6 ms·

Can someone explain what "union recognition" means, concretely?

evolve2k 2mo ago
At the conceptual level, unionising is simply a group of workers gathering into a group and saying we want to negotiate as a group. Usually this is done by workers to improve conditions and to have a better say when they’ve been being ignored or worse, poorly treated. Union recognition is then the company accepting that the union exists and then agreeing to meet and engage with it. Not accepting it, is usually a crappy corporate move in an attempt to not have workers collaborating together. Lots of research shows that generally places where unions exist have better work conditions and perform better over the long term. The US has lower union involvement than in many countries.
- ericmay 2mo ago
  > Lots of research shows that generally places where unions exist have better work conditions and perform better over the long term. Do you have any non-partisan sources for this? Genuinely curious. When you say perform better what do you mean specifically? And does better work conditions include better pay or just on-site conditions or something similar?
  - dofm 2mo ago
    The non partisan source is the history of the industrial revolution itself. I am not saying that you are doing this, but I tend to find that people who think we don't need unions anymore are engaging with the status quo in the same way as people who say we don't need vaccines anymore.
    - TheTaytay 2mo ago
      I think working conditions have changed enough since then to make a request for non-biased studies a reasonable one. Most debates about unions seem to boil down to “I just know” or anecdotes. I would expect unions to fund research to show that working conditions are better in union shops, but not include the fact that some unionized shops can’t compete in a market with non union shops and might go out of business. (But have great working conditions until the last day) And vice-versa for pro industry research. Unions are adversarial, and feel necessary to people that view employment or employers through that lens. It’s possible that we can still credit unions with the status quo, but 1they have nowhere near the adoption of vaccines to make the analogy a good one. I’d rather debate “which employers/industries” need unions than debate whether they are objectively good in all circumstances.
      - inigyou 2mo ago
        Note that government labor regulations are effectively just really one big union (called the government). Where would we be without them? Smart unions are supposed to take business conditions into account. If the business is losing money, the union would recognize that and pull back a bit, because it needs to be a symbiotic relationship to last, not a parasitic one. However, businesses are rarely willing to share honest financial numbers with their unions.
        mcmcmc 2mo ago
        > Note that government labor regulations are effectively just really one big union (called the government). That’s not at all what a union is. Why else would federal workers need their own unions? The point of a union is collective bargaining power for labor. Federal workers have little to no bargaining power when budgets are set by Congress. Especially when they can’t strike.
        inigyou 2mo ago
        I can't parse this comment in relation to the context.
        mcmcmc 2mo ago
        This is what I was arguing against: > Note that government labor regulations are effectively just really one big union (called the government).
        senordevnyc 2mo ago
        They’re pointing out that calling the federal government “a big union” is inaccurate, and reasons why.
        lukeschlather 2mo ago
        It's accurate. The constitution of the United States explicitly describes it as a union in the preamble.
    - j16sdiz 2mo ago
      We have gone a long way since industrial revolution. e.g. Child labor now outlawed. There is a minimum wage. (You can argue it is still way to low, but going from zero to some is a huge change) Some OSHA rules mandate employer provide safety equipment.
      - inigyou 2mo ago
        What you described is the result of the government acting as one big, but very conservative, union.
      - unknownfuture 2mo ago
        Literally demonstrating the point in dofm's second paragraph right here...
        dofm 2mo ago
        Thank you. Almost all of the US discourse around unions seems to involve accepting the literally cartoonish framing that the US corporate right managed to force into popular culture. The fact that union culture in the USA is broken is not a problem with the idea of unions. It's a problem with the USA.
        unknownfuture 2mo ago
        Honestly it's hard to blame folks. The US (and Canada, where I'm from) has seen a 40+ year concerted effort to destroy unions and the propaganda runs deep. There's been a long-running cultural project to depict unions as purely lazy, corrupt, and self-dealing. That same project also involved demonizing social safety nets ("welfare queen") and public projects more broadly using the exact same rhetoric: some people might cheat so we must tear these systems down. It's a language that directs the anger of the aggrieved away from those in power toward those who are powerless, and for nearly a half a century it's been wildly successful.
      - dofm 2mo ago
        > Child labor now outlawed. For now. Many US states are currently trying to roll back these laws though, aren't they? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/22/child-labor-protections-republicans https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/22/child-labor-... https://www.justiceatwork.com/how-are-child-labor-laws-changing/ https://www.justiceatwork.com/how-are-child-labor-laws-chang... https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/why-several-states-are-pushing-to-loosen-child-labor-restrictions https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/why-several-states-are-pus...
    - ericmay 2mo ago
