3 ms·

Nobody claimed a utopia. Extracting natural resources is always going to be a tough job that is ripe for exploitation. Did unions improve the lives of members?

• syshum 6y ago
  That depends, sure you can point to examples where the Union did improve peoples lives But then i can also point to examples where they did not, where they ended up driving business out, bankrupting people Where unions are more focused on their own political power than helping workers Or even if in general the union helped the "average worker" the collectivist nature of unions means not everyone will be better off. For example Seniority, and "personal connections" are often more of a driving factor in Unions than merit or work performance. In fact highly efficient hard workers are often driven out of unions or forced to "work slower", etc.
  • DFHippie 6y ago
    >That depends, sure you can point to examples where the Union did improve peoples lives But then i can also point to examples where they did not, where they ended up driving business out, bankrupting people The answer to this is not airy theorizing or anecdotes but statistical evidence. There are many people who do this. See for example figure 9 here: https://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/ https://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/