It's way more complicated than that, and it can't simply be dismissed as a "FUD campaign". Union members are actually disproportionately likely to support things like right-to-work laws, which unions dislike because it (more or less) means workers aren't obligated to be members if they choose not to.
Similarly, union membership rates have dropped even in states that have very union-friendly laws (like New York and Massachusetts), and unions are having less and less success at the polls, meaning non-unionized workers are rejecting the proposals to unionize their workforces (UAW elections in particular - AFL-CIO elections to a lesser extent).
This pattern isn't as simple to dismiss as "anti-union FUD", especially since it's seen among people who are already union members in closed shops.
The reasons for this have to do with the history of unionization of closed shops, and the regional economic pressures it creates.
You act as though anti-union FUD can't affect members. That's kind of ridiculous... if it didn't affect MEMBERS as well as non-members, what would be the point?
If I'm a less-educated union member who has no concept of what life was like before unions, and constantly hear that unions just take my money while providing no benefit, I'm probably likely to be swayed. What's the union going to do? Tell me about how 50 years ago companies would literally put my life at risk because there was no downside for them. And then the people financing the anti-union movement are spewing "Well that was 50 years ago, that would NEVER happen again" - all while doing everything they can to drive up hours, drive down safety, and insulate themselves from any responsibility RE: workman's comp.
For the average joe who just wants to go to work and get a paycheck, the bigger picture is often lost.
Honestly, it's rather patronizing to say that union members who disapprove of their union and want to decertify or deauthorize it must either be ignorant or under the influence of external propaganda or FUD. Maybe they have access to information you don't? Or maybe they just have a different set of values from you? Maybe they hold different priorities from what you hold? Maybe they should be assumed to have their own agency?
I'm not going to say that democracy is infallible - in fact, I'm usually the first to point out the exact opposite. But "they don't know what's best for them the way I do" is a pretty dangerous line of reasoning to start heading down.
I guess it's a good thing I never said any of the words you both put in my mouth and "quoted". Not once did I say I know what's best for them. Not once did I say they couldn't make decisions for themselves. What I DID say is that it's ridiculous to pretend that propaganda doesn't affect people IN unions. Which is EXACTLY what you implied.
Don't be disingenuous, "they don't know what's best for them the way I do" is a very fair representation of your words. Maybe you do? If you're going to take that position, own it.
In my opinion what's disingenuous is to ignore the main point in favor of picking some nit.
"My interpretation is objective reality, but your interpretation is dumb". How about don't be an asshole, man?
Is it patronizing to say that workers who respond to threats like this:
http://www.nysun.com/business/wal-mart-threatens-to-close-un...
might not be making the best risk/reward trade off?
The employer is hardly going to tell you if they're making an empty threat and the prospect of losing your job because they pulled the nuclear option is probably quite terrifying.
Isn't it possible the armchair talking heads like us are the ones missing the bigger picture and the actual workers are the ones who actually get it?
Let's consider the Boeing workers in South Carolina:
- 2009-09 74% of employees vote against the union and decertify it[1]
- 2009-10 Boeing breaks ground on new South Carolina plant to build 787 airplanes[2]
- 2017-02 again, 74% of employees vote against IAM union representation[3]
The "uncertainty" and "doubt" in "FUD"? The South Carolina workers are quite certain and have no doubt that in 2009, Seattle lost the extra 787 assembly work and it was given to SC workers without the union.
It's not irrational that SC workers fear the loss of jobs in Seattle could happen to them. The upcoming 797[4] model is in the works. It's not irrational for South Carolina workers to think that unionizing for better wages will move that 797 production elsewhere. (E.g. Seattle may end up losing all of the 787 production.[5])
>Well that was 50 years ago,
Well, the struggle & benefits gained 50 years ago is an abstraction. The events of 2009 are very fresh and real in the minds of workers.
Voting "YES" for a union doesn't necessarily mean you get a wage increase. It means (1) you might get a wage increase or (2) you might have no job.
How does a worker properly weigh those possible outcomes?
[1] https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/boein...
[2] http://www.nbcnews.com/id/33521235/ns/business-us_business/t...
[3] https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/boein...
[4] http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/20/news/companies/boeing-797-pa...
[5] http://www.heraldnet.com/news/future-of-boeings-787-seems-se...
