
The decline in unionization has fed the rise in incomes at the top - Tsiolkovsky
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2015/03/jaumotte.htm
======
Devthrowaway80
The wealthy in the US have successfully lobbied for "Right to Work"
legislation and have managed to pump out anti-union propaganda that is being
parroted in this thread for decades. This costs money and effort. Why do you
suppose they have done this? Out of the goodness of their hearts? Because it
benefits the individual worker? Or because it allows them to keep a larger
share of the output of the economy?

Income inequality is the highest it has been since the beginning of the
depression. Real wages have been flat for decades despite large gains in GDP.
Is that a sign that workers have excellent leverage in negotiations?

Programmers are in a privileged position right now because there aren't enough
of us to fill demand. That will not be the case forever. Look at what has
happened with law - people saw the money to be made, flooded the market, and
now a law degree doesn't really mean shit unless you're from a Big N school.
The majority of programming work is not innovative or challenging - look at
how many "I taught myself Javascript Framework 38! Look what I built" posts
that flood this site. What do you think the long-term outlook for programming
work is going to be like? Are you going to be the special snowflake ninja 10X
rockstar in 10 years? Are you going to be happy to have no collective
bargaining then?

~~~
tveita
Target shows its employees anti-union propaganda videos. It's interesting how
it presents a union as a big bad "other" that would necessarily work against
its members' interests, and to see many of the familiar arguments cast in a
ham-handed way towards retail employees. Do we also believe in the 10x retail
employee, or do we agree that retail is a sector where employees have a lot to
gain from collective bargaining?

[http://gawker.com/5811371/heres-the-cheesy-anti-union-
video-...](http://gawker.com/5811371/heres-the-cheesy-anti-union-video-all-
target-employees-must-endure)

[http://gawker.com/behold-targets-brand-new-cheesy-anti-
union...](http://gawker.com/behold-targets-brand-new-cheesy-anti-union-
video-1547193676)

~~~
mc32
When i was putting myself thru college there was a time I worked at a job
which required I join a union. I detested them very much. They were a bunch of
fat cats who did nothing for the regular workers and much less for a part-
timer[1]. all they cared was the organization itself. the workers were there
as a necessary ingredient to keep the organization alive --rather then
actually do anything for the workers.

So, to this day, I loathe unions, in practice, perhaps not in theory, but in
practice I do. I also did not enjoy the 'machismo' that happens in unions.

[1] I sprained my ankle at work while doing work and yet they did nothing for
me. I had to pay the xray bills myself (I don't recall how much it was, but
they did nothing to make things better for me). So I have little sympathy for
the institution.

~~~
EdwardDiego
Ooh, anecdotes. I worked for an abusive employer once (American corporation,
funnily enough), and I joined a union, and it protected me from further abuse
because my managers were scared of the union, because it was an activist
union.

So yeah. My union good, your union bad, let's not make blanket assertions
based on one experience...

~~~
mhuffman
And you believe that using the union as an enforcer or as a protection racket
was a good experience for you?

Just so I have this straight, you thought that a good outcome was to have your
(clearly abusive) manager(s) silently seething with rage against you, but
impotent to act on it, because of the union protection?

This was a good outcome to you, over, say leaving that hostile environment as
fast as humanly possible, or, I don't know, turning in the manager(s) to
higher-ups (or to state agencies if the abuse warranted)?

~~~
zaccus
Whistleblowing on mgmt is a great way to get blacklisted, and one person's
ability to quit their job does not address the root cause of the abuse.

Why should the burden be on the worker to find a new job anyway? If the abuse
is coming from mgmt, it should be their responsibility to make it right.

~~~
mhuffman
I agree, but how might you imagine that management would find this out if the
person is unwilling to speak up, instead relying on the silent fear of the
union to keep it at bay?

Do you think that leaving the abusive manager in place, but impotent, is a
better outcome? For whom? The company, the employees?

~~~
EdwardDiego
> How might you imagine that management would find this out if the person is
> unwilling to speak up

The entire management structure in place was the problem. Are you seriously
suggesting I should have attempted to contact my manager's boss in the USA,
instead of joining a union?

