Hacker News Reader

Comment by Alupis | Hacker News Reader

Honestly curious - is there any available data that demonstrates Unions are a net-benefit in modern times?

Many of us have fond thoughts regarding Unions and the struggles they went through decades ago to achieve sane, safe, rewarding working conditions. What is left to fight for?

In the past couple years, we have had story after story of Unions abusing power and harming companies and the public in the process. Is there good-doing I'm missing?

Take Starbucks for example - already known for higher-than-average wages, college tuition sponsorship programs, management tracks and more - what is left to fight for? It's still nearly zero-skilled labor at the end of the day.

View on HN

There sure is! Here's a recent review:

https://www.nber.org/papers/w29522

It's a pretty consistent finding among labor economics researchers that firms have monopsony power over workers.

> What's left to fight for?

The issue isnt whether they're well paid according to your subjective criteria. It's the ratio between how much the worker is paid and how much they produce for the firm.

I talk about the "bargaining power ratio" concept here[1], but the microeconomics 201 concept is the ratio between marginal product of labor and pay can be thought of as the bargaining power ratio.

If across the board workers have a low ratio, then they have a systematically low bargaining power, and unions would improve that.

[1] https://www.singlelunch.com/2022/02/21/why-you-should-not-hi...

I don't know how we can be confident a Union will just solve the problems you point out.

I'm also not sure we can be confident that most agree these are problems at all - if you are low-skilled or no-skilled, then it does not matter how much value you bring to a company, you are too easily replaced. The solution isn't to fleece the company, but improve the average person's ability to obtain valuable skills, no?

Additionally, Union shops are notoriously poorly run, poorly organized and inefficient. The Union does things to benefit the Union, not the workers, business or public. How do we keep that in check?

> I don't know how we can be confident a Union will just solve the problems you point out.

Unions increase worker bargaining power. If worker bargaining power is low, it solves that

> if you are low-skilled or no-skilled, then it does not matter how much value you bring to a company

The amount of skill has nothing to do with it. Only your marginal product of labor and the ratio of your pay to it

> you are too easily replaced

That would affect bargaining power, correct

> The solution isn't to fleece the company, but improve the average person's ability to obtain valuable skills, no?

Not particularly.

For instance, low skilled job are also easily replaceable. Walmart is hiring just as well as Starbucks or Target.

So why is the balance struck at this wage point? The issue is that there are relatively few firms offering a ton of the low skilled jobs. The firms are forming an effective union (oligopsony for the technical) which suppresses wages.

> Union shops are notoriously poorly run, poorly organized and inefficient.

[Citation needed]

Public sector unions (eg. police unions, teachers unions) tend to be terrible, because the government doesn't face profitability pressures like companies do.

Some private sector unions have been inefficient (eg. Detroit auto workers in the 1990s) but that's also often because the sector itself is immune to competition (chicken tax for auto workers).

Other private sector unions for instance are much better at ensuring labor norms are respected.

All in all it's hard to go against David Card's (author in NBER review paper above) opinion on the matter of labor economics

You keep repeating this old and worn out talking point with no evidence to support it:

> Additionally, Union shops are notoriously poorly run, poorly organized and inefficient. The Union does things to benefit the Union, not the workers, business or public. How do we keep that in check?

Is this just an elaborate sealioning attempt?

I have personal experience with three unions in my area. All of which fit my description very accurately.

> You keep repeating this old and worn out talking point

There has been zero evidence produced that counters this assertion. I asked for evidence, and received complaints that cannot be addressed by unions and links to pro-union think tanks that unsurprisingly argue unions are a net-positive force.

A Union isn't some magical thing that solves all problems. Ultimately it's an organization that puts itself above all other organizations, which includes the businesses they work with and even their own Union Members.

Your local grocery store Union is probably actively engaged in forcing-out young people unless they fork over a portion of their scrawny wages to the Union for nothing in return.

>There has been zero evidence produced that counters this assertion

From what I can read a user provided you with evidence, from the National Bureau of Economic Research, fulfilling your original request for data showing unions are a net benefit in modern times. This evidence counters your assertion that unions are a net negative, so it does come across as "pro-union" in the extent it disagrees with your stated anti-union viewpoint. You have dismissed that evidence entirely on the basis that it is "a link to a pro-union think tank". That link goes to a 16 page PDF summarizing abstracts from a wide body of industry research, so I guess you have also dismissed all of those papers.

So on one hand you bring 3 examples of anecdotal evidence, and on the other hand a user provided a summary document itself linking many additional sources of research. You have declared the source non-credible by default, and then insisted nobody will provide evidence to disagree with you.

Reading this thread to try and grow my own perspectives, as I do on hackernews, I have to say I have gained little to no material information about why your view on this issue is justifiable. I don't think you're being fair to the users who are engaging you on your points, either, and I think that's costing this discussion any chance at producing useful insight.

Also, the 2nd author on the NBER paper is David Card [1] a Nobel laureate for his work in empirical labor economics research, for what that's worth.

