Labor action isn't contrary to a free market. Labor action is precisely labor using its negotiating power in a market to secure concessions, the same way that e

Labor action isn't contrary to a free market. Labor action is precisely labor using its negotiating power in a market to secure concessions, the same way that employers use their market power to secure concessions from employees, customers use their market power to secure concessions from businesses, or businesses use their market power to extract profit. I'm a business owner. I believe in business, and I like participating in a competitive market. I like that it keeps me honest and forces me to really try to do my job. But that doesn't imply that I have to be hostile to the interests of laborers in principle! They're sticking up for their interests, just as much as I stick up for mine. That's how a market works. And just as with my customers, we can have a mutually beneficial working relationship while still negotiating in the knowledge that we're all adults with some degree of self-interest. As long as we're working within a system where we don't expect businesses to show loyalty to employees beyond self-interest (and it seems that we are), why should we expect employees to behave any differently? You can't make employment an ethical question for one side and not the other: either we're all in this together (and thus that businesses have a responsibility that Boeing has clearly failed to uphold), or we believe in a ruthlessly competitive market (and labor has every right to play hardball).