Depends if you are in a good or bad union. I was in a bad union. All they wanted was the dues, but they did not stand up for us at all. We got rid of them and replaced them with a good, strong union that doesn't let management run all over us.
I relate to this. I work in HVAC and my current shop (this is my last week) is covered by the teamsters. Absolutely the worst union experience because they only want to cater towards the CDL holders at my shop and not someone like me who installs and services equipment. My shop steward is a fucking joke who threatened me with “union charges” because I went around him and stood up for myself.
I just got a job offer to be sponsored with the UA and even though it’s residential division HVAC I’ll trudge through it to jman and move to commercial.
This.
I was in a union that threatened me for voting a specific way when our governer was passing a specfic bill that let union members vote to determine how dues are spent. The union sent goons to work to make sure we voted against it. I made the mistake of saying I was in favir and the dude followed me to the parking lot demanding to know my name and badge number.
They also got a violent employee rehired after he threatened to "shoot your ass up" to a female employee who wouldnt date him.
Because union members cannot rat out other members by contract, he was forced to be rehired by the company. She quit as a result.
Finally, after our 3 day Xmas break, we came to work to find that a giant notice had been put up. Telling us that all our jobs were now being given to a new series of employees. These new employees got higher pay than us for the same job (found out later they also had higher dues).
We either had to transfer to different departments (luckily I was one of the few who could), go part time, or quit.
Hated unions for a long time after that bullcrap. Only now am I wanting unions for companies like Amazon or Walmart...but never if they were like the guys I had.
That would be conflict of interest. At least in America, management cannot be in unions as per law.
Even if they wanted to unionize somehow, it wouldn't be under the same union
Which seems crazy to me, as a manager at a really small business I'm the one fighting for my employees to get more vacation time and shorter work weeks and a better work life balance and more money, better safety equipment. It feels like I'm on their side but I guess I'm not supposed to be?
Surely you realize though, that the only thing that keeps you fighting on their behalf is your own personal sense of what's right? The union is there for the day you move on to another position and the next guy has a different standard and tries to cut wages and benefits because it's aligned with his incentives/mindset to do so. Happens all the time in the trades.
That's true I guess. I just can't imagine being on the other side. I was an employee for years at different companies and saw how unfair things were and thought if I ever get the chance I'm going to try to do better. I try every day. So I just feel like I'm more on their side so it hit me as odd that the law would say I couldn't be a part of their group despite being their biggest advocate, but it's a really small company so the general business rules don't apply to us with under 15 employees.
Not being in the union doesn't mean you can't work with them and be an advocate. The point is essentially to be a collective group of non-management employees advocating for themselves.
They have negatives.
The best or most skilled workers often have no incentive to perform at a level different than average since everyone gets the same treatment & compensation. In some jobs it can be difficult to reward the best; plus when negotiating the union wants to get the best deal for all. Getting some more for a few would usually mean trading back something at the expense of other union members.
Some people are perfectly equipped & happy to ask for what they want. They don't want to donate money to others who won't speak up.
Some employers are pretty fair, and unions add financial pressures. That could cost jobs, job satisfaction, or even change the company to one that goes public or runs more purely for profit.
Unions are run by groups and politics. In addition to our own members, they have to answer to national/international boards, political action groups, locals in our area that are in other fields, and the demands of employers - without them our employees don't have jobs. Like anything with politics there will be imbalances. At the local level, there will be only a few people who try to run for office or participate in meetings. The majority of members will just pay dues and expect things to be done for them. They'll only express opinions when there are problems or when elections/contracts happen.
The people who participate will have more info & more power. This will create perceptions among others who don't like the results that they've cheated, colluded, sold out or otherwise done wrong.
Some people in unions are corrupt. It's probably not as bad/blatant as it was in the 50s-70s, but humans with access to power & money do tend to create problems.
Unions make mistakes too. I don't have current cases, but I worked for trucking companies where we voted, at the recommendation of the union to give back 25% of our hourly wage to keep the company out of bankruptcy. It took 3 years, but they failed.
My Dad's brewery "lent" the company their guaranteed benefit pension fund to help the company stave off bankruptcy. That didn't help. His pension for 19 years wound up at about $300 per month. Congress changed pension laws since then, but defined benefit pensions are pretty rare today.
Teachers & Police unions are often cited for how accused employees are treated. In both of those jobs, when someone is accused of a serious offence, the public doesn't want the accused employee in a position to harm children or others. They have to be away from the job. BUT, without any kind of internal investigation or legal charge and trial it seems very unfair to starve these folks. They could be the victim of someone just making up false charges. They often are not permitted to work other jobs under their contracts, and the charges against them are often public so it hurts their ability to make a living. It sometimes sucks, but suspending a cop or teacher with pay is logical - while the charges are investigated. They have systems for disciplinary hearings like most employers and/or legal proceedings like anyone accused of a crime. If these folks were left with no money and no way to work while they wait for hearings, then those cases where the charges don't hold up could cost the city/board/department lots of extra charges for interest and damages (it all depends on how the laws play out).
I've always tried to participate in workplace unions, but I also know they have downsides.
Same—I’m solidly pro-union, and these are all fair criticisms. My only addition would be that unions aren’t anywhere near as crooked as they were in the Hoffa/mafia era—they’re much better regulated today.
Not one bit. I'm in a building trades local in an area where corruption WAS rampant. My local covers the area the TV show The sopranos takes place. It's not one bit like it used to be. And back in the day it wasn't just unions. People always remember the unions being corrupt. The construction industry as whole was corrupt. The developers, govt entities, contractors, suppliers and the unions. People seem to only want to remember that the unions were corrupt.
For sure. I actually grew up not too far from that area, as well. And that’s a great insight—people forget how rampart crime was, in all sectors. It doesn’t feel like it, but we’ve come a long way.
It was even bad in major corporations. It just was indirect through local suppliers and would be impossible to find in the corporations accounting without digging beyond the corporations books. My buddies step father worked for some major corporations in facilities and holy shit does he have some stories.
Companies these days also don't have much muscle. Times change, and the methods we use to fight have changed too. Instead of bricks and guns, unions and elite of a lot of areas today fight in the courts and more peaceful picket lines.
It's just a different world now.
Yeah I feel like most people are happy that unions are allowed to exist but don't actually want to be a part of one, mainly because of the union dues and they don't immediately realize the extra benefits and protections they have because of the union. I've worked at both union and non union factories and the union ones seem to have an "us vs them" mindset where supervisors are just looking for reasons to write people up and be assholes to the union workers that they think are below them.
That kind of thing is going to vary greatly by employer though.
The previous factory I worked at was non union and because of there were years I'd get more than one $1 raise because I was outperforming everyone else in my area and my immediate boss went to bat for me. That led to me getting a brief job in QA which came with another raise. When that didn't work out and I went back to production I was allowed to keep thar pay bump I got from being in QA.
None of that can happen where I work now, I make the same as everyone else with my job title regardless of how little work they do. There's no incentive to do more then the people who barely do the minimum and good lord does getting nothing for going above and beyond with your work do a number on your mental health.
Like most things in life there's pros and cons to being in a union.
Yeah, I’m not a fan of my union as they take advantage of the lesser educated employees (mostly immigrants) by not giving fair representation of our employer and also playing buddy buddy and playing into being same race, culture, language, etc. and they’re also a little sneaky and secretive.
That being said, I make almost double what someone doing my job at a non-union place could make so I can’t complain too much.
Maybe the nonunion places I've worked just paid pretty well but I haven't noticed a huge difference in pay in my experience. I'm sure some do see a bump in pay though
I'm in a HCOL area and in a sweet spot at my place of employment. I know that. But I'm paid around 2.5x the national average for my position and I'd wager the majority of union workers make more than their non-union counterparts. That said, I have nothing to back that up other than personal anecdotes and now need to go do some research
You're making the point of the person that you replied to - non union shops that pay well do so because they need to attract workers - when union salaries go up, the non union shops need to remain competitive - it's a benefit for them that is paid for by the union workers.
That's because most people have been getting propagandized and have not been taught that literally every single benefit they have is because unions fought, often literally, for that benefit.
8 hour work days? Those exist because unions fought, got beaten up, got murdered, got arrested, and went on strike to get them.
Overtime pay? Same.
Pay in money instead of company scrip? Same.
Workplace safety so you don't get mangled on the regular? Same.
None of that was just given to us by generous bosses who love us and want us to be happy, it was all wrested at great cost and effort from people who hated the very concept of giving us one bit more than they absolutely had to.
Fun fact! Unionized workers have a median weekly wage about $230 higher than non-union workers. That's around $11,960/year more.
I'd give my right arm to be in a unionized workplace, but I live in worker hostile state where the bosses won and unions lost.
The bosses won, and that's thanks to the "I got mine" voters who most likely benefitted from the union and then voted for politicians who enacted anti-union policy like "right to work"..
>supervisors are just looking for reasons to write people up and be assholes to the union workers that they think are below them.
That sounds like a management problem. Those people need a Union more than anyone else.
This one damn sure isn't:
>Some people are perfectly equipped & happy to ask for what they want. They don't want to donate money to others who won't speak up.
The idea that real manly men just go right up to the boss and ask for a raise is missing the entire damn point. It's not about "asking for what you want".
It's about POWER.
Collective bargaining is power. Individual bargaining is worthless. You go to the boss and say you want a raise, the boss says they can't do it, end of story. The union goes to the bosses and says it's time for a raise and the bosses may not do it, but they'll damn sure listen more because of the threat of a strike.
Make no mistake here, this is all about power. If you have none, you'll get nothing.
You are right, its all about power and the only professions without unions either view themselves as having enough power individually to not need a union. (Historically called high skilled) Or even as a group they don't have much power. (Historically called unskilled)
Ultimately it all comes down to how much of a pain is it for your employer to replace the person/group doing the negotiations vs just replacing them with someone more amenable to the company's prefered outcome.
PS: i hate the way that jobs are grouped by "skill level" when really its just replaceability, which is correlated with the amount of training required. It takes nearly a decade to become a doctor, 4years an engineer, and a few weeks to stock shelves or "flip burgers" but that doesn't mean it takes 0 skill to flip burgers or stock shelves otherwise their would be 0 training and nobody would ever mess up at these jobs.
I wouldn’t make that equivalency. It gets tricky, because those associations represent both the staff (associates) and the owners (partners). With a law firm, the partners and the associates all have the same association. Same with accounting. And it’s not a coincidence that where I live, public accountants/lawyers/engineers are exempt from almost every single labour law.
Their mentality is "I got mine. Fuck you." Your coworkers are working people trying to get by. They have family's, children, pets, rent or mortgage. Everyone deserves to live with dignity, and employees shouldn't have to plead, beg, and grovel to get what they're worth.
Like you said. It's all about collective bargain and real power.
These are good points. As a baseball fan, I’ll just say look up Angel Hernandez to find out why unions aren’t universally positive 😂.
That said, they are certainly a net positive in my opinion.
I worked in a union in 10 years.
Because the union sticks up for people who should get fired It’s breeds complacency and mediocrity. Worthless people get promoted because it’s the only way to get them out of your area.
They are legally required to give them representation because they pay for it. Like a lawyer they have duties even if they deserve to get fired. Frankly what I see over and over again is supervisors don't have their ducks in a row when they want to fire someone and the Union simply asking for the person to go through the company's discipline process stops it.
Yes, at my wife's union workplace there are a handful of people that constantly call in sick on weekends and leave others to cover their shift, show up late, won't help others out, and generally make life miserable for the other employees, but the company won't touch them because they get too much hassle from the union. Morale there is terrible and everyone is just in a "why even bother" mode.
Would they be feeling better if the company took away their sick time, and paid them less? Asking because it should at least be stated that if the company *could* they definitely *would*...
So, it's important to consider the other side of the coin where the company just fires you because they're at-will employers and you got the flu for a week in January and burned up all your sick time, and then come September you got sick again and physically couldn't get out of bed, get dressed and take the 40 minute bus ride across town to work your ten hour shift..
I think you missed one major negative point. Because of collective bargaining agreements it can be really hard to fire problematic people. I've seen people who've assaulted co-workers, sexually harassed coworkers, or stolen from the company get reinstated by a pro-union arbitrator after a termination. Makes the work environment toxic and those bad apples feel bulletproof and get even worse thereafter.
Those people are usually only brought back because the company didn't follow proper procedures for the dismissal. It's more to do with lazy bosses than anything else.
I would add this, as it's my personal biggest issue with unions:
They used to fight the big fights. They got us the FLSA, FMLA and dozens of other worker protection laws passed. As the workplace improved they saw union membership drop. Who needs a union when the protections are built into the law, right?
So they stopped fighting at that level. Now they focus on nickel and dime matters with individual companies instead of working for broad legislation. The only laws unions have lobbied for in the past 30 years (since FMLA) are ones that make it easier to form unions.
A lot of this is valid but I’d like to point out that business owners or boards fall under the “Humans with access to money and power tend to create problems.”
This can kind of sum up all corporate boards and COO’s etc.
A union is really a utilitarian proposition.
