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Comment by bhhaskin | Hacker News Reader

That's not what right to work is at all.

What you are describing is "at will" employment.

Right to work means that you have a right to choose whether or not to be in a union. It effectively makes "union shops" illegal.

Unions don't like it because it makes them less effective.

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Which is to say, it's only anti-union if people don't actually feel they get value from being in the union. If people do feel they get value from being in the union they'll join the union.

But if the majority are in a union and those that don’t join reap all the benefits the union gains in contracts how is that fair for those who are supporting the union.

In a "right-to-live" country, you would only have to pay taxes if the presidential candidate you voted for won.

uhm, what?

It exposes the union pretty directly to one of the deadliest problems in political science and economics: the free-rider problem.

That's not exactly it, either. Right to work means unions and companies can't negotiate union security agreements. These are agreements that non-union workers have to pay to support the union, since they are benefitting from the union. Essentially they allow the union to coordinate individuals in a prisoner's dilemma.

Where your comment misses the mark is that workers in non-rtw states don't have to join or even pay for unions. They can work for companies that do not have union security agreements. There is no coercion in any step in the chain.

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