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Honest question (am from Europe). Why are not unions (labor) part of the right to free association in the US? Or is it that they must comprise the whole labor f

Honest question (am from Europe). Why are not unions (labor) part of the right to free association in the US? Or is it that they must comprise the whole labor force? EDIT: Wow: thanks a lot. Unbelievably complicated to me…

fundad 5y ago
Unions lost popular support among the American public when it became illegal for them to discriminate by race. That environment has been great for pro-business interests to push laws that weaken union power in many states.
- pfortuny 5y ago
  Oh, really? This is certainly terrible. Man, what a mess. Thanks.
  - fundad 5y ago
    Many institutions the US was known for has suffered the same fate in the last fifty-something years. "Make America Great Again" refers to how beloved our institutions were. They see Civil Rights as our nation's weakness, holding us back from greatness.
    - zdragnar 5y ago
      > "Make America Great Again" That is just patently wrong. It was a reaction to the previous administration's foreign policy strategy, which was to position America as less of a world leader and more of a partner. Conservatives frequently criticized one of President Obama's early trips as an "apology tour", and were incensed when he appeared to bow to the Saudi king. Also, they disliked the domestic policies which had a socialized feel. It literally had nothing to do with the civil rights movement.
      - nfd 5y ago
        > It was a reaction to the previous administration's foreign policy strategy, which was to position America as less of a world leader and more of a partner. Happen to know of any direct discussion of this being the intent behind that slogan from the Trump administration? Especially from Trump himself?
        zdragnar 5y ago
        Yeah, I called to confirm with him right around the time he signed the First Steps act. If you don't trust me, a quick google search yields tons of results: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-donald-trump-came-up-with-make-america-great-again/2017/01/17/fb6acf5e-dbf7-11e6-ad42-f3375f271c9c_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-donald-trump-cam... Quote: “I felt that jobs were hurting,” he said. “I looked at the many types of illness our country had, and whether it’s at the border, whether it’s security, whether it’s law and order or lack of law and order. Then, of course, you get to trade, and I said to myself, ‘What would be good?’ I was sitting at my desk, where I am right now, and I said, ‘Make America Great Again.’ ” Security and trade would be the foreign policy bits that he felt we were far too weak on.
    - esarbe 5y ago
      That's just ridiculous. "Make America Great Again" doesn't reference anything in particular. It is just a catch-all phrase that captures the emotions of nostalgia, a remembrance of a better place that never was. But - as you aptly demonstrate - it lends itself perfectly to project onto anything anyone could imagine and it is ambiguous enough to be applicable for pretty much everything. That's why it's a actually a pretty good slogan.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  You're downvoted, but this is well-studied. White majority shops are at highest risk of labor organizing and increase workplace diversity is well correlated with less organization risk. You can bet companies (especially Amazon) are aware of this fact.
  - fundad 5y ago
    If it's real-talk, I expect it will get downvoted. It's more palatable to back-rationalize things as being the way they are for some exceptional reason.
  - salawat 5y ago
    Source? I find the only thing keeping groups from organizing is some schlub running an out-of-band comm network, and a fear of being heard mentioning the U-word in the workplace, and a general ignorance of just how much anti-union FUD is spread, and how amazingly cheap it is to produce balanced against how effective it is at disincenting organization. Don't get me wrong, not everywhere needs a union. The places that do though, there really is no other option. Source: Lived it.
    - whimsicalism 5y ago
      https://observer.com/2020/04/amazon-whole-foods-anti-union-technology-heat-map/ https://observer.com/2020/04/amazon-whole-foods-anti-union-t...
      - salawat 5y ago
        Technically, that says nothing about whiteness having anything to do with unionizing risk vs. not. That one states low ethnic diversity of the employee base correlates with organizing risk. That just means they're targeting locations where there is an obvious thread tying people together, an easy marker of which that a surprising number of people voluntarily give you is self identification of ethnicity. Not that it's white, black, asian, etc... What the real comment there is, is that there is a tendency for places where you have a pronounced homogenous workforce that culturally identify or share some other commonality with one another are considered unionization risks. Solidarity amongst the ranks breeds contempt of leadership, especially at a distance. It's harder to divide, and they're more likely to forge an outgroup of corporate. This is why you fill in "I'd rather not answer" on those forms, or leave it blank. There is no data point you are asked to give that some data analyst