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U.S. Rules Apple Illegally Interrogated Staff and Confiscated Union Flyers

508 points by iancmceachern 2y ago

boomboomsubban 2y ago
The key section of this story is >The board cannot impose fines or direct punishments against Apple for its violations. Which makes me wonder why they spent two years working on this investigation.
- balls187 2y ago
  Pure speculation—the doj can use that determination against apple in any future proceedings. It’s like a GAL report for a family law case; independent investigator provides a report which the court will then use to inform it’s decision.
- nickff 2y ago
  They have a lot more power than you might think from that quote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Labor_Relations_Board#Processing_of_charges https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Labor_Relations_Board... They can now try Apple in an administrative court, with an 'administrative judge' selected by the agency, then get a (normal) Article 3 court to rubber-stamp their 'order'.
  - couchand 2y ago
    Not a lawyer here. Why does an Article III judge need to get involved, and not in other administrative matters, like say, in an administrative immigration case? edit: further investigation has indicated that it's immigration law which deviates from usual practice of administrative law, which would potentially expect an automatic stay in a context like this.
  - semiquaver 2y ago
    To the contrary, the order already exists (“stop it”) and this article describes the second part of the process you linked to: > The decision of the Administrative Law Judge may be reviewed by the five member board
- paxys 2y ago
  That's like saying "the police can't hand out sentences, so what's the point of having police?" The NLRB's investigation is part of the process. It can and does cooperate with the DoJ and various other federal agencies and courts.
medo-bear 2y ago
[flagged]
- lostlogin 2y ago
  Thanks - Rosa Luxemburg was an interesting human. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Luxemburg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Luxemburg
- deleted 2y ago
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sjtgraham 2y ago
The whole idea of the executive branch functioning as the judicial branch is a bananas concept to me.
- wolverine876 2y ago
  Instead of the same old talking point, what solution do you propose? Should the executive branch agency make decisions by fiat, without due process? The use of due process doesn't make them a judiciary; it's just a more fair way to make decisions within their purview. Should we move every such judgment out of the executive branch's hands? First, they have to be able to make some decisions. But the heart of this issue is, as is well known: There aren't nearly enough capacity in the judicial branch to handle all that work. It's a trick to prevent lawful and needed regulation from happening by severely cutting their capacity.
  - sjtgraham 2y ago
    > Instead of the same old talking point, what solution do you propose? Unnecessarily hostile opening, but full separation of powers as written in the Constitution. > Should the executive branch agency make decisions by fiat, without due process? It should not be adjudicating any kind of legal controversy. That is not the role of the executive branch. > The use of due process doesn't make them a judiciary; it's just a more fair way to make decisions within their purview. It's very often worse. Executive agencies often have legislative functions, i.e. APA rulemaking, as well judicial functions, e.g. in this matter. The SEC is another one, (see SEC vs Jarkesy currently before SCOTUS). > Should we move every such judgment out of the executive branch's hands? Yes. > But the heart of this issue is, as is well known: There aren't nearly enough capacity in the judicial branch to handle all that work. It's a trick to prevent lawful and needed regulation from happening by severely cutting their capacity. Total BS.
    - badcppdev 2y ago
      And what solution do you propose?
    - 2y ago
jollofricepeas 2y ago
I don’t understand how so many HNers are anti-union and anti-collective bargaining. The fact that corporations and billionaires are so anti-union and engage in regular conduct like this demonstrates that unions are pro-worker and ideal for the balance needed in the US and across the globe. Balance is key between workers and owners. Without it we are left with growing wealth inequality such as… - ridiculous housing prices - stagnant wages - poor public school education - no retirement benefits - expensive public universities
- tivert 2y ago
  > I don’t understand how so many HNers are anti-union and anti-collective bargaining. You underestimate the appeal of libertarian propaganda to software engineers. It's got the oversimple but neat models we can't resist, plus our relatively advantaged economic position allows allows us to easily confuse ourselves for capitalists.
- ein0p 2y ago
  Public school education is poor in part because it’s darn near impossible to fire bad teachers though. And I don’t see how unions would improve housing affordability. I’m not against unions per se, particularly for positions which are not as lavishly compensated as a typical white collar FAANG employee. I’m merely pointing out that you need to pick better examples. Otherwise you just undermine your own argument.
  - walthamstow 2y ago
