Not strange. It's cheaper to bust the union and fire those involved, and pay out for the ensuing lawsuits (whether just to lawyers or lawyers + settlement) than to pay higher wages and provide better benefits. Or at least, that's what they think, and I'm sure someone has done some sort of math to validate this course of action (whether or not it's correct).
And companies rarely care about their employees or anything other than profit / bonuses they get from that profit.
> The big advantage of not having to deal with unions is being able to quickly make changes in reaction to changing market conditions.
You could say similar things about authoritarian governmental forms. Like democracy, unions give a bigger seat at the decision-making table to stakeholders outside of privileged leadership classes.
Well that is 100% not true. Democracy in no way gives the people a voice, many many studies have proven this.
>>unions give a bigger seat at the decision-making table to stakeholders outside of privileged leadership classes.
In theory that is true, but that largely depends on the size of the union, and the size of the company the union is negotiating with. I have seen more than a few companies put completely under by unions that believed the economic health of the company was better than it really was and those "privileged leadership classes. " that you clearly have a disdain for was just out to "get the workers". The conflict lead to an economically unsustainable business
> Well that is 100% not true. Democracy in no way gives the people a voice, many many studies have proven this.
Citation most certainly needed. While democracy is admittedly imperfect, it sounds like you're claiming that citizens of democracies have no more political voice than those of authoritarian countries like the PRC or North Korea, which is obviously false.
The only plausible theory that supports your claim is that all decisions in democracies are made to benefit some corporate/financial elite, but the election of Trump rather than Clinton (which none of these elite groups wanted) is pretty strong and straightforward evidence against that.
> I have seen more than a few companies put completely under by unions that believed the economic health of the company was better than it really was and those "privileged leadership classes. " that you clearly have a disdain for was just out to "get the workers". The conflict lead to an economically unsustainable business
Maybe it was true that union was wrong in that case (your story is far too vague to verify), however it's plausible other unions were right in other, similar cases. Typically, management's priority is to be as generous as possible to the shareholders, not the workers.
> "privileged leadership classes. " that you clearly have a disdain for
My comment was a pretty straightforward observation that people with power tend to make decisions that benefit themselves, tend put far less weight on the interests of those without the political power to influence them, and a solution is to spread political power more widely. How exactly did you jump to that conclusion that I have "disdain" for "leadership classes"? You're reading in emotions that aren't there, and if you're going to to that, you're not worth talking to.
They basically show that public desire over a given law has almost no impact on the probability of that issue being passed, and inversely public dissent on a given law has almost not impact on the probability of that law failing to pass.
>it sounds like you're claiming that citizens of democracies have no more political voice than those of authoritarian countries like the PRC or North Korea, which is obviously false.
Is it obviously false? The current situation shows that democratic governments are more than capable of exerting Authoritarian control over society, sure you will argue that it is a "good reason" right now due to pandemic, but the fact this control is even possible shows where the power is, and how little freedom people really have. If people in a democracy were really free what control we see today would not even be possible. It is but with the grace and consent of the government do people have freedom. That is inverse of how it is suppose to be, where by the government is formed on the consent of the governed.
When we have teenagers in Wisconsin being threaten with arrest for disorderly conduct for an Instagram post I think we can safely say we have transitioned into an Authoritarian form of governance, that is just one of 1000's of examples I can cite
> How exactly did you jump to that conclusion that I have "disdain" for "leadership classes"? You're reading in emotions that aren't there
I did jump to an assumption based on past experiences here on HN and the context around your comments.
> They basically show that public desire over a given law has almost no impact on the probability of that issue being passed, and inversely public dissent on a given law has almost not impact on the probability of that law failing to pass.
I read the abstract, and that doesn't seem to contradict what I said, which was "...democracy, ...give[s] a bigger seat at the decision-making table to stakeholders outside of privileged leadership classes." I didn't say it'd always give the people the biggest seat, just a bigger one than they'd have otherwise. Furthermore, even if that study is correct, it would have a big blind-spot, since I can't imagine that it covers policy that "economic elites and organized groups representing business interests" would want but was never pursued by the government because it would be so contrary to public desire (and thus would never show up in any empirical data set). It's quite plausible that elite/business interests dominate certain areas of policy most of the time (probably the smaller and more technical types), but are overridden occasionally but in a big way by the public when it comes to certain large policy changes.
