I have always been a big supporter of #unions but lately I have been second-guessing that and debating with myself if I might actually change my views to be against unions....

My thinking is simple.. I am a huge supporter of anti-trust laws. Essentially I dont think companies should be allowed to create coalitions with the intention of price-fixing the market. This makes sense to me, companies **must** compete or else they can become too powerful.

If i believe in that logic then I should, by similar logic, be against unions. Unions are effectively large groups of people getting together to carry out price-fixing of their labour.

@freemo Unions is to give the workers a fair treatment, isn't it? To stop companies from acting like assholes to their workers.

Price-fixing labour sounds not as bad as price-fixing the market. After all, what is minimum wage if not price-fixing too? Or did you want to get rid of that as well?

@trinsec Everyone wants more, everyone thinks they arent treated fair. Companies think they pay too much for employees and may just as well view themselves as the one not getting fair treatment.

The anti-trust laws on companies is specifically there to ensure fair market value (no price fixing), so thats already how they get fair treatment.

I am also against minimum wage, it has caused enormous harm to the poor.

@freemo How does minimum wage cause harm to the poor?

@trinsec Because minimum wage is well known to cause unemployment shifts towards the poor... Higher minimum wage means hiring shifts so that fewer poor/low-educated people are hired and more higher-education people are hired. Minimum wage effectively increases unemployment amongst the group of people that you are trying to help (the poor) doing more harm than good.

@freemo Huh. That might be an American thing? Here, people are reluctant to hire well-educated people for low-skill jobs, because they tend to stay a short time because they'd get bored and move on to jobs that actually suit their level.

@trinsec No its pretty universal in the world... It isnt the result of high-education people getting hired for low skilled jobs. It is instead the fact that high-education positions that automate low-skilled jobs emerge. People are hired to build self-chekout machines and to maintain them, and the cashiers loose their job entierly. As minimum wage increases this accelerates.

@freemo *Giggles* Self-checkout machines are starting to fall in disfavor around here because theft is hugely on the rise due to inflation. Those companies aren't saving anything, just as a funny aside.

There's a personnel shortage everywhere, too. I'd say minimum wage is actually helping out a lot right now. If there was too many workers and not enough jobs, you'd have a point. But right now, not really.

@trinsec

Giggles Self-checkout machines are starting to fall in disfavor around here because theft is hugely on the rise due to inflation. Those companies aren’t saving anything, just as a funny aside.

Thats the thing there are plenty of downsides to self-checkout… which is why many store owners might be resistant to it. But the more you price-fix the cost of labour with minimum wage the more those down-sides are worth it since there is a point where the costs balance out.

When there is a shortage of workers you dont need unions, thats the point, market pressures increase your pay as is since companies now need to compete to hire you aware… So there really is no good argument for needing unions in that scenario.

@freemo We had teacher strikes, cop strikes, etc, because of the government’s decisions. Only possible with unions because how else will you organize this? Here the strikes are usually against government, not so much against companies. At least, not at that large scale. How do you figure this will fit here?

@trinsec You wont have strikes, strikes shouldnt be allowed, that is price-fixing and would be no different than companies organizing together and refusing to give their services at the market price…

Now you CAN have protests, and those get organized all the time. So nothing stopping people from protesting these issues still.

@freemo Well, the strikes aren’t always about increasing wages, actually. It’s also about lowering work pressure and all that. You seem to be focused on price-fixing here.

@trinsec The idea is the same even when you talk about other features… and it works the same on the flip-side with antitrust… companies might not create coalitions just to price-fix, maybe they want to sell their product at the same price but be allowed to use all sorts of dangerous chemicals, or build it with cheap parts.. The concept is the same even beyond price-fixing, its just easier to talk in price fixing terms.

@freemo

As far as I see it:

(Big) Companies have a lot of power already. Individual workers have considerably less power. Them working together (and forming an union) protects them against the power of companies. Especially big companies.

You’re talking about antitrust and such, but how does that protect the workers? Will they even bother with the individual workers? A sole worker doesn’t have an army of lawyers behind them to do what is right. An union does.

I only have to look at the USA and see how things are shit for the workers in anti-Union states. How would that get fixed anytime soon? Individual workers can hardly demand improvements like an union can. They just get fired and other victims get hired.

No, somehow I’m really not convinced by your arguments. We’ve already got running examples of what you think should have been, and we can see it’s not really an improvement to those workers there.

@trinsec

(Big) Companies have a lot of power already. Individual workers have considerably less power. Them working together (and forming an union) protects them against the power of companies. Especially big companies.

Actually no, they have far less power than individuals… they cant vote, they get taxed double, they dont have human rights and protections, there is no concept of minimum wage where a company is garunteed to make a minimum amount of money at their venture…. overall large companies have far less rights and powers than individuals.

You’re talking about antitrust and such, but how does that protect the workers? Will they even bother with the individual workers? A sole worker doesn’t have an army of lawyers behind them to do what is right. An union does.

Antitrust protects the worker because it makes it illegal for companies to “unionize” and fix worker wages. If it werent for anti-trust laws companies could create a coalition and all companies could agree to never pay any of its employees more than minimum wage. Since its a coalition a worker cant just go and quit and work somewhere else, since all companies “unionized” in this scenario and the wage would be the same… It stops wage competition… anti-trust laws make this illegal.

I only have to look at the USA and see how things are shit for the workers in anti-Union states. How would that get fixed anytime soon? Individual workers can hardly demand improvements like an union can. They just get fired and other victims get hired.

There are no “anti-union” states.. unions are legal in all states.

No, somehow I’m really not convinced by your arguments. We’ve already got running examples of what you think should have been, and we can see it’s not really an improvement to those workers there.

Examples? I know of no place that has what I suggest which is 1) Strong and enforced anti-trust laws 2) Unions are likewise illegal

Unions are currently legal in all states, and anti-trust laws are enforced minimally at best. So no where I know of has these 2 qualities.

@freemo @trinsec While unions are ‘legal’ they are hamstrung in states with “right to work” laws.

You state that businesses don’t vote but they fund Super Pacs that determine who runs. They don’t need to vote. They have economic power that matches or exceeds the political power of the populace.

Unions are an attempt to match the economic power of business.