[steve_adams_86]

That very first * is the first major point for unions.

Many unions protect part time workers, or protect workers from being excluded from a fair share of benefits based on their inputs.

The reason for this is that there’s no incentive to push hours down until no one gets benefits. Which is not uncommon, unfortunately. Many companies tout incredible benefits with a significant portion of their workforce having no entitlement to it because of arbitrary suppression of their shifts.

I don’t believe unions are universally perfect. When they’re well run and union members participate and have a voice, they can be quite amazing. My partner’s union makes my cosy software job seem like it’s missing something. Sure she pays huge dues, but she’s also given protections and benefits I couldn’t even dream of.

I net about 4x as much as her on paper, but if you figured in the cumulative value of her union agreement, it would be much more than her dues. Collective bargaining is no joke. She has life insurance that would cost me an arm and a leg, a great pension plan, incredible leave options, very generous extended health/vision/dental benefits... It’s a long list.

I could say my money is better but it’s nowhere near as secure and dependable, and although it looks so much better paper, I’d be spending a huge amount to get the same benefits privately.

I think she gets something like 6 weeks of leave per year, too. If I don’t work, I don’t get paid, period.

[maybelsyrup]

I joined my union somewhat by accident, and it's opened my eyes to a lot of what you're talking about. (My workplace is not usually the kind of place that's known to be unionized in the US, so when I showed up I was surprised to hear it was a thing. I did my due diligence and decided to join.)

I'm of an age and socioeconomic stratum where union membership is not only not really done - people don't even really know what unions do or how they work, and I was essentially just as ignorant.

> I could say my money is better but it’s nowhere near as secure and dependable, and although it looks so much better paper, I’d be spending a huge amount to get the same benefits privately.

The real epiphany moment for me came when I understood that my lifelong fixation on salary, into which I, as an upper-middle-class person, was socialized from a young age (along with everyone else I know), is a form of sleight of hand: in a society like ours, with a gutted social safety net and enormous inequality, no one tells you in middle school the point you're making here: a metric ton of that fancy six-figure salary is going to go to making up for the absence of benefits and services that could be provided in many cases much more efficiently and cheaply in a less reactionary developed country. And this effect gets worse as you age and have kids, of course.

So these days, after getting a tiny whiff of these dynamics in my somewhat modest (meaning not high-status) but fairly-compensated union gig, I find myself wondering, if given the choice between a $200k salary in Idaho or a $100k salary in, say, Sweden, which would I choose? And a second doesn't pass before I smell pickled herring and lingonberries.

> I don’t believe unions are universally perfect.

I don't either. I'm not blindly ideological about this, and like any human system, human beings can fuck up unions to the detriment of everyone else, too. But man, as someone low on the totem pole in my organization, it's nice to know that a group of competent people with (some) real power actually have my back.

[chordalkeyboard]

> no one tells you in middle school the point you're making here: a metric ton of that fancy six-figure salary is going to go to making up for the absence of benefits and services that could be provided in many cases much more efficiently and cheaply in a less reactionary developed country.

I disagree with the factual assertion and the framing here. The money that you make is not “intended to ma[ke] up for” benefits and services that could be provided in some hypothetical. The money that you’re saving is to provide for yourself in retirement because you’re the one who doesn’t want to die of exposure or become a burden on someone else when you stop working.

[maybelsyrup]

Read the post, fella: I never said "intended". I never said anything about saving money, either.

[chordalkeyboard]

I guess I misunderstood, how do you think a less reactionary country would replicate the standard of living that is obtained with a six figure salary?

[Meph504]

Are you in the U.S.?

You say you don't get paid leave as a software developer, are you a contractor?

[steve_adams_86]

I’m in Canada, but I work an hourly contract with no explicit vacation time. By law I need to be paid some minimum amount to cover the bare minimum of vacation time (4% of my wage, I think) but ultimately if I’m on vacation, I’m not going to get a pay cheque.

[Meph504]

maybe there is a language thing here buy you said you are on an hourly contract?

Are you employed by this company as a full time employee, or are you a contractor?

In the U.S. at least, this is a night and day difference so I guess that is why I am trying to get clarification on that.