~~~
mhuffman
Yes, I am not only suggesting that, I am baffled as to how you think not
making noise about it and letting it lay in some Mexican standoff with the
union was better.

------
Frondo
Before anyone brings up the "I want to be paid for my skill, not my
seniority," I'd just like to point out:

If you formed a union at your workplace, _you and your colleagues_ would get
to decide the rules like that.

And a few other things I think are worth saying...

A union is a legal framework for the employees (who have no ownership stake in
the business, despite putting their time and energy into the business day
after day) to recast some of the power imbalance in their favor; since many of
us here are employees, and not owners, we _should_ be looking out for our
interests.

Aaand...a union isn't a "let's all be lazy and wreck businesses" framework;
that's a bit of nonsensical propaganda that we've all swum in for the last few
decades.

~~~
forrestthewoods
"you and your colleagues would get to decide the rules like that"

False. People who worked there before you decided the rules. Once you have an
entrenched senior workforce the probability that they will vote themselves
less power or money is remarkably low. It's basically the same problem as
NIMBYism.

~~~
SomeCallMeTim
In a blog entry by Micheal O. Church [1], he argues that in the companies that
most need unionization, the downsides like wage normalization and seniority
rules _are already in place_ , and adding unionization to the mix almost _can
't_ make things worse.

He also provides examples of unionized industries where "star performers" have
no wage limits -- that the only limit is in the minimum pay for a position.
And he points out the many ways a union could support programmer rights (for
instance, the right to own personal projects), and kill damaging practices
like stack ranking.

We need _something._ That much is clear. Whether it's a professional guild or
a union, I'm not sure. But the status quo is awful for most of us. [2]

[1] [https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/10/13/it-might-
be-...](https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/10/13/it-might-be-time-for-
software-engineers-especially-in-silicon-valley-to-unionize/)

[2] I'm actually one of the "1%" who is quite well compensated, but I think
more of us should be compensated based on our abilities. And I _do_ want to
get rid of the "we own your free time projects" rules everywhere; I consider
those to be morally reprehensible.

Edit: Added "unionized" to the second paragraph to make it clear what I meant.

~~~
refurb
_But the status quo is awful for most of us._

No offense, but I think that statement is ridiculous. You admit you're in the
top 1% of income earners in the US and you choose to use the word "awful" for
your predicament?

~~~
Igglyboo
Just because he's rich doesn't mean he can't sympathise with or understand the
plight of the middle class, just like most people understand and sympathize
with the plight of the poor.

~~~
refurb
Unless I'm reading the post wrong, he's saying it's "awful for us". That would
include him, someone in the 1%.

My point is, the "plight of programmers" comes nowhere close to "awful" when
you actually look at what some workers have to put up with.

------
petegrif
There seem to be a lot of posts that state, in one form or another, that
unions are imperfect. Unions, it seems, are flawed and can indeed at times, or
indeed regularly, act in the interests of senior officials rather than those
of their members. Hello! They are organizations. They are staffed by human
beings. They are not going to be perfect. They will do dumb things. Some may
be outright corrupt. This however is not the point. The issue is not whether
they live up to their ideals any more than whether any other organization does
so. The point is whether their basic mission is such that they add value to
the life of the average working stiff. On this last point the evidence is
fairly clear. For all their hideous imperfections, most people are better off
with some kind of umbrella organization acting more or less in their
interests. Do you really imagine that the 'fat cats' think that their managers
optimize their earnings as they would like? Do you think that they imagine
that the members of congress they pay off do as good a job as they would like
tweaking the laws to their liking? Of course not. They are pissed. They don't
think they get value for money. They dis this lobbyist and scream at that
editor and hold back funding from that congressman. Life isn't perfect. Why
should unions be any different?

------
rsuelzer
I work for a large private sector union. Unions are not perfect, nothing is,
but they are also completely democratic institutions. But, the decline in
union membership does not tell the whole story about the decline of wages in
America.

I believe the decline in wages and union membership reflects a shift in how
people value themselves as human beings, and their relationship to their
fellow man.

The biggest obstacle to increasing wages to more equitable levels comes from
the mentality: "At least I have a job", "I will be rich someday", "I can make
it on my own", "I'm only going to work here for a year". These thoughts are
what has allowed wages to be pushed to their lowest levels in recent history
without any push-back from the work force.

Unions at their core are nothing more than a group of workers who get together
to negotiate a contract and are willing to take action to force the employer
to sit down and negotiate. This used to be understood, but at some point
unions became viewed as some sort of "servicing" entity that drew its powers
from a mysterious legal paper. Members forgot that the union was THEM.

Thankfully, the labor movement is starting reverse course from decades of this
mentality.

The truth is that, the only power which workers (unionized or not) have is to
withhold labor in a coordinated manner. Contracts are meaningless without the
power of a strike. Without workers being willing to all withhold labor
together, union or not, wages will continue to decline until a moral crisis is
reached.

Sorry, that was a bit of a ramble, but "unions" are just groups of workers who
have a 501(c)(5) paper with IRS that allows them pool money together to
organize.