    Neither of you are giving examples, only conjecture. Bad teachers are a noteworthy cause of poor schools. House prices wouldn't be so high if we had unions. Ok, prove it. Or at least give me some reasoning to go off.
    - ein0p 2y ago
      What is the mechanism under which houses would be more affordable if employees had more money thanks to the unions? Real estate (and by extension rents) will take up any available slack on income.
Stranger43 2y ago
I wonder why US companies keep pulling stunts like this despite the data showing little negative impact of unionization to overall productivity nor company survival. It looks to be a purely dogmatic ego trip where somehow blind loyalty is demanded even when it's not actually necessary.
- nicce 2y ago
  If it saves even a little money, it will happen.
  - Stranger43 2y ago
    Yep but that's again a dogmatic view as there is hints that anti-unionization measures are the kind of cost cutting that kills companies rather then the kind that makes them huge successes.
    - sverhagen 2y ago
      In companies with a healthy culture, maybe. But if staff unionizes, how's Amazon going to make them pee in a bottle to squeeze out a few more deliveries, without running into trouble with the union. I'm sure other companies have their own terrible anecdotes.
  - Rodeoclash 2y ago
    Companies do all sorts of itrrational things that cost money
  - ceejayoz 2y ago
    Only if it saves money now.
- komali2 2y ago
  I personally believe companies are given way too much credit in being considered rational pure-profit motive actors. They're far worse than that (a rational pure-profit motive actor is also bad because it would inevitably select for slavery): they're typically run by extremely conservative, often ivy-league people (if not in alma mater, then in worship of ivy league culture). These people are trained from the get go to associate unions with everything antithetical to their cult heroes of people like Ford or Edison. Once in an argument with a similarly minded founder, he dropped the line on me, "unions are anti-capitalist," which to me really reveals the mindset that to at least him, negotiating from positions of equal power is not capitalism.
Woshiwuja 2y ago
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emsign 2y ago
I simply don't trust companies that crack down on union organizers.
- resource_waste 2y ago
  It doesnt matter, if you want blue bubbles or to compile for iOS, you pay the cartel. I have a similar problem with M$, businesses use Teams, so I pay for it. These companies are beyond our abilities to 'not use them'. Although Apple is one of the few companies I don't seem to have almost any products. There always was a better alternative when I needed it.
- oldpersonintx 2y ago
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- deleted 2y ago
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pashsoft 2y ago
It seems like most of the "union problems" in the US arise from workers clashing with overly-greedy, abusive employers. The employer generally has more power in this relationship, and uses that power to squeeze every last bit of value out of their workforce. The workforce has few ways to push back against this, with unions being one of the options. Maybe if other options were on the table, there would be fewer union problems? As a worker, would you join a union for protection (and pay for it) if your government provided robust legal defences for you?
- cies 2y ago
  Govt is a tool of the large abusive employers at this point. Tesla, Amazon and Apple have all been in the news for illegal anti-union behavior and I expect them to get no significant punishment for this at all. Meanwhile the trials take years in which they can simple continue to misbehave. This "policy" is probably discussed within their giant legal depts and c-family with plenty of plausible deniability sprinkled on top. Meanwhile the word "socialist" already freaks so many voters out in the US, that frankly I do not see an easy way out for you guys. > "union problems" Glad you put it in quotes, as unions are solutions for oppressed workers. Though unions you got weekends, holidays, end of child labour, minimum wage, paid sick leave and more.
- nolok 2y ago
  > Maybe if other options were on the table, there would be fewer union problems? As a worker, would you join a union for protection (and pay for it) if your government provided robust legal defences for you? Yes. The solution you provide might seem to on the surface, but it doesn't in reality. Let me give you an existing exemple, and one that people associate with strong workers right and yet the relation between workforce and employers is horrible : my country of France. France made a capital mistake compared to our other european neighbors, by making an inverted order of agreement. Countries where it works (like nordics, etc ...) have a flow of importance like this : 1 Union collective agreement 2 Country's law 3 Company local agreement Meaning the defining rules are made through the union, some are set by the country (but they're not overriding union agreement), and local companies can make their own internal agreement but they can't override the law nor the union agreement (so eg you can give extra holiday, but you can't take out a national holiday or a union negotiated holiday). France being centralised as it is, and believing in the messiah governement above adult talking with rules; decided to