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Comment by RickHull | Hacker News Reader

> Note I'm not opposed to people's freedom to unionize. In fact, it should not take an act of government to "permit it", and people should do it if they want.

Everyone has the right to organize a voluntary union. What requires special legislated privilege are things like collective bargaining, which is not a normal component or outcome of voluntary negotiations.

Modern unions in the United States enjoy many legal privileges that were specifically lobbied for. It's this type of privileged union which is being argued for, not a mere voluntary association under an impartial legal regime.

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Can you share some of the arguments in favor of involuntary unions? (I'm even willing to invest some time digging if anyone has some pointers to potential sources of literature, I am genuinely interested.)

My personal experience has been that when I've been the so-called "beneficiary" of one, it has not actually benefited me and has often made for awkward scenarios where there is me and the counterparty ("employer") and this weird semi-interested third-party regulating how we can interact, regardless of what is actually in my self-interest.

Just to be clear, I am all for collective bargaining in the sense of a bunch of (small) actors choosing to work together against an adversary. I would do this myself if I deemed it beneficial. I don't understand why we would mandate that individuals had to be bound by the agreement whether they want to participate or not. I recognize that this is a common structure though.

What you are describing is what existed before what we have now. A group of people working for an employer would try to negotiate for safer working conditions, better benefits, etc. The employer would take the list of demands, fire the person who handed him the list and say, "I'm not giving you any of this shit and anyone who talks about it again gets fired too."

So people started organizing by trade. It made sense because workers of a common trade share experiences and grievances. If one particular employer treated its workers bad, that trade guild had more leverage by threatening work stoppage against other employers who could put pressure on the first employer.

Over time employers started to converge and grow in power. Now you have a company who employs thousands of people in multiple locations. To keep the balance in power, the unions converged and grew in power. You cant threaten to replace a union worker if everyone who does that job is in the union(1).

Now the unions are big enough to disrupt economies, sway elections, etc. They are large professional entities of lawyers, financial managers. They want everyone in the union for maximal leverage (ie fewer scabs, more dues) so they lobbied to affect the policies we have today.

The small voluntary no-admin-overhead organization you are describing is ideal, but its really unlikely to work. It would depend on the employer allowing it to happen.

I could say more here about the growing wealth gap, criminalization of poverty, and the quiet ongoing class war, and end with a Malcom X quote, "Anytime you depend on your enemy for a job you're in bad shape." But I dont feel like saying all that. ;)

1. robots

> You cant threaten to replace a union worker if everyone who does that job is in the union

If an employer did something like that, the FTC would go after them for abusing a monopoly to dictate pricing, for anti-competitive practices (e.g. contracts that prevent doing business with competitors), etc. But somehow it's OK for unions to do that?

Maybe.

A very short answer is that there are many differences between capital and labor. (It is even right there on the tin - we don't call our system "laborism", and a few actual words related to that meaning are popularly demonized in the U.S.)

Sure, sure, corporations are people ("my friend"), but most humans still see a difference between John calling in sick because he didn't like seeing his pal Bob fired and things like redlining, oligopoly partitioning, etc.

It has to do with power dynamics, and this is well recognized in law. (One example is that contracts between parties of disparate power are generally interpreted in the light most beneficial to the least powerful. For more extreme cases, look up the legal sense of the word "adhesion".)

And recall that capital always has options.

- Happy employees tend not to unionize. Many places normally considered to be natural homes for unions don't have them because management doesn't give them a reason to need one.

- If capital or management decides those proles are too uppity, it can close shop. (Labor also has this option, but that's called 'suicide' and considered in a rather different light.) Walmart did this a while back when (IIRC) their butchers successfully beat them and unionized; Walmart got out of the meat cutting business.

- Outsource. Amazon has a pile of circuit-breaker corporations that supply them backs and hands. Those corporations (really, binders on a Delaware shelf and bank accounts) take the heat from lawsuits when the backs break and the hands are smashed by robots. This use of non-human shields works surprisingly well in some circumstances, but the tight coupling with the mothership needed by app-driven job direction would make it look pretty strange if they set up shell companies to supply "workers", so that one may not work for Uber.

(update: fixed my goofy formatting.)

Not "somehow." It's written into federal law.

