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Comment by glance9835 | Hacker News Reader

Yea it is odd. Bc then tech workers get fired on mass just to get a little boost in stock price. And yet many don't think we need a union...

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I don't think a union would prevent them getting fired though, much less getting outsourced to areas without unions.

The point of a union is not prevent layoffs and role reduction in force. It is to make sure that the company has done its absolute best to find another solution to the problem (that they're trying to solve with layoffs) and ensures that the company is accountable for all their decisions.

This just limits hiring in the first place as we see in European branches of (generally, American) tech companies. And regardless, what solutions can be found by the union?

It does not limit hiring in any way.

As for what solutions union provide - I have already explained. They exist to protect workers' interests. They do not exist to solve company's problems. That is the job of the company.

For hiring, I meant it in terms of a chilling effect in that companies will not hire as many people as they are much harder to fire.

You said "It is to make sure that the company has done its absolute best to find another solution to the problem," and I am asking, what solutions have unions "made sure" that the companies have done instead of layoffs? I am looking for concrete examples as I often hear this claim but I'm not sure what a union can do if the solution is layoffs, so my question is, what other solutions are there?

Then, I suggest that you educate yourself on how unions function and what they do. It's not my job to educate you. You can also ChatGPT this by the way.

I see, looks like you don't actually have any examples to give despite you yourself making such a claim, on a discussion forum and thread to discuss a topic, so lead with that next time, because that's all that the phrase "It's not my job to educate you" means.

Is that a serious question? Providing for education possibilities, legislating against noncompete agreements to hinder workers to start out on their own, challenging illegal decisions, the list goes on.

The claim was that the union would find solutions instead of a layoff so how would legislating help in that immediate case where a company wants to lay people off in the next quarter? I'm not asking about general things unions do, I'm challenging this specific claim the parent made.

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