Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by marshallp 5157 days ago
Not really. Obama's foreign policy is better than the republicans and he genuinely cares about people so healthcare and welfare policies would be better, but his support base also consists of the unions, which I disagree with.
1 comments
gnaritas 5157 days ago
> but his support base also consists of the unions, which I disagree with

So it's OK for people to pool capital into companies and abuse workers, but it's not OK for workers to pool labor into unions to prevent it?

link
marshallp 5157 days ago
They're not the same. Unions are equivalent to crony capitalism (ie. regulations put in place to prevent competition), but most of what companies do is just free markets at work (which helps the consumer).
link
noahc 5157 days ago
How is a union a regulation? A union is a contractual obligation between workers that they will only work under certain conditions.
link
maratd 5157 days ago
> contractual obligation

In what country? In the US, most are mandated by law. All government jobs are union, regardless of the wishes of the worker.

Contracts are mutually consented to. If it's a union job, you have to be a part of the union. How is forcing workers to do something they do not want beneficial?

I'm all for unions where someone can join and leave freely without the threat of force or loss of work. Do we have that in the US? No.

link
noahc 5157 days ago
I'm not sure that is correct. If you look here[1], at the federal level it's about 31%. I also know of several teachers who are not in a Union.

As far as Union jobs go, it depends. There are Union jobs that require it and don't require it. However, this has nothing to do with the worker, but is actually a contractual obligation that the employer agreed to.

[1] http://voices.washingtonpost.com/federal-eye/2011/01/federal...

link
maratd 5157 days ago
> If you look here[1], at the federal level it's about 31%.

The devil is in the details. I wonder what that figure would look like if you excluded part-time workers like, say, the census workers who are collecting the very data you cite?

> However, this has nothing to do with the worker, but is actually a contractual obligation that the employer agreed to.

Nope. The last time an employer "agreed" to a union was probably a century ago. Federal law mandates how the process is handled and the employer doesn't agree to anything. It is forced on him.

Which is fine.

What isn't fine is that it is forced on the workers too, even if they don't want it. And every worker after them.

Not cool.

link