>> it sounds like you're claiming that citizens of democracies have no more political voice than those of authoritarian countries like the PRC or North Korea, which is obviously false.
> Is it obviously false? The current situation shows that democratic governments are more than capable of exerting Authoritarian control over society, sure you will argue that it is a "good reason" right now due to pandemic, but the fact this control is even possible shows where the power is, and how little freedom people really have.
Yes. I, a member of the public, along with many others fully support stay-at-home orders, etc. Democracy doesn't mean every citizen gets to do whatever dumb thing they get it in their head to do because "freedom."
> I did jump to an assumption based on past experiences here on HN and the context around your comments.
>>Yes. I, a member of the public, along with many others fully support stay-at-home orders, etc. Democracy doesn't mean every citizen gets to do whatever dumb thing they get it in their head to do because "freedom."
so do you support 100% of every measure, every state government has taken, or is that just a board support over closing the entire economy and putting millions out of work?
Do believe there are any limits on government in a time or crisis, or more to the topic at hand do you believe in any limits on democracy or just pure 50.1% can tell the 49.9% what to do?
I will admit I am not a strong supporter of pure democracy, I do prefer Constitutional Republics with strong protections for the minority from the excesses of the majority, the minority being the individual.
History has shown the majority can not be trusted to rule over others any more than dictators can
>Democracy doesn't mean every citizen gets to do whatever dumb thing they get it in their head to do because "freedom."
In a free society you can as that "dumb thing" is not directly, and provably a danger to others, and there is some libertarian arguments for for some of the stay at home orders. However many of them have gone well beyond public protection and are a clear power grab and should be unconstitutional and are a clear violation of natural human rights
But the prevailing opinion by the "majority" in this democracy is that your rights end when the crisis begins, meaning you have no rights at all, because in times of crisis is when you need your rights more than ever, right scan not and should not be "suspended" because of crisis, if they can they are not rights at all but privileges
Of-course a democracy does not have to be a free society, most people associate democracy with freedom though
Very important distinction and thank you for making note of it. While our government is inspired by democratic (rule by the people) values and allows representation through the Legislative branch, it is also designed to protect basic rights and to delegate much else to the States.
I think direct democracies work in small, culturally homogenous countries like Norway or a place where everyone is "on the same page" like Switzerland which really does have a direct democracy, but in such a large and heterogenous federation like the US it could get pretty scary pretty quickly. There is a mysteriously frightening dimension to crowd thought and mob rule that I think individuals don't think about until it's too late, too late to consider what the long-term repercussions of 51% suddenly agreeing on one thing might have.
> so do you support 100% of every measure, every state government has taken, or is that just a board support over closing the entire economy and putting millions out of work?
Who knows? That's a pretty overbroad corpus of material you're citing. That said, I'm pretty comfortable with the state-level responses so far, given the federal government response has been so inept that it required such drastic corrective measures from the states. It would be insane to knowingly choose to sacrifice the lives of hundreds of thousands on the altar of the economy.
> Do [you] believe there are any limits on government in a time or crisis, or more to the topic at hand do you believe in any limits on democracy or just pure 50.1% can tell the 49.9% what to do?
There are, but those limits also cannot be understood to require a dysfunctional response to a crisis. Ultimately, the government has to be able to do the reasonable thing. And yes, "reasonable" is something that requires judgement and often cannot be mechanically predefined.
> I will admit I am not a strong supporter of pure democracy, I do prefer Constitutional Republics with strong protections for the minority from the excesses of the majority, the minority being the individual.
It's pretty clear that we haven't been talking about some fantasy unchecked majoritarian direct democracy, so it's a bit of a straw man to start injecting that in.