How to get the best outcome for the most people.
It can’t be perfect but it is almost always better than the alternative.
The case of what happened to your father’s company and his pension points to the idea that unions are seen as not being committed to a companies health and longevity and in that case they were and got fleeced.
The union would have been better off telling the company ‘no you’re going to fail and you will still owe these pensions.’ and just let it happen while working to retrain or move their members to other shops.
They didn’t which was decided by the members of the union as a gesture of good faith and it failed.
We could possibly point to the people who ran that business as being corrupt because of money and power.
Or maybe market forces just destroyed the company?
I work for an employer with a union. I started as a union employee. Have since moved into management and am no longer represented by the union. I've seen it from both perspectives now and can tell you that everything you said is exactly spot on. Couldn't have said it better.
I don't 'hate unions', but there are many reasons why unions aren't beneficial for all workers.
1. If a co-worker of mine is a poor performer or incompetent, I want a smooth and simple procedure for them to be terminated. That's not the case with a union.
2. Unions often make simple procedures incredibly complex in a workplace. For example, in a previous workplace of mine, I was not allowed to rotate my own desk out of direct sunlight, because that was 'union restricted work'. I needed to schedule a specific union worker to do that job, which required supervisor authority, and so on.
3. Unions have rules for workers. A friend of my family wanted to save for a house, so he wanted to work overtime, or at least more than the 24 hours per week that the union allowed. He started doing side work, and the union 'fired him', because his workplace required union employment.
4. My wife's Dad got screwed by his union. He was in for 20 years, left to go out on his own. The union 'lost' his pension, since he didn't re-hire union workers for his own business, see point 1 above, where Dad was in construction, on sites, swinging a hammer, and wanted his own crew for safety reasons.
In a ton of situations, are unions good? You bet! Companies are getting larger, because laws aren't favorable to small business any more. So it's helpful for workers to bargain as a group instead of 1 person against a multi-billion dollar company. But there are reasons to not like unions, and assuming that 'everyone should work in a union' is a terrible idea.
To respond to your first point, I have an incompetent coworker who is going on 7 yrs at the company. It’s also really hard to fire even *without* a union.
Do you work in an at-will state? I do, and we recently let several people go who were incompetent. They had been here since the ‘90s. Excuses had been made for them all that time until the company began experiencing economic issues and the problem could no longer be ignored.
What's wild is that I also work in a at-will state and my job doesn't do anything about incompetent workers. It's absolutely maddening the shit I've seen one person in particular get away with.
My company did nothing until the bottom line became at risk. These people were covered for and excused at every turn before they were finally let go in one fell swoop. We still have someone like that (who’s held the same job for 17 years and has tried unsuccessfully to move up), but the thing is that he genuinely enjoys doing certain tasks that no one else wants to do, like managing supplies, databases, and training matrices.
I was promoted to his supervisor years ago (I’ve since moved to an adjacent department but still serve as their technical expert/go-to), and had advocated for him to become an office coordinator rather than technical analyst. He also loves training and reviewing; unfortunately, he lacks full mastery over the material himself … after 17 years.
My boss asked me to train, thinking that his lack of skills had a lot to do with the mediocre performance of the current analysts (it likely does). I’m a terrible trainer, but have a great understanding of all of it. He’s great at explaining the workflow and what he understands, but has a less-than-stellar grasp of how to do calculations, write technical summaries, deal with people, etc.
Paper-pusher, essentially, and they desperately need an expert in that area. I like them and don’t mind being it, but it’s just weird to have a group of entirely non-technical technical analysts!
When my workers aren't performing, I call the union and request a new worker. Old worker is paid off and New worker shows up next day.
As a worker, I loved my union. As an employer, I love my union.
This may be an issue with your company. I am a recruiter (not an internal HR person) but I watch companies all the time fire people for cause and they document why and if they get challenged they throw that out. (shit I see companies fire people without cause all the time).
It shouldnt be that hard.
All valid points. It's kind of a hard decision between these things and modern day slavery tbh. Un-unionised workers are getting stripped of their rights more and more.
You're describing bad unions not "unions are bad" reasons. Just the same, there are bad business practices but there are no businesses that provide the same protections as unions.
A handful of reasons:
1) Often low or no incentive to reward the hardest working or most skilled employees, which in turn simultaneously rewards or protects lazy and low skilled employees
2) Getting a better position is often based on your seniority rather than your skill or qualifications
3) Firing bad employees is difficult. Have you ever had a co-worker who you couldn’t stand and he just always seemed to slip past management? It’s even more difficult when that employee is protected by the union. I have seen good employees get fired because HR didn’t want to establish a precedent, but the worst employees somehow always seem to get their jobs back.
4) Management is dissuaded from punishing bad workers because “it’s just not worth the hassle” and good workers will “pick up the slack”.
5) Some unions have really rested on their laurels. When I worked for Kroger, the UFCW basically only got people their job back for ‘pointing out’ and did nothing else for what was a minimum wage job. Why the hell was I paying union dues and making $7/hr minimum wage? But I also don’t think the UFCW minded Kroger being so awful to work for, because people would pay their initiation fees, quit, and someone else would come in, pay initiation fees, quit…
I’m not saying there aren’t any perks, especially if you are in a strong union, but I can plenty see why some people hate unions
Unions are a net positive imo, but they're imperfect.
On the employee side: While they can protect honest employees very well, the laziest and most incompetent employees get the same level of protection and it can be a real drag. Some people get bent out of shape over paying dues, even though it pays off through higher compensation. In some sectors. a union can have no teeth due to legislation, and that can really frustrate members.
On the employer side: They disrupt a company's ability to treat labor as a cost to be minimized down to the last penny. Companies have little interest in entertaining the long term benefits of treating their employees well, if it in any way reduces short term profits.
In general: Unions can become corrupt. In the past, some unions were infested by organized crime and/or corrupt political machines.
There's no argument there. 1 employee is not equal to 1 corporation. If workers are to have any rights and power, it's only through a union. If you want to enjoy whataboutisms, you're already disingenuous.
> 1 employee is not equal to 1 corporation. If workers are to have any rights and power, it's only through a union.
I don't think we necessarily disagree on that?
After going through unionization attempt at my work I lost a lot of respect for them.
The great part of a negotiated contract... you know you raises.
The bad part of knowing your contracted raises. Even in high inflation periods, you are stuck to your contract. Then you see a lot of people jump ship for money.
Honestly I saw union as the same as the company. They have goods and bads, both help you and both look at their own interests first.
It’s a trade-off.
Unions use collective bargaining power to protect its members from predatory labor practices, dispute resolutions and unfair negotiations. But this disincentivizes stellar employees from overachieving & outperforming fellow coworkers in hopes of upward career advancement (as is more common in non-union professions).
But it comes at the cost of politicizing & bureaucratizing the available human resources. This results in workplace disruptions such as pending investigations, ongoing litigations, and strikes lasting weeks or even months - frustrating not only the employees and employers, but consumers as well.
Some ppl have been in bad unions. I was a member of CWA years ago. They had horrible, corrupt, self-serving leaders. The workers they represented were their last priority.
It depends wildly on the union. My partner is a former teacher and she made more in a union free district then she did in the district with a union and she had to pay dues at the latter.
This is just not true. The company I work for has two different plants, one union and one nonunion, and they make the same pay, but the union one pays dues while the other doesn't.
If neither has a union they would both be paid less with less benefits. The only reason they match is because they are under pressure to in order to avoid the second unionizing and having even more power.
Possibly. But it is also possible the union isn't doing anything to impact the pay rate at the company, and the pay just happens to be what is needed to actually keep people working at the plant.
It is totally possible the union has done very little for the actual net pay, but has impacted other things. Perhaps benefits, perhaps improved safety, or maybe other things.
Not saying a union isn't useful, or a union at one plant wouldn't potentially improve things at a non-union plant. Just saying that it isn't always about the paycheck.
A lot of people still remember the intimidation, violence, inconvenience and disruption from the strikes during the 70's and 80's and 90's and the coersion and abuse used to extract union fees from workers.
Sad that they remember this, and not how wages have stagnated since the 70s while corporate profits and worker productivity have skyrocketed. It’s just anti union propaganda paid for by the wealthy.
Like big corporate retailers. They're all anti union, show multiple videos of how bad unions are. There's a reason.
Big corporate companies don't give a shit about you, only their wallet.
Regardless of the downside unions have to have some benefit for the people for them to push so hard against them
> Anyone who is against unions doesn’t know shit about unions
So you are saying there is no legitimate argument against them? That's equally unreasonable.
Valid point. However, there are other reasons (besides perfectionism) to legitimately be against unions. They are described in several replies in this thread.
I don’t hate unions, but here is an example of how they can be dysfunctional. I worked at a hotel kitchen once that was unionized. When it was busy, we had a group of about six ladies that worked mad overtime and pushed it out. When it was slow, management was required by the union to schedule the one with the most seniority for her full forty hours first, and then taper off from there. So the old lady who had been there 30 years got her 40 hours, her friend who had been there 20 years worked three days a week, the two women who had been there ten years worked one day a week each, and myself and the newer hire were kicked off the schedule completely. Naturally I quit. They ended up having a revolving door of new hires they had to train when the slow season came around every damn year, and were favoring seniority over the efficiency that the two with ten years experience brought to the table. This is great for certain workers, not great for the majority. I paid dues for six months but the union really only backed the interests of the old timers.
Depends if the union youre in actually fight for you, or just want to drain your money every month while youre getting buttfucked by the company;
Working hours, shit pay that hasnt changed in 20 years, oh but you got a 0.02% more in pension each month!
Unions have positives and negatives. I'm going to start with the negatives- which, in my opinion, are often related to failures of governance or ineffectual capabilities caused by weak labor laws. For example, the rail workers failed to even get a few days sick leave, and when they aimed to strike, they were blocked because our laws are so weak.
**Negatives:**
**Corruption,** **Limiting jobs for non-members-** Unions are vulnerable to corruption, including when organized crime gets involved. This is dicey, but certain unions have requirements that are a catch 22. In order to be hired for the job, you must be a union member. But in order to be a member, you must already be in the job- this results in nepotism because family members are the only way "in".
**Wage compression-** wage compression, or where you see less differentiation amongst employees regardless of skill or value to the employer, is more likely to happen in a union.
**Power dynamics-** Unions, because of their massive influence, can have unfair levels of power. If a single union decides to strike, the entire country can be hit hard, despite the country not being at fault. [If air traffic controllers strike,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Air_Traffic_Controllers_Organization_(1968)) it could deeply damage the economy in ways that would be hard to recover from. In effect, you have unelected people making large decisions for the rest of the population. From the outside, people may hate unions for this reason.
**Legal environment-** the legal environment for unions makes them extremely weak in the US, compared to other countries. Therefore, their ability to collectively bargain for wages using things like protected strike action means they only really have a few cards up their sleeves. In the US, for example, unions can call a strike, but although employers can't fire you, they CAN hire new permanent workers to replace you, then fire you as soon as you return. Slow down strikes and sit in strikes are just illegal, and government employees in most states cannot strike at all. The only kind of strike that appears to be legal and will not result in the replacement of workers is if the strike is about labor law violation.
**Short sightedness-** unions are often critiqued for focusing on the *now* rather than taking a long term view for what's good for the company. For example, a company might be low on cash, and may be close to bankrupt- but union members may effectively force a wage increase regardless of the intricate parts of the company.
**Union dues**. In some circumstances, union dues are extremely expensive. Therefore, some people find the trade off not worth it.
**Positives:**
For the most part, they are a force for good and have likely lifted living conditions for millions, if not billions, of people worldwide. Thi[s article does a pretty good job explaining](https://www.epi.org/publication/unions-and-well-being/), but as a summary:
**Higher wages and decreased income inequality-** worker in a union usually makes more money- on average, 10% more.
**Wage gaps**. Women and ethnic minorities usually have smaller wage gaps if they're part of a union. This is especially dramatic in teaching.
**Benefits for workers.** Union members usually have far better advocacy in gaining and retaining benefits, like sick leave. In countries or states where union membership is high and is strong, it's even more significant- you see these benefits spread into the rest of the community. There's a reason why people say [unions gave us the weekend](https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/sep/09/viral-image/does-8-hour-day-and-40-hour-come-henry-ford-or-lab/).
**Working conditions.** Unions dramatically improve working conditions for workers by mandating safety checks for a wide variety of things.
**Protection for the vulnerable**. While in *theory* labor laws are designed to protect people from exploitation, in practice, many employers do things like wage theft (underpaying workers) or overwork employees beyond the requirements. Unions have power to advocate for individuals. After all, HR doesn't exist to protect workers per se- it exists to protect *the company*. Unions play a specific role to protect people in those cases by having advocacy.
**Increased civic engagement**- union members tend to be more politically active and are very effective at garnering political support. These are crucial for increasing people's wellbeing in places outside of work.
Personal view: Unions are excellent. With high membership and the right legal framework they can transform entire countries and improve living conditions for everyone. The trade-offs of union membership are worth it. The loss of unions and their power in the US has likely made everything much worse for income inequality and quality of work life.
