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I have very conflicted views on unions. I worked for ~2 years as a contractor for a government entity in Canada. ~3500 headcount of employees. What I observed

by nakor 4y ago

I have very conflicted views on unions. I worked for ~2 years as a contractor for a government entity in Canada. ~3500 headcount of employees. What I observed there was sickening. This was a place that had white-collar unions for all non-management employees. This union had completely hijacked the mission of this institution. It was no longer about serving the people that this entity was created to serve, but rather to protect the union and its contributors. The software we were in charge of writing had direct, material impact on the physical and mental well beings of people in the province. Life and death. And at times I saw things like a deployment of features being delayed by weeks/months because a union member who was responsible for _manually_ deploying the changes was on vacation. To automate that deployment meant automating a union employees job and was impossible. These features directly served the needs of people that were in critical need of them. On the other hand, I have family friends who work for UPS and other delivery services and see the brutal toll it takes on their body and mind. Pushed to absolute limits and exploited because they don't have a union. But to me, it seems unions can and often do exploit people. After witnessing all of this I've developed a very dim view of humanity. We all just want to exploit someone.

throwawaywu 4y ago
UPS is fully unionized and has been for a long time.
- nakor 4y ago
  I may be wrong about exactly what company he worked for. Also it could be they're not unionized in Canada. Anyway I don't think it changes much.
- koheripbal 4y ago
  This explains why they lose all my packages.
xyzzy_plugh 4y ago
This mirrors my experience with unions pretty closely. I would much prefer that the sort of workers rights unions provide were instead at a government policy level. That being said, there will always be some need for collective bargaining. I only wish it were possible to limit these extreme union grabs for power.
- koheripbal 4y ago
  Hence the creation of OSHA and why union nearly entirely disappeared in America
RHSeeger 4y ago
It's hard to even have a reasonable discussion about unions with most people, because (it seems like) the vast majority of people either fall into 1. Unions are great and everyone should be part of one. Anyone who points out the bad parts of unions is an evil conservative and hates the middle/lower class. 2. Unions are evil and cause nothing but problems. Anyone who supports unions is a fool who doesn't see the horrors they cause. Any discussion that includes the viewpoint that unions have both good points and bad points (as you allude to above) has a high likelihood of being attacked by _both_ sides. It also doesn't help that it appears to very hard to actually set things up so that you get the good sides of a union without also getting the bad sides.
- froh 4y ago
  some European countries, the Netherlands, Germany and France for sure, have not two but three pillars of employee company relationship: unions, works council and individual contracts. the works council (aka 'company codetermination') involves employee elected colleagues in company leadership decisions like during, hiring, reorgs, raise distribution, working hours, shift planning guidelines, ... while the unions focus on salary and compensation negotiations
- koheripbal 4y ago
  It's not random that people who have had to collaborate with union workers in their company all fall into that second bucket.
- zdragnar 4y ago
  So long as the SEIU is around, I'll probably be in the second bucket. I get the theory of why unions can be beneficial, but the reality of the way they are structured in the US is fundamentally flawed. Frankly, anyone who raids PCA funds the way they do is evil, plain and simple.
kennend3 4y ago
I live in Ontario as well. This is why we need more PPP (private-public-partnerships) here. Just look at the MTO. It use to be an absolute cesspool or inefficiency which would make the old USSR envious. Drivers license expired? Time to go stand in line where there are two tellers and 6 people "on break" in the back. The lineup is out the door, but who cares? Certainly not the union slugs who work there. They finally introduced kiosks, which charged a "convenience fee" (probably at the request of the unions). Fast forward, there is now a PPP in place for the MTO. Automation all over the place, you can renew your license online (FINALLY). if not for the ability to step away from their union staff, none of this would have taken place. The union fights changes which leads to efficiency as this often means job losses. Any "tech" the government builds looks like it was done by high school students and it is a shame they pay for this garbage. Again, imagine you went to your bank site, and it looked like it was built 10 years ago and never been updated?
kyrra 4y ago
In the United States, our ports have the same problem. They run almost entirely by unions and do not want any kind of automation whatsoever. Pors another major countries have automated a lot of the moving of cargo, but unions here have fought it and prevented it. https://www.cato.org/commentary/americas-ports-problem-decades-making https://www.cato.org/commentary/americas-ports-problem-decad...
bloodyplonker22 4y ago
> It was no longer about serving the people that this entity was created to serve, but rather to protect the union and its contributors. This is exactly why Milton Friedman was against unions. Unions would eventually evolve into this amalgamation that only protects the union and its contributors while disallowing other qualified workers from getting jobs at the respective companies.
- GekkePrutser 4y ago
  This is not how unions work in most of Europe. Except perhaps France where the unions have grown a bit much and strikes are too common. In the other countries I've seen they established a healthy and stable counterbalance. So I would argue it's not inevitable.
GekkePrutser 4y ago
This is absolutely not how unions work in (most of) Europe. They don't get involved in day to day business. They just negotiate working conditions, pay scales etc. Just saying it doesn't have to work that way.

