Your argument that AliBaba can somehow come into the U.S. and not be subjected to the same economic and cultural effects mystifies me. If AliBaba came here they would experience unionization, and it would be a good thing. Also given the extent of Amazon's monopoly in the U.S., and anti-china AND anti-middle-east sentiment in the U.S. being as high as it is (AliBaba cannotes "arab" for a lot of americans), there is just no way AliBaba could ever enter this market successfully unless Amazon was broken up into multiple companies and AliBaba rebranded to something appropriate for the U.S. market. So yeah, your comment is really bizzare.
I'm wary because unions in the US start out strong by addressing very real grievances and putting the greedier aspects of management in-check. But it seems inevitable that they become entrenched, bloated, and protectionist to the point of hurting the company's ability to adapt to market pressure and disruptions from non-unionized competitors. I'm not anti-union per se, and I would rather see them structured the way they are in Europe, and particularly, those in Germany.
Eventually they crumble under their own apathy, bureaucracy, mismanagement, entropy and waste and a more lean competitor takes their place.
Thankfully
Unions aside, Germany requires by law that corporate boards have a minimum percentage of representation from bottom-level employees, meaning employees who are nobody’s boss. This law seems to have been invaluable to working conditions in Germany. The catch is that the American ruling class would simply never allow such a law to be passed. Germany has the law as a result of history. Remember the Soviets defeated the Nazis, “first they came for the communists” and so on.
Remember that after World War One and during the interbellum, most european countries had massive social unrest. Giving workers representation inside the company was usually meant as a way to appease to communist/socialist voters during those times.
Mind you, this all happened before world war 2 and the iron curtain.
You’re tired?
I think you mean wary. Or leery. Not weary.
Some unionization works out well, especially when the union actually has the best interest of both the workers and company in mind. There are many times that self serving unions bleed workers through dues and protect non-productive workers to the benefit of no one, and in some cases, driving companies into bankruptcy.
Mostly too many stories from family of ridiculous interactions with unions (e.g. "you can't carry your own stuff to your booth. If you don't have us carry your briefcase, your truck's windows are all going to be smashed.")
Also, teacher's unions.
It’s in their interest to fight unionization, but the catastrophizing is just part of that negotiating game. You’re just buying a PR line that they don’t even believe themselves.
As soon as unionization gains a foothold, that same PR will talk up how they have strong relations with workers and that it gives them a competitive advantage in hiring, quality, tenure, and loyalty.
It’s spin today, and spin tomorrow. Don’t take it so seriously, maybe.
Of course, there's some pretty good evidence that companies that treat and pay their workers well are more successful than those that try to scrape by treating them like disposable machine parts. But it's not, and has never been, all about the money: a lot of it is about power, and classism, and giving mediocre managers someone they can treat like garbage.
However, I would chalk that up to immature and young guys not voting for their best interests. When you’re up against the best leaders and lawyers money can buy, your union is bound to seem ineffective.
That's still a _lot_ of freakin' restaurants my guy. Costco is the only counterexample that I know of to "all workplaces need unions in order to guarantee workers' quality of life", but I think they might be the exception that proves the rule. That they've grown to be that big and treated their employees that well is a testament to how good economically, long term, it is to treat your employees as the valuable assets they are.
I also trust Costco a lot more than Amazon, even though Costco is not as convenient to use due to their smaller number of SKUs.
The idea is that if you see something that interests you, you buy it now, and there's always something new on each visit. It's annoying for certain things, but at the same time it allows them to avoid having the same stock on the floor because people are on the fence about a purchase.
So pretty freaking big?
A link to a long series about the interaction between US automakers and the unions is below. Of note is the story about how automakers' market share declined precipitously in the early eighties when Japanese automakers figured out the US market.
The US auto industry is not a great example of how a union can work with an employer in the face of existential threats.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/10/08/business/uaw-...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1981/10/11/f...
https://www.investopedia.com/articles/economics/chrysler-bai... (Heavy International Competition)
Unions were not who was responsible for their atrocious offerings during the 70s to 2000s.