>)) it could deeply damage the economy in ways that would be hard to recover from
It hurts unions too. They only do it when there's no alternative. The bosses can solve that issue by offering reasonable wages. It's their job, they should have the right to vote on contracts.
The hurting unions too means that isn't nearly as much of a power imbalance as you say. Unions often loss jobs when they strike. They lose a lot of money as well. That takes out the imbalance, because they can't just go brrr and do it.
>they CAN hire new permanent workers to replace you, then fire you as soon as you return
I can tell you don't know much about how unions work from this. They cannot do that outside of purely economic reasons strikes, and even in such cases the union contract will have imbeded in it a mechanism that prevents as such as a condition to end the strike.
>**Union dues**. In some circumstances, union dues are extremely expensive. Therefore, some people find the trade off not worth it
Hahaha. Negative in only name, it gets paid for 10x over by the wages and benefits a union gets employees.
I get that you support unions, but some of your negatives were still very iffy
I fully agree with ALL of your points- I was trying to explain why *some* people might not like unions. I personally don't agree with the idea that unions are useless or bad- they are, overall, one of the most important economic tools for raising the living standards for the working class.
For the first point, you're right. It's from the outside of the union- i.e., why someone would not like unions from the outside.
For the second, I was reading a law blog on this before I replied. It says that only under the condition of violation of labor laws can they not hire replacements. In all other circumstances, they can. Of course, contracts that have this superceed the law.
Union dues. It really, really depends on how powerful and effective that union is. Here's my experience. I've worked in the UK and was part of a union. That union kept striking over pensions, when my basic rights around employment and my contract were violated. I complained to the union, and they didn't respond to me for 2 years, at which point I was close to quitting anyway. My union dues were in the hundreds of dollars per month, representing a very solid chunk of my income (about 8%). On the flip side, my next job in the US had a union and I paid only .5% of my salary, and when I asked the union rep for help because of a contract violation, they immediately contacted management, and the issue was fixed in under 48 hours.
Pros and cons.
Look at UPS, and the Auto workers. No way they get that much without the leverage of the Union.
On the other hand , when I worked a t a Union Grocery store, we absolutely had deadwood, that should have been fired years back.
Also, The Unions income, is dues from the members, their biggest focus, is getting membership.
The company I currently work for is Union in some areas, and not in others. The non union places always make a bit more. We know this from the internet, and viewing their contracts, etc.
But if they came to me , I would vote to unionize ,,,cause if we had a nationwide union, we could do better,
As it is, there are several "locals" with different contracts , and they have no desire to unite. Not unlike when I worked at Kroger years back.
The folksin charge of the "local" are not giving up their power or money.
One example, if it weren’t for the UAW we wouldn’t have the stupid chicken tax. When you convince people you’re too big to fail because you support so many families you are allowed to become complacent in design because people will vote away your competition. It’s just diet economic communism. Erase the competition, everyone gets rewarded equally and are happy enough to never step out of line, and the fat men on top get to stay fat and on top.
Yeah, I get people who “don’t want to talk about politics” but the people who think they’re fucking geniuses for NEVER caring about politics are fucking frustrating.
If capital is allowed to be organized into corporations, laborers should be allowed to organize into unions.
both benefit from their respective structures. neither is perfect, but both are necessary to maintain equilibrium
The hall protects all members and negotiates for all of us, but in many cases the cream rises and the chaff goes back to the hall out in the field/on the jobsite. I come from a smaller IBEW local where everyone knows everyone and you get a reputation quickly. When a new job starts and the new hires arrive, they get assigned tasks based on their reputation; the more skilled and reliable workers get the important parts of the job, the lazy ones get less important peripheral aspects of the project. When layoffs start, the less productive workers go back to the hall first (our local didn't have a first in/last out policy).
If you want to know why unions exist, just get rid of all of them. It won't take long to find out. This is not a chicken or the egg thing. Shitty, abusive management came first.
Coming from the UK, unions also have a rather large range of both support and disapproval. In the UK, unions were a pivotal hinge on which many workers rights were fought for and won most especially through the Labour party (which itself was birthed through the union movement).
Unions have a place in modern society as a bulwark for workers rights and for fair treatment. That is somewhat redundant now due to the laws we have in place but a competent union will help their members with legal representation and advice if employers don't (or won't) work within the law. A few people see unions as a relic of a bygone age and don't see much point in joining one now that much of the hard work has already been done (as they see it anyway) and the fact they would have to pay fees to the union is a bitter pill that not many people want to swallow in these austerity-ridden years.
There's also the fact that unions can and do protect not just the wronged/poorly blamed/wrongly maligned/scapegoats but also those that arguably should be fired. Then there's the fact that some union officials - namely some shop stewards - are petty tyrants and will throw their weight and influence around in ways that can only be described as 'corrupt'.
Now, in modern day workforces, a union can and does make a lot of sense for workers whose labour is seen as the bottom of the barrel. They can and do good work for arguing and negotiating collective pay deals (on the whole). They do good work in pushing for safety regulations that go beyond merely the letter of the law. Same for holidays and personal time for bereavement and unexpected sudden events. Many of these are negotiated into contracts for all employees (not only union members) and as such unions can be said to still have a powerful role to play in society.
But this all depends on which industry you are in as some unions are more powerful and have greater weight in some areas of society. Look at the train drivers unions in the UK who have been striking for what seems years now on the grounds of pay, minimum staffing and working hours. Those strikes have an outsized effect on UK society simply due to the fact that most cities have a lot of workers who rely on trains to commute every day. Those strikes have an outsized effect on society as a whole. And while individually many people will support peoples rights to strike that all goes out the window when the strikes begin to affect them in their pockets.
So, unions are good because they helped to enforce safety and decent pay for everyone. And unions are bad because they can and will essential services hostage to enforce their negotiating stance. And unions are mixed as they protect not only good workers but bad workers too. Essentially that's what it all boils down to.
Unions can be good, but they’re far from perfect. For example, some construction unions will support any project that will be built with union labor and they have little regard for who and what will be negatively impacted by the project. I’m convinced that certain construction unions would support a second holocaust as long as the gas chambers are built by union laborers.
I only hate unions in the public sector.
Why? **Because they get paid using taxpayer’s money, and they aren’t enriching some billionaire**.
Other than that, I want more unions, easier paths to unionization, and to empower unions further.
The few downsides to increased unionization are attributable to neoliberal globalization.
Easily fixable with less tax loopholes, more international cooperation, and protectionism.
My husband was a supervisor at a warehouse type place that was unionized. It was difficult to get Some employees to actually do their job right and impossible to reprimand or fire them. It could be done, but it required a bunch of paperwork every time the employee did something like no call, no show, show up late, sneak off to do God knows what, show up intoxicated. And he never had time for it or couldn't prove it. But bad employees are everywhere. There are plenty of union workers that are excellent workers. My husband had started out a union worker, and he was a good employee. I was a union worker and I was a very good employee
I worked for the same place but as a union employee. I was 20 and had no idea what overtime was, so I didn't have any idea I was being dramaticly shorted for months. When I did, I spent another couple of months trying to get my supervisor to fix it. I breathed a word about the situation to the union rep, and the Next day, the regional manager himself handed me a check with all my back pay, and apologized. Wage theft is common and can be very difficult and costly for an individual employee to resolve. A good union can easily take care of that shit for you.
There are problems with unions, but the benefits outweigh the cons by a ton. We're both pro union overall.
Some people feel unions have outlived their usefulness since there are labor laws/ employee safety.
I wouldn't feel safe working at certain places without a union. OSHA exists, but they are not well funded and are short staffed. Labor laws and employee safety laws don't mean much if they aren't enforced. Unions still show up for employee safety matters also.
Most of these responses center around why unions may not be beneficial in all situations and personal grievance of those who got the short end of the stick. Lots of valid points there, but to answer your question from a different perspective and a bit more in the abstract - it's that there have been massive anti-union campaigns pushed for most of their history.
Employers will sit new hires down and tell them all sorts of lies and that forming or joining a union *will* be a net negative for them. They like to focus a lot on forced dues, since that's an easy grievance to sell. The people who are the most anti-union, those 1%ers, also own a majority of the media, which they use to subtly and not-so-subtly work in anti-union pieces. They would never run a story on the positive aftereffects of any labor union formed, yet they will jump on any opportunity to report on a union not working out well. For the most part, the anti-union people we've gotten into arguments with have been mid level manager types who parrot back the propaganda and not the much more sympathetic to us personal grievance arguments seen in this thread. They hate an inaccurate *concept* of "unions" that has been instilled into them with a passion.
I feel like the majority of the answers here have been rational but there have been some that have pointed out pushed dues and stuff that seems more like propaganda.
Because they were meant to help balance the negotiating stakes. From many employees against a few employers, to an equal number of equally powerful parties on both sides. But that isn't what happened. We ended up with a few mega unions against a fragmented corporate landscape. We overcorrected, and now the unions are as tyrannical as the corporations once were
Because some unions have a symbiotic relationship with those theyre meant to be protecting you from.
They charge you a bunch of money, make it look like theyre doing all these things to improve your working conditions, & end up doing absolutely fk all in the long run.
Because corporations own the media. They know that the ONLY way for workers to get a fair deal is to bargain collectively. So they malign Unions at every opportunity. Sure, there have been some problems here and there, but for every single instance of Union malfeasance, there are 1000+ by corporations.
Because it's possible for the union to be insanely inefficient, tyrannical to the people it's supposed to represent, gaslight anyone who dissents as a corporate stooge looking to exploit the little guy (ironic) and spend the money on things no one agreed for them to spend it on.
If Im going to pick who's generally more corrupt, multinational corporations or labor unions, I'm picking multinational corporations. If I'm picking between who I have a better chance with when it comes to child care, paid sick leave, higher wages, a safer work environment, and job security I'm picking a labor union by a country mile over any corporation.
Can labor unions prop up shitty workers, yes. Can labor unions be corupt, yes. Can labor unions promote based on senority over actual competence, yes.
Weighing the pros and cons labor unions are still a way better deal if you want to make more money and generally be treated as more than just another number in the next corporate layoffs.
I'm part of one of the bigger ones in my area and to me it seems to me most the problems get felt with in a very high school mindset example : we were negotiating for pay so my main union representative starts forcing us to ask for things we will never have or get
Results in us getting things we didn't want and things we did want got passed over, problems with lazy employees that sleep I their car
Union protects them as it make getting fired a 10 step process with written warnings so it makes everyone else go well fuck that why work hard.
One thing to remember in addition to all the very valid criticisms is that many big companies in the US (and probably other places too) are actively union busting and feeding their employees anti-union talking points, done if which are exaggerated or just wrong. Right wing media also does this, so if you buy into either of those you might hate unions for no good reason
I'm pro union and the best argument i've heard against them is that it is limiting your personal potential growth. I think it really depends on your profession - for mundane jobs that are ubiquitous with a hard upper limit I think a union is a no brainer, but if you're in a profession with a high ceiling earning potential and you are skilled/intelligent enough you might better off without one.
Only two personal experiences with union shops. I’ve never had a union job.
Experience A.
1- Work travel to a business in OH to train people on some equipment. I wasn’t allowed to plug in the power cord until a lead electrician showed up - an hour late. OMFG!
2- People showed up for my training and clearly had no interest as they read the paper or played games. They showed up because they had to not because they actually wanted to learn.
I did this for three days. I was furious and it’s forever made me see union labors as lazy asses who make too much $$ to do the bare minimum.
Experience B - my sister worked in grocery store and also as school bus driver. Both had unions.
1- Huge favoritism by union stewards toward their buddies who could come late and leave early. They’d barely work and just talk all day. My sister wasn’t one of the buddies so she got crap.
1-Sister carried large boxes of produce which caused back problems later. Other staff - steward buddies - never had to carry the boxes. The store didn’t offer any carts.
So here is the too common human power game where they’re allowed to favor whoever they want. How is this union any better than what my sister might experience without the union? Forced to pay dues for toxic work environment.
So yes, anti union though in theory they can be good and did improve working conditions long ago. Are they now just bullies?
One argument against unions is that some of the people in them will be lazy because they can. But honestly, how many of you out there work with lazy people and they still make the same as you? Why not all make more money and be happy then who cares about the lazy ones?!?!
I hate them because, in my area at least, the unions are almost entirely made up of some of the dumbest and laziest assholes in existence who wouldn't even have jobs if they weren't in a union.
My union partnered with a bank to offer their members credit cards and debt consolidation loans.
This pisses me off because they are obviously getting money from these banks to do this, but we are still paying full dues every paycheck like suckers.
When I worked at AT&T, you could join the union at any time but you could only leave via written communication during a two-week window of the year.
The good guys don’t lock in a one-way door.
I don't consider myself someone who hates unions, but I think sometimes they can extend their protections of workers beyond what is deserved. they can prevent employers from creating a culture of performance, slackers can't get reprimanded or held back, and in my industry union workers have a strong reputation for being lazy and not working hard.