invert this with the following scheme : 1 Country's law 2 Union collective agreement 3 Company local agreement On the surface, it seems like it makes sense or is even better. In reality, here is what happens : if you are a worker and want a change, or there is a strike and you're the employer negotiating, or ... The end game is not the other side. It's the governement. This doesn't promote discussion between both side of the work share, it makes it useless. So you have the joke about employer's association regretting that the governement make news laws and rules every time there is a major strike instead of negotiations, and the employee's union regretting that when a strike is stalling the situation employers go to the governement instead of negotiating harder ... You get the governement having to "invite both side to the table" in front of them at every major strike. Because ultimately, our system makes the governement the daddy when workers and employers are the kid. And what's really insane is that both side hate this and criticize it, yet when Macron made a push to change it both side where also against it because they saw it as destroying their position : employees union pretended it would allow employers to do whatever since they have more power, employers pretended it would put them in a kidnapped situation every strike. Meanwhile you go on the french subreddit or any other center to left place, you will regularly see things like union agreement that have minimal salaries in them BELOW the french legal salaries, acting like this is horrible, while in reality it's like that because nobody cares about that because it doesn't matter because the minimal is the country's one. I love my country's approach to people rights and society's rules, but this is one where we're really wrong, except it gives everyone a taste of power (gov like to be in power; employees like that they can call daddy to "screw the evil employer", employers like that they can circumvent their peole to go straight to daddy to "skip those lazy workers"). I don't know if proper union in charge is the best solution. All I know is every place doing better than us at that have strong union and a governement that doesn't try to do their job for them.
ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
In Japan, there's a really symbiotic relationship between unions and corporations. Unions are very powerful, but they also take stakes in the corporations. I'm pretty sure that union reps often sit on corporate boards. Japan has a long culture of employee relations, but they also work their asses off. I don't think Japanese unions would cover slackers, which is a popular view of US unions.
- Frost1x 2y ago
  Japanese work culture is another beast. I don’t think US unions are so much about covering ‘slackers’ but I would say enforcing healthy work—life balance is a component.
  - ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
    Like I said...popular view. However, I have many friends that are quite pro-union, and the reality seems different.
- whamlastxmas 2y ago
  It’s a popular view of anti union propaganda. No one wants to work with lazy people and unions don’t especially want them either
  - ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
    There's a lot of anti-union propaganda, and some of it is self-inflicted. Anyone that has ever participated in a trade show at the Javits Center, has seen unions do serious damage to their own cause.
    - alistairSH 2y ago
      Yeah, LV and NYC convention sites are probably the worst/most-obvious examples. Plenty of stories of presenters being disallowed from plugging in their own equipment without a union employee there to assist and other things like that.
swozey 2y ago
I know a lot of distsys people who went from Google to Apple a few years ago and it sounds like a terrible place to work. They're also super secretive. None of my friends can tell me what they work on. Awhile back it was hinted that they were working on a search engine with K8s as the backend but it's been 2-3 years since I inferred that and there's been nothing. Everyone I know there is/was a k8s contributor. I used to work for a super secret company making cool stuff and it was so lame that I couldn't talk about any of it.
FpUser 2y ago
I am not sure how they can "interrogate" stuff. Can't they be simply told to go fuck themselves and do not stick their nose where it does not belong?
- paxys 2y ago
  Yes you have the right to tell your employer to "fuck themselves", but will find that you no longer have a job a millisecond later. When it comes to an employer-employee relationship an "optional" request isn't really optional.
- lmm 2y ago
  > Can't they be simply told to go fuck themselves and do not stick their nose where it does not belong? If you live in a country where corporations are subject to the rule of law, sure.
- harimau777 2y ago
  America has "at will employment". Except for certain classes (gender, disability, race, etc.) that are illegal to discriminate against, an employer can fire someone for any reason. Therefore, employees have to go along with what the employer wants in order to keep their job; even if what the employer wants is unreasonable or illegal.
  - TheCleric 2y ago
    I agree with you with the caveat that it's "only" most of America (it can vary by state and even whether you work for the local government or not).
trollbridge 2y ago
