
In Historic Move, Harvard Teaching and Research Assistants Vote to Unionize - Mononokay
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/4/21/union-vote-results/
======
forapurpose
Why don't the non-tenured (and non-tenure track) faculty unionize? They seem
like more obvious candidates: Terrible pay, no job security, and a smart,
highly educated group of people. They have nothing to lose but their crappy
jobs. I'm sure they can see it as well as I can; can someone here shed light
on it?

I would guess that they didn't historically unionize because they were a much
smaller group - a higher proportion of faculty had tenure and thus job
security. Also, I wonder if they were better paid before universities in the
U.S. became focused on money as their primary mission (income; expenses;
patents; spin-offs; research grants; tuition; and of course the whole purpose
of education became future salary, not trivial things like knowledge,
understanding, thought, and the welfare of civilization).

~~~
dragonwriter
> Why don't the non-tenured (and non-tenure track) faculty unionize?

They do; traditional higher education unions like AFT have organized wall-to-
wall (single faculty unions encompassing adjuncts and tenure-track faculty) in
public institutions, while unions centered outside the higher education space
(notably, SEIU) have organized adjunct-only unions in a number of private
insitutions (the Supreme Court ruled in 1980 that private institution full-
time faculty are managerial and thus do not have collective bargaining rights
in US law, which is why wall-to-wall only happens in public institutions.)

------
rrivers
Professor Roberto Unger (Harvard) often talks about the current restlessness
of the masses in his political philosophy of the paradigm of Progressive
Politics courses. Something that through listening to his lecturers over the
last few years I strongly agree with. Mainly that people at this moment in
time are yearning for a reimagining of what the human experience is, and the
solution is a progressive political campaign reimagining our entire
institutions.

We see the same restlessness in the national Primary Education teacher
strikes. Is it possible that the academics are the beginning of a more
substantial wave of worker rights and protections as we enter the new
Knowledge Economy?

Edited to add website:
[http://www.robertounger.com/en/](http://www.robertounger.com/en/)

~~~
aldoushuxley001
What is the Knowledge Economy anyway? I hear people talk of it every now and
then but don't understand what it actually is.

~~~
cocacola1
According to Wikipedia:

> The knowledge economy is the use of knowledge (savoir, savoir-faire, savoir-
> être) to generate tangible and intangible values[1]. Technology, and in
> particular, knowledge technology, helps to incorporate part of human
> knowledge into machines[2]. This knowledge can be used by decision support
> systems in various fields to generate economic value. Knowledge economy is
> also possible without technology.[3]

~~~
staticautomatic
Is it just me or is that pure jibberish?

~~~
blackbagboys
What is programming other than a way of embedding human knowledge into
machines in order to generate value?

------
madengr
So where the hell does the $46k/year tuition go?

~~~
Spooky23
There are big shots to be paid and investment managers whose children need to
eat. They only have a $40B endowment.

~~~
closeparen
Endowment interest is 36% of Harvard's operating budget, while students are
21%:
[https://finance.harvard.edu/files/fad/files/harvard_ar_11_12...](https://finance.harvard.edu/files/fad/files/harvard_ar_11_12016_final.pdf)

------
pmoriarty
It's good to see prestigious universities leading for a change, instead of
being one of the most socially conservative institutions in so many ways.

~~~
alexbeloi
Graduate students unionizing is the norm in public universities. As the
article points out, it's only recently (2016) that the NLRB ruled that
graduate students at private universities are to be considered employees,
which opened the door for students to vote whether they wanted to unionize,
prior to this they had no legal standing to even consider unionization.

[0][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graduate_student_employee_unio...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graduate_student_employee_unionization)

------
CryptoPunk
I can't imagine this not impacting the impartiality of staff when teaching
subjects related to labor unions, like Economics.

~~~
eesmith
Is there any thing you can think of which would _not_ impact your need for
impartial staff?

Because I think your comment is a "damned any way" viewpoint.

If they voted to _not_ unionize, then it could still affect the teaching of
subjects related to labor unions. Eg, "Why are a bunch of anti-union people
teaching business courses? Aren't they just going to train the next generation
of managers to hate unions?"

If they never considered unionization, then that too might be seen as a bias,
either directly by the TAs/RAs, or a selection bias by Harvard in how they
pick their TAs/RAs.