The downside is that if the union's approach is too strict, those jobs may simply disappear because it is not feasible to pay those workers more, or it may be cheaper to move those job abroad and import the resulting products.
This also requires workers to struggle and strike not for their job, but for someone else's.
(I am not saying one approach is better than the other, in fact I am usually not too fond of unions, but I am trying to explain the union's point of view)
For example one of the problem is that not all professions are unionized for example, so o get more profit and power the unions need to stifle innovation and steer the government only toward heavy industry to the destriment of almost every other sector
Also being national they seldom talk directly with workers and plant owners, and prefer to play their hands at the political table, often ignoring the specificity of issues.
And since their decision have national level ramification, every singe one needs months if not years to mature, implement and execute. Like, most national contracts are expired and have wages that are ridicolous by 2017 standards and base salary need to be supplemented in various, highly taxed ways, and new form of contracts are impossible to create (IT for example is hired under industrial or commerce contract, as the gategory didn’t exist at the time and there’s no reasonable way to create it now)
The parent comment might be full of lies, but I’m actually more inclined to believe it when the best you can do is call them falsehoods with no evidence or argument.
https://labor411.org/411-blog/1688-this-is-the-anti-union-vi...
The idea that unions can only be used to bargain for wages is propaganda in its own right.
That's where a properly functioning government steps in and stops it. OF COURSE private companies are going to break a union any way possible if the government isn't there to step in. If the US military said "you close that plant, all of our contracts are going to Airbus", exactly how many seconds do you think it would take the CEO of Boeing to change his mind?
The people of South Carolina seem to be quite happy with the current situation.
Right-to-work laws are like prop 13 in California: sounds good on the surface, but hidden terrible impact.
On the surface, "I should be able to choose whether or not I join a union" makes sense, Americans love freedom and choice. But of course, in practice people who choose not to join a union get to freeload: they get most of the benefit of the union in how it informs a company's general policies and culture about workers, but don't have to pay any fees. And like most instances of the freeloader problem, the result is the responsible entity getting starved, as everyone wants the others to be the ones paying for the benefits.
It doesn't sounds like they want any of those so-called benefits. As explained below, the data suggests that if members could feasibly decertify or deauthorize their unions entirely, they would.
Remember that, nationwide, only 7% of union members ever cast a vote in favor of their union. That means less than 7% voted against it, and the remainder never had an opportunity to vote at all.
It's not surprising that, in the absence of a safe way to decertify or deauthorize, some portion of the 86+% who never had the opportunity to vote supports laws that give them the next-best thing. (It's not just right-to-work laws, by the way, though that's the most frequently discussed at the national scale and therefore the most frequently polled).
I mean, most employer policies never get any kind of vote from any subset of the employees, so I'm not sure why I should be so outraged about this one in particular when it seems to be usually to workers' benefit.
Clearly they don't think it's to their benefit, or else they wouldn't be trying to decertify or deauthorize it.
They are, just not directly, because the direct process for decertification or deauthorization is both highly risky (if caught, they could lose their jobs), and also pretty ineffective (the NLRB has a habit of overturning election results, rendering the whole process moot.
So, they use other tactics - hence the increasing support from union members for anti-union lawmakers. Political pundits often write about this as a "paradox" of union members voting "against their own interests", but it's actually pretty straightforward once you remember that union members are individuals who may or may not actually support the interests of the union that they belong to.
But that doesn't mean right to work laws shouldn't exist. Maybe it just means unions shouldn't exist.
I mean, if your entire business model is flawed, should the world change around your business model?
This is more of a devil's advocate position, as I'm not particularly anti-union, but I personally have zero desire to work in a union or be forced to be in one.
I refuse to say that unions have no place in the world, or have no place in certain industries, or didn't have a place in the past. I'm rather neutral on a lot of it, but the fact is the problem is inherent in the union itself.
Unions go a little deep than the concept of "business model"
"[..] I personally have zero desire to work in a union or be forced to be in one."
I'm going to speculate that's only because you have good working conditions.
"unions [..] have a place in the past"
That's a common opinion. What have changed from the past?
Because the laws of capitalism tell us that if any profit or benefit goes to the worker is because there is no way around it. Sometimes is a good idea look back to history. For instance the eight hour working day:
" In 1919 in Barcelona, Catalonia, after a 44-day general strike with over 100,000 participants had effectively crippled the Catalan economy, the Government settled the strike by granting all the striking workers demands that included an eight-hour day, union recognition, and the rehiring of fired workers."