doesn't intend to mine for value in one way or another, and if you think "no one would ever do that!", I would advise you to eschew offers of bridge sales at questionable locations. Also, it's damn easy to get even diverse groups to organize once everyone understands how the game is played. The thing is, most people don't talk about that sort of thing or haven't seen it with their own eyes/done it enough to understand just how much gets done in an "under the radar", "I never said that", fashion. If ya don't believe me, start asking for things in writing. Ask HR what they think Market Rate is. Whole different side of people comes out. Workplaces in particular rely on the fact that workers are by and large, just out to make a living, self-interested, and conflict averse. When unions seem to be starting to form, it's easier to paint them as a threatening outgroup, threatening other worker's jobs because "paying more would impact margins/break the bank", or that the union isn't ultimately out to help anyone but the union; or is out to hold the high performers back. This predates on that self-interest motive, and tries to project an in-group association between the employer and the non-union employee. Psychology works, sadly. Workplaces fear labor organization more than anything else. It's why the Taft-Hartley Act would never have gone anywhere without illegalizing secondary striking (whereby unions would shut down an entire industrial sector to show solidarity for one another). Capital allocators absolutely could not tolerate that kind of threat from the labor force. It's said that's balanced by illegalizing the practice of blacklisting by the Capital class; but you'll find that as capital gets more and more centralized in the hands of fewer and fewer investors, it's much easier to practice that type of collusion without paper trail, or make it so obfuscated as to not be worth looking for. See the Silicon Valley no-poaching agreement.
SpicyLemonZest 5y ago
It’s conventional for American unions to have what we call “exclusive representation”, where the labor force within a determined “bargaining unit” picks them by majority vote and they then represent everyone in that unit. Non-exclusive unions exist and are protected (you may remember the news that a couple hundred Google workers formed one), but they’re generally not very powerful.
- pfortuny 5y ago
  AAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!! This begins to make much more sense.
  - pagibson 5y ago
    I worked as a labor organizer in the US and this response is closest to the correct understanding of the law. Workers have a right to engage in "concerted activity" for the purposes of improving working conditions. However, when workers organize a union it needs to be certified as having a right to negotiate terms and conditions of employment on behalf of the workers, which is almost always done through a union election. In the U.S. this is an exclusive right—a "unit" of workers can only have one certified bargaining agent, and that union must represent all workers in the bargaining unit. It's also illegal for the employer to negotiate with any party other than the recognized union. To my understanding, this is different from Europe and can seem strange to Europeans. Understanding how this framework came about historically can be useful. Before the National Labor Relations Act, workers would strike in order to gain recognition and the right for the union to negotiate on their behalf. The NLRA election framework was an attempt to bring about "labor peace" by introducing orderly elections instead. This was generally supported by a certain segment of capital who could afford it and saw the cost-benefit as worth it, especially finance capital who were much more favorable to New Deal politics, and opposed by others. On the workers' side, this has undoubtedly made it easier to win recognition from the employer, but some see it as having sapped workers' militancy over the long run by trading away pitched battles that revealed sharp class antagonisms for a more orderly bureaucratic process.
lordalch 5y ago
The employees (or any group of them, even less than half) are free to join a union and attempt to negotiate with Amazon. However, Amazon would just ignore them. Union votes like the one described here are about triggering protections of US law that will require Amazon to negotiate with the union.
magila 5y ago
Employees are free to form unions under the freedom of association, but employers are likewise free to fire those employees. These votes are all about forming a union under the rules established by the National Labor Relations Act ("NLRA") which prohibits terminating employees for unionizing.
- woodruffw 5y ago
  > Employees are free to form unions under the freedom of association, but employers are likewise free to fire those employees. It's illegal in the US to fire an employee chiefly for attempting to unionize their workplace. That can be difficult to prove, but it's one of the explicit protections provided by the NLRA and, when proven, is usually sufficient grounds for unconditional reinstatement[1]. So, to be clear: labor rights in the US are more than just "free association" rights. You have an exceptional right, under federal labor law, to expend time and space within your workplace with the goal of unionizing. It is illegal for your employer to retaliate against your organization under the guise of either "free association" on their behalf or at-will employment. [1]: https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/olms/regs/compliance/eo_posters/employeerightsposter11x17_2019final.pdf https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/olms/regs/compliance/...
