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Crushing unions is partly to blame here. I've got relatives whose families have been working in the mining industry for a few generations. They all lament the g

Crushing unions is partly to blame here. I've got relatives whose families have been working in the mining industry for a few generations. They all lament the good old days that are long gone now.

Galatians4_16 2y ago
There was a related hashtag that was banned for hilarious reasons.
whimsicalism 2y ago
how would increasing the cost of labor mean that we have more manufacturing jobs in the US today?
- whatshisface 2y ago
  There are a lot of manufacturing jobs. In fact, the "Manufacturing" category is four times larger (12M vs 4M) in terms of employment than "Information." The primary interests of people working in manufacturing are higher pay and better working conditions. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/release/tables?rid=50&eid=4881#snid=4900 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/release/tables?rid=50&eid=4881#s...
  - whimsicalism 2y ago
    right, but what i am missing is the connection to ‘more machinist jobs’. unions pretty much necessarily trade off number of jobs with average pay for that job, it’s the whole name of the game to restrict entry and wage negotiation.
- os2warpman 2y ago
  Every single country on earth, except China, that has a more robust and profitable machine tool sector than the US has unions strong enough to make a social media libertarian shit their pants. Indeed, the three countries listed in the report as being better than the US all have EXTREMELY strong machinist/metalworking unions. Japan: JAM Italy: FIOM And Germany, with probably the most powerful union in the entire world: IGM The problem isn't unions. The problem is the parasite MBA class, shuffling memos and spreadsheets around to make it look like they're doing something.
- AngryData 2y ago
  Giving labor better bargaining means higher pay for employees and so they need to work less, which leaves room for more employees. Better working conditions also leads to a better and bigger pool of candidates who are interested in your work and industry. Giving labor more power also makes it far harder to offshore their work and the higher pay for everyone improves local economies and induces more local demand. Having wealthier owners doesn't help the local economy nearly as much as more prosperous labor, especially if they end up spending a bunch of that capital in investing in a foreign assets with lower labor costs, essentially throwing what could have been local economic investment into desperate foreign labor markets.
  - whimsicalism 2y ago
    that is just not how microecon works. raising the marginal cost of labor lessens the amount of labor hired. there is no scenario in which it leads to more people working the job. unionized labor did not make it harder to offshore - in fact it accelerated offshoring, automation, and a shift to manufacturing in the South of the country. having lower costs of goods usually benefits the economy more than more prosperous labor (not necessarily the local economy), although the net welfare increasing thing is context dependent. in competitive markets, vast majority of labor cost decreases are captured by the consumer.
InDubioProRubio 2y ago
The unions got crushed, when the sovyeet union caved in. There main negotation power was the threat of a takeover by a of a viable economical alternative. It was just a illusion though..

Crushing unions is partly to blame here. I've got relatives whose families have been working in the mining industry for a few generations. They all lament the good old days that are long gone now.

Galatians4_16 2y ago

There was a related hashtag that was banned for hilarious reasons.

whimsicalism 2y ago

how would increasing the cost of labor mean that we have more manufacturing jobs in the US today?

whatshisface 2y ago
There are a lot of manufacturing jobs. In fact, the "Manufacturing" category is four times larger (12M vs 4M) in terms of employment than "Information." The primary interests of people working in manufacturing are higher pay and better working conditions. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/release/tables?rid=50&eid=4881#snid=4900 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/release/tables?rid=50&eid=4881#s...
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  right, but what i am missing is the connection to ‘more machinist jobs’. unions pretty much necessarily trade off number of jobs with average pay for that job, it’s the whole name of the game to restrict entry and wage negotiation.
os2warpman 2y ago
Every single country on earth, except China, that has a more robust and profitable machine tool sector than the US has unions strong enough to make a social media libertarian shit their pants. Indeed, the three countries listed in the report as being better than the US all have EXTREMELY strong machinist/metalworking unions. Japan: JAM Italy: FIOM And Germany, with probably the most powerful union in the entire world: IGM The problem isn't unions. The problem is the parasite MBA class, shuffling memos and spreadsheets around to make it look like they're doing something.
AngryData 2y ago
Giving labor better bargaining means higher pay for employees and so they need to work less, which leaves room for more employees. Better working conditions also leads to a better and bigger pool of candidates who are interested in your work and industry. Giving labor more power also makes it far harder to offshore their work and the higher pay for everyone improves local economies and induces more local demand. Having wealthier owners doesn't help the local economy nearly as much as more prosperous labor, especially if they end up spending a bunch of that capital in investing in a foreign assets with lower labor costs, essentially throwing what could have been local economic investment into desperate foreign labor markets.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  that is just not how microecon works. raising the marginal cost of labor lessens the amount of labor hired. there is no scenario in which it leads to more people working the job. unionized labor did not make it harder to offshore - in fact it accelerated offshoring, automation, and a shift to manufacturing in the South of the country. having lower costs of goods usually benefits the economy more than more prosperous labor (not necessarily the local economy), although the net welfare increasing thing is context dependent. in competitive markets, vast majority of labor cost decreases are captured by the consumer.

InDubioProRubio 2y ago

The unions got crushed, when the sovyeet union caved in. There main negotation power was the threat of a takeover by a of a viable economical alternative. It was just a illusion though..