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-hour_day)
Sometimes I think that we are all "free riders" on the fights of the past.
I'm going to speculate that's only because you have good working conditions."
I have noticed (personal anecdote here so yeah not great) that a large majority of people that I know against unions have never worked in dangerous fields, office workers are ridiculously ignorant as to the workplace dangers of many unionised industries.
> That's a common opinion. What have changed from the past?
Reminds me of a quote I recently came across by Danish communist and activist Carl Scharnberg, roughly translated as:
"The teacher told his pupils that the class struggle is over! A pupil asks: Who won?"
However, your reply is structured around trying to convince me that I should be pro-union rather than ambivalent, and does not address the issue at hand; how to square "right to work" laws and the free rider problem with unions.
Like, employers can require you to do all kinds of things in a contract: wear certain types of clothes, tell you when and where to show up for work, how much you're paid, etc. We regulate some things like health and safety codes because the regulations themselves are clearly in the best interest of the workforce, but who do right-to-work laws ultimately serve?
That's not true.
Actually... yes. Maintenance-of-dues and other contract stipulations can mean that all members of a bargaining unit are required to pay dues fees, even if they aren't members of the union or covered by the union contracts. So, they're required to pay fees to the union so that the union can represent other people, not them, oftentimes against their own interests.
It's particularly common for teachers and other skilled, low-paying jobs.
Contrary to popular belief, companies have incredibly little power in that regard, especially when you're talking about an already-unionized closed shop (as opposed to a company that wants to prevent its workers from unionizing in the first place). Legally and practically, it's incredibly difficult even for union members to decertify or deauthorize their union, and companies are basically forbidden from taking any part in that process. The NLRB is incredibly strict on this; both the NLRB and the courts bias heavily in favor of unions if there's any evidence that companies are seen to be interfering whatsoever in the process.
But beyond this, it's not as simple as "companies have been increasingly more anti-union" because this increaseingly anti-union sentiment comes from the union members. We know this from direct public polling, from their actions on the ballot at union elections, from their actions at the polling booth in government elections, and from what we can see of internal politics with union governance.
To put it another way: if it were easier for union members to decertify or deauthorize their union without getting fired[0], we'd probably see these elections happening more often (both successful and unsuccessful ones). Instead, union members support laws which allow them to bypass this process.
(Note that, after accounting for race, union members overwhelmingly voted for Republicans in the last two election cycles, despite the unions themselves endorsing union-friendly Democrats).
[0] Even if they manage not to get fired in the process - which is totally legal for a union to do, unlike a company firing an employee for supporting a union - the NLRB can overrule the results of the decertification or deauthorization election, which invalidates the whole process.
There's a lot that's skewed in your comments, but that's just flat out wrong. Union households voted for Clinton over Trump by 8%. That's less than Democrats often get, but the idea that union members prefer Republicans is divorced from reality.
Do your own homework next time, instead of spreading cynical lies on the assumption that everyone else will be too lazy to check them.
You're thinking of union shops, not closed shops. Union shops are nominally illegal, but in practice, many large unionized workplaces are effectively union shops, because the NLRB chooses to enforce a very narrow interpretation of the Supreme Court case that they lost.
I don't think so. The media (the 4th estate) is now basically a mouth piece for the corporations. Noam Chompsky has written extensively on this, and the west really does not have a diverse spectrum of opinion, information, and perspective in popular, widely distributed and readily available information sources.
Media and information sources have been consolidated into a few centralised corporate ownerships that are not interested in social justice and a fair distribution of wealth. Quite the contrary, the corporate interests are simply interested in generating shareholder profits and wealth. Indeed, the directors of media companies are duty bound to generate as much profit for their respective corporations. This naturally means that the media corporations are interested in consolidating and centralising as much wealth for themselves as possible, and will cater their information and direction of opinion to achieve that end.
Many nonprofits educate/persuade as part of growing their membership and fund raising. Their motives are simpler and easier to figure out bias for the purpose of triangulation. This is not the same thing as journalism.
"Is that the truth or did you read it in the Herald Sun?"
No, and that's basically by law. Unions lobbied (successfully) for laws which grant them permanent, exclusive access to the bargaining unit once 50% + 1 vote in favor of it.