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    If you have a pseudo-not law enshrined union and you try to go on strike it is legal for your employer to fire you. That said, this is what unions originally started out as and they were still successful. If anything, the post-legal enshrinement of unions has coincided with their weakening. I am curious if this period of tight labor markets will bring a new chapter in union history.
    - woodruffw 5y ago
      Yes, because that wouldn't be a union under federal law. The NLR{A,B} is very precise about what it considers to be a legitimate form of organized labor, the fact of which does not detract from it being illegal for an employer to fire you for attempting to organize in a form recognized under the NLRA.
deleted 5y ago
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trynewideas 5y ago
I'll just copy this section of the right-to-work article on Wikipedia,[1] because I've sat here trying to explain it to myself for a while and realized there isn't a better encapsulation of it: - Besides the U.S. Supreme Court, other proponents of right-to-work laws also point to the Constitution and the right to freedom of association. They argue that workers should both be free to join unions or to refrain, and thus, sometimes refer to states without right-to-work laws as forced unionism states. These proponents argue that by being forced into a collective bargain, what the majoritarian unions call a fair share of collective bargaining costs, is actually financial coercion and a violation of freedom of choice. An opponent to the union bargain is forced to financially support an organization for which they did not vote in order to receive monopoly representation for which they have no choice. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law
- revolvingocelot 5y ago
  Whereas Canada's decision on this topic is almost the exact opposite, using almost the same logic. "Fascinating". >In Canadian labour law, the Rand formula (also referred to as automatic check-off and compulsory checkoff)[1] is a workplace compromise arising from jurisprudence struck between organized labour (trade unions) and employers that guarantees employers industrial stability by requiring all workers affected by a collective agreement to pay dues to the union by mandatory deduction in exchange for the union agreement to "work now, grieve later." Historically, in some workplaces, some workers refused to pay dues to the union even after benefiting from wage and benefit improvements negotiated by the union representatives, resulting in friction and violence as they were seen as 'free-loaders;' at the same time, absence of a peaceful grievance settlement mechanism created industrial instability as union members often walked off the job. The compromise was designed to ensure that no employee will opt out of the union simply to avoid dues yet reap the benefits of collective bargaining, such as higher wages or health insurance. from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rand_formula https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rand_formula
  - deleted 5y ago
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Supermancho 5y ago
It's not enough to say they are allowed, but determining what constitutes sabotage or impeding this right when voting to unionize with a company, is the issue the USLB addressed. How do you ensure that your unionizing vote (which includes details of how the union will operate, since they each have their own charter), is fair? You have to get the parent company involved, otherwise you might be disenfranchising eligible voters/members and/or involving outside parties. This is where it gets ugly because the company (usually) has a vested interest in observing that the vote fails.
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bena 5y ago
They are, but corporations also have that right by extension of being made up of people. So the company, being a private entity, can say that you can't talk about the union while at work. It can show you "training videos" and other anti-union materials without repercussion. And it's mostly the union that wants it to be all or nothing, because that's the only way it really works. If 5 guys are in the union, but the other 95 are not, then the company doesn't really have to negotiate with the union. Collective bargaining only has power when it represents the entire collective. Or at least most. But if it is in such a position that it can start negotiating, I'm sure one of the things it will negotiate is that anyone working at the company must be a union member. Which is there, yes, to protect the union, but also the workers in the union. Because if the company can hire non-union members, it can slowly replace the entire workforce with non-union labor and eventually soft-terminate the union. The entire situation is complicated and there are lots of places where people can be taken advantage of from every angle.
mdavis6890 5y ago
