Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contractor's vote to unionize

Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by rayiner on Saturday September 21, 2019 @01:50PM (#21036799)

The NYT, a fairly left-leaning paper in a left-leaning city, wrote about how the union is causing cost explosion building the second avenue subway. As to the funding—New York’s MTA has a significantly larger budget than London’s very similar system. London, meanwhile, covers 100% of its operating costs from fares, while New York covers just half.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by rtempaccount1 on Saturday September 21, 2019 @02:00PM (#21036849)

However London's underground system also has unions, so if the suggestion is that it's more efficient than New York, the implication is that it's unlikely to be the presence of a union causing the issues.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by mlindner on Sunday September 22, 2019 @01:33AM (#21039853)

European unions in general actually work, for some reason unknown to me. I've never seen, in the modern era, a union in the US do anything but harm its members in general.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by vondur on Saturday September 21, 2019 @03:37PM (#21037415)

You are probably correct, it’s not unions per se, it’s that particular union. I doubt that the US public would make such a distinction.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by amaccuish on Sunday September 22, 2019 @03:28PM (#21043366)

> The NYT, a fairly left-leaning paper in a left-leaning city

I think American "left" and the Left everywhere else are entirely different things. As a leftie in the UK, I do not recognise the NYT as left at all.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by michaelchisari on Saturday September 21, 2019 @05:55PM (#21038144)

The New York Times is decidedly not left-leaning on economic issues.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by runarberg on Saturday September 21, 2019 @05:07PM (#21037931)

The rhetoric goes that the union is enforcing expensive outdated work to be kept to keeps their members employed. However I don’t buy that rhetoric. If that is the case, it is not the union’s fault, but the governments fault for hiring a corrupt contractor.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by remotecool on Saturday September 21, 2019 @07:14PM (#21038501)

So if an employee steals from their employer, is it the employers fault for hiring them?

Unions always enforce expensive, outdated work. The taxi cab unions fought Uber and Lyft, a vastly superior taxi system, all to prop up an existing outdated system.

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by mcguire on Saturday September 21, 2019 @09:02PM (#21038955)

"* The taxi cab unions fought Uber and Lyft, a vastly superior taxi system...*"

Vastly superior for who?

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Re:Anti-union activity is heating up ahead of Google contrac... by remotecool on Sunday September 22, 2019 @08:59AM (#21041158)

Uber and Lyft are vastly superior than the existing taxi system and better for everyone. It got rid of the medallian system that prevented many people from driving a cab and used technology to make it very convenient to find a ride at any time.

Good things won't last forever. The taxi cab unions are already fighting these companies back in many cities.

They kind of remind me of the record industry and file sharing in the 90s: fighting technology, so they can keep their outdated and expensive system in place.

Most unions are like this. As another example, they will fight automation and force companies to hire multiple, overpaid workers, for a job that can be done by a single person. This only holds companies back and puts them at a disadvantage.

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