> In a free society you can as that "dumb thing" is not directly, and provably a danger to others, and there is some libertarian arguments for for some of the stay at home orders. However many of them have gone well beyond public protection and are a clear power grab and should be unconstitutional and are a clear violation of natural human rights
Eh, I disagree. Also those arguments that the government should only be able to order confirmed cases to stay home are pretty unreasonable, given the fact of asymptomatic carriers and woefully inadequate testing capability.
> But the prevailing opinion by the "majority" in this democracy is that your rights end when the crisis begins, meaning you have no rights at all, because in times of crisis is when you need your rights more than ever, right scan not and should not be "suspended" because of crisis, if they can they are not rights at all but privileges
See that's where you're misunderstanding things. Those rights are meaningless if the system that secures them is so rigid that it invites total rejection. You're right that a crisis can be a risky time, but fundamentalism is not necessarily the safest response.
Well that tells me some of my earlier assumption are infact going to end up being correct in that your political and economic positions lean pretty close to Authoritarian Socialism vs my Libertarian Free Market views
I completely reject this idea that the economy should be ignored in a time of crisis, and I also believe that if the lock down extends beyond the 2nd week of may the actual death rate due to economic loss will be higher than that of the virus. Unemployment does direct cause death, both due to increase rates of suscide, property crime, homelessness and other conditions.
This idea that the economy is some religion that we want to " sacrifice people lives on" is a completely disingenuous comment and appears you are the one making assumptions now about my beliefs
I think there was and is a better way to handle pandemics. Better than simply shutting down the entire economy, locking people in their homes, putting millions out for work, shutting permanently thousands of business, destroying Families, etc all the while expecting fiat currency printing and debt to get us through.
The economy does matter, livelihoods do matter, that is not a alter for people to be sacrifice on, it is reality. Ignore it at your own peril. I suspect given the general user base on HN, that your job (like mine) is insulated from the economic effects of this, I may see a 4-8% reduction in income this year over last. Where we differ is I recognize that not everyone is as lucky as I am, I am not about to scream "let me eat cake" and ignore their economic hardship like you seem to be able to do easily
> Well that tells me some of my earlier assumption are infact going to end up being correct in that your political and economic positions lean pretty close to Authoritarian Socialism vs my Libertarian Free Market views
LOL! You're funny!
> I think there was and is a better way to handle pandemics. Better than simply shutting down the entire economy, locking people in their homes, putting millions out for work, shutting permanently thousands of business, destroying Families, etc all the while expecting fiat currency printing and debt to get us through.
There could have been, but many groups without foresight worked to fuck it up. You can thank them for your stay at home order, which is now necessary and reasonable:
> Government officials and executives at rival ventilator companies said they suspected that Covidien had acquired Newport to prevent it from building a cheaper product that would undermine Covidien’s profits from its existing ventilator business.... In 2014 ... Covidien executives told officials at the biomedical research agency that they wanted to get out of the contract, according to three former federal officials. The executives complained that it was not sufficiently profitable for the company.
Not to mention the inept response and denialism at the federal level that wasted the lead time the US could have used to prepare for this pandemic, and that have continued to the present.
In some ways is not about the direct costs of the union, it is about the indirect costs that a union brings. The work force becomes much more inflexible, and everything has to be negotiated at the group level. Most unions also bring in Seniority over merit which make its harder to replace long tenure employees that have become complacent, and often people use the Union as a shield from Disciplinary actions.
I known a few people that have went through the union fight, they thought everything would be better with the union. After the voted in the union their insurance was reduced, they did get a $1 / hr raise, but the union dues were about $0.90 per hour so.... Productivity and output at that factory dropped like a stone as people believe (and proved to be true) that the union would protect them from termination. with in 3 years the factory was closed.
I would say this is largely because business management and ownership are only interested in short term returns. They have an extreme amount of incentive to only return "now," with no thought as to the true cost. That is to say, they won't be around long enough for the externalities to materialize on the balance sheet so they don't care.
And companies rarely care about their employees or anything other than profit / bonuses they get from that profit.