(American here) This is not about a right to unionize - of course workers have a right to unionize. This is about laws which force employees to join a union if they want to work in a particular business or industry. There are many laws in many parts of our country which restrict my ability to work in a given job or industry unless I join a union. As an employee, I prefer to have the right to choose whether to join a union or not, but many folks don't want me to have that choice. As an example, if this warehouse votes to unionize, will I still be able to work there without joining the union if I don't want to? No, I will be forced to join or leave.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  > This is about laws which force employees to join a union There are no laws forcing employees to join a union. Some businesses might enter into contracts with their employees. Right-to-work states attempt to put restrictions on that freedom of contract by making certain contracts illegal for businesses to accept. There is no right to employment, businesses can fire you for reason outside of any explicitly encoded wrongful termination reason.
  - hirundo 5y ago
    IANAL, but it seems that until Janus V. AFSCME three years ago, it was legal to "require bargaining unit employees to pay union dues or an agency fee". So while those employees could decline to join the union they still had to pay for it. They were not forced to join but that just meant that they didn't get a vote yet were still bound by the result.
    - whimsicalism 5y ago
      Yes, it is legal for employers to enter into a voluntary contract requiring their employees to join a union or pay agency fees. Right-to-work proposes to ban private businesses from proposing or entering into such a contract. But there is no law requiring employees to join a union.
    - pandemicsoul 5y ago
chrisseaton 5y ago
> Why are not unions (labor) part of the right to free association in the US? They are - you can already form a union whenever you want with whoever you want (some exceptions like armed forces.) This vote is about forcing the employer to talk to your union.
ars 5y ago
It's because a European union is NOT the same as a US one. In a European union there are many unions and the employee to is free to chose whichever he likes. In the US version there is a single union for a particular employer, and the employee is forced to join that particular one. (Barring certain laws that complicate this picture a bit.) This is also why unions work in Europe: There is competition among them, and the employee chooses. In contrast in the US because there is a single one for an employer the unions are frequently corrupt and don't actually do anything helpful for the employee.
- kwhitefoot 5y ago
  The employee also does not have to be a union member and doesn't pay union dues unless they are a member. In my experience in the UK and Norway I was treated just the same by both my employers and the unions even though I have never been a union member.
VictorPath 5y ago
The historical answer to that is it was restricted in Europe originally, and by the 1948 eastern Europe was under control of communist parties and western Europe was on the verge of communists being elected to power in Italy and France with militant labor unions existing (with the Labour government in the UK nationalizing much of the country). Compromise on wages, organization etc. was the watchword. The US history was separated and a little different. The New Deal compromise was from 1933 to the 1970s, and has been somewhat rolled back since then. The average inflation-adjusted hourly wage has fallen in the US since the early 70s, so the average US worker is worse off in that respect than they were a half century ago.
skeeter2020 5y ago
>> part of the right to free association in the US? Not American but interestingly there is no freedom of association defined in the First Amendment but rather recognized by the courts as a fundamental right. Part of the challenge when it comes to unions is that it goes both ways, including the freedom to join AND the freedom to leave. This makes something like labour organization tougher to define without coming down to heavy on one side or the other. There are a bunch of aspects and this is only one; it's incredibly complex in any jurisdiction, but especially in one that prioritizes the individual.
- beerandt 5y ago
  Not quite. It's an implicit right (whether fundamental or not), and the courts recognized freedom of association as being implicitly necessary to fully exercise the rights explicitly recognized in the first amendment. It's not freedom to join vs freedom to leave, but whether a contractual agreement can limit this right; can a contractual agreement exclude a party from associating with other parties. Exclusive labor contracts are one example (presuming the company's agreement to exclusivity was truly voluntarily, which is debatable), but what about other contracts? Given that every purchase is a contractual agreement, could Sony put a clause in the sales agreement that says the buyer can never buy another brand of TV? What if it was only while you owned and used the Sony TV? What if your Sony TV discovers another brand TV on your home network and bricks itself until you get rid of other TV? The right to a secret vote is equally implicit in the constitution, but we wouldn't hold a contract that forfeits that right to be valid, just as a contract requiring someone to vote a certain way would be illegal.