Pretty much the only cases where you'd have separate unions are where they're representing different types of workers altogether (ie, nurses vs janitors) or when they're not actually employed by the same organization (ie, two different sets of subcontractors).
> And are there some cross-category unions (where workers in different areas and jobs are members of the same overarching organization
Yes, in fact almost every union is affiliated with a federation like the AFL, UAW, Teamsters, etc.
Is there a source on this?
And non-union members are disproportionately likely to support things like closed-shop laws.
Imagine if we all (and not just the left) talked about companies the same way we talk about unions, using the countless examples of managerial abuse, wage theft etc. as examples. Would you say that would be reasonable?
And preemptively, this is not a "both sides" question either. Everything is grey, but there are shades of grey. And while neither unions nor companies are perfect, both are at the same time vital to how things work right now and not above criticism. They both are definitely preferable to 1820s style enterprises for example, but worse than the Culture.
It's like trying to argue 'not all cops'. Sure, but we still decided body cams were a good idea.
I believe we need to swing back towards unionizing. But I think there are real & legitimate concerns that haven't been fixed & aren't FUD.
Then, when Americans did not want to compete with rural Chinese farmers pay, those corporations abandoned the area? Leaving cities with huge infrastructure bills and a large population? None of these issue develop in a vacuum. They are complex.
That's simply a libertarian + right-wing claim.
Unions can be great for workers. They can also fuck up markets and/or workers. What's wrong with taking the good and improving the bad for unions in the 21st century?
That's literally what 99% of the start-ups in Silicon Valley are doing in various verticals.
The black/white thinking when it comes to discussion of unions always feels like people have more of an agenda to push that being interested in any meaningful discussion.
If unions are so great, then they should stand on their own 2 feet, instead of forcing everyone to join them.
See the problem?
Why? Because as soon as they get a foothold, it is done. Over. Can't get rid of them. There are literally rules where they can fire you for trying to end the union.
If it weren't for attitudes like yours, I wouldn't be opposing unions. But your attitude DOES exist, so my only option is all out war.
Fortunately, the rest of my industry (tech) agrees with me and does not support unions. And fortunately, union support is going down massively all across the US.
http://gotfired.com/blog/2016/04/can-i-be-fired-for-not-join...
>You are protected by law in all 50 states from being fired from your job for not joining a union. You can be only liable for no more than the requirement to pay either union dues or a reduced amount to work in an agency shop. If you refuse to join the union and refuse to pay the required dues, then you can be fired.
Actually there is a better way. The better way is to do everything in your power as a worker and citizen to prevent the union from being formed in the first place. Either at YOUR company, or at any others, even if you don't work there. As well as by pushing for any law that reduces the power of unions.
A union can't force you to pay dues if they are crippled country wide.
And this has been what has been happening in the US for decades, as unions are less powerful than they have ever been.
Don't like that attitude? Well then the pro-union people shouldn't have pushed to require people to pay dues.
The fundamental problem is that the more power that unions get, the more likely they are to invade whatever industry I am in and destroy. I don't ever want to risk THAT.
What good does crippling unions do? You think it's useful for large portions of the community to be on stifled wages and bad working conditions?
Unions are less powerful in the US because the US has a broken system where those with money have more votes than those with less? There is a financial interest in having the "mere peons" on less cash because it results in a better balance sheet situation for executives and share holders, resulting in better EOY dividends and better bonuses.
I support Unions because of people like you, because for some fucking unknown reason, people like you believe that some are entitled to less because they are employed in xxxx profession or don't have xxxx degree.
The fundamental problem is that unions are REQUIRED, if there was a bigger sense of social responsibilty, people would get paid decent living wages and wouldn't be worked in horrendously dangerous conditions dealing with power brokers whose only interest is their own portfolio value.
Please, get away from the trickle down economics bullshit and come back to the real world. How much evidence of corporate malfeasance do you have to see on a daily basis before realising that protecting the rights of the 99% is not only a good economic decision, but also a humane one.
Because we do not want the union "benefits" that aren't really benefits.
We do not want another group controlling our workplace or forcing us into horrible, one size fits all, collective bargaining agreements. We want to be allowed to negotiate for ourselves.
We do not want gigantic barriers to entry, meant only to discriminate against people who couldn't afford to buy a fancy 4 year piece of paper.
We do not want discrimination against young people (ie, seniority pay requirements) forced into our contracts. We want to be judged equally on our own merits.
