Re:Thousands of Google’s cafeteria workers have unionized
by opportune on Tuesday December 31, 2019 @02:24PM
(#21923778)
In a perfect world, unions would be unnecessary. I think that would be a less controversial opinion. Wanting them to be illegal is more a moralization of your economic ideology - it would not be compatible with a belief that “labor is entitled to all it creates”. And stating it as matter of fact rather than as an opinion is kind of lame
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Re:Thousands of Google’s cafeteria workers have unionized
by greatscott404 on Tuesday December 31, 2019 @02:36PM
(#21923947)
When corporations band together to extract higher profits we penalize them, same logic should apply to labor unions.
Re:Thousands of Google’s cafeteria workers have unionized
by dannypgh on Tuesday December 31, 2019 @03:03PM
(#21924235)
I don't buy for a second that the wages absent a union are what a free market would predict. A free market requires freedom to participate, and most individuals are forced to sell their labor in exchange for food and shelter, let alone necessities like healthcare. Unions provide a framework where something closer to a free market wage (note: this is to say nothing of the morality of using markets for these purposes, a separate question) can be negotiated. Maybe in a world where people had a UBI they could live off of this could be argued, but that's not the world of today. You're cherry picking free market economics only where it suits you.
Your assessment of antitrust law is also pretty far removed from reality. By that logic, mergers and acquisitions would be illegal in every instance. Or, for that matter, standards bodies. Corporations band together to increase profits all the damn time, and the overwhelming majority of this activity is legal.
Re:Thousands of Google’s cafeteria workers have unionized
by jkrems on Tuesday December 31, 2019 @02:54PM
(#21924162)
Well, all of Google's shareholders are banding together against thousands of individual workers. We don't penalize them banding together. We just call it "a company". Why is it any different when some of the workers band together to be on equal footing?