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The facts cited in the article show that in "socialist" Europe, where unions are much stronger and governments bigger, mass transit is less expensive to build a

The facts cited in the article show that in "socialist" Europe, where unions are much stronger and governments bigger, mass transit is less expensive to build and more efficient to operate. How do you explain that?

robomartin 14y ago
You can't make that argument. The environments are very different. It's like trying to build a Silicon Valley somewhere outside of Silicon Valley. The environment is different. Some have tried, but it is hard or nearly impossible. Unions in the US are a cancer that is killing this country. I don't know what the solutions is. I, for one, avoid buying any products that come from unionized work forces whenever I can. Sometimes there are no choices. I have to drive on the roads as they exist, for example, but, as much as it hurts me, you will not find me buying an American car.
- danmaz74 14y ago
  The difference is that SV is one of a kind. Instead, government technical agencies and unions are almost everywhere, so making comparisons looks very fair to me. And that's not to say that unions are always "good". I for example have many misgivings about unions here in Italy, but saying that all problems come from them is just trying to find a scapegoat imho.
- ktizo 14y ago
  Union membership in the US is very very low and accounts for ~7% of the private workforce and only ~11% overall. Finland, for comparison, has ~70% union membership, and also tops the rankings for education, among other things. Convincing low waged people that the unions are in some way anti-american is just pure evil genius and took an amazing amount of chutzpa by the politicians who claim to represent them.
  - waterlesscloud 14y ago
    Consider the possibility that US unions and European unions may be different.
    - ktizo 14y ago
      They might be very different. But given that only 11% of workers are unionised, I fail to see how they can hold a lot of blame for the collapse of the US economy, which seems largely driven by a horrendous Total Debt/GDP ratio, massive regulatory capture across pretty much all sectors and blatantly fraudulent accounting in the financial sector.
      - yummyfajitas 14y ago
        ...blatantly fraudulent accounting in the financial sector. Could you explain this claim, possibly providing some citations? I'm unaware of fraud playing any significant role in the recently ended recession. Regulatory capture, maybe - the regulators certainly gave frannie/realtors/construction/homeowners whatever they wanted. A speculative bubble also played a major role. But fraud? Could you explain this claim?
        ktizo 14y ago
        Here's an article about the extent of mortgages and securitisation fraud, which the FBI characterised as an epidemic. http://rwer.wordpress.com/2012/05/26/mortgage-and-securitization-fraud-wheres-the-task-force/ http://rwer.wordpress.com/2012/05/26/mortgage-and-securitiza...
        yummyfajitas 14y ago
        The FBI characterized mortgage fraud in which banks are the victim as an epidemic, according to the only source cited by your blog post. Criminals attempting to rip off banks via schemes involving mortgages != fraudulent accounting in the financial sector.
        ericd 14y ago
  - robomartin 14y ago
    > Finland, for comparison, has ~70% union membership, and also tops the rankings for education I love how these nonsensical connections are made: "Schools are better in Finland because it has 70% union membership". Right. If only it were that simple.
    - ktizo 14y ago
      Unionism isn't responsible for the high quality of schooling in Finland, that is largely down to focusing on an egalitarian school system. Excellence was the rather nice consequence of doing this, rather than being the stated aim. The point I was making is that high union membership has not hindered this, given the results.
      - yummyfajitas 14y ago
        Finland does a really bad job of egalitarianism, certainly far worse than in the US. The gap between Finnish students and immigrants, for example, is more than twice as large as the same gap in the US. http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-about-pisa-scores-usa.html http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-abou...
  - andyakb 14y ago
    Yes, but what percent of workers in the public sector are unionized? The answer is 37%, and I would guess that their hourly pay [all compensation included] is significantly higher than their non union counterparts, and the quality of work is much lower. That is the argument being made.
    - ktizo 14y ago
      There are apparently ~120 million people employed in the US and under 8 million of them are both unionised and in the public sector. So they are doing pretty well if they are causing so much trouble, considering there really isn't all that many of them. One of the groups with the highest union membership in the public sector in the US, is the fire department. So if the argument about union members is right, then presumably the fire departments are full of some of the laziest low quality workers around, and you should be able to map union membership by the length of time that the cities are just left to burn.
- rayiner 14y ago
  [My world view doesn't stand up to factual analysis, so here is this irrelevant rant instead]
- _delirium 14y ago
  As far as I can tell, you didn't provide an argument here, merely reasserted "unions in the US are a cancer". In particular, we're looking to understand why transit construction is so much more expensive in the United States than Europe or Asia. You posit that it's due to unions. But this can't be the explanation, at least not without something more, because many of the countries with cheaper transit construction costs have stronger unions and higher levels of unionization. So your explanation doesn't have much going for it, at least as it stands. Is there some reason American unions are particularly cancerous in comparison to French, German, or Scandinavian unions, all of which are stronger than American unions? If so, what can we do to move American unions more in the direction of German unions? Perhaps strengthen labor laws and increase rates of unionization, to aim towards a more consensus-based and less adversarial framework? If I were hazarding an explanation, however, I'd guess something to do with the U.S.'s court-based regulatory framework and federalist style of government, that dumps everything into agency decisions and lawsuits, and has that all happen at multiple levels. When Denmark approved a new Copenhagen metro line, the details were negotiated for some time (including with the unions). One the plans were agreed on, the project was wrapped into a law passed through the national parliament, which authorized the construction. It was then, by statute, definitionally legal in all aspects (unless it somehow contradicted the constitution). It was impossible to sue over the construction, because the metro-construction plan was itself written into the law, superseding any laws that might otherwise conflict. By contrast, in the U.S., new metro lines have to go through a series of agencies at many levels of government (local/regional/state/federal), and can be challenged on the basis of any number of existing laws.
bearmf 14y ago
There is no comparison of labor costs in the article. I suspect a union worker in New York City makes more money than most European government employees.

