[deogeo]

You can't blame unions if management won't grant them any board access. Nor can you see the future to know that this not-yet-established union will act the same as those you are vilifying. Perhaps if management didn't treat them as the enemy before they are even founded, it could build a more cooperative relationship. And you have yet to prove it was unions that caused the fall of $US_INDUSTRY - suppose it was management instead? The worker compensation in Germany didn't harm those companies - yet the US workers receiving half that are to blame?

And is there any scenario in which US companies wouldn't blame unions? As long as labor costs are above zero, any failure can somehow be pinned on unions, while management and shareholders avoid getting called 'leeches'.

[aurizon]

Most US unions WILL NOT ACCEPT board seats or enter into any amity based relationship. I think it comes from the past history. Germans also get comprehensive health and other benefits and they allow management to kick out drunks and addicts instead of treating them as ill people who need remediation by health clinics - who kick back $ to patients. Many places have moved to places where workers have the right to join or not. That is why western New York state is a wasteland. Uneducated employees from bad schools with untion teachers etc etc.