> somewhere on the spectrum between "egalitarian, flat organization Utopia" and "Slavery"
I didn't say that collective ruin was a result of unionism, only that that you appeared to be trying illustrate a point by outlining a broad spectrum of outcomes, but IMO you forgot one common outcome of forced collectivization. Where it belongs on that spectrum can be debated but that it's a common outcome cannot be.
I provided a range of leader:worker income/power ratios from 1:0 to 1:1 with no commentary whatsoever on outcomes, because my entire point is that the outcome doesn't matter: at some threshold value and below, the existence of the org itself is immoral. We don't have to agree on where that point is, but its existence shouldn't be up for debate, IMO.
I hope we can all agree that a slave plantation should not exist in 2025, regardless of whether it's making billions in quarterly profit, or hovering above insolvency. Paying workers at this plantation $0.01 per hour isn't okay, either, but if you keep adding $0.01/hr N times (and incrementally improve working conditions), you'll eventually arrive at the threshold I was describing.
> They're saying you forgot about the range 1:1 to 0:1.
Color me intrigued! Tell me more about these slave-CEOs serving at the beck and call of empowered workers. I didn't merely forget about the 1:1 to 0:1 range, it's an Outside-Context scenario. I confess I have never encountered - or thought about - organizations with inverted hierarchies. Do you have any specific example of such a thing?
When unions gain too much power and the company can no longer respond effectively to market forces (particularly with hiring/firing), leading to the collective ruin they were talking about.
Who got convicted over Sears, KMart, and Toy's R Us? How about the slap on the wrist for the Sacklers for supercharging to opioid epidemic? What happened the the CEOs of GE from Jack Welsh on who steered the company on into the ground primarily through layoffs and cut-throat business management?
There's plenty of examples of business owners driving a company into the ground to personally enrich themselves.
Not all of those were instances of the management purposely screwing people, but let's suppose some of them were. Should the conclusion then be that we should find ways to prevent that from happening again, or should it be that two wrongs make a right?
Not all businesses fail because of unions, but let's suppose some of them did. Should the conclusion then be that we should find ways to prevent that from happening again, or should it be that two wrongs make a right?
It goes both ways. There are plenty of nations with strong unions throughout. In the US some work is primarily done by unions (such as trade work).
The fact that someone can pull up an example where a union caused a business to go under doesn't make me think "we should eliminate unions". It doesn't even make me think "We should limit union negotiation powers" primarily because unions rights have been curtailed since the Reagan era.
If you wanted to convince me to get rid of unions, you'd do it by setting up robust workers rights nationally which unions provide.
That's the point. We should prevent management from destroying productive companies and prevent unions from doing it, instead of saying "what about those other guys" to justify the bad behavior of either of them.
> In the US some work is primarily done by unions (such as trade work).
You're referring to some of the least efficient industries in the US with high levels of regulatory capture. The fact that there is no test-based path to occupational licensing in many trades, only multi-year "apprenticeship" (i.e. permission from an incumbent), is one of the big reasons construction costs so much, people can't afford housing and government construction projects consistently blow the budget.
> If you wanted to convince me to get rid of unions, you'd do it by setting up robust workers rights nationally which unions provide.
Most "worker protections" are nothing better than highly inefficient alternatives to unemployment insurance. If you have competitive markets then you don't need regulatory protections because companies are subject to competitive pressure. If you don't have competitive markets then you're unconditionally screwed and the first thing you need is to fix that.
> We should prevent management from destroying productive companies and prevent unions from doing it, instead of saying "what about those other guys" to justify the bad behavior of either of them.
Im not justifying anyone, I'm suggesting a pragmatic, imperfect solution to a clear power imbalance. There's only one way to treat a counterpart who repeatedly defects on the iterated prisoners dilemma, and its not waiting for them to unilaterally start cooperating.
> We should prevent management from destroying productive companies and prevent unions from doing it
I'll agree to that. But I'd point out that it's far more the case that management destroys a business, not a union. The US has fairly weak union protections and few unions at the moment. The place where change needs to happen is in management. But also we need to start talking about what it means for a business to be productive.
> You're referring to some of the least efficient
Least efficient how? Because it's expensive?
> high levels of regulatory capture.
No. Regulatory capture is when a business keeps out competitors through hard to fulfill regulations. It's not when the standard for employees is high making it hard for new employees to enter the market. The acid test for regulatory capture is "is there an oligopoly here" and the answer for trade work is a clear "no". There's a billion different companies in any given city that do trade work.
> The fact that there is no test-based path to occupational licensing in many trades, only multi-year "apprenticeship"
For very good reason. Tradework done poorly gets people killed. Taking a one time test is a very bad way to ensure that quality is high. There's a reason places without unions also use the apprenticeship method of licensing (doctors for example).
> If you have competitive markets then you don't need regulatory protections because companies are subject to competitive pressure.
That's wishful thinking assuming that a competitive market can't also be exclusive, hard to enter, or oversaturated. There are things that naturally can't be competitive, usually involving high levels of skill or knowledge. For example, microchip fabrication. It's simply too expensive to buy the equipment to make a computer chip and that can't be solved by anti-trust enforcement.
"he fact that someone can pull up an example where a union caused a business to go under doesn't make me think "we should eliminate unions""
It seems here it does.
For years every time a company fails that also happened to have a union, the union gets blamed. Never mind the management decision.
It's just a common flame bait for some groups to hate unions. That group doesn't actually reasonably think out these things.
It's like 'woke', the word 'union' is a key word that some groups use to label others for hate. They aren't sitting back and making an economic argument.
The longest time an enron CEO spent behind bars was 12 years. Richard DeLisi was sentenced to 90 years for a nonviolent marijuana charge and spent over 30 behind bars before being pardoned. Kind of puts "serious" prison terms in perspective.
I am pointing out that some commenters here are grading Unions and CEOs on different curves on the issue of negative outcomes, and the alleged union bogeyman is a frequent occurrence at ununionized organizations.
> Multiple people were convicted over the Enron scandal, including some serious prison terms.
That is great, and should have been a deterrent for more ruinous shenanigans. Which CEOs got arrested for the subprime mortgage heists that triggered the 2008 GFC? The GFC made Enron look like jaywalking, I'm sure dozens of executive received life sentences and entire banks shuttered for their malfeasance and lack of internal controls. Right?
I didn't say that collective ruin was a result of unionism, only that that you appeared to be trying illustrate a point by outlining a broad spectrum of outcomes, but IMO you forgot one common outcome of forced collectivization. Where it belongs on that spectrum can be debated but that it's a common outcome cannot be.