Re:The US “labor shortage” is just a wage shortage (2021)
by joshstrange on Wednesday June 01, 2022 @10:50AM
(#31582602)
I understand this comment comes from a good place but it falls into the same bucket as "well they can just sue" for me.
As-in, sure, technically they could do all of that but some people just want to work and not take on a huge fight that they themselves may not survive. I'm very pro-union but organizing one sounds miserable and thankless. I want to create software, not herd cats and I assume most people feel the same way. I have huge respect for union organizers and would support them but it's not a simple thing.
These people wanted to do their therapist jobs and they asked for the bare minimum and it was rejected (and the were effectively fired for it), I think that tells you how management would react to a union-effort. You might have legal protection but legal protection doesn't put food on the table.
The way to handle this without backfiring would have been to contact a union about organizing, and let them help with the organizing process. You'd need to get more than 6 people on board, and the employer would fight it, but the organizing employees would have had legal protections against retaliation during and after the process.