We do not want to be stuck in an organization that we can basically never get rid of once it is established.
I believe that I am way better off without any union forcing me to join.
And apparently a whole lot of other people ALSO agree with me.
We believe that it is very much in the self interest of workers to prevent unions from destroying our industry with overbearing rules and regulations that prevent us from doing our job.
This is not some rare, weird, opinion that I hold. This is the MAJORITY opinion. Unions are less popular than ever, because we the workers don't want them.
"The union protects and improves Members' wages and conditions. Our successful bargaining campaigns continue to deliver fair wages and better conditions like superannuation, site allowances, redundancy pay and income protection. In the year 2000 this branch of the CFMEU won the 36 hour week, giving workers 26 paid days off a year."
Also get 5% YOY pay rises, which allows wages to stay in line with inflation instead of stagnating. You're being naive with your comments IMO, ignoring the reality of the matter and trying to pitch us into a "everyone's different and should be able to negotiate" which has been shown to be damaging. How much data do you need to see about stagnating wage growth and consistently growing executive wages to see that this "we don't need unions" argument is ignorant of the truth?
> We do not want another group controlling our workplace or forcing us into horrible, one size fits all, collective bargaining agreements. We want to be allowed to negotiate for ourselves.
http://www.epi.org/blog/strengthening-collective-bargaining-...
http://www.epi.org/publication/how-todays-unions-help-workin...
You can believe what you want, you do realise that most of them don't FORCE you to join, but you will likely just be treated like a leech, which is appropriate.
Please provide some data for your claims because I'm straight up gonna say you're wrong on the majority of your points.
> We believe that it is very much in the self interest of workers to prevent unions from destroying our industry with overbearing rules and regulations that prevent us from doing our job.
This one (and a few of your other comments strike a nerve) because I think that you have the entire purpose of unions confused, unions are there to provide workers, me and you, your parents, normal non-1%ers, an opportunity to get a fairer distribution of the pie, not ALL of the pie, just what is fair. If you actually provided some concrete examples of industries where you don't think the unions should be, I could have easily pulled data up on their profits, compared it to their workers wages, and it would be a lot easier to make the point that most companies can afford to pay workers better wages, which is a win-win for everyone, the idea that if I work at McDonalds, and am an enterprising individual, and ask for a pay rise vs my other workers, is laughable, why would they bother? They've crushed dissenters, and now because of the shit conditions you work in, they'll just fire you and grab someone who doesn't ask for better conditions. It's an incentive disparity, companies have no interest in paying workers more.
For example:
https://twitter.com/VirginTrains/status/881138129176014848
Here's a good one, ITT they acknowledged that they understaff consistently and expect workers to be able to work their rest days so they can keep staffing requirements low. Then naturally, it's the workers fault when they actually take their rest days.
Man, the more I read this comment, the more I think you're just trolling.
5% YOY raises is very low and I would hate to be stuck in that kind of collective bargaing agreement that forced me to accept it. No, I'd rather negotiate on my own and get a much better one.
And yes, unions DO force you to join, because if you don't pay their fee, and accept their bargaining agreement, then you get fired.
If they don't want to force people to join, then I guess it shouldn't be a bad idea to pass right to work laws, that make it illegal to force workers to pay the fees under threat of being fired.
If you like unions, or other people do, then that would be fine if these union people didn't make these rules that cause people to be fired, because they disagree with your opinion on unions (which is a whole lot of people!)
This is not just 1 or 2 people. This is lots and lots of people who disagree with your opinion on how great unions are. And these people should be left alone.
But because they refuse to leave them alone, then there can be no compromise.
That's the biggest problem with union people. They can't possibly understand that people could disagree with them, and don't want their "help".
You aren't interested in the service, fine. But I'm not sure why you feel like you need to cry about unions when you aren't their target group anyway?
Not if unions get a foothold in my industry, then it won't be "fine". If that happens then they will be able to implement rules and regulations that force me to join them.
And yes, there ARE movements to get the tech industry unionized (they aren't very popular, Fortunately).
No thanks. I'm a not going to let my industry be ruined like that. I'd rather stop all of that in its tracks by making unions powerless nation wide.
They can't enter my industry and force me to join if they are powerless EVERYWHERE.
Also, if it is seriously "fine" for people who don't want their "services", then how about we implement right to work laws everywhere?