~~~
randomdata
_I believe the decline in wages and union membership reflects a shift in how
people value themselves as human beings, and their relationship to their
fellow man._

From the data I am looking at, wages started to stagnate (I see no clear
decline trend) around the year 1965, which roughly coincides with when women
started to enter the workforce in a meaningful way. Could it be simply that
the near-doubling of the labour pool pushed the supply beyond the demand, thus
depressing prices and forcing people to take what they can get? More recently,
we might say robots have helped increase the supply even further.

Like you recognized later on in your post, the power of the union comes from
artificially restricting the supply of workers to make supply and demand work
in their favour, so does it not stand to reason that attitude shift you have
observed is a result of the same market economics, not the other way around?

------
task_queue
Right to work and its ilk have a very expressed intention of neutering
unionization efforts.

Keep in mind, that with a proper front for labor to negotiate with firms,
compensation is kept at a fair market level.

We haven't seen compensation increases in most occupations in 30 years.

You, as a worker, are owed a much larger compensation that should be what the
market would bear if you were able to negotiate on a much fairer plane with
your employer.

As IT workers, we are a huge revenue drain compared to other workers on the
books, despite any claims to how much 'worth' we might bring to a company.
Ideally, for them, those wages will go down. The industry has shown time and
again that it will defy the law to keep our pay low and below its true market
value.

~~~
forrestthewoods
Why is collective negotiation fair but non-collective unfair? That feels like
a faulty premise.

~~~
task_queue
You're missing the point. When you are an individual negotiating with a well-
lawyered, well-moneyed organization who holds power (your ability to make a
living) over you, that is not a negotiation. It is reminiscent of Hobson's
choice.

A negotiation happens when both sides have a fairer footing in terms of what
they have to offer and lose.

When a union goes to negotiate with a corporation, their relationship is on an
equal footing. This allows for better negotiations in terms of compensation,
working conditions, benefits and what not.

It is the check and balance that the inequal relationship between a sole
worker and a corporation needs.

~~~
forrestthewoods
Perhaps we're considering different scenarios. Hobson's choice may possibly
apply to unskilled or low skilled jobs. So anything that pays less than
$50,000/year in the US.

Above $50k individuals absolutely have the ability to negotiate. And to do so
strongly from a position of power. Good help is hard to find. When you're in
the 6 figure range negotiating with huge corporations is the best. Small shops
are tight on cash. There's not a lot of wiggle room. For huge corporations
there's a lot of room to negotiate. Salary, bonuses, paid time off, and more.
It's not crazy to negotiate 50% more compensation than their median offer for
a given position.

~~~
Apocryphon
Doesn't scandals such as the Non-poaching case between Apple, Google, Adobe,
Intel, etc. reveal that even high-skilled workers aren't immune to the tricks
of corporate management?

~~~
ptaipale
Well, the point about that scandal was that what Apple, Google and others were
doing was illegal.