It's generally to prevent free-riding. Let's say the union negotiates benefit X, and the company then provides benefit X to all employees including non-union employees. An example could be safety features that the union is pushing for. The non-union employees have benefited from the actions of the union without having to pay the cost.

To balance this, involuntary unionization usually requires a majority vote from the employees to unionize.

Is that true in right-to-work states as well? I thought right-to-work was specifically to prevent involuntary unionization.

Yes, but right-to-work is generally a reaction to involuntary unionization, as in it came after the involuntary unionization phase.

I think the argument is that if people aren't required to be in the union then people can free ride on the union's efforts without paying dues.

they should still have that choice as they cannot choose what happens with their union dues. far too many unions spend inordinate amounts of money on political activities instead of their own membership. then top it off with all the bureaucratic bloat and high paid leadership I think people must be given the right to abstain.

If you want to dodge the free ride then have the dues go to a non political spending charity of your choice provided it is local, may I suggest children's healthcare hospitals

Technically one is allowed to exercise the so-called 'Beck' decision [1] and only pay the union what is required for contact negotiation and related fees. In practice I wonder how difficult it is to actually leverage Beck.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Workers_of_Amer...

"they should still have that choice as they cannot choose what happens with their union dues"

This isn't true.

"far too many unions spend inordinate amounts of money on political activities instead of their own membership"

If you believe that, then start getting involved in your union's leadership and change it.

" then top it off with all the bureaucratic bloat and high paid leadership"

As opposed to the leanness and crappily paid leadership of the company?

In fact, in the two instances where I've worked at "closed shop" places early in my career, the combination of HAVING to join the union to keep my job, and Union dues, meant that I would have been making LESS than minimum wage as a result! (Worse in one case the dues were annual but I had to pay half up front-- which I wouldn't get back if I lost the job.)

A union is essentially a local government, aligned along employment instead of geography. It is logically very similar to how your local municipality (or HOA) can levy taxes and enforce laws against you.

If joining the union is a choice, employers will simply prevent employees from doing so, either with threats or disincentives.

"Want to receive a bonus at the end of the year, don't join the union".

And if the union has enough power and its members care enough, they can say "stop doing that or we'll all quit, good luck replacing us". If the employer has the power to say "go ahead and quit then", then the union doesn't actually have the power to effect change, so why should anyone bother being a member?

> And if the union has enough power and its members care enough, they can say "stop doing that or we'll all quit, good luck replacing us"

How would the union know what the boss tells his new hires? Unions don't get to monitor the hiring process of every communication between a worker and his employee.

First, because the union could negotiate that as part of their initial agreement with the company: "don't use any means to entice or threaten people into not joining the union". If it's that common a tactic, that would presumably be a standard part of a union's playbook.

As for how they'd know it was going on: it only takes one person to "leak" that information to the union. And if the union and company are large enough that new people get hired regularly, they might occasionally find someone who fits the profile and send them through the hiring process specifically to find out how a new employee gets treated.

No. Just no.

Any argument you make will always come back to, "The company will threaten and fire people who don't go along with what they want."

Are you attempting to make a counterargument, or are you hoping people will read your comment and go "yeah, corporations bad, down with corporations!"? Yes, voluntary unions have to fight against the ability of a company to simply fire people; they depend on the willingness of the entire group to stand together and take the risk together, win or lose.

The whole point of a union is that employees have more power collectively than individually. A company can just tell an individual "no". If all or almost all employees get together and say "the situation is so bad that we're willing to quit (and make a lot of noise and bad PR for you) rather than let this go on", then that's harder to ignore. If the company is willing to fire everyone and deal with the bad PR, and that's cheaper than the union's demands, then the union doesn't actually have the power to effect change even as a collective.

I don't see any reason that either the company or the union should be artificially given more power in that scenario.

Except in the current scenario, the company already has disproportionately more power. A company can get by shorthanded for a while. A person not having a job, however, is far, far more devastating, especially if that person has a family to support.

>Can you share some of the arguments in favor of involuntary unions?

They drastically increase employee leverage and lead to much higher wages and benefits for labor.

> Everyone has the right to organize a voluntary union. What requires special legislated privilege are things like collective bargaining, which is not a normal component or outcome of voluntary negotiations.

Collective bargaining can absolutely be a component of a voluntary union, if everyone agrees to it.

Why should a union have the ability to force people to not show up to work and get a paycheck, though? If people agree with the union, they'll go along with it; if people don't agree, then clearly the union does not represent their interests.