fundad 5y ago

Unions lost popular support among the American public when it became illegal for them to discriminate by race. That environment has been great for pro-business interests to push laws that weaken union power in many states.

pfortuny 5y ago
Oh, really? This is certainly terrible. Man, what a mess. Thanks.
- fundad 5y ago
  Many institutions the US was known for has suffered the same fate in the last fifty-something years. "Make America Great Again" refers to how beloved our institutions were. They see Civil Rights as our nation's weakness, holding us back from greatness.
  - zdragnar 5y ago
    > "Make America Great Again" That is just patently wrong. It was a reaction to the previous administration's foreign policy strategy, which was to position America as less of a world leader and more of a partner. Conservatives frequently criticized one of President Obama's early trips as an "apology tour", and were incensed when he appeared to bow to the Saudi king. Also, they disliked the domestic policies which had a socialized feel. It literally had nothing to do with the civil rights movement.
    - nfd 5y ago
      > It was a reaction to the previous administration's foreign policy strategy, which was to position America as less of a world leader and more of a partner. Happen to know of any direct discussion of this being the intent behind that slogan from the Trump administration? Especially from Trump himself?
      - zdragnar 5y ago
        Yeah, I called to confirm with him right around the time he signed the First Steps act. If you don't trust me, a quick google search yields tons of results: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-donald-trump-came-up-with-make-america-great-again/2017/01/17/fb6acf5e-dbf7-11e6-ad42-f3375f271c9c_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-donald-trump-cam... Quote: “I felt that jobs were hurting,” he said. “I looked at the many types of illness our country had, and whether it’s at the border, whether it’s security, whether it’s law and order or lack of law and order. Then, of course, you get to trade, and I said to myself, ‘What would be good?’ I was sitting at my desk, where I am right now, and I said, ‘Make America Great Again.’ ” Security and trade would be the foreign policy bits that he felt we were far too weak on.
  - esarbe 5y ago
    That's just ridiculous. "Make America Great Again" doesn't reference anything in particular. It is just a catch-all phrase that captures the emotions of nostalgia, a remembrance of a better place that never was. But - as you aptly demonstrate - it lends itself perfectly to project onto anything anyone could imagine and it is ambiguous enough to be applicable for pretty much everything. That's why it's a actually a pretty good slogan.
whimsicalism 5y ago
You're downvoted, but this is well-studied. White majority shops are at highest risk of labor organizing and increase workplace diversity is well correlated with less organization risk. You can bet companies (especially Amazon) are aware of this fact.
- fundad 5y ago
  If it's real-talk, I expect it will get downvoted. It's more palatable to back-rationalize things as being the way they are for some exceptional reason.
- salawat 5y ago
  Source? I find the only thing keeping groups from organizing is some schlub running an out-of-band comm network, and a fear of being heard mentioning the U-word in the workplace, and a general ignorance of just how much anti-union FUD is spread, and how amazingly cheap it is to produce balanced against how effective it is at disincenting organization. Don't get me wrong, not everywhere needs a union. The places that do though, there really is no other option. Source: Lived it.
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    https://observer.com/2020/04/amazon-whole-foods-anti-union-technology-heat-map/ https://observer.com/2020/04/amazon-whole-foods-anti-union-t...
    - salawat 5y ago
      Technically, that says nothing about whiteness having anything to do with unionizing risk vs. not. That one states low ethnic diversity of the employee base correlates with organizing risk. That just means they're targeting locations where there is an obvious thread tying people together, an easy marker of which that a surprising number of people voluntarily give you is self identification of ethnicity. Not that it's white, black, asian, etc... What the real comment there is, is that there is a tendency for places where you have a pronounced homogenous workforce that culturally identify or share some other commonality with one another are considered unionization risks. Solidarity amongst the ranks breeds contempt of leadership, especially at a distance. It's harder to divide, and they're more likely to forge an outgroup of corporate. This is why you fill in "I'd rather not answer" on those forms, or leave it blank. There is no data point you are asked to give that some data analyst doesn't intend to mine for value in one way or another, and if you think "no one would ever do that!", I would advise you to eschew offers of bridge sales at questionable locations. Also, it's damn easy to get even diverse groups to organize once everyone understands how the game is played. The thing is, most people don't talk about that sort of thing or haven't seen it with their own eyes/done it enough to understand just how much gets done in an "under the radar", "I never said that", fashion. If ya don't believe me, start asking for things in writing. Ask HR what they think Market Rate is. Whole different side of people comes out. Workplaces in particular rely on the fact that workers are by and large, just out to make a living, self-interested, and conflict averse. When unions seem to be starting to form, it's easier to paint them as a threatening outgroup, threatening other worker's jobs because "paying more would impact margins/break the bank", or that the union isn't ultimately out to help anyone but the union; or is out to hold the high performers back. This predates on that self-interest motive, and tries to project an in-group association between the employer and the non-union employee. Psychology works, sadly. Workplaces fear labor organization more than anything else. It's why the Taft-Hartley Act would never have gone anywhere without illegalizing secondary striking (whereby unions would shut down an entire industrial sector to show solidarity for one another). Capital allocators absolutely could not tolerate that kind of threat from the labor force. It's said that's balanced by illegalizing the practice of blacklisting by the Capital class; but you'll find that as capital gets more and more centralized in the hands of fewer and fewer investors, it's much easier to practice that type of collusion without paper trail, or make it so obfuscated as to not be worth looking for. See the Silicon Valley no-poaching agreement.