Shouldn't it be "fine" for everyone to not join them if they don't want to?
Fortunately for me, though, unions are continueing to become less powerful. So fortunately, less and less of them will be able to force people to join in the future.
I can fight for my self better on my own, thank you very much. I do not want an organization, forcing me to join them and forcing me to agree with their opinions "for my own good", because I don't know any better.
I will negotiate, and fight the capitalist class, using the ways that I feel are best, and not through a coercive organization that is only looking out for themselves.
If unions were so great, then they wouldn't need to make everyone join them. They would stand on their own merits. I do not want their "benefits".
And because unions refuse to be voluntary, my only option is supporting the anti-union movements that make them powerless nationwide. They can't force me to join if they are universally powerless.
Bullshit you can't. You're at best a gnat against the owners of companies valued at hundreds of millions of dollars.
Unfortunately for the pro-union crowd, though, they have forced me to be positioned against them, because they cannot give up on their dumb idea of trying to force everyone who disagrees to join them.
This strategy backfires massively, as the only option it leaves me is to try and make them as powerless as possible because if they are crippled nation wide then they can't force me to join under threat of being fired.
I'd love it if both sides could coexist. But until universal right to work laws exist, that protect workers from being require to join or pay dues, we'll there can be no compromise.
Unions are only as good as their governance and oversight. Unions can be good, and work in partnership with management, but it takes time and effort. There is no one click button or app for collective protection of worker rights.
>If unions are so great, then they should stand on their own 2 feet, instead of forcing everyone to join them.
If you can convince enough people, you can? But if people organize against you, be a good loser. Nobody except the very hardcore is saying:
>If private property is so great, then everyone who wants to have it should stand on their own 2 feet, instead of forcing everyone to accomodate them
to argue against private property or capitalism. But the same social contract that allows for private property can decide that if you want to have its benefits (e.g. the aforementioned private property) can recognize and protect the hard won rights of unions and workers. Stealing a bit of rhetoric, those who don't like it can go to some warlord ridden backwater, I hear there you are free to not follow any social contract if you are up to it
Fortunately, the rest of my industry agrees with me.
And ALSO, fortunately, union support is massively going down all across the US.
It looks like that social contract of yours is changing. Perhaps because of attitudes like yours.
I will not "be a good loser". I will oppose union efforts anywhere and everywhere, no matter what, because any power they get anywhere is a massive risk to me and my industry.
As soon as they get a foothold, they will implement rules that force me and others to join. It is safer to just stop them in their tracks before they can get even close to taking over.
And good on you, others will either agree or disagree with you. But I do wonder, why should you be allowed to stop union efforts if others aren't allowed to force you to join? And with whom would you...organize to stop union efforts?
> But I do wonder, why should you be allowed to stop union efforts if others aren't allowed to force you to join?
But they ARE allowed to force me to join, under threat of being fired, in some states. So that's why.
If the US had universal right to work laws, where you could not be fired for refusing to join a union, then I wouldnt care and wouldn't bother organizing against unions.
The attitude of "screw you for standing up for your right to not join an organization" is very common among union supporters, which is the reason why I oppose them.
I organize against unions already, by supporting right to work laws, and supporting politicians who do as well, and donating to these efforts.
There are a ton of existing efforts to protect worker's rights of voluntary association, and their right to not join organizations that they don't support.
http://gotfired.com/blog/2016/04/can-i-be-fired-for-not-join...
>You are protected by law in all 50 states from being fired from your job for not joining a union. You can be only liable for no more than the requirement to pay either union dues or a reduced amount to work in an agency shop. If you refuse to join the union and refuse to pay the required dues, then you can be fired.
Yes. They want to do it to me, so why wouldn't I do it to them? That just puts me at a disadvantage for following rules that my opponents refuse to follow.
But "taking away their right to organize" is a bit of a stretch.
They should be able to "organize", in the colloquial sense of lobbying, talking to other people, expressing their opinion, and negotiating in groups, all they want in support of their cause.
Freedom of association, as defined in the first amendment of US Constitution, applies to them too.
And in turn, I will "organize" AGAINST their cause, as is also MY right.
Disagreeing with someone, and organizing against them, is not the same as taking away THEIR right to "organize".
And yes, you can be fired, if you refuse to pay the union required fee. That's the same thing as being forced to join. Go get your money from people who chose, of their own free will, to join.