robomartin 14y ago

You can't make that argument. The environments are very different. It's like trying to build a Silicon Valley somewhere outside of Silicon Valley. The environment is different. Some have tried, but it is hard or nearly impossible. Unions in the US are a cancer that is killing this country. I don't know what the solutions is. I, for one, avoid buying any products that come from unionized work forces whenever I can. Sometimes there are no choices. I have to drive on the roads as they exist, for example, but, as much as it hurts me, you will not find me buying an American car.

danmaz74 14y ago
The difference is that SV is one of a kind. Instead, government technical agencies and unions are almost everywhere, so making comparisons looks very fair to me. And that's not to say that unions are always "good". I for example have many misgivings about unions here in Italy, but saying that all problems come from them is just trying to find a scapegoat imho.
ktizo 14y ago
Union membership in the US is very very low and accounts for ~7% of the private workforce and only ~11% overall. Finland, for comparison, has ~70% union membership, and also tops the rankings for education, among other things. Convincing low waged people that the unions are in some way anti-american is just pure evil genius and took an amazing amount of chutzpa by the politicians who claim to represent them.
- waterlesscloud 14y ago
  Consider the possibility that US unions and European unions may be different.
  - ktizo 14y ago
    They might be very different. But given that only 11% of workers are unionised, I fail to see how they can hold a lot of blame for the collapse of the US economy, which seems largely driven by a horrendous Total Debt/GDP ratio, massive regulatory capture across pretty much all sectors and blatantly fraudulent accounting in the financial sector.
    - yummyfajitas 14y ago
      ...blatantly fraudulent accounting in the financial sector. Could you explain this claim, possibly providing some citations? I'm unaware of fraud playing any significant role in the recently ended recession. Regulatory capture, maybe - the regulators certainly gave frannie/realtors/construction/homeowners whatever they wanted. A speculative bubble also played a major role. But fraud? Could you explain this claim?
      - ktizo 14y ago
        Here's an article about the extent of mortgages and securitisation fraud, which the FBI characterised as an epidemic. http://rwer.wordpress.com/2012/05/26/mortgage-and-securitization-fraud-wheres-the-task-force/ http://rwer.wordpress.com/2012/05/26/mortgage-and-securitiza...
        yummyfajitas 14y ago
        The FBI characterized mortgage fraud in which banks are the victim as an epidemic, according to the only source cited by your blog post. Criminals attempting to rip off banks via schemes involving mortgages != fraudulent accounting in the financial sector.
      - ericd 14y ago
- robomartin 14y ago
  > Finland, for comparison, has ~70% union membership, and also tops the rankings for education I love how these nonsensical connections are made: "Schools are better in Finland because it has 70% union membership". Right. If only it were that simple.
  - ktizo 14y ago
    Unionism isn't responsible for the high quality of schooling in Finland, that is largely down to focusing on an egalitarian school system. Excellence was the rather nice consequence of doing this, rather than being the stated aim. The point I was making is that high union membership has not hindered this, given the results.
    - yummyfajitas 14y ago
      Finland does a really bad job of egalitarianism, certainly far worse than in the US. The gap between Finnish students and immigrants, for example, is more than twice as large as the same gap in the US. http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-about-pisa-scores-usa.html http://super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-abou...
- andyakb 14y ago
  Yes, but what percent of workers in the public sector are unionized? The answer is 37%, and I would guess that their hourly pay [all compensation included] is significantly higher than their non union counterparts, and the quality of work is much lower. That is the argument being made.
  - ktizo 14y ago
    There are apparently ~120 million people employed in the US and under 8 million of them are both unionised and in the public sector. So they are doing pretty well if they are causing so much trouble, considering there really isn't all that many of them. One of the groups with the highest union membership in the public sector in the US, is the fire department. So if the argument about union members is right, then presumably the fire departments are full of some of the laziest low quality workers around, and you should be able to map union membership by the length of time that the cities are just left to burn.
rayiner 14y ago
[My world view doesn't stand up to factual analysis, so here is this irrelevant rant instead]
_delirium 14y ago
As far as I can tell, you didn't provide an argument here, merely reasserted "unions in the US are a cancer". In particular, we're looking to understand why transit construction is so much more expensive in the United States than Europe or Asia. You posit that it's due to unions. But this can't be the explanation, at least not without something more, because many of the countries with cheaper transit construction costs have stronger unions and higher levels of unionization. So your explanation doesn't have much going for it, at least as it stands. Is there some reason American unions are particularly cancerous in comparison to French, German, or Scandinavian unions, all of which are stronger than American unions? If so, what can we do to move American unions more in the direction of German unions? Perhaps strengthen labor laws and increase rates of unionization, to aim towards a more consensus-based and less adversarial framework? If I were hazarding an explanation, however, I'd guess something to do with the U.S.'s court-based regulatory framework and federalist style of government, that dumps everything into agency decisions and lawsuits, and has that all happen at multiple levels. When Denmark approved a new Copenhagen metro line, the details were negotiated for some time (including with the unions). One the plans were agreed on, the project was wrapped into a law passed through the national parliament, which authorized the construction. It was then, by statute, definitionally legal in all aspects (unless it somehow contradicted the constitution). It was impossible to sue over the construction, because the metro-construction plan was itself written into the law, superseding any laws that might otherwise conflict. By contrast, in the U.S., new metro lines have to go through a series of agencies at many levels of government (local/regional/state/federal), and can be challenged on the basis of any number of existing laws.

bearmf 14y ago

There is no comparison of labor costs in the article. I suspect a union worker in New York City makes more money than most European government employees.