[nekusar]

The problem with Unions is its just the labor. Its the people who do the work. They don't have the money or the political power.

The Bosses and Owners have the money, the property, the machines, and political connections.

And power/money builds more power/money. And because its a boss vs worker arrangement, the worker's power will invariably get whittled down year by year.

The real solution here isnt socialism or communism. Its Worker Cooperatives. This makes the worker = the boss. And the previous conflict between the 2 go away. And the workers can make better decisions with all the information.

For example, when a dictatorial company announces layoffs, it just happens. But losing people also loses knowledge of the company, which is bad long term. In those cases, a worker cooperative could explain the situation, and make a decision together to temporarily cut wages INSTEAD of laying people off.

[OkayPhysicist]

> And power/money builds more power/money. And because its a boss vs worker arrangement, the worker's power will invariably get whittled down year by year.

Unions used to solve this issue by occasionally dragging a boss out of their home and killing them in the street, or kneecapping scabs. To end such violence, we enshrined in law pretty strong protections for unions, so that they could fight in the courts rather than in the streets. A couple generations of prosperity later, business folk and their bought politicians who wouldn't know Chesterton's fence if it fell on them decided those protections were inconvenient. And so here we are.

[nekusar]

Reminding just how bloody Union history was is kind of a heretical thing to mention here.

The CEO class thinks their lives matter more than the masses. But talking about history or giving a nudge that violence did work certainly makes the CEO fellators come out en masse.

The reason why we're seeing firebombing, shooting, arson, etc is because the public feels they have absolutely no legal way for grievances. And with the NLRB at 2/5 and no quorum, and inequality so extreme, its true. So its illegal. And violence absolutely does work - just you cant ever admit it. Violence is how the USA got the NLRB, and a decent legal process for grievances.

I still look at unions and companies, and the real problem is still the unresolved split between the 2. And the only counter to massive resources and money is violence. And we're already seeing it. Only good solution is worker cooperatives. It the only path that solves the arbitrary dichotomy of owner/worker, democracy in the workplace, and allays feelings powerlesness leading to mass shows of violence.

[matchbok3]

What is the tradeoff when layoffs are harder to do?

Layoffs happen when bets don't pay off. If you want a world where people are guaranteed a job, look at Europe. Also, they don't innovate and have no interesting industries.

They go hand in hand. Companies need to be able to innovate. And yeah that means hiring and firing teams as they see fit.

The second part of your proposal always, always goes unsaid: companies will hire less under a scheme where layoffs are harder.

Cut wages? That sounds horrible and demoralizing. I guess you've never led a team before. Please explain how that company would remain competitive in the marketplace when their salaries are 20% lower than a competitor? They lose talent, fail as a business, and suddenly everyone is out of a job.

[jjk166]

> They go hand in hand. Companies need to be able to innovate. And yeah that means hiring and firing teams as they see fit.

Think about any job you ever worked at.

When layoffs happened, did the work ever get easier or done to a higher standard because of the layoff, or did the sudden loss of knowledge and manpower make your job harder?

When things were bad enough that layoffs were being talked about, who jumped ship, the low performers who don't really do anything or the high performers who can get a job anywhere?

When innovation happened, did it tend to come from the team that would be fired for screwing up, or the team that could confidently experiment and incorporate lessons from past trials.

The idea that weak labor protections is a key requirement for innovation doesn't stand up to the slightest scrutiny.

[matchbok3]

Um, yes? Layoffs have helped. Teams are faster, products ship more efficiently.

Sometimes (believe it or not!) companies over hire. Or they try a thing and it fails. Or you need to pivot. (called "innovation")

Why is this so hard to understand?

America is, indeed, an outlier in terms of innovation right now.

Honestly, do you think high performers are ever mad that people just coasting are let go? Do you think a team has great morale when 20% of the team aren't pulling their own weight?

Every layoff is different, so your generalizations don't make any sense. But they are, in fact, a necessary part of an innovative market. The alternative is a company paying people to do nothing productive because they can't fire them.

[jjk166]

> Why is this so hard to understand?

Because a functioning neocortex prevents it.

Over-hiring is inneficient. If not being able to easily lay people off prevents that issue, it's a good thing.

You're making an logical leap that trying a thing and it failing, or otherwise pivoting requires layoffs despite clear evidence to the contrary.

I can tell you for a fact high performers don't want to see their coworkers laid off, and layoffs destroy team morale more than anything else.

The generalizations make perfect sense because what makes something a layoff makes all the conditions I described true.

I can't imagine any intelligent person arguing in good faith that there is no middleground between freely laying people off on a whim and paying people to do nothing because they can not be fired.

[matchbok3]

Please avoid strawmans when using this forum. Also the personal attacks weaken your already weak argument, FYI.

Nobody said layoffs are happening on a whim. Companies obviously would like to avoid them when possible. No idea what your argument actually is. Layoffs cost a lot of money to do. They don't just "happen". I have done them - the company, and employees, in the long term, were better off. Guess what? People are resilient, they don't need coddled their entire lives.

Yeah, overhiring is inefficient. Guess what is even more inefficient? Keeping those people on the payroll forever. 10 dollars > 5 dollars. :)

Please use your "functioning neocortex" to understand that if a company is limited to fire people in 5 years, they are much, much less likely to hire anybody. Please talk to literally anybody in a hiring role.

Your ideal, I guess, is to have people sitting around in jobs doing nothing (or less busy than they could be) so they aren't building experience, learning, challenging themselves, etc all because company XYZ is legally bound to not fire them? So people's feelings aren't hurt? What a sad, low-ambition, pathetic worldview that is. Nobody wants to work in that environment, that's for sure.

I'm not going to respond any more to this chain because you clearly don't have team leadership experience or have built a company, so are not equipped to engage in this topic at full throttle. Maybe when you start your company you can guarantee the jobs for life! Let me know how that works out for you. :)

[jjk166]

Please avoid strawmans when using this forum. Also the personal attacks weaken your already weak argument, FYI.

[dh2022]

American Companies stopped innovating about 15 years ago (AI does not count as innovation ). The last innovation that happened in America was cloud computing. Since then innovation happened in China, Korea and Japan.

I personally am reverting to early 2000 tech, because today’s American tech is unusable.

The average American would be far better off with union protections than with corporate “innovation”

[matchbok3]

I have seen how unions ruin schools (everywhere), force subways to hire more operators than necessary (NYC), and keep bad people employed (police)

No thanks.

And AI isn't innovation? Take your head out of the sand bozo.

[dh2022]

Yeah, spinning up millions of VMs to guess the next word in a sentence is innovation. It is all yours, my friend.

[ardacinar]

You real solution is literally the workers controlling the means of production.

[nekusar]

There's a big difference between "All Workers" owning "All The Means Of Production" (Communism), and "Workers in a company" owning "Their Means of Production" (Worker cooperative). Your comment is attempting to smear and collapse the 2 very different structures as if they are the same thing. And they're not.

Communism is this weird monopoly/monopsony structure. Dont like what you do? Too bad, its the same owner you're working for.

Whereas with a worker cooperative, there could be 10's of thousands of them. You dont like one? You can go to a different one.