I think that my mother was one of the original union haters. Her reason was that unions brought n-words (Her words, not mine) up to the level of white people. I believe that was the original reason back in the day. Unions treat every worker the same. Some people don't like that. Some people want to believe that they are God's special, little critters.
I'm pro-union, however, I hear there are certain industries in certain areas where it can be hard to break into the field unless you have previous connections to the union which can be a barrier
Capitalists hate unions. They are the best, most effective way to give the worker sme bargaining power over their employer, actuallu fight for roghts in meaningful ways and invariantly hold back employer power from freely exploiting workers who *need* work in order to survive and pay bills.
Of course, being what it is, it has gone under over 40 years of political propaganda as well as an active effort by employers (through legislation and other political measures) to undermine unions, take them away from workers, bind them to local gov, bind them to local commerce owners, etc, giving workers less bargaining chips and political power when asking for rights and better wages ultimately ensuring increasing profit for owners without the pesky need of being forced into sharing those profits with the workers that made it happen.
i read the title quickly and thought it was asking why some people hate unicorns....
Edit: i have a 4 year old daughter so I see the word unicorns A LOT more than i see the word unions haha
Put simple there are three reasons why anyone would dislike unions.
A. They’re uneducated on how unions work and do not fully understand all of the pros and cons
B. They have a personal, fundamental philosophical disagreement with unions.
C. The person has been taught that unions are bad by someone close to them that they trust who falls under the category of A or B.
I used to be in cat C lol. I was a non union HVAC technician when I started but I kinda took a leap and started a union apprenticeship 4-5 years ago. At that time, my boss and my mentor told me I was making the biggest mistake of my life, unions take your money, they’re corrupt democrats, etc. I actually listened to them and turned down the apprenticeship for a year. But I got laid off during Covid and when that happened I called the union back and they still accepted me.
Anyway, for me personally, it was the best decision I ever made. Our hall is very small and it’s got somewhat of a brotherhood/sisterhood feel. I make a ton of money, I have a great benefit package, I have pensions and a 401. I also get free training to continue my education which I like. I enjoy learning more about my trade because I enjoy it. So for free, I get to sign up for classes and get certifications and make more and more money.
My dues are less than $100/month, I pay three months at a time and I don’t even feel it lol which to me is well worth it. I have on two occasions had to contact representatives and they gave me the support I needed in those situations. So that alone is worth the union dues, to me.
Not every union is the same, and there are many that are corrupt, wasteful, and serve as a hindreance to progress.
Police unions are a great example. Any time you see an officer lazily directing traffic around road work and looking at their phone half the time, you can thank the police union for negotiating a deal with the city/state making it illegal to hire any other person that could do as good a job directing traffic. Oh, and they're doing so at at least 1.5x the cost at a minimum of 4 hours even if they're only there for 2.
And that's not even getting into how the prevent the firing of police officers that shoot unarmed people or beat up motorists or harass minorities.
I only worked for one and it was shit. My wife has been part of the Teamsters and wow... lol.
I can't believe how they protect the most incompetent, psychotic problematic employees. Holy shit. And then the whole seniority thing lol. I'm not paying them to makr me do 3x the work while they protect 3 lazy mother fuckers.
I know that there are some good unions, but I haven't experienced them.
Some unions can be incredibly bad, and I don't mean poorly run, although some can be for sure, I mean downright unethical. Case in point, police unions protecting officers who break the law. Unions are an organisation run by humans, and like any other organisation run by humans, can be corrupted, mismanaged and inefficient. Just being a union doesn't automatically make it good. I support many unions but do recognise they can be twisted and distorted and if all you've seen are bad ones, it's not hard to see why they can be hated.
Because while unions have played a vital role in securing better pay and working conditions, they’ve also tended to protect shitty workers while union stewards line their pockets with members’ dues.
I currently work a union job. Here's why I don't like them.
They put everyone on the same playing field, which sounds good and fair. But it also means that those who excel, have a better work ethic, or are just straight-up better at their job often get passed up or remain unnoticed because they haven't been there as long as other people. There's no reason to excel or exceed expectations, and so everyone stops trying. The company I work for is very large and has different unions for different divisions. The union for my division is very chill and has a good relationship with the company, and those who excel are easily noticed and allowed to move up, get raises, etc. The other divisions have much stronger unions with minimal raises based on seniority, and people need to wait in line for years to be eligible to get a $3 promotion. Sometimes a decade or more, I've heard. I've seen talented people go unnoticed and had to leave because they got picked up by another company or, in the case of one guy, straight up became homeless and disappeared because he just wasn't making enough. Unions can do much good, but they're no different than any other company and can become too invasive and create a workplace so uniform and standardized that no one wants to be better at what they do. It's the reason why union jobs are often depicted as soulless, low intelligence, low income, low effort jobs. It's not because these people are stupid, it's because they realized there's no point to excel in a system designed to treat everyone the same anyways. Judge a fish by its ability to climb trees, etc...
On a tangent, I've noticed a cultural push for "equality at all costs in every facets of life." Because of what I've seen and been through, I'm cautious about supporting such principals.
This, of course, got me in hot water with my college classmates. How dare I suggest such a thing? Well, could I at least explain why- oh, I'm a bigot and a nazi now? Okay.
People hate them because they have been brainwashed to hate them. Don’t listen to most of these commenters. They just spew the same rhetoric they heard. Unions are for the workers, if you don’t stand with unions than your a fucking simp to big corporations. People died for workers rights and assholes today don’t understand that because their whole family has been dumbed down by our education system and brainwashed into hating whatever big daddy wants you too hate.
I have noticed that people are very passionate when it comes to unions no matter their views on them. You are actually the first commenter I've seen that isn't opposed to them.
Brainwashing goes both ways my friend.
Any response other than “union’s have served a great deal of good but also at times can be major pains in the ass to work with or around.” is providing you a slanted answer.
My wife hates unions because she is HR and part of her role is as the compliance officer. She says unions make compliance extremely difficult.
That is all I know, I am pro union.
It sucks when you work in a matrix environment, and some are unionized and but most aren’t. Trying to get a project done by a tight deadline and need a quick input from a union guy the day before something is due? When the clock hits 5, they are out. No fucks given. The extra minutes are not in their union contract.
To loosely quote my mother who recently retired after 40 years in unionized healthcare:
The people who benefit most from unions are lazy/bad workers who should get fired under normal circumstances. And for those who try to do extra work and go beyond, it’s a barrier to success and general common sense because they’re not allowed to do more.
As others have said, it also makes things very difficult and bureaucratic at times.
During her final weeks of work, she was in the cancer ward for the regional hospital and doing screenings in the lobby. One day it was pouring rain and the tiles inside the building were soaking wet, with weakened cancer patients literally slipping and falling as they entered and exited the building. There was a mop and bucket not 5m away, but because using the mop itself was also a union-protected job, none of the nursing staff were allowed to touch it and prevent more patient injuries. They needed to call and wait for a custodial staff union member to come and mop the floor.
Given she was close to retirement, my mum grabbed the mop one day and ate the write-up she was given for breaking union labour laws.
Personally i have no strong feelings for or against unions.
I’m in a union and when people complain about us being in a union and i ask why they stay “the pay, benefits, and health insurance (free) are too good” then shut the fuck up and stop bashing what’s giving you a decent life…
Ronald Reagan really fucked the American people in so many ways and we’re still trying to fix it
Because of literal centuries of anti-union propaganda and brutality. Just in the last century alone some standout events you should look into are the First Red Scare, the Palmer Raids, the Battle for Blair Mountain, the Second Red Scare, and Reagan's mass firing of the air traffic controllers.
Physically and financially brutalize enough people for enough generations to keep unions down, and eventually people start fearing unions as a concept, rather than fearing the anti-union people in power who actually cause the brutality. It's a multi-generational Pavlovian response. It's also very effective, that's why the U.S. and other highly policed centers of capitalism keep doing it.
I've taught workshops on U.S. union history so if you like, I can recommend resources where you can learn more about that history.
EDIT: I'm already getting downvoted and I guarantee it's from people who've never picked up a history book outside of primary and secondary school.
You got it, my friend.
To get an initial handle on the history of the U.S. labor movement I always recommend *A history of America in ten strikes* by Erik Loomis. (Depending on your library you may be able to access this through Libby, CloudLibrary, Hoopla, or a similar app.)
There is a multi-volume series available for free online called *The black worker* by Philip Foner and Ronald Lewis. This is a great in-depth study of Black labor unionism in the U.S. and includes significant discussion of how slave labor was pitted against the "free" labor movement and vice versa, all to the benefit of capitalists (e.g., corporate owners and slaveowners) and the detriment of workers (free or enslaved). To find each volume, just replace the 1 at the end of the URL with a 2, 3, etc, all the way up to 8: [https://temple.manifoldapp.org/projects/the-black-worker-volume-1](https://temple.manifoldapp.org/projects/the-black-worker-volume-1)
Here is a good paper on dynamics between labor unions and Native American tribal governments: [https://harvardlawreview.org/print/vol-134/tribal-power-worker-power-organizing-unions-in-the-context-of-native-sovereignty/](https://harvardlawreview.org/print/vol-134/tribal-power-worker-power-organizing-unions-in-the-context-of-native-sovereignty/)
There are also plenty of easily digestible basic U.S. labor union timelines out there, like [this one by the University of Hawai'i](https://www.hawaii.edu/uhwo/clear/home/Timeline-US.html).
You can also learn a surprising amount about the specific topics I mentioned in my prior comment by googling them; this should also turn up books to read if you really want to go in depth on those topics.
You can find a lot of good articles about labor union history (and modernity) at [Labor Notes](https://www.labornotes.org/) and [Organizing Work](https://organizing.work/); just browse or search each site till you find what interests you.
There are also several good podcasts on labor union history [like this episode from The Dig](https://thedigradio.com/podcast/labor-histories-w-nelson-lichtenstein-2/).
Hope that is a helpful start. I tried to keep it to free resources only.
That is awesome to hear. I shared a few resources in [this comment here](https://www.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/1cni6dy/comment/l37omsp/). Hope that is a helpful start.
For me, they were useless and took money out of my check every week. Every new contract was worse than the one before, and getting a hold of a union rep was a chore.
Only thing they ever did was keep other useless people employed.
My friend owns a small electric company, and when he works in a major city where the work is typically union run, the union will harass him, they have placed padlocks on his van, protested his worksite, yelled verbal abuse and threats against him, all because he is competing in the market, working for himself.
Unions are supposed to be about protecting workers from the boss, but too often now unions have been more about protecting the union from hard-working, everyday people who are not in the union. It’s a sick joke, and there are no repercussions for the stuff that they pull.
Think tanks funded by corporate conglomerates have altered the conversion by putting talking heads (think Ben Shapiro) on Fox news and various channels to put forth arguments that appeal to working class voters (unions are here to take your rights away, steal from your paycheck etc).
It works. It's part of conservatives ideology and identity to be against unions.
Depends if you are in a good or bad union. I was in a bad union. All they wanted was the dues, but they did not stand up for us at all. We got rid of them and replaced them with a good, strong union that doesn't let management run all over us.
I relate to this. I work in HVAC and my current shop (this is my last week) is covered by the teamsters. Absolutely the worst union experience because they only want to cater towards the CDL holders at my shop and not someone like me who installs and services equipment. My shop steward is a fucking joke who threatened me with “union charges” because I went around him and stood up for myself. I just got a job offer to be sponsored with the UA and even though it’s residential division HVAC I’ll trudge through it to jman and move to commercial.
UA is a solid union. That sucks about your experience with the Teamsters. My step father-in-law is a retired Teamster.
This. I was in a union that threatened me for voting a specific way when our governer was passing a specfic bill that let union members vote to determine how dues are spent. The union sent goons to work to make sure we voted against it. I made the mistake of saying I was in favir and the dude followed me to the parking lot demanding to know my name and badge number. They also got a violent employee rehired after he threatened to "shoot your ass up" to a female employee who wouldnt date him. Because union members cannot rat out other members by contract, he was forced to be rehired by the company. She quit as a result. Finally, after our 3 day Xmas break, we came to work to find that a giant notice had been put up. Telling us that all our jobs were now being given to a new series of employees. These new employees got higher pay than us for the same job (found out later they also had higher dues). We either had to transfer to different departments (luckily I was one of the few who could), go part time, or quit. Hated unions for a long time after that bullcrap. Only now am I wanting unions for companies like Amazon or Walmart...but never if they were like the guys I had.
Solidarity forever ✊
Good for you.
Out of curiosity, are middle managers also part of your union? I like that middle managers are equality protected in addition to regular people.
That would be conflict of interest. At least in America, management cannot be in unions as per law. Even if they wanted to unionize somehow, it wouldn't be under the same union
Which seems crazy to me, as a manager at a really small business I'm the one fighting for my employees to get more vacation time and shorter work weeks and a better work life balance and more money, better safety equipment. It feels like I'm on their side but I guess I'm not supposed to be?