This seems to be part of a persistent pattern of businesses thinking they are above the law, and when challenged, the filing of endless countersuits and appeals. At some point, the democratic process elected Congress and the laws passed therein, and businesses exist at the pleasure of the people and their elected representatives, not the other way around. A business that doesn’t want to unionise is free to close up shop and go out of business. They are not free to simply ignore lawful unionisation activity.
- weard_beard 2y ago
  Regulatory capture and non-existant enforcement mechanisms would beg to differ. It seems more and more that the US is waiting for the general public to commit egregious acts and then will crack down and that this is the ONLY function of the US government at all levels.
  - sonicanatidae 2y ago
    This is the issue. Even when an entity is cornered for wrong-doing, it'll be a fine, paid with other people's money, that amounts to a pittance compared to the profits gained from their malfeasance, all while "admitting no wrong-doing". The C-suite that made the call, set the culture, and determined budgets suffers zero penalties in a majority of the cases, so there is literally no incentive to comply. We can thank congressional bribery for that.
- sandworm101 2y ago
  >> businesses exist at the pleasure of the people and their elected representatives As one noted politician famously said: "Corporations are people". The issue is that soo much of US jurisprudence has granted corporate entities all the rights of personhood. The only thing they cannot yet do is vote, but that too will come. They are certainly today allowed to vote with their wallets by financially supporting candidates. Part of this issue is in turn tied to how so many powerful people in the US cloak themselves in corporate status. Taylor Swift exists are a person, but all her money flows through her corporation. Trump exists as a person, but all his property is held by his corporations. Some of this is a game to avoid taxation but it is also used to shield people from liabilities. So such powerful people take any attack on corporate personhood very personally.
etc-hosts 2y ago
The Trump administration appointed an extremely anti labor person to head the NLRB(they had been involved in Reagan's mass air traffic controller firings in the 80s). One of the first things the Biden administration did, hours into the new administration, was replace that person. The ACLU is currently going through a court case involving the NLRB. The ACLU is fighting with the novel argument that the Biden administration replacement was done unlawfully, therefore every action of the NLRB since then is illegal. I'm sure a potential future Trump administration will try as hard as possible to destroy labor and the NLRB. https://www.nlrbedge.com/p/the-aclu-is-attacking-free-speech https://www.nlrbedge.com/p/the-aclu-is-attacking-free-speech https://prospect.org/podcasts/2024-03-18-aclu-nlrb-lawsuit-labor-rights/ https://prospect.org/podcasts/2024-03-18-aclu-nlrb-lawsuit-l... https://dailycaller.com/2024/03/12/aclu-worked-undermine-bidens-labor-board-defend-firing-employee-racism-accusations/ https://dailycaller.com/2024/03/12/aclu-worked-undermine-bid...
brookst 2y ago
I’m in the HN minority that actually likes Apple’s products and business model. I like the consistency the closed ecosystem brings, I like the product design, I like the vertical integration. But this union stuff pisses me off to no end. Apple has high margins and is generally ahead of competitors in things like sustainability and supplier responsibility (yes yes not perfect, I just said ahead). It would be 100% in line with the company’s ethos to embrace unions. Not necessarily to encourage, but certainly to treat them as an important part of the economy and a good check/balance to ensure the benefits of customer loyalty and high margins are shared with those who make it happen. Just like renewables or supply chain audits, this wouldn’t have huge impacts on profits but it would make the world better. Serious misstep by Apple that pisses me off.
- azemetre 2y ago
  People easily forget that both Apple and Google actively suppressed tech salaries (along with other tech companies) in collision with each other: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...
- nflblitz 2y ago
  It's always hard arguing the counterfactual, but do you really believe that Apple would be the Apple you love if their employees were unionized? Put another way, and before you downvote me to oblivion, what are the most innovative tech companies that have unions?
  - skeaker 2y ago
    What if Steve Jobs wore green instead of black when announcing the iPhone? Would Apple still be the same company today? Who cares? That's a stupid question, we can't possibly know and either way we can't change the past. What we CAN do is change how things are now and implement a union with Apple as it is today. Why postulate about the upbringing of the company and how things could have been different ideologically when that's not what the discussion is about? People just want job security, protection from abuse by their employer, and reasonably consistent raises to at least match inflation.
deleted 2y ago
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monetus 2y ago
Was steve jobs ever on the record discussing unions? With his reputation, I'd imagine the enmity has been a part of apple's culture for decades, but I have never worked there to know.