~~~
pgeorgi
But since you can't jail a corporation, all it boils down for Apple, Google
and others is a simple financial cost/benefit calculation. And I'm not sure if
the class action lawsuit tipped the scale towards not doing such things yet.

------
ef4
I think unionizing is actually aiming way too low for many workers. Even
lower-skill ones.

As an example, people have bandied about ideas about whether Uber drivers
should unionize. But Uber drivers _already own the means of production_. So if
you could effectively organize them, don't bother with a union, just create a
worker-owned cooperate that competes directly with Uber. Get 100,000 drivers
to chip in $10 a month and you can fund a really nice app plus the necessary
lawyers.

The same pattern reoccurs in many parts of the modern economy. Many businesses
are so capital-efficient that they only exist because they're good at
coordinating workers -- not because they monopolize the working capital. So if
you can organize workers, skip the union and go directly to worker ownership.

~~~
Apocryphon
This is a really great idea, and brings something that's ironically been
absent in this entire conversation: innovation. Why not "disrupt" the state of
labor? So many startups are already involved in the art of social engineering
and tweaking, why not create a modern equivalent to unions that could empower
workers in a different way?

------
akulbe
I'm guessing my opinion won't be popular here, but I don't see anyone saying
anything similar, so I'm going to speak up.

There was once a time where unions were necessary. Personally, I think that
time is long past.

Now, I think unions breed mediocrity, and set up situations where you have
folks with an attitude of entitlement striking when they don't get every last
bit of their way. Walking around with picket signs like as if they are owed
everything.

Time to join the real world, with the rest of us. You don't always get what
you want.

We had gas prices go way down in the last couple months, then they went all
the way back up. I had heard it attributed to refinery workers striking,
because some had been laid off. I don't know if that is true, or not, but if
it is... it only proves my point.

~~~
wfo
I think it's time for you to join the real world. Union workers are not
entitled. You are coming from a place of entitlement if you think that life is
that good for most workers. Union workers are trying to regain some semblance
of power in an exploitative relationship. Many employers (all of the most
efficient and therefore successful ones) are abusive. Even the hyper-entitled,
and therefore hyper-libertarian software engineers are abused by their
employers - employers break the law and collude to depress wages, if you want
a real example from the news. Employees as a whole in this country are
currently getting screwed -- because of a very well funded and long-running
campaign by business interests to destroy unions through criminal action,
regulatory capture, propaganda, etc. Incidentally it's much easier to convince
software engineers to turn on each other and work against their best
interests, all it takes is a quick ego stroke -- claim 'no, we're only going
to screw over the \bad\ engineers, and you're not one of them... are you?'
Fortunately some of them trying to stop it. Complaining about gas prices
changing because of those pesky entitled blue collar upstarts acting above
their class and demanding to be treated like human beings doesn't particularly
endear people to your cause either. There are arguments to be made against
unions; none of these are them.

~~~
akulbe
Before I comment, I want to clarify. I'm _not_ trying to come across like a
jerk.

I certainly think there are things about the current system of employment that
can improve. But you can negotiate what you get.

I stand by the statement that you don't always get what you want, but you can
compromise with an employer and meet in the middle. Digging your heels in
(like unions often do) isn't very productive.

If you don't like the terms, you can look for employment elsewhere, right?

One other thing to consider... remove the gatekeeper/middleman. By that, I
mean work for yourself. It's not easy, but you have more flexibility to charge
what you want, and go after the things that are important to you, in your
work.

In addition to working for yourself, I'd like to add that having multiple
streams of income, even small, can give you a greater degree of freedom.

------
gavanwoolery
When a union is used to defend rights, it is good. When a union is used for
exploitation, it is bad.

The problem is when unions grow too large, and become politically lucrative
feeding grounds. The government hands out certain contracts to certain unions
to gain their votes (and in some cases, their returned financial support),
while squashing "fair competition" (not everyone is, or cares to be,
unionized, especially when the disagree with the principles and practices of
some unions).

