I admit I just don't understand how unions are formed or how they work. Once I saw picketing (not sure if I'm using the term properly) outside of a grocery store. When I asked what their complaint was, I found out they didn't work there and I got confused.
What does "a majority of the workers" mean? Is that a majority in a particular establishment, or employees of a company (across many locations) or an industry?
And if they vote Yes, do they then choose what kind of union to be (Teamsters, etc.) and doesn't it get kind of complicated? What happens to the people that vote No?
It depends on the country you're in but, briefly put...
A group of workers come together. They form a collective known as a Trade Union.
They can say "pay us a better wage or we'll stop working for you". Or "stop managers from sexually harassing us or we won't do any overtime". They use collective bargaining to extract better value or conditions from their employer.
Some unions are tiny - they might just cover a single office. Others are huge - they might cover an entire industry. Because labour laws are complex it is sometimes better for people to be in a large union. There are unions which cover single companies and there are unions which cover industries. There are even "miscellaneous" unions.
Generally speaking, if a majority of workers vote to join a union then the company has to recognise that union (I'm glossing over the detail of what a majority means because different countries have different rules). Recognising a union means (again, depending on the law) that the company has to consult with the employees before making certain changes. It might also mean that the union gets to represent workers when negotiating pay.
In most countries, an individual can choose whether to join a union or not. If they don't join, they don't pay any union fees - but they also don't get the protection of the union's lawyers.
Some countries and industries allow for a "closed shop". That means you must be a member of a union in order to take a job. Normally, that means paying a monthly fee. Other industries are flexible - if you don't pay to become a member you can still do the job. You may even be able to take advantage of collective negotiation. But if you need legal advice, the union may not be able to help you. It's similar to insurance in that respect - you can't take out a policy after your house burns down.
Unions are democratically controlled and member run. They make choices based on what their membership votes for. Sometimes, the members may vote to go on strike e.g. "We will withdraw our labour until you fix this problem."
Some unions can engage in secondary action - in your example, let's say that the grocery store has been underpaying people. Union members might come and protest outside a store they don't work at in order to show support to those workers, to inform customers about the bad behaviour, and to let management know that their actions won't be tolerated.
Unions are necessary because your employer is richer, stronger, and has more lawyers than you do as an individual. In unity there is strength.
> When I asked what their complaint was, I found out they didn't work there and I got confused.
Do you ever go help out a friend who needs it? Same thing, but two unions.
> And if they vote Yes, do they then choose what kind of union to be (Teamsters, etc.) and doesn't it get kind of complicated?
A union is just an organization of people, like a company in many ways. The union forms with some basic governance rules, and the union decides to join up with some bigger organization if they want to.
> What happens to the people that vote No?
I believe it depends on the state's laws, but broad strokes either basically they're in the union anyway, or they can choose to be or not.
What happened in your first sentence was ruled impermissable in the USA due to Taft-Hartley in 1947 as I understand it, strikers can only picket where the company they are striking against does business. So you really need to be less vague.
There are three different things. Creating a new union where there was none before. Having a workplace's workforce represented by that union. An individual joining a union.
We can safely ignore the first of the three for your question (no one wants to talk about how the Teamsters union was formed) and the last one (a trucker fills out paperwork).
For the second part, some employees work with an existing union to fill out cards indicating they want to join and be represented by that existing union. Once enough workers (by percentage) have filled out such cards, a vote is held among the affected workforce. (For instance, just the janitorial staff may have to fill out cards and vote to unionize the janitorial staff, or an entire Starbucks may unionize). The government sets regulations on the vote and/or oversees it, but both the company and the union get to make their cases in the time before the vote. Then, majority wins. (The company can just agree and start working with the union without the vote)
Specific to your question about what a majority means, it certainly isn't by industry. I've heard of individual stores holding votes for Starbucks or Walmart, but also company wide votes for less retail oriented businesses. I'm not sure if that's because each location is a separate llc or because it can be by location.
Everyone, regardless of vote, can then join the union or not. Some states prevent unions from negotiating an "only union employees" clause in their contracts, others do not. Note that even if it's "only union employees", that just means all employees must join the union for the term of their employment, not that they have to be a member to get hired at all.
