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Comment by mattl | Hacker News Reader

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Because if an employer already treats you well it just adds unneeded bureaucracy. I'm a big fan of unions, but I'm also a big fan of treating employees well. I would hope that my employees would never feel the need to unionize because I already hear their feedback and give them the benefits they want.

Unions create an adversarial relationship between labor and management. That shouldn't be necessary if labor and management are already allies.

Regardless of how adversarial it is, all work relationships are contractual negotiations. Without a union, one side of the equation has a boatload of money and expertise, and the other side is... you. Unions are about balancing that equation.

Sometimes employers use that money and expertise for good by figuring out ways to get employees extra benefits, for example inventing the 10 year option, which costs the company more but is better for the employee.

When two people who get along negotiate a contract they don't need lawyers if they aren't trying to take advantage of the other party.

> Sometimes employers use that money and expertise for good by figuring out ways to get employees extra benefits

A union doesn't prevent that. With a union, the employees have the power and expertise to have a say in those improvements too, instead of being at the whims of their bosses.

> When two people who get along negotiate a contract they don't need lawyers

I don't really know how to respond to this... above like five employees, every employment contract is drafted by a lawyer. My employment agreement at the big company I work for now is many dozens of pages long. I tried reading it, but it's just not my area. With a union, I would know that someone on "my side" of the table, who I pay and who works for me, has had a hand in drafting it.

Corporations are not people.

Unfortunately management and labor have never really been allies. Even at companies I super, super love to work at and treat their workers well.. they still will do things like shocking layoffs directly from the board-- because the board doesn't care even if my manager and manager's manager etc. does.

And in the case of Fastmail, it’s already an employee-owned business (not sure on the AU/US split from the Fastmail/Pobox merge, but I believe that all shareholders are employees except one who is a brother of an employee). As a former employee of Fastmail (AU, 2017–2020), I’m a bit puzzled by this, and curious about it.

> Unions create an adversarial relationship between labor and management

Isn’t there still an adversarial relationship between non-union labor and management?

So the story goes: Management wants to pay as little as possible for the most work and labor wants to get paid as much as possible for the least amount of work?

> Management wants to pay as little as possible for the most work and labor wants to get paid as much as possible for the least amount of work?

Well for example, at Netflix, management specifically paid extra for good labor and offered interesting problems, and in return we did extra work because we were motivated by the interesting problems and the great co-workers.

And at Google back in the day, they gave significantly more benefits than necessary to attract great talent.

So no, I'd say it's possible to create a non-adversarial workplace. The trick is keeping it that way as it grows, which is usually when unions come in.

What about Netflix's practice of using an employee until they aren't of any use then disposing them? A practice that applied to an employee that helped draft it?

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/inside-netflixs-n...

Or how, when the pandemic hit, people realized even with all the perks a Google/Apple campus gives you it was still preferable to stay at home, or even move to a more preferable place, and avoid the tour bus commute? Not to mention the lack of transparency in pay which will stagger individual negotiation efforts when employers apply, or attempt to apply, a WFH tax.

Because they shouldn't start their own union. Unions are across companies, having a single union for a single company doesn't make much sense. Take the UAW, they don't just cover General Motor, they cover all workers in that sector, giving them more power and influence.

It's the same with a Star Bucks union, that's silly and not cost effective. You have a "restaurants (and cafe's)"- union. Take McDonalds, they have an agreement with a union in Denmark, 3F. 3F covers fast food staff, construction workers, factory workers, paramedics and many more. They are hugely powerful.

The Fastmail workers formed a local branch of the Communications Workers of America.

Oh, perfect then... nevermind.

There's a very strong, anti-union sentiment in HN IMO as it's contrary to the "bootstrapping" image venture capitalist that drives so much here. But if fellow readers put aside any resentment and look at it objectively: we prosper in ways due to past unions, and hopefully see it as a tool to push back on broken hiring/firing processes, at the least.

Low hanging fruit: We all think we are strong or can bounce back to a new job easily. What happens when we cross that line of ageism we hear about often? Not everyone is going to be able to retire in their 40s/50s. A union can push back in this practice.

What about not being granted lengthy paternal leave to spend with new family members and the state you reside in doesn't offer assurances?

What about the lengthy contracts we all fool ourselves into signing, thinking the companies won't come after us as long as we treat and be treated as "part of the family" and we leave it to luck and withstand unfair practices to not rock the boat?

We even tell ourselves "HR is not our friend, they are there to protect the company" and in the same breath say "unions are useless"

Like I've been hearing: It's better to start and be in a union when you don't need one.

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