508 points by iancmceachern 2y ago

The key section of this story is >The board cannot impose fines or direct punishments against Apple for its violations. Which makes me wonder why they spent two years working on this investigation.

balls187 2y ago
Pure speculation—the doj can use that determination against apple in any future proceedings. It’s like a GAL report for a family law case; independent investigator provides a report which the court will then use to inform it’s decision.
nickff 2y ago
They have a lot more power than you might think from that quote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Labor_Relations_Board#Processing_of_charges https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Labor_Relations_Board... They can now try Apple in an administrative court, with an 'administrative judge' selected by the agency, then get a (normal) Article 3 court to rubber-stamp their 'order'.
- couchand 2y ago
  Not a lawyer here. Why does an Article III judge need to get involved, and not in other administrative matters, like say, in an administrative immigration case? edit: further investigation has indicated that it's immigration law which deviates from usual practice of administrative law, which would potentially expect an automatic stay in a context like this.
- semiquaver 2y ago
  To the contrary, the order already exists (“stop it”) and this article describes the second part of the process you linked to: > The decision of the Administrative Law Judge may be reviewed by the five member board
paxys 2y ago
That's like saying "the police can't hand out sentences, so what's the point of having police?" The NLRB's investigation is part of the process. It can and does cooperate with the DoJ and various other federal agencies and courts.

medo-bear 2y ago

[flagged]

lostlogin 2y ago
Thanks - Rosa Luxemburg was an interesting human. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Luxemburg https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Luxemburg
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

sjtgraham 2y ago

The whole idea of the executive branch functioning as the judicial branch is a bananas concept to me.

wolverine876 2y ago
Instead of the same old talking point, what solution do you propose? Should the executive branch agency make decisions by fiat, without due process? The use of due process doesn't make them a judiciary; it's just a more fair way to make decisions within their purview. Should we move every such judgment out of the executive branch's hands? First, they have to be able to make some decisions. But the heart of this issue is, as is well known: There aren't nearly enough capacity in the judicial branch to handle all that work. It's a trick to prevent lawful and needed regulation from happening by severely cutting their capacity.
- sjtgraham 2y ago
  > Instead of the same old talking point, what solution do you propose? Unnecessarily hostile opening, but full separation of powers as written in the Constitution. > Should the executive branch agency make decisions by fiat, without due process? It should not be adjudicating any kind of legal controversy. That is not the role of the executive branch. > The use of due process doesn't make them a judiciary; it's just a more fair way to make decisions within their purview. It's very often worse. Executive agencies often have legislative functions, i.e. APA rulemaking, as well judicial functions, e.g. in this matter. The SEC is another one, (see SEC vs Jarkesy currently before SCOTUS). > Should we move every such judgment out of the executive branch's hands? Yes. > But the heart of this issue is, as is well known: There aren't nearly enough capacity in the judicial branch to handle all that work. It's a trick to prevent lawful and needed regulation from happening by severely cutting their capacity. Total BS.
  - badcppdev 2y ago
    And what solution do you propose?
  - 2y ago

jollofricepeas 2y ago

I don’t understand how so many HNers are anti-union and anti-collective bargaining. The fact that corporations and billionaires are so anti-union and engage in regular conduct like this demonstrates that unions are pro-worker and ideal for the balance needed in the US and across the globe. Balance is key between workers and owners. Without it we are left with growing wealth inequality such as… - ridiculous housing prices - stagnant wages - poor public school education - no retirement benefits - expensive public universities

tivert 2y ago
> I don’t understand how so many HNers are anti-union and anti-collective bargaining. You underestimate the appeal of libertarian propaganda to software engineers. It's got the oversimple but neat models we can't resist, plus our relatively advantaged economic position allows allows us to easily confuse ourselves for capitalists.
ein0p 2y ago
Public school education is poor in part because it’s darn near impossible to fire bad teachers though. And I don’t see how unions would improve housing affordability. I’m not against unions per se, particularly for positions which are not as lavishly compensated as a typical white collar FAANG employee. I’m merely pointing out that you need to pick better examples. Otherwise you just undermine your own argument.
- walthamstow 2y ago
  Neither of you are giving examples, only conjecture. Bad teachers are a noteworthy cause of poor schools. House prices wouldn't be so high if we had unions. Ok, prove it. Or at least give me some reasoning to go off.
  - ein0p 2y ago
    What is the mechanism under which houses would be more affordable if employees had more money thanks to the unions? Real estate (and by extension rents) will take up any available slack on income.

