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Alright, split the fees! Now you need someone to count the days paid out, calculate how much each member has to pay, send payment requests, follow up, manage the account, ... A professional Union needs funds to do its work. Over time the benefits members get more than pay for the union dues. If there's a strike at least in Europe the union will also use the dues to cover the salary for the days striking. The imaginary alternative would be to have somebody do this for free in their evenings and on their weekends. Have you ever tried to manage even a class representative and budget for your kids' school or a little league or any other kind of long-term engagement? Already at that small scale things tend to break down quote easily and few stay involved more than a few years. How can you expect volunteer union reps to work 8h+/day, spend their nights writing legal briefs, researching, organising events, managing members and expenses, etc while being up against an army of professional lawyers? Unions brought the five day work week, end to child labour, 40/38 hour weeks, the right to breaks, vacations, medical leave, ... If you don't have those right now then that's likely because you are in a non-union workplace (and/or country). |
Absolutely true.
> Over time the benefits members get more than pay for the union dues.
That strikes me as an opinion that could use some supporting facts. It might be the case, but union fees are the same order of magnitude as many workers' savings rate. If the prospective member saved those fees over a lifetime, would they be better off?
> If there's a strike at least in Europe the union will also use the dues to cover the salary for the days striking.
That means that union members are buying insurance against there being a strike declared. Would they be better off to pay smaller dues and bear the risk themselves? If all possible strikes are union-wide, it seems like this insurance can only be a losing gamble for members, all the while creating a fat piggybank for union leaders to raid/drain.