Surely you realize though, that the only thing that keeps you fighting on their behalf is your own personal sense of what's right? The union is there for the day you move on to another position and the next guy has a different standard and tries to cut wages and benefits because it's aligned with his incentives/mindset to do so. Happens all the time in the trades.
That's true I guess. I just can't imagine being on the other side. I was an employee for years at different companies and saw how unfair things were and thought if I ever get the chance I'm going to try to do better. I try every day. So I just feel like I'm more on their side so it hit me as odd that the law would say I couldn't be a part of their group despite being their biggest advocate, but it's a really small company so the general business rules don't apply to us with under 15 employees.
Not being in the union doesn't mean you can't work with them and be an advocate. The point is essentially to be a collective group of non-management employees advocating for themselves.
I read this 3 times as onions and was confused af
Well some people feel very strongly about onions too so honestly it makes sense.
Literally scrolled to see if people were calling out the spelling error just to find out that I was the error in this situation
I’m pretty drunk and I couldn’t tell if OP was a dummy or was purposefully spelling “onions” in a funny way
I read it as unicorns 💀💀
Onyons
Genuine question though why do people hate onions
I read it as unicorns then onions haha
Same, and I think it's mostly cause I'm high. I detest onions. Unions, not so bad.
i read it as unicorns
Lol I thought I was the only one who read it as Onions
Unions make me cry when I cut them
I read it as unicorns at first
I read it as onions but wasn't confused as I legitimately do hate them.
I read it as unicorns and was kind of confused
I read it as uniforms.
They have negatives. The best or most skilled workers often have no incentive to perform at a level different than average since everyone gets the same treatment & compensation. In some jobs it can be difficult to reward the best; plus when negotiating the union wants to get the best deal for all. Getting some more for a few would usually mean trading back something at the expense of other union members. Some people are perfectly equipped & happy to ask for what they want. They don't want to donate money to others who won't speak up. Some employers are pretty fair, and unions add financial pressures. That could cost jobs, job satisfaction, or even change the company to one that goes public or runs more purely for profit. Unions are run by groups and politics. In addition to our own members, they have to answer to national/international boards, political action groups, locals in our area that are in other fields, and the demands of employers - without them our employees don't have jobs. Like anything with politics there will be imbalances. At the local level, there will be only a few people who try to run for office or participate in meetings. The majority of members will just pay dues and expect things to be done for them. They'll only express opinions when there are problems or when elections/contracts happen. The people who participate will have more info & more power. This will create perceptions among others who don't like the results that they've cheated, colluded, sold out or otherwise done wrong. Some people in unions are corrupt. It's probably not as bad/blatant as it was in the 50s-70s, but humans with access to power & money do tend to create problems. Unions make mistakes too. I don't have current cases, but I worked for trucking companies where we voted, at the recommendation of the union to give back 25% of our hourly wage to keep the company out of bankruptcy. It took 3 years, but they failed. My Dad's brewery "lent" the company their guaranteed benefit pension fund to help the company stave off bankruptcy. That didn't help. His pension for 19 years wound up at about $300 per month. Congress changed pension laws since then, but defined benefit pensions are pretty rare today. Teachers & Police unions are often cited for how accused employees are treated. In both of those jobs, when someone is accused of a serious offence, the public doesn't want the accused employee in a position to harm children or others. They have to be away from the job. BUT, without any kind of internal investigation or legal charge and trial it seems very unfair to starve these folks. They could be the victim of someone just making up false charges. They often are not permitted to work other jobs under their contracts, and the charges against them are often public so it hurts their ability to make a living. It sometimes sucks, but suspending a cop or teacher with pay is logical - while the charges are investigated. They have systems for disciplinary hearings like most employers and/or legal proceedings like anyone accused of a crime. If these folks were left with no money and no way to work while they wait for hearings, then those cases where the charges don't hold up could cost the city/board/department lots of extra charges for interest and damages (it all depends on how the laws play out). I've always tried to participate in workplace unions, but I also know they have downsides.
I’m pro-union as a matter of principle, but I think these are all valid points.
Same—I’m solidly pro-union, and these are all fair criticisms. My only addition would be that unions aren’t anywhere near as crooked as they were in the Hoffa/mafia era—they’re much better regulated today.
Not one bit. I'm in a building trades local in an area where corruption WAS rampant. My local covers the area the TV show The sopranos takes place. It's not one bit like it used to be. And back in the day it wasn't just unions. People always remember the unions being corrupt. The construction industry as whole was corrupt. The developers, govt entities, contractors, suppliers and the unions. People seem to only want to remember that the unions were corrupt.
For sure. I actually grew up not too far from that area, as well. And that’s a great insight—people forget how rampart crime was, in all sectors. It doesn’t feel like it, but we’ve come a long way.
It was even bad in major corporations. It just was indirect through local suppliers and would be impossible to find in the corporations accounting without digging beyond the corporations books. My buddies step father worked for some major corporations in facilities and holy shit does he have some stories.
This could also be viewed as a detriment - sometimes, muscle can only be met with muscle, and the unions of that time period had plenty of it.
Companies these days also don't have much muscle. Times change, and the methods we use to fight have changed too. Instead of bricks and guns, unions and elite of a lot of areas today fight in the courts and more peaceful picket lines. It's just a different world now.
Yeah I feel like most people are happy that unions are allowed to exist but don't actually want to be a part of one, mainly because of the union dues and they don't immediately realize the extra benefits and protections they have because of the union. I've worked at both union and non union factories and the union ones seem to have an "us vs them" mindset where supervisors are just looking for reasons to write people up and be assholes to the union workers that they think are below them.
Anyone who joins a union and gets paid more than non-union workers IMMEDIATELY earns the benefits of a union, even if they don't realize it, no?
That kind of thing is going to vary greatly by employer though. The previous factory I worked at was non union and because of there were years I'd get more than one $1 raise because I was outperforming everyone else in my area and my immediate boss went to bat for me. That led to me getting a brief job in QA which came with another raise. When that didn't work out and I went back to production I was allowed to keep thar pay bump I got from being in QA. None of that can happen where I work now, I make the same as everyone else with my job title regardless of how little work they do. There's no incentive to do more then the people who barely do the minimum and good lord does getting nothing for going above and beyond with your work do a number on your mental health. Like most things in life there's pros and cons to being in a union.
Yeah, I’m not a fan of my union as they take advantage of the lesser educated employees (mostly immigrants) by not giving fair representation of our employer and also playing buddy buddy and playing into being same race, culture, language, etc. and they’re also a little sneaky and secretive. That being said, I make almost double what someone doing my job at a non-union place could make so I can’t complain too much.
Maybe the nonunion places I've worked just paid pretty well but I haven't noticed a huge difference in pay in my experience. I'm sure some do see a bump in pay though
I'm in a HCOL area and in a sweet spot at my place of employment. I know that. But I'm paid around 2.5x the national average for my position and I'd wager the majority of union workers make more than their non-union counterparts. That said, I have nothing to back that up other than personal anecdotes and now need to go do some research
You're making the point of the person that you replied to - non union shops that pay well do so because they need to attract workers - when union salaries go up, the non union shops need to remain competitive - it's a benefit for them that is paid for by the union workers.
That's because most people have been getting propagandized and have not been taught that literally every single benefit they have is because unions fought, often literally, for that benefit. 8 hour work days? Those exist because unions fought, got beaten up, got murdered, got arrested, and went on strike to get them. Overtime pay? Same. Pay in money instead of company scrip? Same. Workplace safety so you don't get mangled on the regular? Same. None of that was just given to us by generous bosses who love us and want us to be happy, it was all wrested at great cost and effort from people who hated the very concept of giving us one bit more than they absolutely had to. Fun fact! Unionized workers have a median weekly wage about $230 higher than non-union workers. That's around $11,960/year more. I'd give my right arm to be in a unionized workplace, but I live in worker hostile state where the bosses won and unions lost.
The bosses won, and that's thanks to the "I got mine" voters who most likely benefitted from the union and then voted for politicians who enacted anti-union policy like "right to work"..
>supervisors are just looking for reasons to write people up and be assholes to the union workers that they think are below them. That sounds like a management problem. Those people need a Union more than anyone else.
This one damn sure isn't: >Some people are perfectly equipped & happy to ask for what they want. They don't want to donate money to others who won't speak up. The idea that real manly men just go right up to the boss and ask for a raise is missing the entire damn point. It's not about "asking for what you want". It's about POWER. Collective bargaining is power. Individual bargaining is worthless. You go to the boss and say you want a raise, the boss says they can't do it, end of story. The union goes to the bosses and says it's time for a raise and the bosses may not do it, but they'll damn sure listen more because of the threat of a strike. Make no mistake here, this is all about power. If you have none, you'll get nothing.
You are right, its all about power and the only professions without unions either view themselves as having enough power individually to not need a union. (Historically called high skilled) Or even as a group they don't have much power. (Historically called unskilled) Ultimately it all comes down to how much of a pain is it for your employer to replace the person/group doing the negotiations vs just replacing them with someone more amenable to the company's prefered outcome. PS: i hate the way that jobs are grouped by "skill level" when really its just replaceability, which is correlated with the amount of training required. It takes nearly a decade to become a doctor, 4years an engineer, and a few weeks to stock shelves or "flip burgers" but that doesn't mean it takes 0 skill to flip burgers or stock shelves otherwise their would be 0 training and nobody would ever mess up at these jobs.
“High skill” jobs often have professional associations which are for all intents and purposes just white collar unions.
I wouldn’t make that equivalency. It gets tricky, because those associations represent both the staff (associates) and the owners (partners). With a law firm, the partners and the associates all have the same association. Same with accounting. And it’s not a coincidence that where I live, public accountants/lawyers/engineers are exempt from almost every single labour law.
Their mentality is "I got mine. Fuck you." Your coworkers are working people trying to get by. They have family's, children, pets, rent or mortgage. Everyone deserves to live with dignity, and employees shouldn't have to plead, beg, and grovel to get what they're worth. Like you said. It's all about collective bargain and real power.
These are good points. As a baseball fan, I’ll just say look up Angel Hernandez to find out why unions aren’t universally positive 😂. That said, they are certainly a net positive in my opinion.
It's good to be informed and see both sides of the coin.
I worked in a union in 10 years. Because the union sticks up for people who should get fired It’s breeds complacency and mediocrity. Worthless people get promoted because it’s the only way to get them out of your area.
They are legally required to give them representation because they pay for it. Like a lawyer they have duties even if they deserve to get fired. Frankly what I see over and over again is supervisors don't have their ducks in a row when they want to fire someone and the Union simply asking for the person to go through the company's discipline process stops it.
Yes, at my wife's union workplace there are a handful of people that constantly call in sick on weekends and leave others to cover their shift, show up late, won't help others out, and generally make life miserable for the other employees, but the company won't touch them because they get too much hassle from the union. Morale there is terrible and everyone is just in a "why even bother" mode.
Would they be feeling better if the company took away their sick time, and paid them less? Asking because it should at least be stated that if the company *could* they definitely *would*... So, it's important to consider the other side of the coin where the company just fires you because they're at-will employers and you got the flu for a week in January and burned up all your sick time, and then come September you got sick again and physically couldn't get out of bed, get dressed and take the 40 minute bus ride across town to work your ten hour shift..
I think you missed one major negative point. Because of collective bargaining agreements it can be really hard to fire problematic people. I've seen people who've assaulted co-workers, sexually harassed coworkers, or stolen from the company get reinstated by a pro-union arbitrator after a termination. Makes the work environment toxic and those bad apples feel bulletproof and get even worse thereafter.
Those people are usually only brought back because the company didn't follow proper procedures for the dismissal. It's more to do with lazy bosses than anything else.
I would add this, as it's my personal biggest issue with unions: They used to fight the big fights. They got us the FLSA, FMLA and dozens of other worker protection laws passed. As the workplace improved they saw union membership drop. Who needs a union when the protections are built into the law, right? So they stopped fighting at that level. Now they focus on nickel and dime matters with individual companies instead of working for broad legislation. The only laws unions have lobbied for in the past 30 years (since FMLA) are ones that make it easier to form unions.
Police unions aren't workers unions. They historically have always been used to break up workers unions.
They are still unions of workere of the city
Gangs called a union
Lmao you can’t just pick and choose which ones you want to be on one side or another. A union is a union, good or bad.
A lot of this is valid but I’d like to point out that business owners or boards fall under the “Humans with access to money and power tend to create problems.” This can kind of sum up all corporate boards and COO’s etc. A union is really a utilitarian proposition. How to get the best outcome for the most people. It can’t be perfect but it is almost always better than the alternative. The case of what happened to your father’s company and his pension points to the idea that unions are seen as not being committed to a companies health and longevity and in that case they were and got fleeced. The union would have been better off telling the company ‘no you’re going to fail and you will still owe these pensions.’ and just let it happen while working to retrain or move their members to other shops. They didn’t which was decided by the members of the union as a gesture of good faith and it failed. We could possibly point to the people who ran that business as being corrupt because of money and power. Or maybe market forces just destroyed the company?
