Should private labor unions be outlawed?

I've known people personally who were in unions (not including myself) and they never did any such thing. Actually, although he's my friend, it's a non-union member at this company I work for, that steals thousands of dollars of equipment and steel from this company every month.

 

Because you stereotype anything remotely involving unions, its really difficult to take you seriously.

 

That's wonderful, Deathstar. The union exists as a criminal enterprise. That does not mean everyone in the union is a criminal. I have some good friends in unions and often the union's behavior thoroughly embarrasses them. Unions use threats, coercion, and social pressure to keep them in line, though.

Consider who uses the terms "squealer", "rat", and "fink" to describe those who report their criminal acitivities. Oh, right, organized crime and unions. Amazing coincidence.

 

As an apologist for oganized crime, Gamewell45, why should you be taken seriously? The "working" man in the U.S. is not involved with unions. Unions are corrupt, criminal organizations. Working men and women aren't.

"Under the Supreme Court's 1973 Enmons decision, vandalism, assault, even murder by union officials are exempt from federal anti-extortion law. As long as the violence is aimed at obtaining property for which the union can assert a "lawful claim"--for example, wage or benefit increases-- the violence is deemed to be in furtherance of "legitimate" union objectives. By the Court's peculiar logic, such violence does not count as extortion.

The result has been an epidemic of union-related violence. The National Institute for Labor Relations Research (NILRR) has recorded 8,799 incidents of violence from news reports since 1975. Those reports show only 258 convictions, suggesting a conviction rate of less than 3 percent. Moreover, local law enforcement authorities often get many more reports of strike violence than journalists can possibly cover.|
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-316es.html

Working men and women? I think not. Criminals who belong to criminal organizations and have support from liberal politicians.

 

I'm not talking about individuals, I'm talking about entire unions. No one in the unions I've met, does these things.

 

Individuals in a union might be good, honest, kind, decent people just as a mafia guy might. The union, as an organization, is organized crime. That's why the Enmons decision was passed, Deathstar. That decision exists for no reason other than to protect unions from federal prosecution.

I was involved in an investigation of a man who flew around the country committing arsons for a construction union. I know it's hard to believe, Deathstar, but the union did not introduce him at rallies as "our arsonist." Does your union practice extortion? Obtaining benefit by violence or threats of violence? You know, like, pay us protection money or we'll wreck your store. With unions, it's pay us or we'll destroy your business. Is it okay to attack non-union workers? How about damaging the property of non-union workers? Is that okay?

Let's face it. Without threats of violence or actual violence the unions would not be multi-billion dollar industries.

 

The unions I've known of have never done any of that. They did threaten, but they didn't threaten aggression, they simply threatened to all leave work if, for example, a guy got fired simply because of personal distaste from the employer. Are they not allowed to leave work if they don't want to?

 

They should be free to walk off the job. The employer should then be free to fire and replace every employee who does so.

 

The entire idea of unions is that it's hard to find enough replacements to replace everyone quickly enough to avoid losing profits for a certain period of time. And that assumes that the replacements didn't form a union

 

Unions attract capital that could otherwise be used to increase employment.

As labor becomes more expensive(as most all union labor is) it attracts more capital as it becomes more cost effective to replace that labor with capital. This is capital that could otherwise be used to increase employment. It is quite inefficient and I would imagine you of all people would be against this.

The minimum wage funtions much in the same way. As labor becomes more expensive it simply becomes easier to replace that labor with capital or simply require your current employee's to do more with less in lieu of hiring more workers.

Haven't bothered with economics?

I just have not bothered with your bastardized version of market socialism.

 

The same could be said of anyone that ever demands more for their services, during negotiation, than they could survive with. A large business owner, instead of making a billion a year, could hire thousands of employees and sacrifice his own financial rewards for that. Just like union members could sacrifice their own wages in order to allow others to be employed.

As long as this negotiation is legitimate, then you should have no problem with it. If they use threats of violence etc., then that's criminal, but if they just use the strategy of "we'll *all* quit if one of us gets fired for reasons that we don't like", that's not using any sort of violence against anyone or their property because they all have the right to leave whenever they want for any reason or no reason at all. It's the exact same thing that employers do when they say "if you don't work this way, I'll cut you off from access to my property (factory, restaurant etc.) and you won't get payment as a result because if you come here you'll be trespassing". It's not actually a violation of the employee's rights to liberty and property for an employer to do that, and it's not a violation of the employer's rights to liberty and property to say "we'll all quit if you fire this guy or lower his wages".

Now, if a union isn't careful, they can hurt or destroy a business and then be out of a job. But if they do that by legitimate means, there's nothing we can do to stop them and the unions will be the ones being punished. The employer "should have" gotten employees to replace said unions, and if they couldn't do that, then either the employer was incompetent, or the unions had individuals in them that were so skilled that they couldn't easily be replaced. Or both

 

Given they are found to increase productivity, your comment is not high up in the sense stakes

You'd have to assume that the monopoly union model, within a competitive context, dictates employer-employee interaction. It doesn't

The minimum wage, at the very least, reduces the inefficiency generated by monopsony. Its basic supply and demand: given job search frictions firms face upward sloping labour supply curves and therefore minimum wages can increase both wages and employment. Those against minimum wages are essentially against the exhaustion of mutually beneficial exchange.

