this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2023
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Sadly, with recent events, all I can think about with this is how Linus Sebastion would go on the WAN Show and say things like, "You don't need a union unless you have bad management, and I never want my employees to need a union."
The counter statement is that a union is insurance for when good management goes bad.
I mean, a union is simply a way for workers to organize independently from management. While it's useful for countering bad management and things like that, that's not its only purpose. And anyone saying that it is either doesn't know as much about unions as they think or is anti-union while trying not to say as much directly.
Yes of course. I was meaning in terms as a direct response to that pretty dumb statement from Linus.
It also gives a voice to everyone and establishes a single bargain. If you have 50 employees and you’re negotiating with each of them separately how sure are you that you’re really being fair to all of them and not having any biases impacting your treatments? How sure are you that they agree? If you agree with the union about compensation and conditions of that compensation you know it’s fairer. If every management action has a steward as a witness you know that someone else who knows the rules you agreed to will speak up if you break them. You know that you aren’t about to get hit with an accusation of misconduct behind closed doors unless the steward agrees you misbehaved.
And as you say there’s security against management changing. You get someone with a union job with a pension and it’s hard for them to willingly leave. It’s a level of security that you know you aren’t getting elsewhere even if you’d be promoted.
I do actually agree with his initial statement, which was “if my workers need a union to stay safe, I will consider it a personal failure.”
…absolutely agreed. His conclusion of that his workers shouldn’t need one though, is the problem. They should have one. However, if the union needs to step in because he’s being a dick, then he has failed indeed. Guess it was a good thing they had a union though, right? Oh wait…
Honestly it's seeming like he might have failed then.
We should have realized when he started dropping hard "R"s.....
My favorite counter is that unions aren't only used as protection against management. Unions democratize the workplace!
Surely shouldn't he not be afraid of his employees unionizing if he treats them well?
Hell if he treats them well and compensates them fairly a union might prove beneficial to him
If a "good boss" is being an actual good boss, the worst they should have to expect from the union is having the occasional friendly meeting with them to discuss any minor workplace concerns and contract negotiations.
The fact many "good bosses" immediately start sprewing hell and brimstone at the mention of a union hints maybe they ain't as good and benevolent as they claim to be.
I completely agree. A good boss would likely appreciate a union, because the kinds of minor concerns that might be raised at a meeting are the kinds of things that individuals wouldn't mention because it's not worth the stress to flag it - even under a good boss who you trust would take even minor concerns seriously, it still costs time and brain energy to raise a thing, and the union being the middle man between the boss and the worker can be a boon in terms of collating concerns.
Not least of all because one of the concerns may be about a thing that is genuinely too trivial to make a thing of, if it's only affecting one person. A union has the ability to go "hey, so this is only a small thing but a few people have mentioned it to us and we went around asking and it does seem quite widespread"
That's like saying "You don't need democracy unless you have a bad king, and I never want my subjects to need democracy."
See how stale that comment has become with the recent news?
I always found that funny. And then he was like, IF YOU THINK THE UNION IS A BLACK AND WHITE QUESTION YOU ARE AN IDIOT. :D :D.
He has a point.
The problem is that because of Capitalism, there is no such thing as good management.
Yes, all the stories coming out about LMG should have the workers thinking about unionizing, as a minimum.