[cogman10]

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.

[AnthonyMouse]

> It goes both ways.

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.

[overfeed]

> 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.

[AnthonyMouse]

> 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.

Except that there isn't only one way, there are two. The first is that you keep playing with the defector and start defecting yourself, hoping that they unilaterally start cooperating. The second is that you quit playing with the defector and go play with someone else. And which one of those is likely to work out better for you?

[overfeed]

Now apply your 2 options to American workers and see which one's feasible.

[AnthonyMouse]

How is it infeasible to quit working for someone and go work for someone else?

[overfeed]

When employers act like cartels and connive to not compete on salary, directly[1] or indirectly[2]

1. E.g. Steve Job's email to Eric Schmidt

2. E.g. the Work Number as a specific instance

[cogman10]

> 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.

[AnthonyMouse]

> 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.

It's possible that those two sentences are related.

> But also we need to start talking about what it means for a business to be productive.

So to some extent the premise needs to be challenged. If e.g. Kmart fails, but there are a zillion others to take its place for workers and customers, then its failure is primarily of impact to its shareholders and it's their fault for hiring shortsighted fools to run it. The people who used to work there can just work somewhere else.

If e.g. GE fails, and it was the primary company sustaining some industry in the US, that doesn't work because now nobody is doing that here anymore. But the problem then isn't that they failed, it's that they didn't have enough domestic competitors to begin with. Mismanaged companies are supposed to fail, what they're not supposed to do is take the domestic industry with them.

> 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.

That's literally the same thing. "New employees" and "competitors" are synonyms.

> The acid test for regulatory capture is "is there an oligopoly here" and the answer for trade work is a clear "no".

So zoning rules can't be regulatory capture for the housing market, even if they're unambiguously limiting supply and raising costs, because there is no oligopoly?

> 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.

It works for truck drivers and lawyers and real estate brokers etc.

Meanwhile the assumption is that the apprenticeship requirement would have higher standards, but it doesn't. It's even less effective. All it is in most places is a time requirement. If your overseer has you doing nothing but wrote physical labor of a uniform type that only represents 1% of what you would see if you went out on your own, you've still put in your hours and get your license. And it's far more susceptible to corruption because then people sign off on hours not actually performed in cases of nepotism etc.

> There's a reason places without unions also use the apprenticeship method of licensing (doctors for example).

That's just another example of trade organizations capturing the regulators. The fact that they use the AMA instead of a union doesn't change the nature of it.

> 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.

Sure it can. Prohibit vertical integration. Make all the fabs contract fabs (most of the state of the art ones already are) and then separate the facilities from the production equipment. Then TSMC or Samsung or Micron don't fabricate chips, their business is essentially building new fabs for independent third parties. At which point they stop worrying about "overcapacity" because their profit only comes from building more fabs. Then someone like Apple or AMD goes and contracts with the independent fabs to produce their designs, only now each facility is a separate company in competition with the others.

Meanwhile the companies that produce the equipment would then be smaller (because less vertical integration) which lowers the capital requirements to enter into that market. And if you lower it enough then they all end up in cross-licensing agreements and the only requirement to enter is to develop ~1/Nth of the next generation's improvements where N is the number of existing companies, so that they each want to license yours as much as you do theirs.

[FrustratedMonky]

"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.