4 ms·

This seems like a place for a union to do something actually economically useful. Take the burden of dealing with malingers and fakers while providing some ros

by treis 4y ago

This seems like a place for a union to do something actually economically useful. Take the burden of dealing with malingers and fakers while providing some rostering flexibility for sick workers.

AlexandrB 4y ago
Unions already do something economically useful - increase wages. How would you have a consumer economy if no one had any disposable income?
- treis 4y ago
  That's shifting where the pie goes. It's not making more pie.
  - nasmorn 4y ago
    It absolutely is. Workers getting paid more actually spend that money. If you pay more dividends to the Saudi wealth fund or even a local billionaire the economy doesn’t grow as much of that.
    - yamtaddle 4y ago
      Yeah, every study I've seen about economic stimulus indicates it's really, really hard to do better than "give ordinary people more money". That's what you do if you're serious about giving the economy a kick in the ass (and politics and/or bribery don't get in the way). Which makes sense.
  - markus_zhang 4y ago
    Shifting pie can be very useful. Consider the situation: One super rich gets 100 million and 100 ordinary people get 100k. The super rich has an upper limit for expenditure because he is still a human being. However if all 100 ordinary people get extra 10k which is paltry, they will probably spend it all to boost economy. $$ is useless if not flowed through economy.
    - treis 4y ago
      No, we'll just get one fewer super yacht and 100 more nice cars (or whatever). It's not an increase in productivity. Regardless, that's not really the point. The point is that if the unions want sick days it's perfectly within their capability to provide it since their salaries are quite high.
pdonis 4y ago
If you mean unions should become actual corporations that sell the service of organized labor to corporations that want it, I completely agree. If workers want to improve their bargaining position, they need to manage the business risks involved with things like workers getting sick themselves instead of relying on employers to do it. Then those risks can be managed in a way that is fair to workers, because they are being managed by the workers, collectively, as a corporation.
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
  I don't quite get how this is expected to work. Does this somehow avoid a management level of this proposed corporation who are going to be trying to maximize profits at the expense of the employees who are ostensibly in a worse bargaining position? At that point, the decision for the worker is only whether they're working directly for the end-exploiters or just the middle-exploiter.
  - pdonis 4y ago
    > Does this somehow avoid a management level of this proposed corporation who are going to be trying to maximize profits at the expense of the employees who are ostensibly in a worse bargaining position? The corporation that takes the union's role would be owned by the workers; that's the whole point. It would be more like a "worker's cooperative" from that point of view, the way unions as they currently exist are supposed to be, but it would be a corporation from the point of view of other corporations who wanted to hire organized labor, so it would be in a better bargaining position than unionized employees are today. The workers would come to a consensus as a cooperative on things like how the corporation would manage the business risk of unscheduled absences, and then the corporation owned by the workers would sell the service of organized labor to other corporations that wanted it, probably with various different service levels depending on things like how critical unscheduled absences would be, and with higher service levels costing more.
    - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
      Yeah, I don't know why I didn't just think employee-owned. I live half a mile away from a WinCo[0], which has the words "Employee-Owned" in big ol' block letters on it. Thanks for the explanation! (Though to my knowledge WinCo isn't the friendliest to their employees on the floor when it comes to stock ownership, I can imagine something more fair.) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinCo_Foods https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinCo_Foods

by treis 4y ago

This seems like a place for a union to do something actually economically useful. Take the burden of dealing with malingers and fakers while providing some rostering flexibility for sick workers.

AlexandrB 4y ago

Unions already do something economically useful - increase wages. How would you have a consumer economy if no one had any disposable income?

treis 4y ago
That's shifting where the pie goes. It's not making more pie.
- nasmorn 4y ago
  It absolutely is. Workers getting paid more actually spend that money. If you pay more dividends to the Saudi wealth fund or even a local billionaire the economy doesn’t grow as much of that.
  - yamtaddle 4y ago
    Yeah, every study I've seen about economic stimulus indicates it's really, really hard to do better than "give ordinary people more money". That's what you do if you're serious about giving the economy a kick in the ass (and politics and/or bribery don't get in the way). Which makes sense.
- markus_zhang 4y ago
  Shifting pie can be very useful. Consider the situation: One super rich gets 100 million and 100 ordinary people get 100k. The super rich has an upper limit for expenditure because he is still a human being. However if all 100 ordinary people get extra 10k which is paltry, they will probably spend it all to boost economy. $$ is useless if not flowed through economy.
  - treis 4y ago
    No, we'll just get one fewer super yacht and 100 more nice cars (or whatever). It's not an increase in productivity. Regardless, that's not really the point. The point is that if the unions want sick days it's perfectly within their capability to provide it since their salaries are quite high.

pdonis 4y ago

If you mean unions should become actual corporations that sell the service of organized labor to corporations that want it, I completely agree. If workers want to improve their bargaining position, they need to manage the business risks involved with things like workers getting sick themselves instead of relying on employers to do it. Then those risks can be managed in a way that is fair to workers, because they are being managed by the workers, collectively, as a corporation.

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
I don't quite get how this is expected to work. Does this somehow avoid a management level of this proposed corporation who are going to be trying to maximize profits at the expense of the employees who are ostensibly in a worse bargaining position? At that point, the decision for the worker is only whether they're working directly for the end-exploiters or just the middle-exploiter.
- pdonis 4y ago
  > Does this somehow avoid a management level of this proposed corporation who are going to be trying to maximize profits at the expense of the employees who are ostensibly in a worse bargaining position? The corporation that takes the union's role would be owned by the workers; that's the whole point. It would be more like a "worker's cooperative" from that point of view, the way unions as they currently exist are supposed to be, but it would be a corporation from the point of view of other corporations who wanted to hire organized labor, so it would be in a better bargaining position than unionized employees are today. The workers would come to a consensus as a cooperative on things like how the corporation would manage the business risk of unscheduled absences, and then the corporation owned by the workers would sell the service of organized labor to other corporations that wanted it, probably with various different service levels depending on things like how critical unscheduled absences would be, and with higher service levels costing more.
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
    Yeah, I don't know why I didn't just think employee-owned. I live half a mile away from a WinCo[0], which has the words "Employee-Owned" in big ol' block letters on it. Thanks for the explanation! (Though to my knowledge WinCo isn't the friendliest to their employees on the floor when it comes to stock ownership, I can imagine something more fair.) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinCo_Foods https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinCo_Foods