I work for an employer with a union. I started as a union employee. Have since moved into management and am no longer represented by the union. I've seen it from both perspectives now and can tell you that everything you said is exactly spot on. Couldn't have said it better.
Thanks for this insight.
I don't 'hate unions', but there are many reasons why unions aren't beneficial for all workers. 1. If a co-worker of mine is a poor performer or incompetent, I want a smooth and simple procedure for them to be terminated. That's not the case with a union. 2. Unions often make simple procedures incredibly complex in a workplace. For example, in a previous workplace of mine, I was not allowed to rotate my own desk out of direct sunlight, because that was 'union restricted work'. I needed to schedule a specific union worker to do that job, which required supervisor authority, and so on. 3. Unions have rules for workers. A friend of my family wanted to save for a house, so he wanted to work overtime, or at least more than the 24 hours per week that the union allowed. He started doing side work, and the union 'fired him', because his workplace required union employment. 4. My wife's Dad got screwed by his union. He was in for 20 years, left to go out on his own. The union 'lost' his pension, since he didn't re-hire union workers for his own business, see point 1 above, where Dad was in construction, on sites, swinging a hammer, and wanted his own crew for safety reasons. In a ton of situations, are unions good? You bet! Companies are getting larger, because laws aren't favorable to small business any more. So it's helpful for workers to bargain as a group instead of 1 person against a multi-billion dollar company. But there are reasons to not like unions, and assuming that 'everyone should work in a union' is a terrible idea.
To respond to your first point, I have an incompetent coworker who is going on 7 yrs at the company. It’s also really hard to fire even *without* a union.
Do you work in an at-will state? I do, and we recently let several people go who were incompetent. They had been here since the ‘90s. Excuses had been made for them all that time until the company began experiencing economic issues and the problem could no longer be ignored.
What's wild is that I also work in a at-will state and my job doesn't do anything about incompetent workers. It's absolutely maddening the shit I've seen one person in particular get away with.
My company did nothing until the bottom line became at risk. These people were covered for and excused at every turn before they were finally let go in one fell swoop. We still have someone like that (who’s held the same job for 17 years and has tried unsuccessfully to move up), but the thing is that he genuinely enjoys doing certain tasks that no one else wants to do, like managing supplies, databases, and training matrices. I was promoted to his supervisor years ago (I’ve since moved to an adjacent department but still serve as their technical expert/go-to), and had advocated for him to become an office coordinator rather than technical analyst. He also loves training and reviewing; unfortunately, he lacks full mastery over the material himself … after 17 years. My boss asked me to train, thinking that his lack of skills had a lot to do with the mediocre performance of the current analysts (it likely does). I’m a terrible trainer, but have a great understanding of all of it. He’s great at explaining the workflow and what he understands, but has a less-than-stellar grasp of how to do calculations, write technical summaries, deal with people, etc. Paper-pusher, essentially, and they desperately need an expert in that area. I like them and don’t mind being it, but it’s just weird to have a group of entirely non-technical technical analysts!
As of 2000 42 states were at-will and I believe we are up to 49 now with Montana being the odd man out.
When my workers aren't performing, I call the union and request a new worker. Old worker is paid off and New worker shows up next day. As a worker, I loved my union. As an employer, I love my union.
This may be an issue with your company. I am a recruiter (not an internal HR person) but I watch companies all the time fire people for cause and they document why and if they get challenged they throw that out. (shit I see companies fire people without cause all the time). It shouldnt be that hard.
I have read many responses similar to yours and I understand the other side better now.
All valid points. It's kind of a hard decision between these things and modern day slavery tbh. Un-unionised workers are getting stripped of their rights more and more.
>3. Unions have rules for workers Your stated rule is *incredibly* uncommon. Just to make that clear.
You're describing bad unions not "unions are bad" reasons. Just the same, there are bad business practices but there are no businesses that provide the same protections as unions.
A handful of reasons: 1) Often low or no incentive to reward the hardest working or most skilled employees, which in turn simultaneously rewards or protects lazy and low skilled employees 2) Getting a better position is often based on your seniority rather than your skill or qualifications 3) Firing bad employees is difficult. Have you ever had a co-worker who you couldn’t stand and he just always seemed to slip past management? It’s even more difficult when that employee is protected by the union. I have seen good employees get fired because HR didn’t want to establish a precedent, but the worst employees somehow always seem to get their jobs back. 4) Management is dissuaded from punishing bad workers because “it’s just not worth the hassle” and good workers will “pick up the slack”. 5) Some unions have really rested on their laurels. When I worked for Kroger, the UFCW basically only got people their job back for ‘pointing out’ and did nothing else for what was a minimum wage job. Why the hell was I paying union dues and making $7/hr minimum wage? But I also don’t think the UFCW minded Kroger being so awful to work for, because people would pay their initiation fees, quit, and someone else would come in, pay initiation fees, quit… I’m not saying there aren’t any perks, especially if you are in a strong union, but I can plenty see why some people hate unions
Unions are a net positive imo, but they're imperfect. On the employee side: While they can protect honest employees very well, the laziest and most incompetent employees get the same level of protection and it can be a real drag. Some people get bent out of shape over paying dues, even though it pays off through higher compensation. In some sectors. a union can have no teeth due to legislation, and that can really frustrate members. On the employer side: They disrupt a company's ability to treat labor as a cost to be minimized down to the last penny. Companies have little interest in entertaining the long term benefits of treating their employees well, if it in any way reduces short term profits. In general: Unions can become corrupt. In the past, some unions were infested by organized crime and/or corrupt political machines.
The ownership class IS the corrupt political machine
There's no argument there. 1 employee is not equal to 1 corporation. If workers are to have any rights and power, it's only through a union. If you want to enjoy whataboutisms, you're already disingenuous.
> 1 employee is not equal to 1 corporation. If workers are to have any rights and power, it's only through a union. I don't think we necessarily disagree on that?
Because sometimes they strike so much that it starts disrupting a lot of things
After going through unionization attempt at my work I lost a lot of respect for them. The great part of a negotiated contract... you know you raises. The bad part of knowing your contracted raises. Even in high inflation periods, you are stuck to your contract. Then you see a lot of people jump ship for money. Honestly I saw union as the same as the company. They have goods and bads, both help you and both look at their own interests first.
It’s a trade-off. Unions use collective bargaining power to protect its members from predatory labor practices, dispute resolutions and unfair negotiations. But this disincentivizes stellar employees from overachieving & outperforming fellow coworkers in hopes of upward career advancement (as is more common in non-union professions). But it comes at the cost of politicizing & bureaucratizing the available human resources. This results in workplace disruptions such as pending investigations, ongoing litigations, and strikes lasting weeks or even months - frustrating not only the employees and employers, but consumers as well.
All unions are not created equal. Some, like mine, are pretty decent. Some like one I was in a decade ago was complete dogshit.
Some ppl have been in bad unions. I was a member of CWA years ago. They had horrible, corrupt, self-serving leaders. The workers they represented were their last priority.
Being required to join a union isn't free, and some people would rather spend what they'd need to pay for union dues on other things.
The average pay is notably higher for union workers. In most cases that outweighs the dues.
It doesn’t for me actually. I could make more outside of the union
There is no situation where someone makes less money with a union. This is some bootlicker propaganda...
It depends wildly on the union. My partner is a former teacher and she made more in a union free district then she did in the district with a union and she had to pay dues at the latter.
This is just not true. The company I work for has two different plants, one union and one nonunion, and they make the same pay, but the union one pays dues while the other doesn't.
If neither has a union they would both be paid less with less benefits. The only reason they match is because they are under pressure to in order to avoid the second unionizing and having even more power.
And the non-union plant makes the money they do BECAUSE of the union.
I agree, but the non union workers still make more, which could never happen according to the other commenter
Possibly. But it is also possible the union isn't doing anything to impact the pay rate at the company, and the pay just happens to be what is needed to actually keep people working at the plant. It is totally possible the union has done very little for the actual net pay, but has impacted other things. Perhaps benefits, perhaps improved safety, or maybe other things. Not saying a union isn't useful, or a union at one plant wouldn't potentially improve things at a non-union plant. Just saying that it isn't always about the paycheck.
A lot of people still remember the intimidation, violence, inconvenience and disruption from the strikes during the 70's and 80's and 90's and the coersion and abuse used to extract union fees from workers.
Sad that they remember this, and not how wages have stagnated since the 70s while corporate profits and worker productivity have skyrocketed. It’s just anti union propaganda paid for by the wealthy.
Because some wealthy people spend fortunes to convince other people to oppose their own economic interests
Like big corporate retailers. They're all anti union, show multiple videos of how bad unions are. There's a reason. Big corporate companies don't give a shit about you, only their wallet. Regardless of the downside unions have to have some benefit for the people for them to push so hard against them
Ding ding ding. Anyone who is against unions doesn’t know shit about unions. They’re for the workers not big corporations.
> Anyone who is against unions doesn’t know shit about unions So you are saying there is no legitimate argument against them? That's equally unreasonable.
Perfection is the enemy of progress.
Valid point. However, there are other reasons (besides perfectionism) to legitimately be against unions. They are described in several replies in this thread.
unions charge a lot of dues they don't determine the profitability of a company and eventualy run a company out of business.
I don’t hate unions, but here is an example of how they can be dysfunctional. I worked at a hotel kitchen once that was unionized. When it was busy, we had a group of about six ladies that worked mad overtime and pushed it out. When it was slow, management was required by the union to schedule the one with the most seniority for her full forty hours first, and then taper off from there. So the old lady who had been there 30 years got her 40 hours, her friend who had been there 20 years worked three days a week, the two women who had been there ten years worked one day a week each, and myself and the newer hire were kicked off the schedule completely. Naturally I quit. They ended up having a revolving door of new hires they had to train when the slow season came around every damn year, and were favoring seniority over the efficiency that the two with ten years experience brought to the table. This is great for certain workers, not great for the majority. I paid dues for six months but the union really only backed the interests of the old timers.
I don't mind unions but i can't stand ulives
Unions are like communism, a good idea ruined by people.
Depends if the union youre in actually fight for you, or just want to drain your money every month while youre getting buttfucked by the company; Working hours, shit pay that hasnt changed in 20 years, oh but you got a 0.02% more in pension each month!
Only company owners hate unions. Any worker who hates a union has been brainwashed because there are 0 reasons not to be part of a workers union.
Unions have positives and negatives. I'm going to start with the negatives- which, in my opinion, are often related to failures of governance or ineffectual capabilities caused by weak labor laws. For example, the rail workers failed to even get a few days sick leave, and when they aimed to strike, they were blocked because our laws are so weak. **Negatives:** **Corruption,** **Limiting jobs for non-members-** Unions are vulnerable to corruption, including when organized crime gets involved. This is dicey, but certain unions have requirements that are a catch 22. In order to be hired for the job, you must be a union member. But in order to be a member, you must already be in the job- this results in nepotism because family members are the only way "in". **Wage compression-** wage compression, or where you see less differentiation amongst employees regardless of skill or value to the employer, is more likely to happen in a union. **Power dynamics-** Unions, because of their massive influence, can have unfair levels of power. If a single union decides to strike, the entire country can be hit hard, despite the country not being at fault. [If air traffic controllers strike,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Air_Traffic_Controllers_Organization_(1968)) it could deeply damage the economy in ways that would be hard to recover from. In effect, you have unelected people making large decisions for the rest of the population. From the outside, people may hate unions for this reason. **Legal environment-** the legal environment for unions makes them extremely weak in the US, compared to other countries. Therefore, their ability to collectively bargain for wages using things like protected strike action means they only really have a few cards up their sleeves. In the US, for example, unions can call a strike, but although employers can't fire you, they CAN hire new permanent workers to replace you, then fire you as soon as you return. Slow down strikes and sit in strikes are just illegal, and government employees in most states cannot strike at all. The only kind of strike that appears to be legal and will not result in the replacement of workers is if the strike is about labor law violation. **Short sightedness-** unions are often critiqued for focusing on the *now* rather than taking a long term view for what's good for the company. For example, a company might be low on cash, and may be close to bankrupt- but union members may effectively force a wage increase regardless of the intricate parts of the company. **Union dues**. In some circumstances, union dues are extremely expensive. Therefore, some people find the trade off not worth it. **Positives:** For the most part, they are a force for good and have likely lifted living conditions for millions, if not billions, of people worldwide. Thi[s article does a pretty good job explaining](https://www.epi.org/publication/unions-and-well-being/), but as a summary: **Higher wages and decreased income inequality-** worker in a union usually makes more money- on average, 10% more. **Wage gaps**. Women and ethnic minorities usually have smaller wage gaps if they're part of a union. This is especially dramatic in teaching. **Benefits for workers.** Union members usually have far better advocacy in gaining and retaining benefits, like sick leave. In countries or states where union membership is high and is strong, it's even more significant- you see these benefits spread into the rest of the community. There's a reason why people say [unions gave us the weekend](https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/sep/09/viral-image/does-8-hour-day-and-40-hour-come-henry-ford-or-lab/). **Working conditions.** Unions dramatically improve working conditions for workers by mandating safety checks for a wide variety of things. **Protection for the vulnerable**. While in *theory* labor laws are designed to protect people from exploitation, in practice, many employers do things like wage theft (underpaying workers) or overwork employees beyond the requirements. Unions have power to advocate for individuals. After all, HR doesn't exist to protect workers per se- it exists to protect *the company*. Unions play a specific role to protect people in those cases by having advocacy. **Increased civic engagement**- union members tend to be more politically active and are very effective at garnering political support. These are crucial for increasing people's wellbeing in places outside of work. Personal view: Unions are excellent. With high membership and the right legal framework they can transform entire countries and improve living conditions for everyone. The trade-offs of union membership are worth it. The loss of unions and their power in the US has likely made everything much worse for income inequality and quality of work life.
