[jon-wood]

A union does whatever its members want the union to do. I'd argue that an environment where pay negotiation is a case of every person for themselves isn't actually good for anyone but if the majority of members disagree with me then the union won't get involved in pay. If they wanted to they could scope the union's responsibility purely to being notified of budget reductions/redundancies and given a seat at the table when working out how to handle them.

[bluGill]

A union works best when workers see they are all in it together. There are lots of unions, but it is much harder for them to be powerful when members see defecting as helping them. There is a reason unions are most common in labor areas where everyone is the same. You can't be a better bus driver than someone else (either you are bad enough to fire or you are as good as everyone else). The assembly line is as good as the worst/slowest person on it, so there is no advantage in being faster at putting bolts in, or whatever you do (unions can sometimes push safety standards, but also comes from others who have the union take credit)

[eru]

> The assembly line is as good as the worst/slowest person on it, so there is no advantage in being faster at putting bolts in, or whatever you do [...]

I guess you have no experience with assembly lines?

> (unions can sometimes push safety standards, but also comes from others who have the union take credit)

Btw, health and safety are what economists call a 'normal good'. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_good

> In economics, a normal good is a type of a good for which consumers increase their demand due to an increase in income, unlike inferior goods, for which the opposite is observed. When there is an increase in a person's income, for example due to a wage rise, a good for which the demand rises due to the wage increase, is referred as a normal good. Conversely, the demand for normal goods declines when the income decreases, for example due to a wage decrease or layoffs.

That explains fairly well, why rich countries all have more-or-less similar health and safety standards despite very different histories and especially histories of labour activism, and why poor countries fare worse in this respect--even if some of them have laws on the books that are just as strict.

[bluGill]

> I guess you have no experience with assembly lines?

I've spent a few weeks on one, so not zero, but not a lot.

Note that I simplified greatly a real assembly line, and there are lots of different lines with different configurations. Nearly everything is multiple lines. There are often buffers along the way so that you can get ahead of the line by a little (or if you need to use the restroom the line continues). Sometimes there are two people in a station with the understanding that if both are perfect they are 80-90% busy (or some such number), but if someone is slow the other can help up. Lines often go slower than possible because of safety. There are likely more issues, but there is a point where the line is waiting on the slow person.

With the above in mind, what am I missing?

[eru]

I'm not a great expert on assembly lines, to be honest. But two things:

- From theoretical considerations (less important): you can be better not just by improving average speed, but also by reducing variance (ie being more reliable) and improving quality.

- A practical consideration (more important): from what I recall, even people on assembly lines are often paid piece rates. Ie they are paid more or less proportional to their output. Assuming companies aren't complete idiots, we can assume that they have a good reason for rewarding individuals for higher output? That seems to be in at least mild contradiction to "The assembly line is as good as the worst/slowest person on it, [...]"

[eru]

> A union does whatever its members want the union to do.

Just like a democracy does whatever its voters want it to do?..

Different people want different things.

> I'd argue that an environment where pay negotiation is a case of every person for themselves isn't actually good for anyone but if the majority of members disagree with me then the union won't get involved in pay.

Well, I feel for the minority that doesn't want the union to get involved in their affairs.