Unions are form of collusion/price fixing where employees attempt to gain a monopoly on labor and raise wages/rents above market rate. However, this form of antitrust is not illegal because corporations, were they people, would be psychopaths that actually behave even more badly. And, all things being equal, groups of people deserve wealth more than corporations do.
I think this is what the difference between “right to work” states and not is. In “right to work” states, unions cannot stop someone from working at an employer. In non-right to work states, unions have more power to determine that, but I don’t understand how exactly.
Personally I find it pretty hard to reason through this. On one hand, right to work seems utterly reasonable, how can a third party tell an employer and employee that they can’t conduct business to their mutual satisfaction? But at the same time, it’s clear that right to work will gut unions. So if you feel that employers have too much power over employees and unions are a good answer to that, but also think it’s absurd to allow a third party to block an employment contract, then it seems like there are no options left.
The small issue with reviving Joy Silk is that the Supreme Court is the one that abandoned it.
As such, the NLRB, despite what they may want, doesn't actually have the authority to revive it.
They are just hoping the facts in this case are egregious enough that a court lets it slide.
That may or may not happen - the NLRB traditionally does not have the greatest success in court, even in days where unions were much more supported in the US than they are now.
One outcome in fact is that the courts decide to gut the power of the NLRB
The only thing I have ever thought of that could provide balance without unions is making standardized work shifts and forbid full time work. That way to work full time you wouldn’t have have to have two part time jobs. That would give jobs to employees a similar level of fungibility as employees to employers and leaving or changing one of your two jobs wouldn’t be as challenging.
This new rule is simply a power grab for leftists. It will be cheered on by everyone too dimwitted to realize there are huge negative externalities to unions and minimum wage laws, which ironically affect the working class the most.
Labor has _always_ been a liability for rich amoral capitalists. Should one assume by you saying this in response to this story that labor should race to the bottom, becoming just as cheap and disposable as a machine? Sounds like a bad world to live in, and it also wouldn't even work.
I think it is fascinating how employers have the gall to call themselves "job creators" and talk about their contribution to society through employment while this is so obviously happening.
This is a hilarious comment. It's exactly the comment that was made in the 70s when workers had a larger share of national income and when average salaries could afford a house.
Indeed, soon thereafter in the late 70s we saw rounds of union busting, neoliberalism, Thatcherism and Regan and drastic cuts to taxes and employment security.
Inequality spiked, wages stagnated, many millionaires and billionaires produced and the growing frustration and malaise in the working classes generating the rise of nationalist and populist movements the world over.
It's becoming a bipartisan realization we went too far with both Republicans and Democrats calling for reshoring, investment in industry and yes, worker protection. The most minimal watered down corporate friendly worker protection. This is 10% of what any radical would wish for.
And already this comment. The reactionary spirit has been embedded deeply.
So the standard way that this works out is that an employee testifies that he was improving coerced to sign a card, and the company challenges the nlrb and the court reaffirms the sc decision. So this strikes me as political grandstanding at taxpayer expense; Congress needs to change the law and the nlrb doesn't have the authority to do it unilaterally
tldr: the election only happens after significant organizing and demonstrated worker interest in forming a union.
Currently it’s a two step process: get a threshold % of workers to indicate interest in unionizing, then hold an election over all workers to see if a majority want a union. The ruling makes it so that if the company interferes with the election, the NLRB deems that initial interest level sufficient for allowing a union to form and recognizing its authority to collectively bargain on behalf of all covered workers.
But that's not how English works. When you pull some words out of a sentence and exclude others, you often get another sentence with a different or nonsensical meaning.
It's "company must [ (1. voluntarily recognize union) or (2. hold election) ]". Choosing option 1 is voluntary because option 2, which you elided completely, exists and may be chosen instead. The "must", on the other hand, denotes the overarching mandate to select from the enumerated options.
The part that the ruling the article is about changes is after that, BTW. The penalty for interfering with (2. hold election) is no longer a redo of the election, but rather imposed recognition of the union and a mandate to bargain with it. The previous penalty wasn't much of one and thus provided no deterrent for companies.
The Vice journalist who wrote this has an ethical duty to disclose that she herself is unionized, and thus benefits from these contract liberty suppressing government actions in favor of unions.