"Collective bargaining can absolutely be a component of a voluntary union, if everyone agrees to it."

That "everyone" has to include the leadership of the company. All they have to do is say "no", and the whole thing goes up in smoke.

"If people agree with the union, they'll go along with it"

Unless they're afraid of getting fired.

> That "everyone" has to include the leadership of the company. All they have to do is say "no", and the whole thing goes up in smoke.

That "no" means they have to be willing to replace a substantial amount of their employees (including those who might not be part of the union but are willing to go along anyway when they see the terms of the negotiation), deal with the bad PR the union can bring to bear (strikes at large companies are major national news), find replacement employees who can look at that PR and still say "I'm willing to work for this company", deal with falling stock prices, deal with the public or partners potentially choosing to not do business with them, and do all that while continuing to fulfill existing contracts and orders that don't care what troubles they're having. That's a pretty massive "All they have to do". The wrong call there can put a company out of business.

If they're still willing to go through all of that, and the cost of doing so is still cheaper than granting the union's requirements, then they'll say "no", and the union's attempt to bargain will fail.

> Unless they're afraid of getting fired.

Yes, that's the risk you take. You have to actually be willing to quit and stand with the union if you want the union to fight on your behalf. You have to be willing to be out of work and not get a paycheck. The situation needs to be serious enough to put that on the line.

Unions are an incredible tool, and I'm in favor of them. That doesn't mean I'm in favor of laws enshrining them into disproportionately more power than they already wield.

"That "no" means they have to be willing to replace a substantial amount of their employees"

Not if many of them are afraid of being fired by speaking up. You know, the very people who need a union.

"Unions are an incredible tool, and I'm in favor of them. That doesn't mean I'm in favor of laws enshrining them into disproportionately more power than they already wield."

But without those laws, they have no power. So you've just admitted you are not in favor of unions.

> Not if many of them are afraid of being fired by speaking up. You know, the very people who need a union.

The point of a union is that if you fire some of them, you'd have to fire all of them.

> But without those laws, they have no power.

Collective bargaining still works just fine; that gives them more power than individual employees acting individually.

I've asked about this before and have never gotten a clear answer. What legislated privileges are granted? A voluntary union could still collectively bargain. They could all agree to make the same demand and all quit or strike if said demand is not met. That doesn't require federal law.

I do believe there are some protections against companies firing everyone when they attempt to collectively bargain. Which is nice I guess. But not a requirement to form an effective union.

> I do believe there are some protections against companies firing everyone when they attempt to collectively bargain. Which is nice I guess. But not a requirement to form an effective union.

Part of the theory of a union is that the workers aren't easily replaceable as a group. Doubly so in that a company that is willing to fire N thousand people and hire replacements will likely have a harder time finding people willing to work for them. That seems sufficient to have enough bargaining clout, even with at-will employment.

"A voluntary union could still collectively bargain."

And as someone else said, the company can fire the person who brought the demands to them and tell the rest of them to fuck off and get back to work, or they're next.

Perfect. Part of being a union means being willing to collectively strike. When the company fires one person the rest of the union needs to have the resolve to stop working. This forces the company to negotiate. Or if the company can trivially replace those workers that's fine as well.

Not seeing anything here that requires legislative intervention.

So using the firing of someone to intimidate everyone else is fine by you?

I'd say it's as reasonable as workers collectively refusing to work to intimidate their employer.

I don't see how collective bargaining is some special thing that should require special protection or permission. It seems like a logical result of the freedom to negotiate the terms of one's own employment (which hopefully isn't controversial) and the freedom to assemble with other people (which hopefully isn't controversial). I'm free to tell my employer that I want $x per hour, and the employer is free to say yes or no. Similarly, I should be able to tell my employer that I want $x per hour for me and a bunch of my friends, and the employer is free to say yes or no.

That's not what "collective bargaining" means.

It entails government enforcement of a set of rules on a labor marketplace for all participants.

Collective bargaining arrangements are why, for example, one cannot be a teacher at a Los Angeles public school without paying union dues. You must operate under the same employment rules as all other teachers.

You certainly are not allowed to undercut them by working at a lower wage level.

You can't just go to the Los Angeles Unified School District and negotiate your own separate contract as a teacher. Neither you nor the school district are free to make such an arrangement.

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