~~~
bduerst
Sounds like a problem with contract selection, honestly. Maybe use an
independent [agnostic] party to select vendors for major government contracts?

------
andrewfong
Although the study (or summary) heavily implies that the decline in unionizing
causes greater income inequality, the standard correlation-is-not-causation
caveat still applies.

In particular, there's a plausible argument that greater automation is a
confounding variable, insofar that (a) easy-to-automate jobs tend to be more
unionized than hard-to-automate jobs and (b) automation leads to outsized
rewards for relatively small groups of people (investors, owners, inventors,
etc.)

That's not to say unions _don 't_ matter, but I'm curious if there's any
research that attempts to distinguish between unionization and new
technological developments.

------
harigov
It's so strange to notice that we live in a democratic society but work in
authoritarian organizations (for employees at least). By getting rid of
unions, we made it clear as to who owns the companies and who have rights
within the company. Having some say in the direction that the company is
moving towards seems like a reasonable thing to ask for.

~~~
colmvp
This is especially more funny when you consider corporate influence in
politics, along with the influence of money. Corporations and the rich have a
disproportionate influence yet it would be audacious to ever propose workers
having a vote in these matters.

Owners of corporations are of course delighted when employees are fractured,
unable to coalesce to wage battles for greater equality and say in decision-
making and sharing profits.

------
MCRed
Unions do not negotiate the best deal for the employees, they negotiate the
best deal for the union.

One of the terms unions love to have is a requirement that all employees be
members of the union.

When you have to pay the union in order to keep your job, the union becomes a
tax on your income... and the union has no incentive to treate you right-- as
what are you going to do? Quit and go work for another company? That's your
only option.

That modern unions attempt to force employees to be members when the employees
don't want to-- shows that the unions themselves know they aren't offering an
advantage to the employees that the employees would voluntarily choose.

Walmart doesn't force me to buy its hot dogs. Walmart competes with other hot
dog providers for my business. (And loses because there is a very good german
deli in this town.)

~~~
gerbal
1\. Closed shops are pretty much necessary for Unions to form or persist. It
give Unions bargaining power.

2\. Unions are democracies, in a functioning democracy what's good for the
power structure should be good for the electorate.

~~~
pdonis
_> in a functioning democracy what's good for the power structure should be
good for the electorate_

So basically, you're saying that there is no such thing as a "functioning"
democracy.

~~~
TheCoelacanth
I don't think that's accurate. Many democratic countries are run in a fashion
that reasonably approximates what is good for their electorate. Yes, they
don't match it perfectly, but compared to any other form of government that
has ever been implemented on a large scale, it has worked very well.

~~~
pdonis
_> Many democratic countries are run in a fashion that reasonably approximates
what is good for their electorate._

I think this is a judgment call (it depends on what you believe is "good" for
the electorate, particularly in the long term vs. the short term), but let's
assume it's true for the sake of argument. That still doesn't mean that what's
good for the power structure is good for the electorate. For a democracy to do
what's good for the electorate, elected representatives have to act in the
electorate's interest, and the only benefit to their own interest that they
can consistently expect from that is getting re-elected. They can't make
backroom deals with lobbyists, they can't promise favorable legislation to
corporations in exchange for cushy jobs after retirement, etc., etc. In short,
they can't do all the things that politicians in democracies routinely do to
further their own interests, because those things are not good for the
electorate.

So if the definition of a "functioning" democracy is that what's good for the
power structure is good for the electorate, then I don't think such a thing
exists, has ever existed, or can exist. The interests of the power structure
will always be in conflict with the interests of the electorate. Some
democracies may manage that conflict better than others, but it's always going
to be there.

------
addicted44
I think the problem is that the word unionization encapsulates many different
things which should not necessarily be tied together. Collective bargaining,
employees having a voice on the running of the business, legal and advisory
services provided by someone on your side as opposed to someone with interests
diametrically opposed to yours (the CEOs, not the companies), elections of
representatives, etc.

As a whole these (as the data conclusively proves) were better for workers and
probably the companies as well at the expense of the C-level suits. But it is
probably true that some of ideas implemented by unions did work against
workers. The solution is not to throw the baby out with the bath water but to
analyze and experiment with different union structures which reduce the
negative effects and enhance the positive ones.

Unfortunately, Americans have decide to wholesale reject and vilify the only
structure that empowers non-owners even slightly which despite all its faults
was still better for most Americans, instead of trying to separate the
effective ones from the ineffective ones, and are reaping the unequal society
they have sowed.

Gotta give credit to our wealthy overlords who have done an impressive job of
getting people to vote against their own interests by splitting people along
various social dividing lines as well as magnifying limited failures of
systems as endemic to them.