      > The non partisan source is the history of the industrial revolution itself. I think that’s less of a factor of unions existing themselves and more so the public realizing the need for stronger labor laws. Though certainly unions were advocating for stronger labor laws (as they should have been). > I am not saying that you are doing this, but I tend to find that people who think we don't need unions anymore are engaging with the status quo in the same way as people who say we don't need vaccines anymore. I wouldn’t think that, because that doesn’t make sense. Vaccines are a clear public good. Unions can be but aren’t necessarily. Or should I bring up public unions like police unions? I don’t have a strong position on unions. I don’t care too much one way or the other. Folks should be able to freely organize, business should be able to freely fire. But I think the OP’s claims need more substance. If you look at “performance” well none of the Mag 7 have unions, all have insanely high pay, and great benefits to boot. Would it be better under a union? Perhaps. Perhaps not.
      - dofm 2mo ago
        > I think that’s less of a factor of unions existing themselves and more so the public realizing the need for stronger labor laws. Though certainly unions were advocating for stronger labor laws (as they should have been). > […] > I wouldn’t think that, because that doesn’t make sense. Then you don't really know history.
        ericmay 2mo ago
        I know history better than you do, generally speaking. You cherry-picked the wrong comment. Vaccines and vaccine adoption has nothing to do with unions nor are they even remotely comparable.
        dofm 2mo ago
        I literally did not say that vaccine and vaccine adoption has anything to do with unions. Why would you ever think I did? It's an analogy. (Though as it goes, I suspect vaccine rollout and universal healthcare does, in fact, owe some of its ability to function to the products of the organised labour movement; national, universal healthcare in the UK literally sprang from the first Labour government) If you can't understand why I am comparing anti-union with anti-vax, then I think you don't really understand the point I am making about history, or about culture.
  - bix6 2mo ago
    https://www.nber.org/digest/202508/unpacking-union-wage-premium https://www.nber.org/digest/202508/unpacking-union-wage-prem... They earn more and are more productive. Here is one Canadian study but I’m sure you can find more if you’re interested.
    - ericmay 2mo ago
      Thanks for sharing. I’ll take a look!
- matchbok3 2mo ago
  [flagged]
  - kelvinjps10 2mo ago
    Is not what happened? WWU announced on 28 July that they would file for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board. The announcement also accused the Wikimedia Foundation of being disingenuous in their public communications: Also on the communication by wales he says he wasn’t happy with the election because people knew who voted for, but he didn’t deny there was some kinda of election?
  - hamper653 2mo ago
    > Wikimedia Foundation is asking for an election to ensure everyone actually wants this. Why? Does recognition entail that every worker is compelled to join the union?
    - jacobgkau 2mo ago
      My dad worked for the United States Postal Service for decades. He never joined the union, but he was still legally required to pay union dues, and the union was still legally required to represent him. So at least in some cases, yes, starting a union does affect all employees and practically requires them to "join" even if there's an option to not join on paper.
      - inigyou 2mo ago
        Wouldn't it be better to join so that you can have a vote in the union operations, including to disband it?
  - nekusar 2mo ago
    > This is incorrect. Voluntary recognition, which is what this article is about, means that an election is not done. Wikimedia Foundation is asking for an election to ensure everyone actually wants this. Misinformation. Voluntary recognition just means that there isn't a 120 hard fight against union elections to decide if there CAN BE a union. Dark Horse comics just voluntarily acknowledged their union. After that is union elections, to decide who the union elected is.
- hamper653 2mo ago
  Is union recognition legally required to, say, organise a strike? Do workers who participate in a strike organised by a non-recognised union expose themselves to getting fired?
  - jordanb 2mo ago
    When strikes are legal is really complicated and depends on industry. The thing to understand is that labor law in the US was created to "reduce labor strife." Unions existed before they were recognized as legal. What labor law tries to do is make an orderly process with the goal is no strikes and a mutually agreed-on contract. The company recognizing the union is the first step towards a contract. Basically it's saying "I understand this organization represents these employees and I should negotiate with it."
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      This reminds me of the German approach to street marches. They are allowed, must be registered with the police, and the police will ensure there are several policemen around for each protestor just in case any of them "try anything". The police form a box around the protest, restricting it from going anywhere not approved and restricting people from seeing the signs; they also blare their sirens so that the chants can't be heard outside the box. The cost of all this is, of course, billed to the protest organiser. So as you can see, they have incredible free speech! They allow just anyone to carry out a street march!
      - dgellow 2mo ago
        As someone living in Germany, what you're saying is not true. It is correct that protests have to be registered, that's the case for pretty much all developed countries. It is also correct that the organizers are responsible to cover costs. But the police doesn't restrict people from seeing signs, doesn't blare their sirens. They mostly stay on the side while handling the traffic, and intervene if the protest becomes chaotic. In the vast majority of protests they do literally nothing other than being present. Compared to the US where multiple protesters have been killed on video by ICE this year Germany is a dream of free speech
- zetanor 2mo ago
  The conceptual level breaks down in places where an open shop is illegal or disincentivized, which I suspect is the case in California where the Wikimedia Foundation is based. Europe usually has open shops, not closed shops, for example.
  - cool_dude85 2mo ago
    No, it doesn't. There is no such thing as an "open shop" in the US, even under right to freeload. Union membership is determined by job classification. If you are working in a unionized environment, and your job title is a union job title, you are in the union. You will be covered by the contract your union bargains with the employer. The only question, then, is whether you pay the dues to cover the costs of union membership. In a right to freeload state, you can choose not to pay the costs.