> They forget to mention the corruption, the ties to organized crime, the sexism, racism, homophobia, and xenophobia
These are odd criticisms to bring up, because they apply just as well to companies and governments. It's not like unions should be rejected for failing to be an improvement in every possible dimension.
Rather than taking Stephen Dubner's word for it, who may not know how collective bargaining work, do you have a source for the claim that the newspaper union limited their members' salaries? Because I have not heard of unions that disallow members from negotiating better deals with employers.
> Unions have arguably been good for straight white native born men.
Where "arguably" means "it's trivial to claim but I have absolutely no supporting evidence."
[+] [-] chmod600|2 years ago|reply
What does "a majority of the workers" mean? Is that a majority in a particular establishment, or employees of a company (across many locations) or an industry?
And if they vote Yes, do they then choose what kind of union to be (Teamsters, etc.) and doesn't it get kind of complicated? What happens to the people that vote No?
[+] [-] edent|2 years ago|reply
A group of workers come together. They form a collective known as a Trade Union.
They can say "pay us a better wage or we'll stop working for you". Or "stop managers from sexually harassing us or we won't do any overtime". They use collective bargaining to extract better value or conditions from their employer.
Some unions are tiny - they might just cover a single office. Others are huge - they might cover an entire industry. Because labour laws are complex it is sometimes better for people to be in a large union. There are unions which cover single companies and there are unions which cover industries. There are even "miscellaneous" unions.
Generally speaking, if a majority of workers vote to join a union then the company has to recognise that union (I'm glossing over the detail of what a majority means because different countries have different rules). Recognising a union means (again, depending on the law) that the company has to consult with the employees before making certain changes. It might also mean that the union gets to represent workers when negotiating pay.
In most countries, an individual can choose whether to join a union or not. If they don't join, they don't pay any union fees - but they also don't get the protection of the union's lawyers.
Some countries and industries allow for a "closed shop". That means you must be a member of a union in order to take a job. Normally, that means paying a monthly fee. Other industries are flexible - if you don't pay to become a member you can still do the job. You may even be able to take advantage of collective negotiation. But if you need legal advice, the union may not be able to help you. It's similar to insurance in that respect - you can't take out a policy after your house burns down.
Unions are democratically controlled and member run. They make choices based on what their membership votes for. Sometimes, the members may vote to go on strike e.g. "We will withdraw our labour until you fix this problem."
Some unions can engage in secondary action - in your example, let's say that the grocery store has been underpaying people. Union members might come and protest outside a store they don't work at in order to show support to those workers, to inform customers about the bad behaviour, and to let management know that their actions won't be tolerated.
Unions are necessary because your employer is richer, stronger, and has more lawyers than you do as an individual. In unity there is strength.
[+] [-] kadoban|2 years ago|reply
Do you ever go help out a friend who needs it? Same thing, but two unions.
> And if they vote Yes, do they then choose what kind of union to be (Teamsters, etc.) and doesn't it get kind of complicated?
A union is just an organization of people, like a company in many ways. The union forms with some basic governance rules, and the union decides to join up with some bigger organization if they want to.
> What happens to the people that vote No?
I believe it depends on the state's laws, but broad strokes either basically they're in the union anyway, or they can choose to be or not.
[+] [-] stevenwoo|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] HWR_14|2 years ago|reply
We can safely ignore the first of the three for your question (no one wants to talk about how the Teamsters union was formed) and the last one (a trucker fills out paperwork).
For the second part, some employees work with an existing union to fill out cards indicating they want to join and be represented by that existing union. Once enough workers (by percentage) have filled out such cards, a vote is held among the affected workforce. (For instance, just the janitorial staff may have to fill out cards and vote to unionize the janitorial staff, or an entire Starbucks may unionize). The government sets regulations on the vote and/or oversees it, but both the company and the union get to make their cases in the time before the vote. Then, majority wins. (The company can just agree and start working with the union without the vote)
Specific to your question about what a majority means, it certainly isn't by industry. I've heard of individual stores holding votes for Starbucks or Walmart, but also company wide votes for less retail oriented businesses. I'm not sure if that's because each location is a separate llc or because it can be by location.