~~~
MCRed
Consider for a second that maybe they aren't voting against their own
interests.

My interest is not in having some jackhole thug whose primary skill is
breaking kneecaps going around and negotiating my salary, thank you very much.

With unions you always have the principle-agent problem. The union is going to
negotiate for its best interest, not necessarily the employees and certainly
not a specific employees. There's a long history of these kinds of union
abuses. This is why the unions in america are closely associated iwht the mob
(that and the fact that the mob is what started the unions in america.)

------
pdkl95
[http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/08/david-simon-
cap...](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/08/david-simon-capitalism-
marx-two-americas-wire)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNttT7hDKsk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNttT7hDKsk)

The above two links go to the same essay by author of "The Wire" David Simon
in written and video forms. He discusses specifically the problem of unions...
and the problem of capital. If you have the time, please watch and/or read
this essay.

A very, very brief summary:

Unions are absolutely necessary, but not because of some specific feature they
might achieve. Instead, they are a _check_ on capital. (and vice versa).
Similar to our "adversarial" judicial system - where each side is _expected_
to fight hard for their own interests - it is the struggle between labor and
capital that produces a working economy. If either side actually gets what
they want, the system becomes pathological.

So yes, unions are an inefficiency. That was the intended effect. There is a
lot of hostility in this very thread to the idea that "those people" \- in
this case, "people I see as 'lower-quality engineers'" \- might be getting
something they "don't deserve". Or the fear might be that helping the bottom
end would require taking from someone else, as if the economy was some zero-
sum game. Yes, _some amount_ of those effect was the _goal_.

The alternative that says some variation of "fsck you, I've got mine" may
betray a lack of empathy in the speaker, but in most cases I suspect it
betrays a belief in one of our most damaging cultural myths: the "just world"
fallacy we call the "free market".

The question isn't really about unions. Instead, the question to ask yourself
is "are we in this together?" Do you want a society with a functioning economy
or not? Or do you want to let us continue our slide back into feudalism... and
probably some sort of violent rebellion in the long run.

To make society work, it might require occasionally _helping_ those that are
less fortunate. Just like we do with "taxes" and "health insurance". Forming a
union _and participating in it_ might be one of the ways you can provide input
on how these issues should be managed.

~~~
steveax
Thanks for the link. Terrific essay. I often look at the industry I'm in and
the dominant political & economic perceptions the participants adhere to and
wonder if there is an ignorance of history, or just a misguided belief that
"it's different this time".

------
sago
Unions suffer from the same problem as communist states: they are
theoretically superb, but practically cumbersome and prone to abuse.

A successful union should be able to

\- Guarantee minimum wages and conditions for all employees.

\- Hold management to account on malpractice towards employees.

\- Not limit individual employees ability to command higher wages or
conditions than the minimum.

\- Not limit the ability of companies to make decisions that improve the
health of the company.

\- Allow employees to be agile in what they need from the company, without
calcifying previous agreements.

\- Not privilege the employment of union representatives.

In practice good unions hit some of these, but not all. And anti-union folks
tend to carp on the ones that they're poor at.

I'd love to see a model for how to unionise that provided all these qualities.

They aren't called 'unions', but there are professional organizations that act
as unions and are generally respected: doctors, accountants, etc. They don't
hit all my points, but I think, on balance, programmers would benefit from
something similar.