    - wildfireday2 2mo ago
      You both have it mostly backwards. The Taft-Hartley act mostly bans closed shops and allows states to pass “right to work” laws making payment of any agency fees to unions optional. In no state are any employees compelled to formally join a union. In an American-style “closed shops” in a non-right-to-work state, if you don’t join the union the bargaining agreement can charge nonmembers an agency fee representing most of the dues they would pay as members. Not to mention pressure tactics to join. Also especially in the trades in major markets unions control apprenticeship programs and hiring halls and make it virtually impossible for nonmembers to get union work, as well as gatekeeping access to apprenticeship programs in the first place.
      - cool_dude85 2mo ago
        Right to freeload laws work as I describe. Although no employees are forced to "join a union" in the sense of signing a piece of paper joining the union, in all cases they are union employees in practice. That is, the union collectively bargains their working conditions, the union supports them via grievance if the employer doesn't follow the contract, and so on. The right to freeload allows for such a person to get by without paying dues - that is, the cost of providing these collective bargaining and legal representation services.
- amazingamazing 2mo ago
  There is no evidence of unions performing better for digital services at all. Unions do make sense when physical labor and danger is involved because the demands of leadership contradict realities of human physiology like getting tired, leading to injury or death.
  - acdha 2mo ago
    “No evidence” or “I haven’t looked for evidence”? Unions do more than just keeping people from dying in mining accidents — for example, I read this yesterday with what sure looks to be concrete benefits for the workers: https://www.propublicaguild.org/updates/propublica-guild-ratifies-first-contract https://www.propublicaguild.org/updates/propublica-guild-rat...
    - amazingamazing 2mo ago
      This isn’t impressive. 13% over 4 years? In any case this can’t be evaluated without knowing what was initially offered pre union and what they initially asked for.
      - acdha 2mo ago
        Can you show the research you did before declaring there is no evidence of better performance? For example, how does the ProPublica contract compare to the industry trend?
  - dgellow 2mo ago
    > Unions do make sense when physical labor and danger is involved because the demands of leadership contradict realities of human physiology like getting tired, leading to injury or death. You mean, like actors? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAG-AFTRA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAG-AFTRA Or teachers? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Education_Association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Education_Association Or service employees? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_Employees_International_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_Employees_Internationa...
  - 2mo ago
deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]
matchbok3 2mo ago
[flagged]
- fn-mote 2mo ago
  1. Mention some concrete facts. Or at least assert some claim. 2. Given the very low rate of unionization in the USA, I think the issue you need to be most concerned about is no-benefit gig work instead of a huge wave of unionization.
- Waterluvian 2mo ago
  If you are capable of adding any substance to your various comments, you need to do so. Otherwise you’re just strengthening the view of the opposite as your comments read like someone is desparate to manipulate public opinion.
Macha 2mo ago
At the very minimum, the company acknowledges the union and negotiates with the union for working conditions for union members. It’s quite common that that also extends to negotiation on salary bands, and it’s also quite common the company then applies the same salary bands to non union employees also, rather than the norm in tech of individual negotiation. Many people think they’re in the group that is negotiating outlier salaries and would lose from this. However, many people with that viewpoint are also wrong about their position in the salary scale. Sometimes this extends to promotion criteria and some unions push for tenure or seniority based promotions. This may or may not be better than your individual companies specific combination of merit, nepotism, the political clout of your managers and the business criticality of your department. One thing that happens in the US that is illegal here is some companies agree to becoming a union shop and make joining the union compulsory.
- nekusar 2mo ago
  > At the very minimum, the company acknowledges the union and negotiates with the union for working conditions for union members. By federal law, if a company has a union, the union must represent ALL non-management workers, even those who do not pay dues. This is obviously fucked up. But this has been union law at the NLRB for a long time. The fair response: a union should only legally be responsible for representing its members. But these sorts of terrible union laws are the consequence of attempting to destroy them since their creation. And for those of you who think unions are terrible (capitalists and ilk), what we had before was 'firebomb the business or the bosses house', and basically waging war between capitalists and labor. Unions and legal representation WAS the compromise. Labor history has always been a bloody and murderous affair. Go look up the history of the pinkertons.
  - inigyou 2mo ago
    The problem there is that if it doesn't represent everyone, the company will simply give better conditions to nonmembers to pressure members to quit their membership. You do still have a way to change the union even if it's involuntarily representing you: just join it and then vote to disband it.
  - 2mo ago
derektank 2mo ago
“Union recognition” means the employer acknowledges that the union is the bargaining representative for a subset of employees within the organization. This comes with additional legal duties on the part of the employer, such as exclusively bargaining with the union and not attempting to negotiate directly with individuals the union represents.