Stranger43 2y ago

I wonder why US companies keep pulling stunts like this despite the data showing little negative impact of unionization to overall productivity nor company survival. It looks to be a purely dogmatic ego trip where somehow blind loyalty is demanded even when it's not actually necessary.

nicce 2y ago
If it saves even a little money, it will happen.
- Stranger43 2y ago
  Yep but that's again a dogmatic view as there is hints that anti-unionization measures are the kind of cost cutting that kills companies rather then the kind that makes them huge successes.
  - sverhagen 2y ago
    In companies with a healthy culture, maybe. But if staff unionizes, how's Amazon going to make them pee in a bottle to squeeze out a few more deliveries, without running into trouble with the union. I'm sure other companies have their own terrible anecdotes.
- Rodeoclash 2y ago
  Companies do all sorts of itrrational things that cost money
- ceejayoz 2y ago
  Only if it saves money now.
komali2 2y ago
I personally believe companies are given way too much credit in being considered rational pure-profit motive actors. They're far worse than that (a rational pure-profit motive actor is also bad because it would inevitably select for slavery): they're typically run by extremely conservative, often ivy-league people (if not in alma mater, then in worship of ivy league culture). These people are trained from the get go to associate unions with everything antithetical to their cult heroes of people like Ford or Edison. Once in an argument with a similarly minded founder, he dropped the line on me, "unions are anti-capitalist," which to me really reveals the mindset that to at least him, negotiating from positions of equal power is not capitalism.

Woshiwuja 2y ago

[flagged]

emsign 2y ago

I simply don't trust companies that crack down on union organizers.

resource_waste 2y ago
It doesnt matter, if you want blue bubbles or to compile for iOS, you pay the cartel. I have a similar problem with M$, businesses use Teams, so I pay for it. These companies are beyond our abilities to 'not use them'. Although Apple is one of the few companies I don't seem to have almost any products. There always was a better alternative when I needed it.
oldpersonintx 2y ago
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deleted 2y ago
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pashsoft 2y ago

It seems like most of the "union problems" in the US arise from workers clashing with overly-greedy, abusive employers. The employer generally has more power in this relationship, and uses that power to squeeze every last bit of value out of their workforce. The workforce has few ways to push back against this, with unions being one of the options. Maybe if other options were on the table, there would be fewer union problems? As a worker, would you join a union for protection (and pay for it) if your government provided robust legal defences for you?

