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 @trinsec , let them collude to fix prices, and buy from someone else. Government limiting competition is the problem there, not the companies trying to maximize profits.

@JonKramer

We already know from expiernce that doesnt work. We created anti-trust laws with very good reason, because when they are allowed to coordinate and price fix the markets collapse.

@trinsec

@freemo @trinsec @JonKramer

You’re making an argument against firms being able to entire into exclusive contracts with suppliers, not against price-fixing.

@HeavenlyPossum @trinsec @JonKramer

No not at all this has nothibg to do with exclusive contracts

@JonKramer @freemo @trinsec

A labor union merely acts as a labor-selling firm. Some of these labor firms enter into exclusive supplier contracts with other firms to supply labor at agreed-on rates. You’re objecting to contractual agreements as price-fixing.

@HeavenlyPossum @freemo @trinsec , it CAN be price fixing if the companies are required by law to only use union labor, and not freely enter into contracts that say they will only use union labor... But that would require the union to exist everywhere the company can operate. I just don't see any examples of that world wide.

@JonKramer

Well no.. all you need is enough people collaborating to artificially tilt the market, it doesnt have to be an exclusive contract.

This is why anti-trust isnt limited to company coalitions that require companies to join (which dont exist anyway)... even just two companies collaborating to fix price is illegal... just as even two people collaborting in a union should be.

@HeavenlyPossum @trinsec

@freemo @HeavenlyPossum @trinsec , a small company is 50 people maybe? That is considerably different than 2 people. Anti trust doesn't scale DOWN.

Imagine 500 farms trying to sell 100 people oranges. But each farm only produces a single orange. If two of those farmers collude to raise the prices, or fix them, what is the result? They don't sell their oranges. Even if half the farmers price fix, it won't make much of a difference. You need all 500 to fix the prices... and even then, the customers just buy bananas instead. Labor is like orange farmers. There is a vast supply. They can't price fix, unless they get control of the government, and even then the companies are multinational. They just move and buy their labor elsewhere.

@JonKramer

Even just two companies of one person each would be in violation of the law if they colluded to price fix together. We have seen examples of this where single-owner businesses on a signle block (in this case on a campus) colluded to price fixed and were found to be acting illegally.

@HeavenlyPossum @trinsec

@freemo @HeavenlyPossum @trinsec , sure, this has happened. That doesn't make it immoral. If two guys want $10K for pens, and collude to fix those prices, I will just buy pens on Amazon for $1 each. And this is not immoral. Not my actions, or theirs. "Found that they acted illegally" isn't a good argument to me.

@JonKramer

It has nothing to do with morality, it has to do with a healthy, functioning economy where everyone benefits.. price fixing destroys economies.

@HeavenlyPossum @trinsec

@freemo @HeavenlyPossum @trinsec If anything, unions drive economic progress... Although I doubt this is true, the numbers show it. Name a strong non-unionized nation in history. Pick a economically powerful non-unionized African nation, or Asian. They just don't exist. Unions signal an economy that is VERY healthy. There are some exceptions... Places where the union is the government... Nazi German comes to mind. Communist China right now. But these are not labor unions. Where independent labor unions exist, the economies are strong. With no exceptions of note.