At the conceptual level, unionising is simply a group of workers gathering into a group and saying we want to negotiate as a group. Usually this is done by workers to improve conditions and to have a better say when they’ve been being ignored or worse, poorly treated. Union recognition is then the company accepting that the union exists and then agreeing to meet and engage with it. Not accepting it, is usually a crappy corporate move in an attempt to not have workers collaborating together. Lots of research shows that generally places where unions exist have better work conditions and perform better over the long term. The US has lower union involvement than in many countries.

ericmay 2mo ago
> Lots of research shows that generally places where unions exist have better work conditions and perform better over the long term. Do you have any non-partisan sources for this? Genuinely curious. When you say perform better what do you mean specifically? And does better work conditions include better pay or just on-site conditions or something similar?
- dofm 2mo ago
  The non partisan source is the history of the industrial revolution itself. I am not saying that you are doing this, but I tend to find that people who think we don't need unions anymore are engaging with the status quo in the same way as people who say we don't need vaccines anymore.
  - TheTaytay 2mo ago
    I think working conditions have changed enough since then to make a request for non-biased studies a reasonable one. Most debates about unions seem to boil down to “I just know” or anecdotes. I would expect unions to fund research to show that working conditions are better in union shops, but not include the fact that some unionized shops can’t compete in a market with non union shops and might go out of business. (But have great working conditions until the last day) And vice-versa for pro industry research. Unions are adversarial, and feel necessary to people that view employment or employers through that lens. It’s possible that we can still credit unions with the status quo, but 1they have nowhere near the adoption of vaccines to make the analogy a good one. I’d rather debate “which employers/industries” need unions than debate whether they are objectively good in all circumstances.
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      Note that government labor regulations are effectively just really one big union (called the government). Where would we be without them? Smart unions are supposed to take business conditions into account. If the business is losing money, the union would recognize that and pull back a bit, because it needs to be a symbiotic relationship to last, not a parasitic one. However, businesses are rarely willing to share honest financial numbers with their unions.
      - mcmcmc 2mo ago
        > Note that government labor regulations are effectively just really one big union (called the government). That’s not at all what a union is. Why else would federal workers need their own unions? The point of a union is collective bargaining power for labor. Federal workers have little to no bargaining power when budgets are set by Congress. Especially when they can’t strike.
        inigyou 2mo ago
        I can't parse this comment in relation to the context.
        mcmcmc 2mo ago
        This is what I was arguing against: > Note that government labor regulations are effectively just really one big union (called the government).
        senordevnyc 2mo ago
        They’re pointing out that calling the federal government “a big union” is inaccurate, and reasons why.
        lukeschlather 2mo ago
        It's accurate. The constitution of the United States explicitly describes it as a union in the preamble.
  - j16sdiz 2mo ago
    We have gone a long way since industrial revolution. e.g. Child labor now outlawed. There is a minimum wage. (You can argue it is still way to low, but going from zero to some is a huge change) Some OSHA rules mandate employer provide safety equipment.
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      What you described is the result of the government acting as one big, but very conservative, union.
    - unknownfuture 2mo ago
      Literally demonstrating the point in dofm's second paragraph right here...
      - dofm 2mo ago
        Thank you. Almost all of the US discourse around unions seems to involve accepting the literally cartoonish framing that the US corporate right managed to force into popular culture. The fact that union culture in the USA is broken is not a problem with the idea of unions. It's a problem with the USA.
        unknownfuture 2mo ago
        Honestly it's hard to blame folks. The US (and Canada, where I'm from) has seen a 40+ year concerted effort to destroy unions and the propaganda runs deep. There's been a long-running cultural project to depict unions as purely lazy, corrupt, and self-dealing. That same project also involved demonizing social safety nets ("welfare queen") and public projects more broadly using the exact same rhetoric: some people might cheat so we must tear these systems down. It's a language that directs the anger of the aggrieved away from those in power toward those who are powerless, and for nearly a half a century it's been wildly successful.
    - dofm 2mo ago
