What are your opinions on Unions, do they now do more harm than good?
Referring to labor unions if anyone is unclear.
>>1102780
They were needed like 100+ years ago when workers were falling into meatgrinders, falling off buildings and little children were dying in coal mines
Now they just want more gibsmedats and bully anyone who doesn't meet their ridiculous demands
There's plenty of potential abuses in how they're run, but unions are often absolutely necessary to create a level playing field for labor negotiations. Capitalism assumes some degree of equanimity between buyer and seller, and unions help ensure that remains true for collective wages.
You can't believe in capitalism without believing in unions.
>>1102796
This.
Unions are completely necessary even if, in recent times they have been exploiting their power/ influence. Government should absolutely never get involved with breaking up unions. Modern union bureaucracy is fucked though.
>>1102780
I hate then and I work for one. I had a job that was ending in a week and got offered another job so I wouldn't have any down time between jobs and my union told me I couldn't do the job because they didn't assign it to me and made me sit around for a month with no work and pretty much told me to suck it up. I can't speak for all unions but mine has made me extremely anti union.
>>1102922
One rupee has been deposited into your good-goy-points account prajeet
>>1102780
Public sector, kill them all.
Private sector, sure thing matey, I don't care.
I work on the non-union side of a union shop.
The older guys are good for the most part. The kids are shitty, but the union does not protect them like the guys with 20-30 years.
The pay advancement structure is straightforward. You get trained on all of the equipment, but you have to bid to work it full time. The most senior members get their pick, but there are some sweet gigs on 2nd and 3rd shift that can be had with a few years of seniority.
Contract is up in 2017 and we are bleeding money. Placing the odds of a strike at 50/50. There have been some nasty fights between unions and management in my industry recently.
>>1102952
Naw, I have an actual job cuck king.
>>1102916
It's because Walmart operates on 1% fucking margins whereas car companies, coal mining, and all other union-heavy industries have margins much higher.
It's not some nefarious case of corporations "winning". It's a result of the transition our economy went through to a cheap, mass-produced goods and services industry that requires a lot more saving on labor costs than industries in the past have.
>>1103055
It's more because Walmart can replace its employees with literally anyone, whereas a car manufacturer or coal mining company need employees with particular skills.
>>1103089
>coal mining is a high-skill job
No. It's the margins thing, m8. This isn't just me speculating like you are doing. This is the actual reason.
>>1103055
moreover, by definition the less-skilled industries are the ones where unionization is most likely to form. THe whole point of being in a union is that you have no individual power because you can be replaced at any time, so instead you resort to collective power.
>>1102881
>in recent times they have been exploiting their power/ influence
>in recent times
how are things back there in 1979?
>>1103089
Kids worked in coal mines at one point you moron. How is it a job that requires skills?
>>1103135
That was when coal mining was done by people walking into a cave to mine the coal out with pickaxes.
PROTIP: That's not how we mine coal anymore.
>>1102780
They are awesome, champions of the worker, and continue to keep workers well treated.
People who are against them are either fatcats or don't know what the fuck they are talking about.
They do have SOME slight drawbacks, but the gains vastly outweigh the drawbacks. Assuming you are not a business owner, a union will always be better than no union.
Imagine if the NFL players didn't have a union. They'd probably be breaking their necks and knees for $300k a year.
>>1103147
I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not o.o
>>1103140
So now that it's skilled, it shouldn't need unions anymore.
Alls I know is my Grandfather was big on Unions growing up.
He was part of a union for his skilled labor division (factory work) for years. Union picnics, helped with pay negotiation, did everything they asked, donated to them, paid his union dues etc. Loved it, harassed my Dad to join a Union (he installed HVAC), always talked about it.
Came time to retire, he was set with a pension for 35+ years of hardwork. Some technicality happened according to him and they didn't give him his pension and completely dropped him like a rock.
Now I might be a bit biased since I only know his side of the story, but according to him the moment he wasn't useful to them anymore they completely shut him out and weren't there for him anymore.
>>1103628
Unions usually aren't in charge of the pension.
I'm an employer and a libertarian, and I'm pro union.
It seems to me they're just a natural part of the free market, i.e. if people are free to do what they want, then they should be free to unionise.
Having said that, I only have 2 employees, so I've never had to sit down and negotiate with a union, which I'm sure would be a fucking nightmare.
I take offense to the leftist assertion that workers are being exploited by their employers. If you don't take any risks in life you don't deserve any rewards.
These cunts show up, work for 8 hours, get a guaranteed wage no matter how the business does, and go home. That's the deal they chose, it's not exploitation.
Meanwhile, if employers are not turning a profit we don't get paid. If something goes wrong it's our balls on the line. We're out there fighting off bankruptcy every day to provide stability for them, and then they complain when we make the big bucks.
Unions operate on a hierarchy system, it has nothing to do with how efficient you are at work, but how much arse you can kiss in the process or how long you have been there.
Sure, we shouldn't destroy Unions because they provide a necessary counter balance, but at the same time they should expect employers to tell them to fuck off if things become unproductive.
>>1103098
Not many people are willing to work in a job where they get dirty, have to do manual labor and guarantees you'll get COPD/Asthma and other ailments for 100k a year.
>>1102780
Look at working conditions, pay etc. BEFORE unions then AFTER unions.
You figure it out OP.
>>1102959
Ironically we went the other way around.
Im a member of the IAMAW. I work at a defense contractor.
pros:
>good wage
>good benefits(pension, health insurance paid for)
>other things like weingarten rights
>since i have a skill/license no one else has, i have super seniority
>guaranteed wage increases
cons:
>seniority list, if a layoff happens the bottom of the list gets hit
>2/3rds of the members have an entitlement mentality
>some workers are absolutely worthless but since they have high seniority they cant be laid off
>'tooling'. some of the machines/actions/processes/trades only certain job classifications can preform
>some people think that you're a motherfucking scab for not complying with tooling
>some people think that you're a motherfucking retard for complying with tooling
The unions for electricity are the worst, apparently if you do work without them they cut your wires
>>1102780
Unions are great and God bless them.
>>1103964
As someone who actually knows people in West Virginia right now, I can confirm this is absolute bullshit. Everyone there would clamor for the coal mining to return to the area so they could be employed. You seem to forget that in most coal mining towns, the coal companies have near monopsony power. I can't believe your'e actually trying to argue coal is a sector that struggles to find workers when it just blatantly is not.
>>1102780
Unions are acceptable for competitive private business. Competitive in the sense that the business can actually fail, so that in case bullshit seniority can be a downfall for the business.
Unions are unacceptable for government workers.
>>1103631
Unions can. I've seen in some cable show where some Union pension plans were robbed blind because they couldn't be fucked to check up on the fund manager
>>1103964
>not many people are willing to do [x] for a lot of money
Suburbia college age fuccboi detected