~~~
pessimizer
>Not limit the ability of companies to make decisions that improve the health
of the company.

The only purpose of unions is to limit the ability of companies to make
decisions that improve the health of the company (at the expense of the people
who work for it.)

~~~
sago
Why put the last phrase in parentheses when removing it would totally alter
the meaning?

The only purpose of surgeons is to hack into peoples bodies and mess about
with their internal organs (when the person's health would be worse if they
did not). See? It's easy to play those games.

Employment isn't a zero sum game. Employees can benefit from a healthy
company. Unions should facilitate the growth of a company in ways that do not
exploit the workforce.

------
jkot
My friend worked at place with unions in Ireland:

* Safety was 'important', every year they checked that chairs and screens are ergonomically positioned. However lab vent contamination with poison was swept under rag.

* Monthly union membership fee 50 euro. This was 'optional', but most people paid to avoid problems.

* union had huge income surplus. It was used to send union leaders to 'seminars' on exotic locations.

* in case of strike, union would not compensate first three days (except officials who were organizing the strike). All strikes very under 3 days. Basically extra holiday.

* that place had 10 HR persons on 120 personnel. My company had 1 HR for 110 people.

* People with permanent contracts were untouchable.

* 70% people worked on 6 month contracts extended for YEARS.

* This company spend fifty year budget on huge unnecessary building. There were no money left to hire people

~~~
pjscott
Maybe the workers should form some sort of group to collectively bargain with
the union.

~~~
Apocryphon
Ideally, shouldn't there be multiple unions within a workforce, to compete
with each other, just as there are multiple corporations?

~~~
pjscott
Ah, but then one of the unions could free-ride on the sacrifices of the
others, and the whole system would collapse bit by bit! No, if you have
multiple unions, then obviously they need to form a union-of-unions to allow
the unions to collectively bargain.

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blackRust
I would be interested in learning about forms of unionisation via co-operative
structures.

The perception is that unions can "block" things, that is also their power.

Co-operatives distribute ownership, and thus responsibility and profits.

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ChuckMcM
Interesting idea, its possible though that rather than unionization the issue
is a lack of dividends. The efficiency of enterprises to generate value has
gone up quite a bit, without significant competition, that leads to excess
profits. How that extra capital is allocated can be to pay employees more,
accumulate cash, or pay it out to the share holders.

In the 30's the "profit" for the non-institutional investor from owning stock
was receiving dividends on a pro-rata basis, not trading the stock. In the run
up of the market from the 80's trading was more valuable than holding, and
technology companies, companies that increasingly made up the composition of
stocks were more likely to not pay any dividends at all.

You might ask yourself why you hold stock in any company that doesn't pay you
a dividend. What are they doing with the capital they generate? Your only
recourse is to sell the stock when the value goes up. The status quo is good
for the company, they can put money in (value goes up) and take money out
(value goes down) of your pocket all day and you can't do a thing about it
(except to stop playing by selling the stock) whereas with a dividend once
you've received the check the worst that can happen is the next year you don't
get one.

So really the companies are giving your dividend money to their top executives
rather than you. As a shareholder you should work on changing that :-)

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Apocryphon
In this commentary thread, I see a lot of opinions about unions, as well as
anecdata, but little in the way of actual discussion of the findings that the
article is talking about.

I myself lack the economic and statistical knowledge to offer such discussion,
but would very much like to read discussion from those who are knowledgeable.

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vasilipupkin
this article takes a correlation and proceeds to imply causation from it.
There is a correlation between recent rise of inequality in advanced economies
and decline in unionization. But, global inequality has decreased over the
same period. It's quite probable that the same forces are driving all 3 of
these

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bnolsen
cause and effect have been misidentified. the craptastic business environment
in the US has led to fall of the system. unions can't survive because they've
helped price american labor out of the market. union money has gone
unilaterally to democrats who raise more taxes and levy more and more rules
and regulations and entitlements driving up taxes and corruption. the union
centers, like detroit and many other traditional union strongholds collapsed,
businesses went to friendlier environments.

i personally despise unions. they force people into collectivism and destroy
any individuality. my dad was a long time of this. he used to get letters from
the union telling him he was working too hard and making other people look
bad. he should have been given pay raises, not punished for working hard for
his company.

