If unions decreased lifetime earnings, do you think companies would fight them so vehemently?
Point to data, and folks still try to justify why unions bad (anecdotes, deflection, etc.).
Point to overseas success, well, USA is exceptional wouldn't work here.
Rather than argue, just ask them what would change their mind? Otherwise the line will always move.
Why should the capital owners, who are providing money and benefits to their employees cede further their assurance those employees are infinitely replicable? They are, aren't they, without the artifice of a union.
In China there's the notion of the Mandate of Heaven, a philosophy that whoever is currently ruling is the ruler justified by god, evidenced by the fact that the universe, or god, has allowed that person to become the ruler.
The general American capitalist philosophy applies this on an individual level. One's impoverishment or lack thereof is a justified realization of their inherent worth. If they were worth more, they wouldn't be employees, they'd be founders, calling the shots, right?
Switching the US to be open shop would change my mind. This would allow people to easily switch away from or negotiate with abusive unions.
The unions I have dealt with have universally been more abusive than my employers, to the point where employers would try to sneak unauthorized employee benefits through contract loopholes. In one case the union agrees to let the company hire non-union labor (with capped, low pay and benefits) to do the jobs of union employees with seniority that refused to work and could not be fired.
If you think my repeated personal experiences with multiple national unions are all anecdotal outliers, then explain why wildcat strikes have become common in the US in recent years.
It seems pretty obvious to me that if you find that some US unions are rather bad, which is probably true because most of everything is bad, the right solution would be to strengthen the good ones. And if really there aren't any good ones, a good solution would be to organize to create better ones based on what has worked in the history of the labor movement united States. And based on what is working abroad, especial in more democratic societies like in Scandinavia
This is how it has always worked. No worker right we take for granted - and in the US you are missing some! - has ever been gifted to us. They happened because a small group of people decided to organize and do something about it.
Not saying that's easy, but the base principle is pretty simple and according to the research paper - and history in general - clearly worth it.
And to be transparent, if someone says to me that what I describe is impossible, i will listen to the arguments, but my baseline assumption would be that he spreads corporate propaganda, or worse, is victim of it.
Unions are just like political parties after a while, the people that get involved in them have a particular personality, and pretty much none of them think you should take pride in the quality of your work, it's generally people who are very sour and see only enemies in their work life. Otherwise they'd be doing the work and getting rewarded for it.
Aren't the democratic and the republican party sometimes corrupted? What about the Koch Brothers and the Tobacco companies and the Bitcoin/Blockchain sector and the fossil fuel companies and the alcool companies? What about the tech monopolies? What about everyone that has a political stake in everything?
Who decided it was important to associate corruption with the unions and only the unions?
I literally already compared them to political parties in my comment, this is a strawman.
Then if was you I would express similar concerns because the Koch brothers and powerful economic players in general have by definition way more power over political decisions - or non decisions - and our lives than the unions. Unions are merely a weak counter power.
I'm not even making a negative jugement here, this is just how power works.
"Switching the US to be open shop would change my mind" Literally, closed shop is illegal in the USA: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_shop#United_States
Give some names if you want to provide anecdotes, otherwise I think you're someone arguing in bad faith on the internet.
Look at the data, look at how kneecapped unions are in the USA, and you'll begin to understand that you're being manipulated.
As with most thing, unions have both good points and bad points. Your comment reads like it's saying "we can show they are objectively better with data, but (mistaken) people still try to justify why they're bad". It comes across, to me at least, as intentionally misleading.
1. I too can be a millionaire. 2. Bucket of crabs.
For example, classically union heavy industries like coal mining... And weaving...
Interestingly, black lung cases have increased in the last decade https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/updates/upd-07-20-18.html I wonder if that correlates with union membership?
(And killing the coal mining industry can't be anything but a good thing)
The slow production decline is more related to veins that are getting too deep to mine or running out and there was also the Obama era moratorium and leasing federal lands for coal mining.
edit: If you're trying to say that this study and the amount that union membership earns a worker is obviously correct without using any reference to the study, I disagree with that method of processing new information.
Unions need to pay lobbyists so politicians don't repeal the laws they use, lawyers to review any agreements with the companies, possibly decrease the pool of revenue available to be split between workers and management(say, if doing something new gets caught up in negotiations and they lose first-mover advantage), advertising campaigns to convince people that unions are good, etc.
Depending on exact circumstances, they could be good for both companies and workers, or bad for both.
I'm also skeptical that companies are so competent that we should model them as ideal agents optimizing for profit EV. There are plenty of bankrupt incompetent companies, and while the remainder are the product of "natural selection", they only need to be fit enough to survive and not true optimizers. It's entirely possible that a company could benefit from unions, but management would be too prideful about losing control.
https://thisiscriminal.com/episode-148-errol-morris-9-25-202...
> Early in his career, Errol Morris read about a shocking series of alleged insurance crimes in a small town in Florida, which some referred to as “Nub City.” There were allegations that men and women were mutilating themselves — removing hands and feet — in order to exploit accidental dismemberment clauses in insurance policies, and collect money.