SpicyLemonZest 5y ago

It’s conventional for American unions to have what we call “exclusive representation”, where the labor force within a determined “bargaining unit” picks them by majority vote and they then represent everyone in that unit. Non-exclusive unions exist and are protected (you may remember the news that a couple hundred Google workers formed one), but they’re generally not very powerful.

pfortuny 5y ago
AAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!! This begins to make much more sense.
- pagibson 5y ago
  I worked as a labor organizer in the US and this response is closest to the correct understanding of the law. Workers have a right to engage in "concerted activity" for the purposes of improving working conditions. However, when workers organize a union it needs to be certified as having a right to negotiate terms and conditions of employment on behalf of the workers, which is almost always done through a union election. In the U.S. this is an exclusive right—a "unit" of workers can only have one certified bargaining agent, and that union must represent all workers in the bargaining unit. It's also illegal for the employer to negotiate with any party other than the recognized union. To my understanding, this is different from Europe and can seem strange to Europeans. Understanding how this framework came about historically can be useful. Before the National Labor Relations Act, workers would strike in order to gain recognition and the right for the union to negotiate on their behalf. The NLRA election framework was an attempt to bring about "labor peace" by introducing orderly elections instead. This was generally supported by a certain segment of capital who could afford it and saw the cost-benefit as worth it, especially finance capital who were much more favorable to New Deal politics, and opposed by others. On the workers' side, this has undoubtedly made it easier to win recognition from the employer, but some see it as having sapped workers' militancy over the long run by trading away pitched battles that revealed sharp class antagonisms for a more orderly bureaucratic process.

lordalch 5y ago

The employees (or any group of them, even less than half) are free to join a union and attempt to negotiate with Amazon. However, Amazon would just ignore them. Union votes like the one described here are about triggering protections of US law that will require Amazon to negotiate with the union.

magila 5y ago

Employees are free to form unions under the freedom of association, but employers are likewise free to fire those employees. These votes are all about forming a union under the rules established by the National Labor Relations Act ("NLRA") which prohibits terminating employees for unionizing.