cies 2y ago
Govt is a tool of the large abusive employers at this point. Tesla, Amazon and Apple have all been in the news for illegal anti-union behavior and I expect them to get no significant punishment for this at all. Meanwhile the trials take years in which they can simple continue to misbehave. This "policy" is probably discussed within their giant legal depts and c-family with plenty of plausible deniability sprinkled on top. Meanwhile the word "socialist" already freaks so many voters out in the US, that frankly I do not see an easy way out for you guys. > "union problems" Glad you put it in quotes, as unions are solutions for oppressed workers. Though unions you got weekends, holidays, end of child labour, minimum wage, paid sick leave and more.
nolok 2y ago
> Maybe if other options were on the table, there would be fewer union problems? As a worker, would you join a union for protection (and pay for it) if your government provided robust legal defences for you? Yes. The solution you provide might seem to on the surface, but it doesn't in reality. Let me give you an existing exemple, and one that people associate with strong workers right and yet the relation between workforce and employers is horrible : my country of France. France made a capital mistake compared to our other european neighbors, by making an inverted order of agreement. Countries where it works (like nordics, etc ...) have a flow of importance like this : 1 Union collective agreement 2 Country's law 3 Company local agreement Meaning the defining rules are made through the union, some are set by the country (but they're not overriding union agreement), and local companies can make their own internal agreement but they can't override the law nor the union agreement (so eg you can give extra holiday, but you can't take out a national holiday or a union negotiated holiday). France being centralised as it is, and believing in the messiah governement above adult talking with rules; decided to invert this with the following scheme : 1 Country's law 2 Union collective agreement 3 Company local agreement On the surface, it seems like it makes sense or is even better. In reality, here is what happens : if you are a worker and want a change, or there is a strike and you're the employer negotiating, or ... The end game is not the other side. It's the governement. This doesn't promote discussion between both side of the work share, it makes it useless. So you have the joke about employer's association regretting that the governement make news laws and rules every time there is a major strike instead of negotiations, and the employee's union regretting that when a strike is stalling the situation employers go to the governement instead of negotiating harder ... You get the governement having to "invite both side to the table" in front of them at every major strike. Because ultimately, our system makes the governement the daddy when workers and employers are the kid. And what's really insane is that both side hate this and criticize it, yet when Macron made a push to change it both side where also against it because they saw it as destroying their position : employees union pretended it would allow employers to do whatever since they have more power, employers pretended it would put them in a kidnapped situation every strike. Meanwhile you go on the french subreddit or any other center to left place, you will regularly see things like union agreement that have minimal salaries in them BELOW the french legal salaries, acting like this is horrible, while in reality it's like that because nobody cares about that because it doesn't matter because the minimal is the country's one. I love my country's approach to people rights and society's rules, but this is one where we're really wrong, except it gives everyone a taste of power (gov like to be in power; employees like that they can call daddy to "screw the evil employer", employers like that they can circumvent their peole to go straight to daddy to "skip those lazy workers"). I don't know if proper union in charge is the best solution. All I know is every place doing better than us at that have strong union and a governement that doesn't try to do their job for them.

ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago

In Japan, there's a really symbiotic relationship between unions and corporations. Unions are very powerful, but they also take stakes in the corporations. I'm pretty sure that union reps often sit on corporate boards. Japan has a long culture of employee relations, but they also work their asses off. I don't think Japanese unions would cover slackers, which is a popular view of US unions.

Frost1x 2y ago
Japanese work culture is another beast. I don’t think US unions are so much about covering ‘slackers’ but I would say enforcing healthy work—life balance is a component.
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
  Like I said...popular view. However, I have many friends that are quite pro-union, and the reality seems different.
whamlastxmas 2y ago
It’s a popular view of anti union propaganda. No one wants to work with lazy people and unions don’t especially want them either
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
  There's a lot of anti-union propaganda, and some of it is self-inflicted. Anyone that has ever participated in a trade show at the Javits Center, has seen unions do serious damage to their own cause.
  - alistairSH 2y ago
    Yeah, LV and NYC convention sites are probably the worst/most-obvious examples. Plenty of stories of presenters being disallowed from plugging in their own equipment without a union employee there to assist and other things like that.

swozey 2y ago

I know a lot of distsys people who went from Google to Apple a few years ago and it sounds like a terrible place to work. They're also super secretive. None of my friends can tell me what they work on. Awhile back it was hinted that they were working on a search engine with K8s as the backend but it's been 2-3 years since I inferred that and there's been nothing. Everyone I know there is/was a k8s contributor. I used to work for a super secret company making cool stuff and it was so lame that I couldn't talk about any of it.

FpUser 2y ago

I am not sure how they can "interrogate" stuff. Can't they be simply told to go fuck themselves and do not stick their nose where it does not belong?

paxys 2y ago
Yes you have the right to tell your employer to "fuck themselves", but will find that you no longer have a job a millisecond later. When it comes to an employer-employee relationship an "optional" request isn't really optional.
lmm 2y ago
> Can't they be simply told to go fuck themselves and do not stick their nose where it does not belong? If you live in a country where corporations are subject to the rule of law, sure.
harimau777 2y ago
America has "at will employment". Except for certain classes (gender, disability, race, etc.) that are illegal to discriminate against, an employer can fire someone for any reason. Therefore, employees have to go along with what the employer wants in order to keep their job; even if what the employer wants is unreasonable or illegal.
- TheCleric 2y ago
  I agree with you with the caveat that it's "only" most of America (it can vary by state and even whether you work for the local government or not).