~~~
CryptoPunk
Labor unions depend on laws that inhibit the contract freedom of employers for
the above-market wages they fetch their members.

They're rent-seeking organizations where the benefits concentrate to their
members, while their costs diffuse widely across the general population.

For these reasons, I suspect being a part of a union is a significantly larger
source of bias than not being part of one, and that's roughly what Public
Choice Theory on special interests would predict.

~~~
hekfu
> Labor unions depend on laws that inhibit the contract freedom of employers
> for the above-market wages they fetch their members.

> They're rent-seeking organizations where the benefits concentrate to their
> members, while their costs diffuse widely across the general population.

> For these reasons, I suspect being a part of a union is a significantly
> larger source of bias than not being part of one, and that's roughly what
> Public Choice Theory on special interests would predict.

Imagine this: the labourers instead form a company, each holding a number of
shares, taking what you call market wages for whatever they are doing. They
create a new position inside this company, let's call it union ltd., to
negotiate a contract between the university and union ltd. Union for the
services the members provide. Any surplus the union negotiates is distributed
via dividends on the shares.

Is this now differen to what you describe? Or different to any outsourcing
company? Unions are nothing more, nothing less than a negotiation,i.e.
business tactic, just like we use outsourcing as a business tactic

~~~
CryptoPunk
You're deeply mistaken. Unions would be immediately fired if they were
operating in a free market. Their power depends entirely on laws that restrict
the contracting freedom of the employer.

For instance, the law prohibits an employer from firing workers for
unionizing, or firing unionized workers for striking.

It forces employers to engage in collective bargaining when a union forms and
demands it. This mandate to collectively bargain includes a prohibition on the
employer negotiating individually with employees that would prefer individual
negotiations.

It is due to these laws that union members get above market wages.

~~~
eesmith
Going back to my original comment, I think it's clear that if the TAs felt
like you do, then there would be a clear bias towards anti-unionism at
Harvard, and we would have to distrust their ability to be impartial.

As regards your followup, you are only looking at 1/2 of the picture.

Yes, there are restrictions on what an employer can do, eg, prohibitions
against firing a worker for unionizing.

On the other hand, since the Taft-Hartley Act, _unions_ are prohibited from
"jurisdictional strikes, wildcat strikes, solidarity or political strikes,
secondary boycotts, secondary and mass picketing, closed shops, and monetary
donations by unions to federal political campaigns." (Quoting Wikipedia.)

The idea is to remove so-called "unfair labor practices" from both the
employer and the union. So you can't just point to the restrictions on
employers and stop there.

Your statement "Unions would be immediately fired if they were operating in a
free market." is contrary to the historical evidence.

We know that unions exist in a free market and with no laws to support them
because history gives clear examples. It wasn't until Commonwealth v. Hunt in
1842 that unions in the US were determined to be legal in the first place.
Previously people who tried to use their collective bargaining power were
sometimes prosecuted for criminal conspiracy.

Under your free market hypothesis, how did these early unions exist without
laws to back them up?

It's because collective bargaining can be effective even without legal
enforcement. Quoting from the Wikipedia page on Commonwealth v. Hunt: '"Wait,
Horne’s master, testified that "he did not feel at liberty to employ any but
society men," because he "would not wish to lose five or six good workmen for
the sake of one."' No law force him to accept the union.

Your last line is "It is due to these laws that union members get above market
wages."

That's neither here nor there. We are far from a free market, in regards to
employment, and we don't know what the free market rate would be if both
employers and unions were unconstrained in what they could do.

Moreover, people in unions may accept lower rates than those not in a union.
Some people would rather have the stability of a long-term job that is not
affected by one's ability to kiss up to the boss, and accept the trade-off of
having a lower salary for that stability.

We also know that companies engage in collusion to lower salaries. See the
settlement a few years ago where Apple, Google and several other Silicon
Valley companies allegedly "illegally conspired to prevent their workers from
getting better job offers." (Quoting
[https://phys.org/news/2015-09-415m-settlement-apple-
google-w...](https://phys.org/news/2015-09-415m-settlement-apple-google-
wage.html) )

If you really believe in a free market, then it seems you think that group of
employers should be able to work together collectively to lower employee
wages, yes? If employers can act collectively, then why shouldn't employees
act collectively?