woodruffw 5y ago
> Employees are free to form unions under the freedom of association, but employers are likewise free to fire those employees. It's illegal in the US to fire an employee chiefly for attempting to unionize their workplace. That can be difficult to prove, but it's one of the explicit protections provided by the NLRA and, when proven, is usually sufficient grounds for unconditional reinstatement[1]. So, to be clear: labor rights in the US are more than just "free association" rights. You have an exceptional right, under federal labor law, to expend time and space within your workplace with the goal of unionizing. It is illegal for your employer to retaliate against your organization under the guise of either "free association" on their behalf or at-will employment. [1]: https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/olms/regs/compliance/eo_posters/employeerightsposter11x17_2019final.pdf https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/olms/regs/compliance/...
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  If you have a pseudo-not law enshrined union and you try to go on strike it is legal for your employer to fire you. That said, this is what unions originally started out as and they were still successful. If anything, the post-legal enshrinement of unions has coincided with their weakening. I am curious if this period of tight labor markets will bring a new chapter in union history.
  - woodruffw 5y ago
    Yes, because that wouldn't be a union under federal law. The NLR{A,B} is very precise about what it considers to be a legitimate form of organized labor, the fact of which does not detract from it being illegal for an employer to fire you for attempting to organize in a form recognized under the NLRA.

deleted 5y ago

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trynewideas 5y ago

I'll just copy this section of the right-to-work article on Wikipedia,[1] because I've sat here trying to explain it to myself for a while and realized there isn't a better encapsulation of it: - Besides the U.S. Supreme Court, other proponents of right-to-work laws also point to the Constitution and the right to freedom of association. They argue that workers should both be free to join unions or to refrain, and thus, sometimes refer to states without right-to-work laws as forced unionism states. These proponents argue that by being forced into a collective bargain, what the majoritarian unions call a fair share of collective bargaining costs, is actually financial coercion and a violation of freedom of choice. An opponent to the union bargain is forced to financially support an organization for which they did not vote in order to receive monopoly representation for which they have no choice. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law

revolvingocelot 5y ago
Whereas Canada's decision on this topic is almost the exact opposite, using almost the same logic. "Fascinating". >In Canadian labour law, the Rand formula (also referred to as automatic check-off and compulsory checkoff)[1] is a workplace compromise arising from jurisprudence struck between organized labour (trade unions) and employers that guarantees employers industrial stability by requiring all workers affected by a collective agreement to pay dues to the union by mandatory deduction in exchange for the union agreement to "work now, grieve later." Historically, in some workplaces, some workers refused to pay dues to the union even after benefiting from wage and benefit improvements negotiated by the union representatives, resulting in friction and violence as they were seen as 'free-loaders;' at the same time, absence of a peaceful grievance settlement mechanism created industrial instability as union members often walked off the job. The compromise was designed to ensure that no employee will opt out of the union simply to avoid dues yet reap the benefits of collective bargaining, such as higher wages or health insurance. from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rand_formula https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rand_formula
- deleted 5y ago
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Supermancho 5y ago

It's not enough to say they are allowed, but determining what constitutes sabotage or impeding this right when voting to unionize with a company, is the issue the USLB addressed. How do you ensure that your unionizing vote (which includes details of how the union will operate, since they each have their own charter), is fair? You have to get the parent company involved, otherwise you might be disenfranchising eligible voters/members and/or involving outside parties. This is where it gets ugly because the company (usually) has a vested interest in observing that the vote fails.

deleted 5y ago

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bena 5y ago

They are, but corporations also have that right by extension of being made up of people. So the company, being a private entity, can say that you can't talk about the union while at work. It can show you "training videos" and other anti-union materials without repercussion. And it's mostly the union that wants it to be all or nothing, because that's the only way it really works. If 5 guys are in the union, but the other 95 are not, then the company doesn't really have to negotiate with the union. Collective bargaining only has power when it represents the entire collective. Or at least most. But if it is in such a position that it can start negotiating, I'm sure one of the things it will negotiate is that anyone working at the company must be a union member. Which is there, yes, to protect the union, but also the workers in the union. Because if the company can hire non-union members, it can slowly replace the entire workforce with non-union labor and eventually soft-terminate the union. The entire situation is complicated and there are lots of places where people can be taken advantage of from every angle.