Acquiring some relevance of the Austrian school probably wouldn't appeal to you

 

Are you able to prove that this supposed increase in productivity offsets the obvious increase in unemployment?

It certainly does, atleast here in the US.

Pure nonsense.

 

There are numerous studies that show it. Much of its refers to the testing of 'voice effects'. Personally I'd refer to the limits of it (e.g. the enforcement of wage norms that can harm long term productivity). However, that reflects my socialism bias and therefore natural distrust over union competition.

You show your innocence. Traditionally, at least compared to countries like the UK, efficient bargain models have been more useful in understanding economic result

Supply and demand is 'pure nonsense'? Wow, aren't you the revolutionary!

 

Then why do unions require laws to protect their jobs when they strike?

 

That depends on what kind of union youre talking about. When it comes to some jobs, it's not easy for an employer to find a good employee so when they do get some good employees, the employees have a LOT of say-so and negotiation power.

Now, most people who'd spend their entire lives in low-skill jobs, wouldn't have the organization ability to form an effective union anyways, but even if they were that organized, it's hard to form an effective union unless the labor is skilled enough to where it's hard to replace people who are on strike

 

There are studies that compare the financial benefits of increased productivity outweighing the loss of employment?

That is not the case in the US.

Monopsony is pure nonsense.

 

Studies into productivity find that there are increases in productivity and reductions in profitability. We'd of course expect that with redistribution of economic rents

Stamping your foot won't make your argument more reasoned. As I said, the right to manage model has traditionally been found to be closer to the British union.

I appreciate that you think supply and demand is 'pure nonsense'. However, back to the economic reality. We know, without any doubt, that the market age doesn't exist (i.e. even after controlling for compensating differentials and human capital there exists a wage distribution). We also know, without any doubt, that firms have wage-making power (i.e. they face an upward sloping labour supply curve). Inconvenient for you, but there's not much we can do but accept the obvious!

 

So there are no studies that compare productivity gains to the effects of increased unemployment?

Why is the British union important? Is it the only one that supports your argument?

I believe this paper sums it up nicely.

http://mises.org/journals/scholar/Block12.pdf

 

I've already told you what the studies find. If you want to refer to studies that find unemployment increases from unions then be my guest! I'm happy to discuss any empirical evidence referenced.

To adopt your argument (based on wage gains at the expense of employment) we'd have to refer to the 'right to manage' model (which predicts that very finding). Such an approach has been found to be more consistent with British union behaviour.

You've chosen very poorly. That paper makes no reference to modern monopsony theory. Where's the reference to job search? Where's the reference to employee preferences etc etc etc. As usual, you only describe that the Austrians have no understanding of the labour market. Cheers for that though!

 

I was merely confirming the fact that the studies you referenced don't actually refute what I am saying. Thank you for the confirmation.

The 'right to manage' model does not exist in the US in any significance, so I do not understand its relevance.

Ahhhh, so while Monopsony theory was debunked, MODERN Monopsony theory is still alive and well?

Is that similar to the reasoning used in support of bailouts? "Ok, guys the bailout failed.....well of course it failed you didn't use MODERN bailout theory...what were you thinking!!!".

 

No, you were merely dodging the evidence and, when asked to provide some, dodge that too. Shame really. This subject deserves better, needing- by definition- an integration of theory and empirical evidence. Fortunately economists have noted that. For example, our understanding of efficiency wages (where its market forces that derive unemployment) is the result of the empirical failure to understand unemployment through the standard 'extra-market constraints' analysis.

Its an economic theory used to explain trade union preferences. That you don't know that only shows that I'm discussing unions with someone that doesn't know the analysis used to understand unions

Again you only show your innocence. This isn't your fault. You've been fed deliberate prance, with an analysis that deliberately misrepresents orthodox labour theory. However, anyone that has bothered to research labour economics will know that the traditional source of monopsony is typically only used in Economics 101 (as part of the standard analysis into deadweight loss). That monopsony power is derived through relaxing the more ludicrous assumptions is a powerful result. Perfect knowledge? Used for simplification, but now we appreciate the consequences of asymmetric information for labour inefficiency. Homogeneous workers? Again used for simplification, but now we appreciate the consequences of preferences for the firm's labour supply. The real debate for monopsony, away from the low brow offerings that the fake libertarians are fed, is over the relative importance of the different sources of monopsony. Job search models, for example, predict employment gains from minimum wages. However, something like a transport cost model will often predict a firm exit effect and therefore zero overall impact

 

I'm completely fine with private sector unions. It's the public sector unions I want gone.