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steveplace
People who think the labor movement was the creation of heroic union
organizers have a problem to explain: why are unions shrinking now? The best
they can do is fall back on the default explanation of people living in fallen
civilizations. Our ancestors were giants. The workers of the early twentieth
century must have had a moral courage that's lacking today.

In fact there's a simpler explanation. The early twentieth century was just a
fast-growing startup overpaying for infrastructure. And we in the present are
not a fallen people, who have abandoned whatever mysterious high-minded
principles produced the high-paying union job. We simply live in a time when
the fast-growing companies overspend on different things.

~~~
task_queue
Or you can look at the legislature enacted to curb unionism instead of
comparing the twentieth century to a start up.

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topkai22
I'd love to see better information on alternative collective bargaining to
unions, which is a loaded word in the U.S. I've never worked as a union
member, but my impression from working with them is that they undermine their
own success long term by over protecting incumbent members and reducing
organizational agility, but do a good job of improving the live of their
averages member in the short to midterm.

I've often mused on how to make collective bargaining work better without much
success. I wonder if employee owned corporations that function like
contractors would be better (the employees start working for the union once
the collective bargaining goes into effect.)

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mullingitover
It's pretty ironic that the party of small government favors a policy of huge
government overreach into the ability of various to enter into contracts with
each other. That's all Unions really boil down to: contracts. It's supposed to
be what makes this country a superior place to do business, the fact that you
can enter into binding contracts which will be enforced. But hey, if you know
how to operate the institutionalized bribery system known as campaign finance,
you can get the government to rewrite the contract to your advantage, or even
deny your counterparty the ability to enter into a binding contract at all.

------
jfe
the primary function of unions is to improve working conditions and increase
wages for its members. the improved working conditions are welcome in
developing nations, but the increased wages come at a cost, for unions can
only ensure higher wages by limiting the number of jobs available.
furthermore, unions must define a set of criteria for the acceptance of new
union members that discriminates for reasons wholly irrelevant to employers.

------
randomsearch
I feel ambivalent about unions, but here's what I see.

Lots of people are criticising unions, because sometimes they are inefficient
or corrupt.

Equally, I could write a rant about how employers are inefficient and corrupt.

So, my question is, what's the alternative to unionisation? Because currently,
these arguments seem to say "let's get rid of the unions, and just let people
be powerless and exploited."

Criticism is easy. Constructive criticism is something different.

[edit: typo]

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spiritplumber
I wonder if unions can benefit from the "instant direct democracy" that
technology allows but isn't currently used in most governments.

------
CyberDildonics
I think an interesting Union would be one that lets employees decide who they
want to be their direct supervisor along with some sort of incentive for
output.

~~~
jbuzbee
Start your own company, and you're free to try that out. Trying to force your
own will on someone else's company and business plan is an economic road-to-
ruin for everybody. Just ask the US Auto-makers.

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rdlecler1
The top 10% are also putting in a lot more hours. Moreover, a good education,
which now costs about $150k, is no longer a guarantee of a good job. I have
many friends who won't pay off their student loans until they are 40. I have
other friends with union jobs but little additional education that have houses
and boat. Why should someone be compensated more than those who took the risk
to pursue a higher education?

~~~
pistle
It sounds like the more compensated made better choices. Why does risk-taking
engender high pay than working for good money? If the facts in the books
aren't worth a damn to the employers, maybe the higher education has no market
value?

Just because someone says it's a 'good education' doesn't mean it breeds
worthwhile labor in a market.

~~~
rdlecler1
A society where people are not compensated for taking risks is called
communism. How did that work out?

------
brc
Correlation does not equal causation.

Technology multipliers are the cause of income disparity.