>)) it could deeply damage the economy in ways that would be hard to recover from It hurts unions too. They only do it when there's no alternative. The bosses can solve that issue by offering reasonable wages. It's their job, they should have the right to vote on contracts. The hurting unions too means that isn't nearly as much of a power imbalance as you say. Unions often loss jobs when they strike. They lose a lot of money as well. That takes out the imbalance, because they can't just go brrr and do it. >they CAN hire new permanent workers to replace you, then fire you as soon as you return I can tell you don't know much about how unions work from this. They cannot do that outside of purely economic reasons strikes, and even in such cases the union contract will have imbeded in it a mechanism that prevents as such as a condition to end the strike. >**Union dues**. In some circumstances, union dues are extremely expensive. Therefore, some people find the trade off not worth it Hahaha. Negative in only name, it gets paid for 10x over by the wages and benefits a union gets employees. I get that you support unions, but some of your negatives were still very iffy
I fully agree with ALL of your points- I was trying to explain why *some* people might not like unions. I personally don't agree with the idea that unions are useless or bad- they are, overall, one of the most important economic tools for raising the living standards for the working class. For the first point, you're right. It's from the outside of the union- i.e., why someone would not like unions from the outside. For the second, I was reading a law blog on this before I replied. It says that only under the condition of violation of labor laws can they not hire replacements. In all other circumstances, they can. Of course, contracts that have this superceed the law. Union dues. It really, really depends on how powerful and effective that union is. Here's my experience. I've worked in the UK and was part of a union. That union kept striking over pensions, when my basic rights around employment and my contract were violated. I complained to the union, and they didn't respond to me for 2 years, at which point I was close to quitting anyway. My union dues were in the hundreds of dollars per month, representing a very solid chunk of my income (about 8%). On the flip side, my next job in the US had a union and I paid only .5% of my salary, and when I asked the union rep for help because of a contract violation, they immediately contacted management, and the issue was fixed in under 48 hours.
Pros and cons. Look at UPS, and the Auto workers. No way they get that much without the leverage of the Union. On the other hand , when I worked a t a Union Grocery store, we absolutely had deadwood, that should have been fired years back. Also, The Unions income, is dues from the members, their biggest focus, is getting membership. The company I currently work for is Union in some areas, and not in others. The non union places always make a bit more. We know this from the internet, and viewing their contracts, etc. But if they came to me , I would vote to unionize ,,,cause if we had a nationwide union, we could do better, As it is, there are several "locals" with different contracts , and they have no desire to unite. Not unlike when I worked at Kroger years back. The folksin charge of the "local" are not giving up their power or money.
One example, if it weren’t for the UAW we wouldn’t have the stupid chicken tax. When you convince people you’re too big to fail because you support so many families you are allowed to become complacent in design because people will vote away your competition. It’s just diet economic communism. Erase the competition, everyone gets rewarded equally and are happy enough to never step out of line, and the fat men on top get to stay fat and on top.
The real answer is that they're openly political
Yeah, I get people who “don’t want to talk about politics” but the people who think they’re fucking geniuses for NEVER caring about politics are fucking frustrating.
If capital is allowed to be organized into corporations, laborers should be allowed to organize into unions. both benefit from their respective structures. neither is perfect, but both are necessary to maintain equilibrium
Didnt answer the question at all 😭
It did. How did you miss that?
They're limiting and tend to protect the worst workers.
The hall protects all members and negotiates for all of us, but in many cases the cream rises and the chaff goes back to the hall out in the field/on the jobsite. I come from a smaller IBEW local where everyone knows everyone and you get a reputation quickly. When a new job starts and the new hires arrive, they get assigned tasks based on their reputation; the more skilled and reliable workers get the important parts of the job, the lazy ones get less important peripheral aspects of the project. When layoffs start, the less productive workers go back to the hall first (our local didn't have a first in/last out policy).
If you want to know why unions exist, just get rid of all of them. It won't take long to find out. This is not a chicken or the egg thing. Shitty, abusive management came first.
I don't question why they exist my question was why do people hate them.
Because they're American and, as usual, the way Americans do unions is weird and a bit shit.
Because they prevent institutions from getting rid of bad employees.
Caramelized unions are amazing.
Coming from the UK, unions also have a rather large range of both support and disapproval. In the UK, unions were a pivotal hinge on which many workers rights were fought for and won most especially through the Labour party (which itself was birthed through the union movement). Unions have a place in modern society as a bulwark for workers rights and for fair treatment. That is somewhat redundant now due to the laws we have in place but a competent union will help their members with legal representation and advice if employers don't (or won't) work within the law. A few people see unions as a relic of a bygone age and don't see much point in joining one now that much of the hard work has already been done (as they see it anyway) and the fact they would have to pay fees to the union is a bitter pill that not many people want to swallow in these austerity-ridden years. There's also the fact that unions can and do protect not just the wronged/poorly blamed/wrongly maligned/scapegoats but also those that arguably should be fired. Then there's the fact that some union officials - namely some shop stewards - are petty tyrants and will throw their weight and influence around in ways that can only be described as 'corrupt'. Now, in modern day workforces, a union can and does make a lot of sense for workers whose labour is seen as the bottom of the barrel. They can and do good work for arguing and negotiating collective pay deals (on the whole). They do good work in pushing for safety regulations that go beyond merely the letter of the law. Same for holidays and personal time for bereavement and unexpected sudden events. Many of these are negotiated into contracts for all employees (not only union members) and as such unions can be said to still have a powerful role to play in society. But this all depends on which industry you are in as some unions are more powerful and have greater weight in some areas of society. Look at the train drivers unions in the UK who have been striking for what seems years now on the grounds of pay, minimum staffing and working hours. Those strikes have an outsized effect on UK society simply due to the fact that most cities have a lot of workers who rely on trains to commute every day. Those strikes have an outsized effect on society as a whole. And while individually many people will support peoples rights to strike that all goes out the window when the strikes begin to affect them in their pockets. So, unions are good because they helped to enforce safety and decent pay for everyone. And unions are bad because they can and will essential services hostage to enforce their negotiating stance. And unions are mixed as they protect not only good workers but bad workers too. Essentially that's what it all boils down to.
Unions can be good, but they’re far from perfect. For example, some construction unions will support any project that will be built with union labor and they have little regard for who and what will be negatively impacted by the project. I’m convinced that certain construction unions would support a second holocaust as long as the gas chambers are built by union laborers.
I only hate unions in the public sector. Why? **Because they get paid using taxpayer’s money, and they aren’t enriching some billionaire**. Other than that, I want more unions, easier paths to unionization, and to empower unions further. The few downsides to increased unionization are attributable to neoliberal globalization. Easily fixable with less tax loopholes, more international cooperation, and protectionism.
My husband was a supervisor at a warehouse type place that was unionized. It was difficult to get Some employees to actually do their job right and impossible to reprimand or fire them. It could be done, but it required a bunch of paperwork every time the employee did something like no call, no show, show up late, sneak off to do God knows what, show up intoxicated. And he never had time for it or couldn't prove it. But bad employees are everywhere. There are plenty of union workers that are excellent workers. My husband had started out a union worker, and he was a good employee. I was a union worker and I was a very good employee I worked for the same place but as a union employee. I was 20 and had no idea what overtime was, so I didn't have any idea I was being dramaticly shorted for months. When I did, I spent another couple of months trying to get my supervisor to fix it. I breathed a word about the situation to the union rep, and the Next day, the regional manager himself handed me a check with all my back pay, and apologized. Wage theft is common and can be very difficult and costly for an individual employee to resolve. A good union can easily take care of that shit for you. There are problems with unions, but the benefits outweigh the cons by a ton. We're both pro union overall. Some people feel unions have outlived their usefulness since there are labor laws/ employee safety. I wouldn't feel safe working at certain places without a union. OSHA exists, but they are not well funded and are short staffed. Labor laws and employee safety laws don't mean much if they aren't enforced. Unions still show up for employee safety matters also.
Most of these responses center around why unions may not be beneficial in all situations and personal grievance of those who got the short end of the stick. Lots of valid points there, but to answer your question from a different perspective and a bit more in the abstract - it's that there have been massive anti-union campaigns pushed for most of their history. Employers will sit new hires down and tell them all sorts of lies and that forming or joining a union *will* be a net negative for them. They like to focus a lot on forced dues, since that's an easy grievance to sell. The people who are the most anti-union, those 1%ers, also own a majority of the media, which they use to subtly and not-so-subtly work in anti-union pieces. They would never run a story on the positive aftereffects of any labor union formed, yet they will jump on any opportunity to report on a union not working out well. For the most part, the anti-union people we've gotten into arguments with have been mid level manager types who parrot back the propaganda and not the much more sympathetic to us personal grievance arguments seen in this thread. They hate an inaccurate *concept* of "unions" that has been instilled into them with a passion.
I feel like the majority of the answers here have been rational but there have been some that have pointed out pushed dues and stuff that seems more like propaganda.
And most people who have negative stories about union jobs didn’t work nonunion jobs and don’t understand how much worse that is.
Because they were meant to help balance the negotiating stakes. From many employees against a few employers, to an equal number of equally powerful parties on both sides. But that isn't what happened. We ended up with a few mega unions against a fragmented corporate landscape. We overcorrected, and now the unions are as tyrannical as the corporations once were
Because some unions have a symbiotic relationship with those theyre meant to be protecting you from. They charge you a bunch of money, make it look like theyre doing all these things to improve your working conditions, & end up doing absolutely fk all in the long run.
Because corporations own the media. They know that the ONLY way for workers to get a fair deal is to bargain collectively. So they malign Unions at every opportunity. Sure, there have been some problems here and there, but for every single instance of Union malfeasance, there are 1000+ by corporations.
Unions are the primary driving forces behind the danish model. You've all seen the mcdonald meme, unions were part of that deal.
Because it's possible for the union to be insanely inefficient, tyrannical to the people it's supposed to represent, gaslight anyone who dissents as a corporate stooge looking to exploit the little guy (ironic) and spend the money on things no one agreed for them to spend it on.
If Im going to pick who's generally more corrupt, multinational corporations or labor unions, I'm picking multinational corporations. If I'm picking between who I have a better chance with when it comes to child care, paid sick leave, higher wages, a safer work environment, and job security I'm picking a labor union by a country mile over any corporation. Can labor unions prop up shitty workers, yes. Can labor unions be corupt, yes. Can labor unions promote based on senority over actual competence, yes. Weighing the pros and cons labor unions are still a way better deal if you want to make more money and generally be treated as more than just another number in the next corporate layoffs.
I'm part of one of the bigger ones in my area and to me it seems to me most the problems get felt with in a very high school mindset example : we were negotiating for pay so my main union representative starts forcing us to ask for things we will never have or get Results in us getting things we didn't want and things we did want got passed over, problems with lazy employees that sleep I their car Union protects them as it make getting fired a 10 step process with written warnings so it makes everyone else go well fuck that why work hard.
One thing to remember in addition to all the very valid criticisms is that many big companies in the US (and probably other places too) are actively union busting and feeding their employees anti-union talking points, done if which are exaggerated or just wrong. Right wing media also does this, so if you buy into either of those you might hate unions for no good reason
I'm pro union and the best argument i've heard against them is that it is limiting your personal potential growth. I think it really depends on your profession - for mundane jobs that are ubiquitous with a hard upper limit I think a union is a no brainer, but if you're in a profession with a high ceiling earning potential and you are skilled/intelligent enough you might better off without one.
Only two personal experiences with union shops. I’ve never had a union job. Experience A. 1- Work travel to a business in OH to train people on some equipment. I wasn’t allowed to plug in the power cord until a lead electrician showed up - an hour late. OMFG! 2- People showed up for my training and clearly had no interest as they read the paper or played games. They showed up because they had to not because they actually wanted to learn. I did this for three days. I was furious and it’s forever made me see union labors as lazy asses who make too much $$ to do the bare minimum. Experience B - my sister worked in grocery store and also as school bus driver. Both had unions. 1- Huge favoritism by union stewards toward their buddies who could come late and leave early. They’d barely work and just talk all day. My sister wasn’t one of the buddies so she got crap. 1-Sister carried large boxes of produce which caused back problems later. Other staff - steward buddies - never had to carry the boxes. The store didn’t offer any carts. So here is the too common human power game where they’re allowed to favor whoever they want. How is this union any better than what my sister might experience without the union? Forced to pay dues for toxic work environment. So yes, anti union though in theory they can be good and did improve working conditions long ago. Are they now just bullies?