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

I think you're reading biased publications if they failed to report on OSHA violations in Amazon warehouses (which are so bad, the DOJ had to step in), or about starbucks workers' issues around scheduling, firings, etc. You don't have to rely on articles though, maybe there's a Starbucks or other place near you that's in the midst of unionization. If so, go talk to the people involved.

In the general sense, according to the DOL, unionized workers earn more than non-unionized workers, have more paid sick leave, are more likely to take vacation days, have better retirement plans, better scheduling, etc.: https://www.dol.gov/general/workcenter/union-advantage#:~:te...).

Also, the fact is, unionization is a right, and it is illegal to fire workers for trying to unionize. Even if you think your employer is good, they can always be better and employers are not going to go out of their way to improve your working conditions, pay or benefits, and it's easier to fight for these as a group rather than alone.

I'm not sure what you mean by "harming companies and the public"; however we can come up with concrete examples of companies harming working people in the US.

Wage theft in the US alone costs working people billions of dollars annually; by some estimates employers stealing from employees results in "three times as much economic loss as all other types of theft combined". (https://www.edelson-law.com/blog/2022/10/wage-theft-outpaces...)

EPI has done work around this:

> in the 10 most populous U.S. states. We find that, in these states, 2.4 million workers lose $8 billion annually (an average of $3,300 per year for year-round workers) to minimum wage violations—nearly a quarter of their earned wages

https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-fro...

> What is left to fight for?

- Non-competes being used for fast-food workers

- Tech employees asked to work on military projects (at places that aren't traditionally servicing the military)

- Minimum wages are still like $8 in some states, which is redicuous today

- Companies only giving workers 29.5 hours of work when the minimum for "full time benefits" is 30 hours

- Workers being fired for saying/doing things outside of work

- Companies laying off massive numbers of employees without doing the legally-required steps

- etc.

> Non-competes being used for fast-food workers

Non-competes are illegal in California. This is a state or Federal issue, not a Union issue.

> Tech employees asked to work on military projects (at places that aren't traditionally servicing the military)

This is an ideology issue, and does not belong in the workplace at all.

> Minimum wages are still like $8 in some states, which is redicuous today

This story is much deeper than headlines would lead you to believe. For starters, the cost of living in majority of this country is low. Companies pay market rates, and the government sets minimum wages.

> Companies only giving workers 29.5 hours of work when the minimum for "full time benefits" is 30 hours

Most companies are not required to offer any benefits - full time or not.

> Workers being fired for saying/doing things outside of work

Yet we routinely cancel people for things they said 15 years ago...

> Companies laying off massive numbers of employees without doing the legally-required steps

And the courts take care of that already.

Practically none, or none, of the issues you brought up can be solved by a Union.

My personal feelings on unions aside, I think some of these points a union COULD address.

- Non-competes. Your rationale for non-competes is a non sequitur here. A union can represent workers and negotiate against signing non-competes if it is legal in a state, which would make a union desirable in that case.

- Military contracts. Whether it belongs in the workplace is irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that there are many tech employees who are averse to working on certain projects, and a union representing them would be able to negotiate what kind of contracts their members would work on.

- Benefits - A union certainly is viable here.

- Outside of work - a union would certainly be able to defend their members’ right to not be terminated for reasons irrelevant to their work, expressing their opinions on a controversial matter being one of those potential reasons.

Specifically regarding non-competes - No, a Union negotiating for no non-compete does nobody any good. The moment you go to a different company that is not serviced by that same Union (or perhaps the Union did not negotiate this), then you are back at square one - signing a non-compete or finding a different job.

The only solution to non-competes is at the State and Federal level. Anything less solves nothing, but sounds good...

and how would we get the lawmakers in this country to actually propose regulation that would fix non-competes? Mind you, corporations have an absolute amount of influence in politics compared to the average worker. A union is also a political force which looks after political interest of workers.

Somehow California did it...

If the people of your state don't think it's important enough to make into a law, then it's not important enough to the people in your state. You are free to disagree, but apparently most of the people in your state do not.

Change it at the State or Federal level. Everything else accomplishes nothing. Unions aren't a magic bullet, and do not apply across different businesses.

Literally any workplace issues can be solved through collective worker action, if there are enough workers. The trick is to get enough workers into the union to be able to have a say in the things I listed, and more. What do you propose? Politicians are in the pocket of the opposite interest from the workers, they are the capitalists' tools. Companies aren't going to change, because they want more profits above all else. Do you expect to just wait to be given more rights? People keep shooting down unions, but then offer literally zero solutions.

At minimum, you can argue it's game theoretical insurance.

If Starbucks is so magnanimous towards their employees today, they may not be that way tomorrow.

Corporate advocates for itself. Unions advocate for the employees.

Ideally, they strike a balance so that nobody's satisfied and the best compromise is reached.

Discarding unions leaves the door open for an imbalance of corporate power. (And, since corporations tend toward monopoly these days, that's a lot of corporate power.)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com