[steve_adams_86]

I’m an employee, but my hours aren’t set. I can work no hours or forty in a week. I was a contractor before, but this arrangement made it easier to add other forms of compensation besides wages to our agreement. It’s an atypical arrangement.

[Meph504]

I don't think given the info you've presented here, you can fairly make a comparison of union vs non.

[steve_adams_86]

Given my current position, I suppose not - but I’ve been in a union and my partner has never not been in a union. I have other family members in unions. It’s a topic I’m close to and very interested in. I see no reason I can’t weigh in on it.

[refurb]

The part-time/full-time issue is very union dependent. I was a member of the Teamster's union many moons ago and got zero benefits as a part-time worker.

[steve_adams_86]

You’re right, not all unions protect part-timers. I’ve known of a few that do, but probably just never heard of many that don’t.

[chordalkeyboard]

> Many unions protect part time workers, or protect workers from being excluded from a fair share of benefits based on their inputs.

I can understand why this would be highly preferable for part time workers. Can you understand how a company might be able to afford to provide a $30,000/yr benefits package to workers who work 40 hours a week, but not be able to afford to provide a $30,000/yr benefits package to workers who work 20 hours a week? Can you see how increasing the cost of part time employment might make a lot of those part time jobs go away?

> The reason for this is that there’s no incentive to push hours down until no one gets benefits. Which is not uncommon, unfortunately. Many companies tout incredible benefits with a significant portion of their workforce having no entitlement to it because of arbitrary suppression of their shifts.

I understand that it seems unfair for a company to replace one 40 hour worker with two 20 hour workers. Especially when the 40 hour worker has benefits and the 20 hour workers do not. The issue here is that requiring an employer to provide benefits for full time employees creates the situation where an employer may not be able to afford benefits for their full time employees. So in order to keep the business going, they do what they can. Making it more expensive for them to do this is just going to result in fewer businesses anyway.

> Collective bargaining is no joke.

Collective bargaining flattens worker salaries, the lower performing workers make more than they should and the higher performing workers make less. Its not a given that everyone wants this, or should want it. People should be able to negotiate as individuals.

> She has life insurance that would cost me an arm and a leg, a great pension plan, incredible leave options, very generous extended health/vision/dental benefits... It’s a long list.

Not everyone wants all these things. More importantly, not everyone wants to pay for all of them. Some people could use the money elsewhere (perhaps they are covered under a spouse).

> I could say my money is better but it’s nowhere near as secure and dependable, and although it looks so much better paper, I’d be spending a huge amount to get the same benefits privately.

I like a world where both of these things are available for people who choose them.

> I think she gets something like 6 weeks of leave per year, too. If I don’t work, I don’t get paid, period.

I personally would prefer to get paid more and manage my own finances and vacations. You don’t get interest on vacation days (although they do include health insurance).

[steve_adams_86]

These are all valid points that are worth investigating.

As far as negotiating as an individual goes, you’re right - a union removes that option. It does however empower those who can’t or won’t or otherwise struggle to negotiate for themselves, for a multitude of valid reasons. To me that’s worth something. I’ve been fortunate enough to more or less glide through my career and rarely need to negotiate anything in order to live comfortably. This is exceedingly rare though. I wouldn’t want to say no to a union because I’ve never needed or wanted one for myself. If people collectively desire it, I think it’s a net positive.

As far as getting paid more and managing your own benefits and vacation, I hear that. I’ve felt the same as times. However, the older I get the more I think things like a pension and extended health sound pretty nice. It’s like having an easy-bake oven that pumps out legitimate desserts. We’re not all endowed with the chops to make that happen, so having this stuff on autopilot is a significant windfall eventually.

As far as flattening wages goes, I’m not so sure. Everywhere my partner has worked with a union, her wages have steadily increased due to the union bargaining for her. Sometimes the increases are substantial. The wages across the current organization certainly aren’t flat either.

You’re right that not everyone wants these things, too. I’m not sure you can get around that particular problem.

Ultimately I’d just say unions aren’t inherently bad and if you don’t like them, work somewhere that doesn’t have one. Most places don’t, so it’s not a limiting factor that should impose personal risk.

[slumpt_]

You should actually spend time reading up on unions. Present and historically.