4 ms·

“It’s been sustainable for a century” is not a very convincing argument and is kind of the whole point

bravetraveler 3y ago
It's sustainable until the union is out of money, supposedly At which point the "problem" deals with itself... no? Either the workers capitulate or Tesla ceases operations Just reading the thread... the sustainability argument seems totally backwards. For those in the "shut up and get to work camp", this seems ideal Tesla has more money and is managed by a person who is physically incapable of abandoning an idea
- fnordsensei 3y ago
  Sustainable here is with regards to the model as a whole (politicians stay away; unions and companies settle things amongst themselves), and in the economic and political sense, not eg. the environmental sense.
  - bravetraveler 3y ago
    Ah I see, I quite enjoy that model as someone from the US. Someone mentioned familiarity with the industry being key - this is so true We have decisions made by those who are actively not informed, but rather, biased
fnordsensei 3y ago
Even if we disregard the history of the labour market in the country, it’s far from the whole point. There are also several other points, some of which I mentioned along with the statement you took issue with.
rsynnott 3y ago
Every other company seems to be able to deal with it; it’s just Elmo struggling. You can see that Sweden wouldn’t be keen to rearrange society to suit one company that employs a whole 120 people.
- jncfhnb 3y ago
  It’s fine to say that companies should comply with local laws. It’s also fine to say that the laws may be leading a country to long term economic decline even if it’s temporarily ok.
  - rsynnott 3y ago
    Okay, but what leads you to believe that this system (it’s not a law, as such, though it is implied by the law) is doing that? Like, just this incident?
    - jncfhnb 3y ago
      GDP trends over the past couple decades (2008 being the common comparison Point for US:Europe) and just general observations of business trends mostly. A lot of Europeans speak proudly of their economic laws as “dignified” versus what you get in America. And perhaps that is true. But if this leads to lower and lower economic opportunity for Europeans, what will future generations say? Will they be glad their grandparents had such dignified rights? Or will they call them entitled pricks who squandered it? Europe is in a tough place. The US is going to eat its economic opportunities up due to the war in Ukraine AND make a killing selling them natural gas. This is probably the bigger driver of things right now than the business environment and that sucks. But it all plays a part. I don’t care about this particular incident. European unions are better than our unions because you get to choose which you want to be a part of. Sweden appears to do even better than average per the article on lost days to strikes.
      - rsynnott 3y ago
        ... Do you have any particular reason to think that Swedish economic growth is restricted by its labour system? I think it's really difficult to make that argument just looking at the numbers; it has generally outperformed the far less worker-friendly southern EU states, say (except possibly Spain). To explain the 21st century US/EU growth gap, I'd personally probably be looking at fiscal policy and the aging population (while this is a problem in both blocs, the EU is further down the rabbit hole), not _labour law_.

It's sustainable until the union is out of money, supposedly At which point the "problem" deals with itself... no? Either the workers capitulate or Tesla ceases operations Just reading the thread... the sustainability argument seems totally backwards. For those in the "shut up and get to work camp", this seems ideal Tesla has more money and is managed by a person who is physically incapable of abandoning an idea

fnordsensei 3y ago
Sustainable here is with regards to the model as a whole (politicians stay away; unions and companies settle things amongst themselves), and in the economic and political sense, not eg. the environmental sense.
- bravetraveler 3y ago
  Ah I see, I quite enjoy that model as someone from the US. Someone mentioned familiarity with the industry being key - this is so true We have decisions made by those who are actively not informed, but rather, biased

fnordsensei 3y ago

Even if we disregard the history of the labour market in the country, it’s far from the whole point. There are also several other points, some of which I mentioned along with the statement you took issue with.

rsynnott 3y ago

Every other company seems to be able to deal with it; it’s just Elmo struggling. You can see that Sweden wouldn’t be keen to rearrange society to suit one company that employs a whole 120 people.

jncfhnb 3y ago
It’s fine to say that companies should comply with local laws. It’s also fine to say that the laws may be leading a country to long term economic decline even if it’s temporarily ok.
- rsynnott 3y ago
  Okay, but what leads you to believe that this system (it’s not a law, as such, though it is implied by the law) is doing that? Like, just this incident?
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    GDP trends over the past couple decades (2008 being the common comparison Point for US:Europe) and just general observations of business trends mostly. A lot of Europeans speak proudly of their economic laws as “dignified” versus what you get in America. And perhaps that is true. But if this leads to lower and lower economic opportunity for Europeans, what will future generations say? Will they be glad their grandparents had such dignified rights? Or will they call them entitled pricks who squandered it? Europe is in a tough place. The US is going to eat its economic opportunities up due to the war in Ukraine AND make a killing selling them natural gas. This is probably the bigger driver of things right now than the business environment and that sucks. But it all plays a part. I don’t care about this particular incident. European unions are better than our unions because you get to choose which you want to be a part of. Sweden appears to do even better than average per the article on lost days to strikes.
    - rsynnott 3y ago
      ... Do you have any particular reason to think that Swedish economic growth is restricted by its labour system? I think it's really difficult to make that argument just looking at the numbers; it has generally outperformed the far less worker-friendly southern EU states, say (except possibly Spain). To explain the 21st century US/EU growth gap, I'd personally probably be looking at fiscal policy and the aging population (while this is a problem in both blocs, the EU is further down the rabbit hole), not _labour law_.