      > Child labor now outlawed. For now. Many US states are currently trying to roll back these laws though, aren't they? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/22/child-labor-protections-republicans https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/22/child-labor-... https://www.justiceatwork.com/how-are-child-labor-laws-changing/ https://www.justiceatwork.com/how-are-child-labor-laws-chang... https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/why-several-states-are-pushing-to-loosen-child-labor-restrictions https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/why-several-states-are-pus...
  - ericmay 2mo ago
    > The non partisan source is the history of the industrial revolution itself. I think that’s less of a factor of unions existing themselves and more so the public realizing the need for stronger labor laws. Though certainly unions were advocating for stronger labor laws (as they should have been). > I am not saying that you are doing this, but I tend to find that people who think we don't need unions anymore are engaging with the status quo in the same way as people who say we don't need vaccines anymore. I wouldn’t think that, because that doesn’t make sense. Vaccines are a clear public good. Unions can be but aren’t necessarily. Or should I bring up public unions like police unions? I don’t have a strong position on unions. I don’t care too much one way or the other. Folks should be able to freely organize, business should be able to freely fire. But I think the OP’s claims need more substance. If you look at “performance” well none of the Mag 7 have unions, all have insanely high pay, and great benefits to boot. Would it be better under a union? Perhaps. Perhaps not.
    - dofm 2mo ago
      > I think that’s less of a factor of unions existing themselves and more so the public realizing the need for stronger labor laws. Though certainly unions were advocating for stronger labor laws (as they should have been). > […] > I wouldn’t think that, because that doesn’t make sense. Then you don't really know history.
      - ericmay 2mo ago
        I know history better than you do, generally speaking. You cherry-picked the wrong comment. Vaccines and vaccine adoption has nothing to do with unions nor are they even remotely comparable.
        dofm 2mo ago
        I literally did not say that vaccine and vaccine adoption has anything to do with unions. Why would you ever think I did? It's an analogy. (Though as it goes, I suspect vaccine rollout and universal healthcare does, in fact, owe some of its ability to function to the products of the organised labour movement; national, universal healthcare in the UK literally sprang from the first Labour government) If you can't understand why I am comparing anti-union with anti-vax, then I think you don't really understand the point I am making about history, or about culture.
- bix6 2mo ago
  https://www.nber.org/digest/202508/unpacking-union-wage-premium https://www.nber.org/digest/202508/unpacking-union-wage-prem... They earn more and are more productive. Here is one Canadian study but I’m sure you can find more if you’re interested.
  - ericmay 2mo ago
    Thanks for sharing. I’ll take a look!
matchbok3 2mo ago
[flagged]
- kelvinjps10 2mo ago
  Is not what happened? WWU announced on 28 July that they would file for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board. The announcement also accused the Wikimedia Foundation of being disingenuous in their public communications: Also on the communication by wales he says he wasn’t happy with the election because people knew who voted for, but he didn’t deny there was some kinda of election?
- hamper653 2mo ago
  > Wikimedia Foundation is asking for an election to ensure everyone actually wants this. Why? Does recognition entail that every worker is compelled to join the union?
  - jacobgkau 2mo ago
    My dad worked for the United States Postal Service for decades. He never joined the union, but he was still legally required to pay union dues, and the union was still legally required to represent him. So at least in some cases, yes, starting a union does affect all employees and practically requires them to "join" even if there's an option to not join on paper.
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      Wouldn't it be better to join so that you can have a vote in the union operations, including to disband it?
- nekusar 2mo ago
  > This is incorrect. Voluntary recognition, which is what this article is about, means that an election is not done. Wikimedia Foundation is asking for an election to ensure everyone actually wants this. Misinformation. Voluntary recognition just means that there isn't a 120 hard fight against union elections to decide if there CAN BE a union. Dark Horse comics just voluntarily acknowledged their union. After that is union elections, to decide who the union elected is.
hamper653 2mo ago
Is union recognition legally required to, say, organise a strike? Do workers who participate in a strike organised by a non-recognised union expose themselves to getting fired?
- jordanb 2mo ago
  When strikes are legal is really complicated and depends on industry. The thing to understand is that labor law in the US was created to "reduce labor strife." Unions existed before they were recognized as legal. What labor law tries to do is make an orderly process with the goal is no strikes and a mutually agreed-on contract. The company recognizing the union is the first step towards a contract. Basically it's saying "I understand this organization represents these employees and I should negotiate with it."
