Unions. Whats Your Opinion?

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Dauphin
They still went on strike to protect 200 jobs that were threatened in the deal and to try and secure a 4 day working week.

Yeah, that's the last thing any of us would want - people trying to protect your job.

[Az]

That's possible. But there are other examples.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Tingkai


Yeah, that's the last thing any of us would want - people trying to protect your job.

You think it necessary to keep 200 unnecessary jobs, with a 6.75% pay rise, just so that people remain in work rather than look for alternate employment?

[Agathon]

Unions are cartels set to keep wages high and jobs secure.

And capitalism is a system that is set to keep wages low and jobs insecure.

Your point?

One can gripe about some of the silly things that unions do, but they perform an important function: preventing the immiseration of the working poor. Sometimes they do this well, sometimes not.

It's the same as when people gripe about the free market. It performs an important function, but has its drawbacks.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Dauphin
You think it necessary to keep 200 unnecessary jobs, with a 6.75% pay rise, just so that people remain in work rather than look for alternate employment?

I've worked for too many companies that have laid off people, only to turn around and hire more people six months later.

How do you know these are unnecessary jobs?

Let's say you've been a bus driver for 10 years. How easy will it be to get another job?

It's also not a 6.75% pay rise. You said that's for two years so it's 3.375% per year. What's inflation like in London these days? Maybe 1.5%.

So these guys are going to make 1.875% more in real terms. Wow.

How much are executives paying themselves and how much of a pay rise did they take last year.

As for the shorter work week. It is an alternative to laying people off.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Agathon
And capitalism is a system that is set to keep wages low and jobs insecure.

No it isn't. Capitalism is a system whereby wages are set by supply and demand. Unions exist to move this from it's equilibrium towards the workers side, generally making it more efficient. That's in theory. In practice, they tend to create even more inefficiency, without increasing incomes. Inefficiency generally has the oppposite effect, it reduces average income.

Originally posted by Agathon
One can gripe about some of the silly things that unions do, but they perform an important function: preventing the immiseration of the working poor. Sometimes they do this well, sometimes not.

Even without them, in the UK, there wouldn't be the immiseration of the working poor. Unions have held so much power in the UK, traditionally, that they hold companies or governments to ransom, over pay and job cuts.

Originally posted by Agathon
It's the same as when people gripe about the free market. It performs an important function, but has its drawbacks.

It does. Sometimes there is market failure, like monopolies, and when there is, they need to be addressed. If there is a monopoly (or more accurately, a monopsony) in a labour market, then this needs to be addressed. However unions are an incredibly inefficient way of addressing it.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Tingkai
Yeah, that's the last thing any of us would want - people trying to protect your job.

When the jobs are unnecessary, yes. If a company doesn't need that many workers, why should ti keep paying them for a job it doesn't need? Companies get bigger and smaller, and thus need more/fewer staff. Companies become more efficient, and thus need fewer staff, as they replace them with technology, for example. Or in the most famous case in the UK, coal mines become completely unfeasable, and so the government orders many of them to be shut down.

Why should the taxpayer pay the wages for a job we don't need? It's cheaper to pay unemployment benefit, if it comes to it.

Why shouldn't a company fire a worker it doesn't need?

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Tingkai


I've worked for too many companies that have laid off people, only to turn around and hire more people six months later.

Let's say you've been a bus driver for 10 years. How easy will it be to get another job?

So they lose their job as a bus driver, and then when the company wants to rehire it will hire the bus driver that they laid off?

Regardless, unemployment hasn't increased if people are hired and fired. Employment law can protect the people who are made redundant.

And I think that executives get obscene amounts of self-awarded pay, but thats not going to be solved by unions.

[JohnT]

My opinion is about the same as everybody elses (especially Brebro's) - a needed social institution who has mostly lost their way. I think the world would be a better place overall if the unions started showing a bit of spine: while I don't agree with year-long coal strikes that deprive the nation of their heat, I also don't agree with them becoming nothing more than an arm of management.

Balance... such a easy thing to desire, such a hard thing to achieve.

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by Dauphin

And I think that executives get obscene amounts of self-awarded pay, but thats not going to be solved by unions.

Could not agree more.

In general, unions played an invaluable role in getting labour laws to where they are today (at least, in the west). They can still do some good, but I think in many instances they've become bureaucratic beasts.

Personally, I would never, ever, ever, EVER join a union. The single greatest problem with them, from my perspective, is that they almost singularly reward seniority over skill and competence. They also make it nearly impossible to fire someone for poor performance. The job protection they provide is obviously of more benefit to unskilled labour. For qualified, traditionally "white collar" workers who have ambitions beyond sitting in the same job for 35 years, they are a massive career anchor.

[Agathon]

Even without them, in the UK, there wouldn't be the immiseration of the working poor. Unions have held so much power in the UK, traditionally, that they hold companies or governments to ransom, over pay and job cuts.

How old are you? Do you even remember Thatcher?

Unions have lost their way because capital declared war on them in the 70s.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Agathon
How old are you? Do you even remember Thatcher?

What does first hand experience have to do with it? Were you a policemen at the time? Ir a coal miner? Were you at the strikes? If so, I would question your impartiality, and if not, it would make no difference whether or not you were alive at the time. You can see the effects of thatcherism far better now than you could at the time, because most effects, especially economic ones, take a long time to become apparent.

I agree, Thatcherism was appauling to live through, but it has beneficial effects for us now, giving the elected government power over public service wages, and means mean we can improve services because all extra funding doesn't have to go straight into wages, without us being able to modernise and improve services, because moderisation might cause job losses.

If you can do the same job, with less people, it's more efficient. Why pay extra when you can't get the results?

Originally posted by Agathon
Unions have lost their way because capital declared war on them in the 70s.

In the UK, unions in the 70s were used to running the country. People talk about how the tories used to be in the pockets of big business, but Labour was controlled by the unions, at the time. Indeed, the unions exerted massive influence over Labour until Blair came into power.

Unions, even as a theoretical idea, cause inefficiency when they're out of balance. In a field with many companies, and many employees, there is a balance. Where there is only 1 or 2 employers, collective bargaining can cause a better balance of power, and when there are a few skilled workers, and many companies competing for them, collective bargaining with employers can cause a better balance. The former is far more likely, but to completely ban cartels, when on (very few) occasions, they can even out the balance, while allowing unions for everything, when at times they will cause it to be even more unbalanced, doesn't seem like a good system to me.

I'd far rather not have either, and let the market decide (going for maximum efficiency, ahd highest average income), while having a social security net so that those that can't find jobs can still survive. That way you make the country as prosperous and efficient as possible, while also making sure that people don't starve.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Unions served a noble purpose once upon a time. Betterment of wages and primarily the only advocate of safe working conditions. Problem is in their weakened stat today they concern themselves instead primarily with the promotion of the apparatus rather than the cause.

[Brundlefly]

Unions. Whats Your Opinion?

Personally, I like mine dipped in batter and deep-fried.

[Imran Siddiqui]

My opinion on unions? Theoretically or practically?

Practically unions are no better than the corporations they rail against. Union leadership has no regrets about screwing over its memebership. I work for the US Department of Labor and unions are FAR, FAR, FAR worse than corporation in stealing pension funds.