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What gets me about opposition to unions as limiting a free market is that unions solve a very real problem with the efficiency of employee negotiations. A union

by Osmose 3y ago

What gets me about opposition to unions as limiting a free market is that unions solve a very real problem with the efficiency of employee negotiations. A union is a much more efficient way to discover what the employees want from their workplaces than negotiating individually with them one by one. When negotiations break down, the union makes it clear and potentially strikes or takes other steps to pressure the company. When individual employee negotiations break down, you get churn and underperformance and dissatisfaction. People will often see burnout or mismanagement and assume it's an individual issue vs a breakdown in the contract between workers and the company.

303uru 3y ago
You know what else gets me about union opposition? Unions help everyone. When I was managing union employees, despite not being in the union as a manager myself, I was paid better, had better benefits, etc... Rising tides lift all ships.
MandieD 3y ago
That’s generally how it works in Germany. We have had more strikes than usual the last few years, but they’re usually really short. In my particular industry, having a very strong but pragmatic union that the companies know can make their very expensive production lines stop motivates everyone to quickly work things out. I decided to finally join IG Metall after they got us a quickly-negotiated 8% raise during the post-Covid inflation. They were realistic enough to give phase-in time, so there’s still been some sting for us, but we’ve not felt motivated to strike.
- caballeto 3y ago
  Unions do not help everyone. Unions often impose artificially high labor costs, which results in a lower amount of jobs being created. The real impact soon becomes apparent when companies start to lay off those union employees because their margins are slim and they try to automate as much as possible, instead of hiring people to do the job. See the recent UPS layoff, just after 6 months of a great union deal: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/difficult-disappointing-ups-lay-off-144500181.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/difficult-disappointing-ups-l...
  - 6510 3y ago
    With slaves or prison labor you can sustain even smaller margins, can have many more people employed and you can avoid automation for much longer. > plans to lay off 12,000 employees to save $1 billion in costs ( 1000 000 000 / 12 000 = 83 334 ) > The mass layoffs mainly target management-level and contractor positions. > She attributed the weak performance to increased labor costs, challenges in the broader U.S. economy, freight complications abroad and the disruption tied to labor negotiations last summer that diverted business to rivals. https://moneywise.com/news/top-stories/ups-ceo-says-delivery-drivers-will-earn-an-average-of-170k-in-new-ratified-teamster-contract?utm_source=syn_oath_mon&utm_medium=Z&utm_campaign=42114&utm_content=oath_mon_42114_%E2%80%9Clucrative%E2%80%9D+new+labor+deal https://moneywise.com/news/top-stories/ups-ceo-says-delivery... > The deal will also create 7,500 new full-time union jobs at UPS (NYSE:UPS) and the fulfillment of 22,500 open positions, giving more opportunities for part-timers to transition to full-time work. 7.5 + 22.5 - 12 = 18 ?

by Osmose 3y ago

303uru 3y ago

You know what else gets me about union opposition? Unions help everyone. When I was managing union employees, despite not being in the union as a manager myself, I was paid better, had better benefits, etc... Rising tides lift all ships.

MandieD 3y ago

That’s generally how it works in Germany. We have had more strikes than usual the last few years, but they’re usually really short. In my particular industry, having a very strong but pragmatic union that the companies know can make their very expensive production lines stop motivates everyone to quickly work things out. I decided to finally join IG Metall after they got us a quickly-negotiated 8% raise during the post-Covid inflation. They were realistic enough to give phase-in time, so there’s still been some sting for us, but we’ve not felt motivated to strike.

caballeto 3y ago
Unions do not help everyone. Unions often impose artificially high labor costs, which results in a lower amount of jobs being created. The real impact soon becomes apparent when companies start to lay off those union employees because their margins are slim and they try to automate as much as possible, instead of hiring people to do the job. See the recent UPS layoff, just after 6 months of a great union deal: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/difficult-disappointing-ups-lay-off-144500181.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/difficult-disappointing-ups-l...
- 6510 3y ago
  With slaves or prison labor you can sustain even smaller margins, can have many more people employed and you can avoid automation for much longer. > plans to lay off 12,000 employees to save $1 billion in costs ( 1000 000 000 / 12 000 = 83 334 ) > The mass layoffs mainly target management-level and contractor positions. > She attributed the weak performance to increased labor costs, challenges in the broader U.S. economy, freight complications abroad and the disruption tied to labor negotiations last summer that diverted business to rivals. https://moneywise.com/news/top-stories/ups-ceo-says-delivery-drivers-will-earn-an-average-of-170k-in-new-ratified-teamster-contract?utm_source=syn_oath_mon&utm_medium=Z&utm_campaign=42114&utm_content=oath_mon_42114_%E2%80%9Clucrative%E2%80%9D+new+labor+deal https://moneywise.com/news/top-stories/ups-ceo-says-delivery... > The deal will also create 7,500 new full-time union jobs at UPS (NYSE:UPS) and the fulfillment of 22,500 open positions, giving more opportunities for part-timers to transition to full-time work. 7.5 + 22.5 - 12 = 18 ?