  - inigyou 2mo ago
    This reminds me of the German approach to street marches. They are allowed, must be registered with the police, and the police will ensure there are several policemen around for each protestor just in case any of them "try anything". The police form a box around the protest, restricting it from going anywhere not approved and restricting people from seeing the signs; they also blare their sirens so that the chants can't be heard outside the box. The cost of all this is, of course, billed to the protest organiser. So as you can see, they have incredible free speech! They allow just anyone to carry out a street march!
    - dgellow 2mo ago
      As someone living in Germany, what you're saying is not true. It is correct that protests have to be registered, that's the case for pretty much all developed countries. It is also correct that the organizers are responsible to cover costs. But the police doesn't restrict people from seeing signs, doesn't blare their sirens. They mostly stay on the side while handling the traffic, and intervene if the protest becomes chaotic. In the vast majority of protests they do literally nothing other than being present. Compared to the US where multiple protesters have been killed on video by ICE this year Germany is a dream of free speech
zetanor 2mo ago
The conceptual level breaks down in places where an open shop is illegal or disincentivized, which I suspect is the case in California where the Wikimedia Foundation is based. Europe usually has open shops, not closed shops, for example.
- cool_dude85 2mo ago
  No, it doesn't. There is no such thing as an "open shop" in the US, even under right to freeload. Union membership is determined by job classification. If you are working in a unionized environment, and your job title is a union job title, you are in the union. You will be covered by the contract your union bargains with the employer. The only question, then, is whether you pay the dues to cover the costs of union membership. In a right to freeload state, you can choose not to pay the costs.
  - wildfireday2 2mo ago
    You both have it mostly backwards. The Taft-Hartley act mostly bans closed shops and allows states to pass “right to work” laws making payment of any agency fees to unions optional. In no state are any employees compelled to formally join a union. In an American-style “closed shops” in a non-right-to-work state, if you don’t join the union the bargaining agreement can charge nonmembers an agency fee representing most of the dues they would pay as members. Not to mention pressure tactics to join. Also especially in the trades in major markets unions control apprenticeship programs and hiring halls and make it virtually impossible for nonmembers to get union work, as well as gatekeeping access to apprenticeship programs in the first place.
    - cool_dude85 2mo ago
      Right to freeload laws work as I describe. Although no employees are forced to "join a union" in the sense of signing a piece of paper joining the union, in all cases they are union employees in practice. That is, the union collectively bargains their working conditions, the union supports them via grievance if the employer doesn't follow the contract, and so on. The right to freeload allows for such a person to get by without paying dues - that is, the cost of providing these collective bargaining and legal representation services.
amazingamazing 2mo ago
There is no evidence of unions performing better for digital services at all. Unions do make sense when physical labor and danger is involved because the demands of leadership contradict realities of human physiology like getting tired, leading to injury or death.
- acdha 2mo ago
  “No evidence” or “I haven’t looked for evidence”? Unions do more than just keeping people from dying in mining accidents — for example, I read this yesterday with what sure looks to be concrete benefits for the workers: https://www.propublicaguild.org/updates/propublica-guild-ratifies-first-contract https://www.propublicaguild.org/updates/propublica-guild-rat...
  - amazingamazing 2mo ago
    This isn’t impressive. 13% over 4 years? In any case this can’t be evaluated without knowing what was initially offered pre union and what they initially asked for.
    - acdha 2mo ago
      Can you show the research you did before declaring there is no evidence of better performance? For example, how does the ProPublica contract compare to the industry trend?
- dgellow 2mo ago
  > Unions do make sense when physical labor and danger is involved because the demands of leadership contradict realities of human physiology like getting tired, leading to injury or death. You mean, like actors? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAG-AFTRA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAG-AFTRA Or teachers? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Education_Association https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Education_Association Or service employees? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_Employees_International_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_Employees_Internationa...
- 2mo ago