~~~
CryptoPunk
>>Going back to my original comment, I think it's clear that if the TAs felt
like you do, then there would be a clear bias towards anti-unionism at
Harvard, and we would have to distrust their ability to be impartial.

I don't understand what you mean. How do I feel?

>>The idea is to remove so-called "unfair labor practices" from both the
employer and the union. So you can't just point to the restrictions on
employers and stop there.

The laws overwhelmingly benefit unions. If there were a free market, employers
would be much better off.

>>We know that unions exist in a free market and with no laws to support them
because history gives clear examples.

That wasn't a free market either. The threat of violence and property damage
was what compelled companies to negotiate.

And it was only with the passing of laws restricting employers' right to
contract and violating their private property rights that unionization rates
began to become substantial, and unions began gaining major benefits for their
members.

>>Moreover, people in unions may accept lower rates than those not in a union.
Some people would rather have the stability of a long-term job that is not
affected by one's ability to kiss up to the boss, and accept the trade-off of
having a lower salary for that stability.

We can quantify the market value of job security as well. It has a cost for
the employer after all.

The point is that unions result in their members getting benefits/salary that
has above-market value.

>>We also know that companies engage in collusion to lower salaries. See the
settlement a few years ago where Apple, Google and several other Silicon
Valley companies allegedly "illegally conspired to prevent their workers from
getting better job offers."

It's pretty rare, and even that case was not an ironclad agreement preventing
all competition between these firms for workers.

Moreover there are other solutions to this kind of collusion than laws that
effectively rob all employers of their property, by creating rules that usurp
their control over it for the benefit of unions.

>>If employers can act collectively, then why shouldn't employees act
collectively?

They should do anything that advances their interests, including acting
collectively, except when it involves advocating for laws and other coercive
measures that violate other people's right to freely contract.

If their unions can survive in a free market without such laws, and without
utilizing extra-judicial threats of violence, they have every reason to use
them.

~~~
eesmith
It's clear that you are anti-union.

Under your earlier guidelines, if you were a TA at a business course in
Harvard, I would not be able to trust that you would give an impartial
treatment of labor rights.

"The threat of violence and property damage was what compelled companies to
negotiate."

It's like you didn't even read the Wikipedia page for Commonwealth v. Hunt.

In that court case - the one which established the legal right for unions in
the US - where was the threat of violence and property damage?

Based on my reading of the MA Supreme Court judgement, there wasn't any. If
there had been, the decision would have gone the other way.

The collective bargaining power in that came from the ability of the workers
to leave Wait’s shop, and by exercising their freedom of employment, incur
economic hardship on the Wait.

Perhaps I am wrong, and you can point to how the Boston Journeymen Bootmaker’s
Society threatened violence and property damage.

But if you cannot, then your understanding of labor relations is invalid,
which should make you question about how you came to those beliefs.

Or perhaps you'll argue that your ability to sign a non-union contract with a
company means that those who have a union contract with the company are
prohibited from freely leaving their employment?

Because I can't make sense of why I can be forced to work for a company when I
want to leave it, just because you want to work there.

~~~
CryptoPunk
>>It's clear that you are anti-union.

I don't think being pro or anti-union is the issue. I think being pro or anti-
union due to ideological biases or a personal financial conflict of interest
is the issue.

That's what the TAs unionizing could result in.

If one has a normative stance on unions that is derived from impartial
analysis, that seems fine to me.

>>It's like you didn't even read the Wikipedia page for Commonwealth v. Hunt.

I was not talking about that case. I was talking about your earlier point
about unions existing before labor laws gave them legal privileges, which you
claimed proves unions can survive in a free market.

My point was that historically, in the pre-labor-law era, all of the leverage
that unions had seems to have come from the threat of violence toward
replacement workers, and company property, which intimidated employers into
negotiations.

Are you familiar with how strikes were conducted in the 19th century?