Everyone, regardless of vote, can then join the union or not. Some states prevent unions from negotiating an "only union employees" clause in their contracts, others do not. Note that even if it's "only union employees", that just means all employees must join the union for the term of their employment, not that they have to be a member to get hired at all.
[+] [-] 7e|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] creato|2 years ago|reply
I think this is what the difference between “right to work” states and not is. In “right to work” states, unions cannot stop someone from working at an employer. In non-right to work states, unions have more power to determine that, but I don’t understand how exactly.
Personally I find it pretty hard to reason through this. On one hand, right to work seems utterly reasonable, how can a third party tell an employer and employee that they can’t conduct business to their mutual satisfaction? But at the same time, it’s clear that right to work will gut unions. So if you feel that employers have too much power over employees and unions are a good answer to that, but also think it’s absurd to allow a third party to block an employment contract, then it seems like there are no options left.
[+] [-] DannyBee|2 years ago|reply
As such, the NLRB, despite what they may want, doesn't actually have the authority to revive it.
They are just hoping the facts in this case are egregious enough that a court lets it slide.
That may or may not happen - the NLRB traditionally does not have the greatest success in court, even in days where unions were much more supported in the US than they are now.
One outcome in fact is that the courts decide to gut the power of the NLRB
[+] [-] thebradbain|2 years ago|reply
https://news.gallup.com/poll/398303/approval-labor-unions-hi...
[+] [-] Pet_Ant|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rightbyte|2 years ago|reply
It would remove alot of the risk for the employee to not have all eggs in one basket.
[+] [-] ETH_start|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mplewis|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] workingdog|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MrBuddyCasino|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kadoban|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] randyrand|2 years ago|reply
Hiring should be avoided if you can get away with automation or slower growth.
[+] [-] UncleMeat|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] FreshStart|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xbpx|2 years ago|reply
And already this comment. The reactionary spirit has been embedded deeply.
[+] [-] colinwilyb|2 years ago|reply
Once people can be reliably replaced they will be.
One can only guess that cost, availability, or proficiency, of machines is still not matched by machines.
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] CraigRo|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mcpackieh|2 years ago|reply
Or does "automatically recognize the union" imply "if the workers vote for it"?
[+] [-] waitwhatwhoa|2 years ago|reply
Currently it’s a two step process: get a threshold % of workers to indicate interest in unionizing, then hold an election over all workers to see if a majority want a union. The ruling makes it so that if the company interferes with the election, the NLRB deems that initial interest level sufficient for allowing a union to form and recognizing its authority to collectively bargain on behalf of all covered workers.
[+] [-] superq|2 years ago|reply
It's not merely semantics to point out: if a someone must do something, then it's not voluntary anymore.
[+] [-] elgenie|2 years ago|reply
It's "company must [ (1. voluntarily recognize union) or (2. hold election) ]". Choosing option 1 is voluntary because option 2, which you elided completely, exists and may be chosen instead. The "must", on the other hand, denotes the overarching mandate to select from the enumerated options.
The part that the ruling the article is about changes is after that, BTW. The penalty for interfering with (2. hold election) is no longer a redo of the election, but rather imposed recognition of the union and a mandate to bargain with it. The previous penalty wasn't much of one and thus provided no deterrent for companies.
[+] [-] defrost|2 years ago|reply
Companies have the option to allow workers to hold an election to recognize or reject a union.
[+] [-] mlyle|2 years ago|reply
If you have the choice between:
* letting the union election go on unmolested, or
* recognizing the union without an election.
The latter would be voluntarily recognizing the union (instead of exercising your option to demand an election).
[+] [-] ETH_start|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wtfwhateven|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] baron816|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] KingMob|2 years ago|reply
These are odd criticisms to bring up, because they apply just as well to companies and governments. It's not like unions should be rejected for failing to be an improvement in every possible dimension.
[+] [-] bjourne|2 years ago|reply
> Unions have arguably been good for straight white native born men.
Where "arguably" means "it's trivial to claim but I have absolutely no supporting evidence."
[+] [-] pjmlp|2 years ago|reply
As if the 1920 bosses took over the collective opinion.
Thankfully in most European countries where they are active, they happen to apply across the industry, regardless of the specific profession.