deleted 2mo ago

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matchbok3 2mo ago

[flagged]

fn-mote 2mo ago
1. Mention some concrete facts. Or at least assert some claim. 2. Given the very low rate of unionization in the USA, I think the issue you need to be most concerned about is no-benefit gig work instead of a huge wave of unionization.
Waterluvian 2mo ago
If you are capable of adding any substance to your various comments, you need to do so. Otherwise you’re just strengthening the view of the opposite as your comments read like someone is desparate to manipulate public opinion.

Macha 2mo ago

At the very minimum, the company acknowledges the union and negotiates with the union for working conditions for union members. It’s quite common that that also extends to negotiation on salary bands, and it’s also quite common the company then applies the same salary bands to non union employees also, rather than the norm in tech of individual negotiation. Many people think they’re in the group that is negotiating outlier salaries and would lose from this. However, many people with that viewpoint are also wrong about their position in the salary scale. Sometimes this extends to promotion criteria and some unions push for tenure or seniority based promotions. This may or may not be better than your individual companies specific combination of merit, nepotism, the political clout of your managers and the business criticality of your department. One thing that happens in the US that is illegal here is some companies agree to becoming a union shop and make joining the union compulsory.

nekusar 2mo ago
> At the very minimum, the company acknowledges the union and negotiates with the union for working conditions for union members. By federal law, if a company has a union, the union must represent ALL non-management workers, even those who do not pay dues. This is obviously fucked up. But this has been union law at the NLRB for a long time. The fair response: a union should only legally be responsible for representing its members. But these sorts of terrible union laws are the consequence of attempting to destroy them since their creation. And for those of you who think unions are terrible (capitalists and ilk), what we had before was 'firebomb the business or the bosses house', and basically waging war between capitalists and labor. Unions and legal representation WAS the compromise. Labor history has always been a bloody and murderous affair. Go look up the history of the pinkertons.
- inigyou 2mo ago
  The problem there is that if it doesn't represent everyone, the company will simply give better conditions to nonmembers to pressure members to quit their membership. You do still have a way to change the union even if it's involuntarily representing you: just join it and then vote to disband it.
- 2mo ago

derektank 2mo ago

“Union recognition” means the employer acknowledges that the union is the bargaining representative for a subset of employees within the organization. This comes with additional legal duties on the part of the employer, such as exclusively bargaining with the union and not attempting to negotiate directly with individuals the union represents.