by nakor 4y ago

throwawaywu 4y ago

UPS is fully unionized and has been for a long time.

nakor 4y ago
I may be wrong about exactly what company he worked for. Also it could be they're not unionized in Canada. Anyway I don't think it changes much.
koheripbal 4y ago
This explains why they lose all my packages.

xyzzy_plugh 4y ago

This mirrors my experience with unions pretty closely. I would much prefer that the sort of workers rights unions provide were instead at a government policy level. That being said, there will always be some need for collective bargaining. I only wish it were possible to limit these extreme union grabs for power.

koheripbal 4y ago
Hence the creation of OSHA and why union nearly entirely disappeared in America

RHSeeger 4y ago

It's hard to even have a reasonable discussion about unions with most people, because (it seems like) the vast majority of people either fall into 1. Unions are great and everyone should be part of one. Anyone who points out the bad parts of unions is an evil conservative and hates the middle/lower class. 2. Unions are evil and cause nothing but problems. Anyone who supports unions is a fool who doesn't see the horrors they cause. Any discussion that includes the viewpoint that unions have both good points and bad points (as you allude to above) has a high likelihood of being attacked by _both_ sides. It also doesn't help that it appears to very hard to actually set things up so that you get the good sides of a union without also getting the bad sides.

froh 4y ago
some European countries, the Netherlands, Germany and France for sure, have not two but three pillars of employee company relationship: unions, works council and individual contracts. the works council (aka 'company codetermination') involves employee elected colleagues in company leadership decisions like during, hiring, reorgs, raise distribution, working hours, shift planning guidelines, ... while the unions focus on salary and compensation negotiations
koheripbal 4y ago
It's not random that people who have had to collaborate with union workers in their company all fall into that second bucket.
zdragnar 4y ago
So long as the SEIU is around, I'll probably be in the second bucket. I get the theory of why unions can be beneficial, but the reality of the way they are structured in the US is fundamentally flawed. Frankly, anyone who raids PCA funds the way they do is evil, plain and simple.

kennend3 4y ago

I live in Ontario as well. This is why we need more PPP (private-public-partnerships) here. Just look at the MTO. It use to be an absolute cesspool or inefficiency which would make the old USSR envious. Drivers license expired? Time to go stand in line where there are two tellers and 6 people "on break" in the back. The lineup is out the door, but who cares? Certainly not the union slugs who work there. They finally introduced kiosks, which charged a "convenience fee" (probably at the request of the unions). Fast forward, there is now a PPP in place for the MTO. Automation all over the place, you can renew your license online (FINALLY). if not for the ability to step away from their union staff, none of this would have taken place. The union fights changes which leads to efficiency as this often means job losses. Any "tech" the government builds looks like it was done by high school students and it is a shame they pay for this garbage. Again, imagine you went to your bank site, and it looked like it was built 10 years ago and never been updated?

kyrra 4y ago

In the United States, our ports have the same problem. They run almost entirely by unions and do not want any kind of automation whatsoever. Pors another major countries have automated a lot of the moving of cargo, but unions here have fought it and prevented it. https://www.cato.org/commentary/americas-ports-problem-decades-making https://www.cato.org/commentary/americas-ports-problem-decad...

bloodyplonker22 4y ago

> It was no longer about serving the people that this entity was created to serve, but rather to protect the union and its contributors. This is exactly why Milton Friedman was against unions. Unions would eventually evolve into this amalgamation that only protects the union and its contributors while disallowing other qualified workers from getting jobs at the respective companies.

GekkePrutser 4y ago
This is not how unions work in most of Europe. Except perhaps France where the unions have grown a bit much and strikes are too common. In the other countries I've seen they established a healthy and stable counterbalance. So I would argue it's not inevitable.

GekkePrutser 4y ago

This is absolutely not how unions work in (most of) Europe. They don't get involved in day to day business. They just negotiate working conditions, pay scales etc. Just saying it doesn't have to work that way.