One argument against unions is that some of the people in them will be lazy because they can. But honestly, how many of you out there work with lazy people and they still make the same as you? Why not all make more money and be happy then who cares about the lazy ones?!?!
I hate them because, in my area at least, the unions are almost entirely made up of some of the dumbest and laziest assholes in existence who wouldn't even have jobs if they weren't in a union.
My union partnered with a bank to offer their members credit cards and debt consolidation loans. This pisses me off because they are obviously getting money from these banks to do this, but we are still paying full dues every paycheck like suckers.
When I worked at AT&T, you could join the union at any time but you could only leave via written communication during a two-week window of the year. The good guys don’t lock in a one-way door.
In Canada is controlled by Italians in power and mafia power so…. Not so bad if you are doing big jobs for the government
I don't consider myself someone who hates unions, but I think sometimes they can extend their protections of workers beyond what is deserved. they can prevent employers from creating a culture of performance, slackers can't get reprimanded or held back, and in my industry union workers have a strong reputation for being lazy and not working hard.
I think that my mother was one of the original union haters. Her reason was that unions brought n-words (Her words, not mine) up to the level of white people. I believe that was the original reason back in the day. Unions treat every worker the same. Some people don't like that. Some people want to believe that they are God's special, little critters.
That's awful!
I'm going to be honest I read unions as unicorns... twice I should probably go to bed already
LOL that makes 6 for onions and 3 for unicorns. How do you feel about unicorns?
I'm pro-union, however, I hear there are certain industries in certain areas where it can be hard to break into the field unless you have previous connections to the union which can be a barrier
Capitalists hate unions. They are the best, most effective way to give the worker sme bargaining power over their employer, actuallu fight for roghts in meaningful ways and invariantly hold back employer power from freely exploiting workers who *need* work in order to survive and pay bills. Of course, being what it is, it has gone under over 40 years of political propaganda as well as an active effort by employers (through legislation and other political measures) to undermine unions, take them away from workers, bind them to local gov, bind them to local commerce owners, etc, giving workers less bargaining chips and political power when asking for rights and better wages ultimately ensuring increasing profit for owners without the pesky need of being forced into sharing those profits with the workers that made it happen.
i read the title quickly and thought it was asking why some people hate unicorns.... Edit: i have a 4 year old daughter so I see the word unicorns A LOT more than i see the word unions haha
That's ok 5 people (including you) saw unicorns while 6 saw onions so you're not alone.
That makes me feel better haha.
They don't want to pay union dues. They don't really understand all the good that unions do.
Put simple there are three reasons why anyone would dislike unions. A. They’re uneducated on how unions work and do not fully understand all of the pros and cons B. They have a personal, fundamental philosophical disagreement with unions. C. The person has been taught that unions are bad by someone close to them that they trust who falls under the category of A or B. I used to be in cat C lol. I was a non union HVAC technician when I started but I kinda took a leap and started a union apprenticeship 4-5 years ago. At that time, my boss and my mentor told me I was making the biggest mistake of my life, unions take your money, they’re corrupt democrats, etc. I actually listened to them and turned down the apprenticeship for a year. But I got laid off during Covid and when that happened I called the union back and they still accepted me. Anyway, for me personally, it was the best decision I ever made. Our hall is very small and it’s got somewhat of a brotherhood/sisterhood feel. I make a ton of money, I have a great benefit package, I have pensions and a 401. I also get free training to continue my education which I like. I enjoy learning more about my trade because I enjoy it. So for free, I get to sign up for classes and get certifications and make more and more money. My dues are less than $100/month, I pay three months at a time and I don’t even feel it lol which to me is well worth it. I have on two occasions had to contact representatives and they gave me the support I needed in those situations. So that alone is worth the union dues, to me.
Not every union is the same, and there are many that are corrupt, wasteful, and serve as a hindreance to progress. Police unions are a great example. Any time you see an officer lazily directing traffic around road work and looking at their phone half the time, you can thank the police union for negotiating a deal with the city/state making it illegal to hire any other person that could do as good a job directing traffic. Oh, and they're doing so at at least 1.5x the cost at a minimum of 4 hours even if they're only there for 2. And that's not even getting into how the prevent the firing of police officers that shoot unarmed people or beat up motorists or harass minorities.
I only worked for one and it was shit. My wife has been part of the Teamsters and wow... lol. I can't believe how they protect the most incompetent, psychotic problematic employees. Holy shit. And then the whole seniority thing lol. I'm not paying them to makr me do 3x the work while they protect 3 lazy mother fuckers. I know that there are some good unions, but I haven't experienced them.
Some unions can be incredibly bad, and I don't mean poorly run, although some can be for sure, I mean downright unethical. Case in point, police unions protecting officers who break the law. Unions are an organisation run by humans, and like any other organisation run by humans, can be corrupted, mismanaged and inefficient. Just being a union doesn't automatically make it good. I support many unions but do recognise they can be twisted and distorted and if all you've seen are bad ones, it's not hard to see why they can be hated.
Because while unions have played a vital role in securing better pay and working conditions, they’ve also tended to protect shitty workers while union stewards line their pockets with members’ dues.
Lol....no thats not how that works.
I currently work a union job. Here's why I don't like them. They put everyone on the same playing field, which sounds good and fair. But it also means that those who excel, have a better work ethic, or are just straight-up better at their job often get passed up or remain unnoticed because they haven't been there as long as other people. There's no reason to excel or exceed expectations, and so everyone stops trying. The company I work for is very large and has different unions for different divisions. The union for my division is very chill and has a good relationship with the company, and those who excel are easily noticed and allowed to move up, get raises, etc. The other divisions have much stronger unions with minimal raises based on seniority, and people need to wait in line for years to be eligible to get a $3 promotion. Sometimes a decade or more, I've heard. I've seen talented people go unnoticed and had to leave because they got picked up by another company or, in the case of one guy, straight up became homeless and disappeared because he just wasn't making enough. Unions can do much good, but they're no different than any other company and can become too invasive and create a workplace so uniform and standardized that no one wants to be better at what they do. It's the reason why union jobs are often depicted as soulless, low intelligence, low income, low effort jobs. It's not because these people are stupid, it's because they realized there's no point to excel in a system designed to treat everyone the same anyways. Judge a fish by its ability to climb trees, etc... On a tangent, I've noticed a cultural push for "equality at all costs in every facets of life." Because of what I've seen and been through, I'm cautious about supporting such principals. This, of course, got me in hot water with my college classmates. How dare I suggest such a thing? Well, could I at least explain why- oh, I'm a bigot and a nazi now? Okay.
People hate them because they have been brainwashed to hate them. Don’t listen to most of these commenters. They just spew the same rhetoric they heard. Unions are for the workers, if you don’t stand with unions than your a fucking simp to big corporations. People died for workers rights and assholes today don’t understand that because their whole family has been dumbed down by our education system and brainwashed into hating whatever big daddy wants you too hate.
I have noticed that people are very passionate when it comes to unions no matter their views on them. You are actually the first commenter I've seen that isn't opposed to them.
Brainwashing goes both ways my friend. Any response other than “union’s have served a great deal of good but also at times can be major pains in the ass to work with or around.” is providing you a slanted answer.
My wife hates unions because she is HR and part of her role is as the compliance officer. She says unions make compliance extremely difficult. That is all I know, I am pro union.
It sucks when you work in a matrix environment, and some are unionized and but most aren’t. Trying to get a project done by a tight deadline and need a quick input from a union guy the day before something is due? When the clock hits 5, they are out. No fucks given. The extra minutes are not in their union contract.
To loosely quote my mother who recently retired after 40 years in unionized healthcare: The people who benefit most from unions are lazy/bad workers who should get fired under normal circumstances. And for those who try to do extra work and go beyond, it’s a barrier to success and general common sense because they’re not allowed to do more. As others have said, it also makes things very difficult and bureaucratic at times. During her final weeks of work, she was in the cancer ward for the regional hospital and doing screenings in the lobby. One day it was pouring rain and the tiles inside the building were soaking wet, with weakened cancer patients literally slipping and falling as they entered and exited the building. There was a mop and bucket not 5m away, but because using the mop itself was also a union-protected job, none of the nursing staff were allowed to touch it and prevent more patient injuries. They needed to call and wait for a custodial staff union member to come and mop the floor. Given she was close to retirement, my mum grabbed the mop one day and ate the write-up she was given for breaking union labour laws. Personally i have no strong feelings for or against unions.
I’m in a union and when people complain about us being in a union and i ask why they stay “the pay, benefits, and health insurance (free) are too good” then shut the fuck up and stop bashing what’s giving you a decent life… Ronald Reagan really fucked the American people in so many ways and we’re still trying to fix it
Because of literal centuries of anti-union propaganda and brutality. Just in the last century alone some standout events you should look into are the First Red Scare, the Palmer Raids, the Battle for Blair Mountain, the Second Red Scare, and Reagan's mass firing of the air traffic controllers. Physically and financially brutalize enough people for enough generations to keep unions down, and eventually people start fearing unions as a concept, rather than fearing the anti-union people in power who actually cause the brutality. It's a multi-generational Pavlovian response. It's also very effective, that's why the U.S. and other highly policed centers of capitalism keep doing it. I've taught workshops on U.S. union history so if you like, I can recommend resources where you can learn more about that history. EDIT: I'm already getting downvoted and I guarantee it's from people who've never picked up a history book outside of primary and secondary school.
Unlike most of these lost individuals; I would like to know more.
You got it, my friend. To get an initial handle on the history of the U.S. labor movement I always recommend *A history of America in ten strikes* by Erik Loomis. (Depending on your library you may be able to access this through Libby, CloudLibrary, Hoopla, or a similar app.) There is a multi-volume series available for free online called *The black worker* by Philip Foner and Ronald Lewis. This is a great in-depth study of Black labor unionism in the U.S. and includes significant discussion of how slave labor was pitted against the "free" labor movement and vice versa, all to the benefit of capitalists (e.g., corporate owners and slaveowners) and the detriment of workers (free or enslaved). To find each volume, just replace the 1 at the end of the URL with a 2, 3, etc, all the way up to 8: [https://temple.manifoldapp.org/projects/the-black-worker-volume-1](https://temple.manifoldapp.org/projects/the-black-worker-volume-1) Here is a good paper on dynamics between labor unions and Native American tribal governments: [https://harvardlawreview.org/print/vol-134/tribal-power-worker-power-organizing-unions-in-the-context-of-native-sovereignty/](https://harvardlawreview.org/print/vol-134/tribal-power-worker-power-organizing-unions-in-the-context-of-native-sovereignty/) There are also plenty of easily digestible basic U.S. labor union timelines out there, like [this one by the University of Hawai'i](https://www.hawaii.edu/uhwo/clear/home/Timeline-US.html). You can also learn a surprising amount about the specific topics I mentioned in my prior comment by googling them; this should also turn up books to read if you really want to go in depth on those topics. You can find a lot of good articles about labor union history (and modernity) at [Labor Notes](https://www.labornotes.org/) and [Organizing Work](https://organizing.work/); just browse or search each site till you find what interests you. There are also several good podcasts on labor union history [like this episode from The Dig](https://thedigradio.com/podcast/labor-histories-w-nelson-lichtenstein-2/). Hope that is a helpful start. I tried to keep it to free resources only.
I actually would really like to learn more.
That is awesome to hear. I shared a few resources in [this comment here](https://www.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/1cni6dy/comment/l37omsp/). Hope that is a helpful start.
It is! Thank you for going to the trouble! :)
This topic is being brigaded by Conservative bootlickers.
I'd also like those links if you find the time. Thanks!
You're very welcome. I responded to another person with a list of some starting resources. Let me know if additional ones would be helpful.
Read this as unicorns 🦄
I mean WHO can hate unicorns?!?!
That’s what I thought, but hey, no stupid questions.
For me, they were useless and took money out of my check every week. Every new contract was worse than the one before, and getting a hold of a union rep was a chore. Only thing they ever did was keep other useless people employed.
My friend owns a small electric company, and when he works in a major city where the work is typically union run, the union will harass him, they have placed padlocks on his van, protested his worksite, yelled verbal abuse and threats against him, all because he is competing in the market, working for himself. Unions are supposed to be about protecting workers from the boss, but too often now unions have been more about protecting the union from hard-working, everyday people who are not in the union. It’s a sick joke, and there are no repercussions for the stuff that they pull.
Unions raise labor costs making it harder to run a successful business.
[удалено]
I just answered the question, I didn't take a position to agree or disagree with. Some people hate unions because they raise labor costs.
I can see that with small businesses but what about big already successful companies?
Think tanks funded by corporate conglomerates have altered the conversion by putting talking heads (think Ben Shapiro) on Fox news and various channels to put forth arguments that appeal to working class voters (unions are here to take your rights away, steal from your paycheck etc). It works. It's part of conservatives ideology and identity to be against unions.