mdavis6890 5y ago

(American here) This is not about a right to unionize - of course workers have a right to unionize. This is about laws which force employees to join a union if they want to work in a particular business or industry. There are many laws in many parts of our country which restrict my ability to work in a given job or industry unless I join a union. As an employee, I prefer to have the right to choose whether to join a union or not, but many folks don't want me to have that choice. As an example, if this warehouse votes to unionize, will I still be able to work there without joining the union if I don't want to? No, I will be forced to join or leave.

whimsicalism 5y ago
> This is about laws which force employees to join a union There are no laws forcing employees to join a union. Some businesses might enter into contracts with their employees. Right-to-work states attempt to put restrictions on that freedom of contract by making certain contracts illegal for businesses to accept. There is no right to employment, businesses can fire you for reason outside of any explicitly encoded wrongful termination reason.
- hirundo 5y ago
  IANAL, but it seems that until Janus V. AFSCME three years ago, it was legal to "require bargaining unit employees to pay union dues or an agency fee". So while those employees could decline to join the union they still had to pay for it. They were not forced to join but that just meant that they didn't get a vote yet were still bound by the result.
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    Yes, it is legal for employers to enter into a voluntary contract requiring their employees to join a union or pay agency fees. Right-to-work proposes to ban private businesses from proposing or entering into such a contract. But there is no law requiring employees to join a union.
  - pandemicsoul 5y ago

chrisseaton 5y ago

> Why are not unions (labor) part of the right to free association in the US? They are - you can already form a union whenever you want with whoever you want (some exceptions like armed forces.) This vote is about forcing the employer to talk to your union.

ars 5y ago

It's because a European union is NOT the same as a US one. In a European union there are many unions and the employee to is free to chose whichever he likes. In the US version there is a single union for a particular employer, and the employee is forced to join that particular one. (Barring certain laws that complicate this picture a bit.) This is also why unions work in Europe: There is competition among them, and the employee chooses. In contrast in the US because there is a single one for an employer the unions are frequently corrupt and don't actually do anything helpful for the employee.

kwhitefoot 5y ago
The employee also does not have to be a union member and doesn't pay union dues unless they are a member. In my experience in the UK and Norway I was treated just the same by both my employers and the unions even though I have never been a union member.

VictorPath 5y ago

The historical answer to that is it was restricted in Europe originally, and by the 1948 eastern Europe was under control of communist parties and western Europe was on the verge of communists being elected to power in Italy and France with militant labor unions existing (with the Labour government in the UK nationalizing much of the country). Compromise on wages, organization etc. was the watchword. The US history was separated and a little different. The New Deal compromise was from 1933 to the 1970s, and has been somewhat rolled back since then. The average inflation-adjusted hourly wage has fallen in the US since the early 70s, so the average US worker is worse off in that respect than they were a half century ago.

skeeter2020 5y ago

>> part of the right to free association in the US? Not American but interestingly there is no freedom of association defined in the First Amendment but rather recognized by the courts as a fundamental right. Part of the challenge when it comes to unions is that it goes both ways, including the freedom to join AND the freedom to leave. This makes something like labour organization tougher to define without coming down to heavy on one side or the other. There are a bunch of aspects and this is only one; it's incredibly complex in any jurisdiction, but especially in one that prioritizes the individual.

beerandt 5y ago
Not quite. It's an implicit right (whether fundamental or not), and the courts recognized freedom of association as being implicitly necessary to fully exercise the rights explicitly recognized in the first amendment. It's not freedom to join vs freedom to leave, but whether a contractual agreement can limit this right; can a contractual agreement exclude a party from associating with other parties. Exclusive labor contracts are one example (presuming the company's agreement to exclusivity was truly voluntarily, which is debatable), but what about other contracts? Given that every purchase is a contractual agreement, could Sony put a clause in the sales agreement that says the buyer can never buy another brand of TV? What if it was only while you owned and used the Sony TV? What if your Sony TV discovers another brand TV on your home network and bricks itself until you get rid of other TV? The right to a secret vote is equally implicit in the constitution, but we wouldn't hold a contract that forfeits that right to be valid, just as a contract requiring someone to vote a certain way would be illegal.