent. T_T
dv_dt 6y ago
I think worker cooperatives could also be a pressure for material change industry wide, and specifically in the tech industry I suspect that's more attainable than for workers of many other industries.
- tehjoker 6y ago
  I agree. I think one day I will be interested in organizing a tech cooperative. I'm not quite ready to make the jump though.
  - dv_dt 6y ago
    I'm in a similar place. I think the key is just getting some initial cash flow started to sustain an organic growth path.

nickff 6y ago

Unions have historically been some of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in the USA.

ardy42 6y ago
> Unions have historically been some of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in the USA. The USA has been pretty racist in discriminatory, and I think it's disingenuous to single out unions for that history. I mean, who instituted Jim Crow and profited from slavery? White voters, government officials, and private enterprise. Unions were definitely not leading that.
- nickff 6y ago
  Private enterprise was usually castigated for not being racist enough. Economics was the 'dismal science' because it didn't support racism, segregation, and slavery.
  - ardy42 6y ago
    > Private enterprise was usually castigated for not being racist enough. Economics was the 'dismal science' because it didn't support racism, segregation, and slavery. I had slavery in mind with the private enterprise comment. But it's not like businesses are actually run by perfectly rational automatons according to textbook economics. They're run by owners and managers who can be just as racist as the surrounding community, and who can very well prioritize prejudice over a little more profit.
    - tehjoker 6y ago
      Don't forget that creating arbitrary hierarchies among workers is good for business by creating divisions among the working class, which keeps them from banding together effectively against the ownership class.
- dnautics 6y ago
  That history is not entirely correct. Typically private enterprise has been against segregation: Think about it, it is pretty expensive to have to maintain two sets of facilities for society. The montgomery bus company was AGAINST segregation when the laws forcing bus segregation were passed. Barry Goldwater donated a ton of money in the early days first NAACP chapter in Arizona in part because segregating his department store would be expensive for operations. As for Unions, think about it, their major threat is cheap labor from abroad, so the way that they have historically been discriminatory has been in lobbying for anti-immigration and immigration quota (don't know if they still do that as much).
  - opo 6y ago
    >...Typically private enterprise has been against segregation Unclear why you were downvoted. Another example of this was Plessy v. Ferguson where the railroad worked with a civil rights group to bring the case: >...On June 7, 1892, Plessy bought a first-class ticket at the Press Street Depot and boarded a "Whites Only" car of the East Louisiana Railroad in New Orleans, Louisiana, bound for Covington, Louisiana.[11] The railroad company, which had opposed the law on the grounds that it would require the purchase of more railcars, had been previously informed of Plessy's racial lineage, and the intent to challenge the law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plessy_v._Ferguson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plessy_v._Ferguson
tehjoker 6y ago
That's a crazy idea. There are sometimes unions that have racist members, and sometimes unions that are no good, but anyone paying attention to history has seen that unions are what fight for progressive change - material change that improves the lives of workers, who have always been multi-racial. Often they tackle racist structural problems. For example, in the Sanitation Workers' strike. https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/memphis-sanitation-workers-strike https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/memphis-sani...
roflc0ptic 6y ago
This is so unhelpful and dumb. The US has historically been one of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in North America. Does that mean we shouldn’t engage the US? Does that mean the US can’t be less racist? Does that mean the US isn’t a tool we can try to use to make the world a better place? Unions provide countervailing power to corporate power. Racist people are racist. Sometimes these can overlap.
- f154hfds 6y ago
  Unions historically in America have been massive front organizations for mobsters and mafia. Check out the Teamsters - there are many many other examples. Does that make them racist? Of course not. But they have absolutely been discriminatory. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Brotherhood_of_Teamsters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Brotherhood_of_T...
  - tehjoker 6y ago
    Sure some of them have, but their foundational democratic and working class structure makes it possible for them to have a progressive effect on society. By contrast, the corporations that they are in conflict with supported the Nazis and planned a coup against FDR because their foundational interests in a regimented, nationalist, power hungry, and elitist society were aligned. https://newspunch.com/american-companies-nazi-germany/ https://newspunch.com/american-companies-nazi-germany/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot EDIT: to respond to comments below: 1. Union busting since the New Deal era resulted in one of the most oppressed working classes in the world. Hence, low union enrollment. 2. FDR saved capitalism. I'm not his biggest fan. I'm a socialist. 3. Serious money was offered during the business plot. It didn't come to fruition, but the danger was real. Corporations are the real power in America.
    - busterarm 6y ago
      And yet the most unionized industry in the US (at like 75% of overall union membership) is white-collar federal employment. There's nothing working class about that.
cool_dude85 6y ago
Compare unions to corporations and I think unions come out ahead on that front. Any large American unions who directly worked with Nazi Germany like IBM did, for instance?
- macinjosh 6y ago
  My violent collectivist group is less violent than your violent collectivist group!
alistoriv 6y ago
That is irrelevant. Pointing out that unions have effected negative changes or engaged in discrimination internally in the past is not an argument against the idea that they're necessary to force positive change.
bwestergard 6y ago
"Unions have historically been some of the most racist and discriminatory organizations in the USA." You're telling much less than half the story, and taking the latter half of the twentieth century in isolation without considering what came before. U.S. unions with communist and socialist leadership were universally anti-racist in word and very often in deed. Employers often interfered with employee choice of leadership to the benefit of conservative, racist, union leaders as opposed to leftists with anti-racist commitments. In one of the most flagrant violations of the First Amendment in U.S. history, the Taft-Hartley Act[1] criminalized membership in all manner of left-wing political organization. With the cooperation of union leaders ready to sell out their membership, many of the strongest voices for integration were purged. Employers and union officials alike had relationships ranging from extortion to open cooperation with organized crime. The relationship between the Hoffa Sr's Teamsters and the mafia was complex, and notorious in part because it was so exceptional. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taft%E2%80%93Hartley_Act#Anti-communism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taft%E2%80%93Hartley_Act#Anti-...
- tehjoker 6y ago
  I'm just so happy that HN has lost its hard edged anarcho-captialist bent. T_T

dv_dt 6y ago

I think worker cooperatives could also be a pressure for material change industry wide, and specifically in the tech industry I suspect that's more attainable than for workers of many other industries.

tehjoker 6y ago
I agree. I think one day I will be interested in organizing a tech cooperative. I'm not quite ready to make the jump though.
- dv_dt 6y ago
  I'm in a similar place. I think the key is just getting some initial cash flow started to sustain an organic growth path.