trollbridge 2y ago

This seems to be part of a persistent pattern of businesses thinking they are above the law, and when challenged, the filing of endless countersuits and appeals. At some point, the democratic process elected Congress and the laws passed therein, and businesses exist at the pleasure of the people and their elected representatives, not the other way around. A business that doesn’t want to unionise is free to close up shop and go out of business. They are not free to simply ignore lawful unionisation activity.

weard_beard 2y ago
Regulatory capture and non-existant enforcement mechanisms would beg to differ. It seems more and more that the US is waiting for the general public to commit egregious acts and then will crack down and that this is the ONLY function of the US government at all levels.
- sonicanatidae 2y ago
  This is the issue. Even when an entity is cornered for wrong-doing, it'll be a fine, paid with other people's money, that amounts to a pittance compared to the profits gained from their malfeasance, all while "admitting no wrong-doing". The C-suite that made the call, set the culture, and determined budgets suffers zero penalties in a majority of the cases, so there is literally no incentive to comply. We can thank congressional bribery for that.
sandworm101 2y ago
>> businesses exist at the pleasure of the people and their elected representatives As one noted politician famously said: "Corporations are people". The issue is that soo much of US jurisprudence has granted corporate entities all the rights of personhood. The only thing they cannot yet do is vote, but that too will come. They are certainly today allowed to vote with their wallets by financially supporting candidates. Part of this issue is in turn tied to how so many powerful people in the US cloak themselves in corporate status. Taylor Swift exists are a person, but all her money flows through her corporation. Trump exists as a person, but all his property is held by his corporations. Some of this is a game to avoid taxation but it is also used to shield people from liabilities. So such powerful people take any attack on corporate personhood very personally.

etc-hosts 2y ago

The Trump administration appointed an extremely anti labor person to head the NLRB(they had been involved in Reagan's mass air traffic controller firings in the 80s). One of the first things the Biden administration did, hours into the new administration, was replace that person. The ACLU is currently going through a court case involving the NLRB. The ACLU is fighting with the novel argument that the Biden administration replacement was done unlawfully, therefore every action of the NLRB since then is illegal. I'm sure a potential future Trump administration will try as hard as possible to destroy labor and the NLRB. https://www.nlrbedge.com/p/the-aclu-is-attacking-free-speech https://www.nlrbedge.com/p/the-aclu-is-attacking-free-speech https://prospect.org/podcasts/2024-03-18-aclu-nlrb-lawsuit-labor-rights/ https://prospect.org/podcasts/2024-03-18-aclu-nlrb-lawsuit-l... https://dailycaller.com/2024/03/12/aclu-worked-undermine-bidens-labor-board-defend-firing-employee-racism-accusations/ https://dailycaller.com/2024/03/12/aclu-worked-undermine-bid...

brookst 2y ago

I’m in the HN minority that actually likes Apple’s products and business model. I like the consistency the closed ecosystem brings, I like the product design, I like the vertical integration. But this union stuff pisses me off to no end. Apple has high margins and is generally ahead of competitors in things like sustainability and supplier responsibility (yes yes not perfect, I just said ahead). It would be 100% in line with the company’s ethos to embrace unions. Not necessarily to encourage, but certainly to treat them as an important part of the economy and a good check/balance to ensure the benefits of customer loyalty and high margins are shared with those who make it happen. Just like renewables or supply chain audits, this wouldn’t have huge impacts on profits but it would make the world better. Serious misstep by Apple that pisses me off.

azemetre 2y ago
People easily forget that both Apple and Google actively suppressed tech salaries (along with other tech companies) in collision with each other: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...
nflblitz 2y ago
It's always hard arguing the counterfactual, but do you really believe that Apple would be the Apple you love if their employees were unionized? Put another way, and before you downvote me to oblivion, what are the most innovative tech companies that have unions?
- skeaker 2y ago
  What if Steve Jobs wore green instead of black when announcing the iPhone? Would Apple still be the same company today? Who cares? That's a stupid question, we can't possibly know and either way we can't change the past. What we CAN do is change how things are now and implement a union with Apple as it is today. Why postulate about the upbringing of the company and how things could have been different ideologically when that's not what the discussion is about? People just want job security, protection from abuse by their employer, and reasonably consistent raises to at least match inflation.

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monetus 2y ago

Was steve jobs ever on the record discussing unions? With his reputation, I'd imagine the enmity has been a part of apple's culture for decades, but I have never worked there to know.