Are you familiar with the blockades, violently enforced picket lines, etc?

~~~
eesmith
As I wrote, ideological biases which result in the TAs not unionizing are also
a possible. No matter which way you view it, it's possible to cast suspicion
on their presumed impartiality.

Thus, I don't see your original comment as adding anything other than FUD.

You wrote "I was not talking about that case". However, here's the chain:

You: "Unions would be immediately fired if they were operating in a free
market. Their power depends entirely on laws that restrict the contracting
freedom of the employer."

Me: "We know that unions exist in a free market and with no laws to support
them because history gives clear examples." I specifically pointed to the
Boston Journeymen Bootmaker’s Society in Commonwealth v. Hunt as my example.

You: "I was not talking about that case"

Except you were. You made a claim that was for all unions, including craft
unions.

Now you're backing away from your claim when you realized it's indefensible.

You make that claim again with your statement "all of the leverage that unions
had seems to have come from the threat of violence toward replacement workers,
and company property, which intimidated employers into negotiations."

Again, I point to Commonwealth v. Hunt as a counter-example to your claim.
Their power comes from the collective agreement to quit en mass. The Supreme
Court of MA found no conspiracy to threaten replacement workers or destroy
company problem.

Since what you claim is clearly wrong, why do you repeat it?

Yes, certainly I know the basics of how strikes were conducted in the 19th
century. But strikes aren't the only way to exercise collective bargaining ...
as shown in Commonwealth v. Hunt where no evidence was presented to show the
boot makers were even planning to strike.

Yes, I know about blockades, violently enforced picket lines, etc.

Yes, I _also_ know about the Pinkerton Agency goon squads that the business
owners employed, which among other things lead to the Anti-Pinkerton Act. And
the "un-American" paternalism which was partially to blame for the Pullman
Strike. And the deadly strike-breaking actions of Baldwin–Felts, leading to
the Ludlow Massacre.

This is why I stressed that you were looking at only 1/2 of the picture when
you focused on government prohibitions of what an employer could do, and not
also government prohibitions on what the unions could do.

As MLK said, "a riot is the language of the unheard". Collective bargaining is
a way to be heard.

~~~
CryptoPunk
>>No matter which way you view it, it's possible to cast suspicion on their
presumed impartiality.

Of course, but there are degrees of suspicion. That's why we have standards.

>>Thus, I don't see your original comment as adding anything other than FUD.

Your comment is just trying to delegitimize valid concerns about the
corrupting influence of union privileges.

If you want to betray society by playing these manipulative games, I'm not
going to dignify the rest of your response.

~~~
eesmith
You have never mentioned what those standards might be, or how they might be
used in this case.

Instead, your comments have implicitly assumed that those standards fit your
view of the world.

As I have demonstrated multiple times, you do not have a good understanding of
unions and economics.

As for your last line, I can only shrug and say "takes one to know one."

~~~
CryptoPunk
I don't have to set a standard to make an observation that making TAs
financially invested in the success of unions could bias their teaching.

You're imposing unreasonable standards on me to try to shut down debate. It's
disingenuous.

>>As I have demonstrated multiple times, you do not have a good understanding
of unions and economics.

You support Marxism! That doesn't suggest an empirically grounded
understanding of economics.

As for what you've demonstrated, it's just been deflections from my points
about the history of unions, and the main tools they utilized to gain
leverage. I see no instance of you showing that I don't understand economics
or unions.

------
Bucephalus355
After the Civil War, all of those who were in favor of ending slavery became
the most vicious opponents of labor and unions and worker rights.

Their reasoning was that this was a form of governmental control over working
and the freedom of workers, just like slavery was.

Every time they defeated a minimum wage law, or broke a union, they
congratulated themselves for standing up for “freedom”.

Anyway, this is one of the reasons that the Republican party drifted into
conservatism slowly after the Civil War.

We are seeing something similar now, with Democrats so focused on the rights
of smaller and smaller groups, it’s starting to look like “extreme individual
rights” all over again. Will they drift towards conservatism while Republicans
do the opposite, cross-pollinating some positions between them on the way?

~~~
Kalium
> After the Civil War, all of those who were in favor of ending slavery became
> the most vicious opponents of labor and unions and worker rights.

Among other weird historical quirks, unions were at times used to keep out
people who spoke the wrong language or had the wrong color skin. Unions were
not always the reliable bastions of progressive politics they are seen as
today.

~~~
ende
Unions are only reliable bastions of progressive politics in the minds of
progressives. Your average union member resembles Doland Trump far more than
Bernie Sanders.

~~~
refurb
Absolutely. The only reason why unions typically vote Democrat is because of
their support of unions. There is very little overlap across other progressive
issues.