That's quite a claim, do you have any data to back that up? That just sounds like another claim intended to politicize things in some binary fashion - left vs right. Which is ironic because it is this same FUD tactic that politicians use to get people to react with their gut rather than their brain. You seem to be propagating this divisive tactic.
There are many reason for a shrinking middle class in the US - loss of the manufacturing sector, an aging population, the decline in marriage rates, a more unequal income distribution and changing demographics such as an increase in racial and ethnic diversity.[1]
Also the majority of of union members are now in public sector jobs and not private sector jobs.[2]
The past 50 years has overall seen an increase in the public sector union jobs, trending slightly downward recently.
Public-sector workers have a union membership rate (34.4 percent) more than five times higher than that of private-sector workers (6.4 percent).[3]
[1] http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2015/12/09/the-american-middl...
Ford's financials were better at the time (lots of strong European subsidiaries) and they managed to tough it out.
Toyota, Honda, etc don't have the same union in their US factories.
Not to mention the bank bailouts, and I don't remember banks being known for their exceptionally strong labour organisation.
The bailouts were the reaction to an exogenous shock, the recession, and have not much to say about labour politics. In fact unions have the ability to collectively negotiate wage stalls, like in Germany in the early 2000s or Scandinavia in the 80s. Which is a positive in recessions to maintain employment and liquidity.
Second (and more important), taking a bailout would have meant no dividends. Many Ford family members rely on dividends as primary income.
A classic case of be careful what you wish for.
* salary fixing * wage theft * shift of tax burden from capital to labor * raiding pensions, defunding retirement plans * denying collective bargaining * tying healthcare insurance to employment * etc, etc
The way I see it, is either Government protect their Workers and working class with benefits and wages, Like what many parts of Europe have done or they allow Union to do it.
And i know this is considered an extremely unpopular opinion in US.
* Does any one know if this middle class problem is also a thing in Germany?
European economy is slow compared to the US due to high taxes, too much social protection and needless state meddling in the economy. If they introduce a tax on robots it will only get worse.
Define "slow". Growth rates are comparable everywhere with France and Germany fractionally ahead of the US:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/may/31/uk-comes-bo...
(of course all of those are pretty low at the moment, which may be a more general post-2008 problem)
"Too much social protection" and "high taxes" seem to me to be memes aimed at benefiting the top 1-10%, with little grounding in truth. If you look at marginal tax rates faced by median families, and compensate for the ways in which this includes things like healthcare which aren't included in the US, it's much less of a difference.
The US is at the opposite pole, meaning too little social protection. I was thinking about some kind of middle ground, like in Canada or the UK.
That sounds wrong. Example: Czech rep. had much more expansive monetary stimulus policy (we printed quite a bit of money), is booming on Germany-level and yet is super eurosceptic.
Euroscepticism is just newest brand of populism in Europe. Especially after ECB stimulus Europe is getting better, "on life support" sounds like ridiculous hyperbole.
Devaluing the CZK wouldn't have been possible if your country had switched to the Euro like Slovakia did.
The problem is the ECB does not want to devalue the Euro mainly because German fears of hyperinlfation. So they're trying to stimulate sluggish growth with negative interest rates. Which doesn't work. It only destroys pensions because it's esentially a tax on money.
Yes technology was part of it, but rampant inflation or vast increase of liquidity is also another factor, and economist are still puzzled as to why wages aren't going up.
Your obvious cleaning suspects are maybe the first ones to go. Most of the floor cleaning nowadays is done by people operating some sort of cleaning vehicle. Also, most niche cleaning jobs requiring more detail won't be replaced by robots soon. Truck and bus drivers will probably go as well, maybe in 20-30 years. Until then, this sector is just going to get more regulated with electronic log books, dynamic weight checks, satellite tracking and such. Waitresses I rather doubt will go away doring my lifetime.
German here.
At this point, I think it's not yet a problem comparable to the US, but there is rising (perhaps overblown, but certainly not unfounded) fear of a social decline among the middle class.
Remember, the German employment environment (I'm struggling to find a good word) is different from the US. Trades are stronger and more respected, university education is free, social systems offer more protection (but only from outright poverty, not from social decline).
So the pressures are probably not felt a sharply. But there is growing worry.
In economic terms, 2008 was basically yesterday. Everything I've read points to the erosion of the middle class being related to stagnant wages in real terms going back DECADES.