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Author Topic: Walmart Strike
Samprimary
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quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
It's sort of funny to see you appropriating the "free association" term to argue against RTW, Sam.

It's not funny! It's direly appropriate. RTW laws expressly prohibit forms of free association. What unions would be allowed to do in the absence of RTW laws are not issues of free association.
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Blayne Bradley
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quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
He probably means, for the same reason that your vote doesn't make a difference. And I'd say he's probably correct. If one person's purchases made a difference in the big scheme of things, I'd feel a very strong obligation to become a vegetarian.

Something like that, it has slightly more to do with that consumer habits are cultural and ethics will never swing a larger majority of them except in a few edge cases (like say if Walmart suddenly supported terrorism).

For example Walmart in Japan doesn't do very well, this has nothing to do with its history or ethics but everything to do with the baffling Japanese propensity towards preferring expensive trendy goods because they are trendy expensive crap over the cheaper alternative; Germany as the oldest social democratic european welfare state has abysmal situation for Walmart who a) find out that there's already a dedicated store for most of what they sell and b) already mom&pop stores that sell cheap stuff and c) that ze Germans don't take too kindly to Walmart's anti union rhetoric. (Chinese Walmart apparently sells expensive stuff, irony?)

Its not that I believe one person doesn't make a difference, only that whatever difference they make is entirely offset by the millions of others who likely do not have better options than Walmart. Its better to enact social change through unions who are better positioned to remain informed and react to exploitation than the average person.

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Darth_Mauve
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Libertarian view on Right To Work laws.

Which truly defines freedom, the laws making it illegal to force employees to join a union in order to hold a specific job, or a lack of those laws.

At first glance it would be simple. The employee who has the choice between joining a union or not joining a union to hold a specific job has more freedom.

Yet it is a basic Libertarian value that people have the right to limit their own freedoms. You will not be forced to choose the most freedom filled option. So a restaurant should have the choice of serving all people, or limiting there serving options to those of any specific group--even limiting it to specific racial groups if they desire. The freedom of the patron to eat where ever they wish is less important than the freedom of the server to serve only those people they wish.

So it is that a Libertarian can and must contractually limit their freedoms in every day business agreements. It would be nice to work only the hours one feels like it, but when you sign an employment contract you agree to work the hours the employer wishes you to.

Are unions any less made up of a group of free individuals as businesses are? Of course not. So if a union is negotiating a contract with a business it is as free to set limits and requirements, including the requirement that all employees hired by that business must join the union. It could just as easily not put in that requirement. Obviously this would be against the union's interests.

So "Right To Work" laws are not Libertarian.

Try it this way, I feel that I should be free to play golf at any golf course I wish. The neighboring country club only allows members and guests to use their grounds. Would a law requiring all golf courses be open to the general public be acceptable? Its not outlawing Country Clubs. I mean, if what the Country Club offers, besides the golf, is important to you, then you would continue to pay the $30,000 a year membership fees.

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Rakeesh
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quote:
Its not that I believe one person doesn't make a difference, only that whatever difference they make is entirely offset by the millions of others who likely do not have better options than Walmart. Its better to enact social change through unions who are better positioned to remain informed and react to exploitation than the average person.
Well since it's an either/or situation...
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Blayne Bradley
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As for me, since I am making an effort to lose weight going the extra minute is something I'll probably do, but its not really relevant as it has no bearing on the argument.
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Geraine
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quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
quote:
Originally posted by scholarette:
My understanding was that much of what Walmart is accused of doing is a violation of the law and in some cases, people have been able to sue Walmart for lost wages and stuff over the retaliations. However, ability to do that is limited to people who don't live paycheck to paycheck.

Some rich, connected guy should get a job at Walmart so as to secretly film how bad it is for employees and then sue the crap out of them.

Sam, if you're listening, you should totally do this.

If Wal-Mart were doing anything illegal, they would have already been sued. It doesn't matter how much money a company has, they have to follow State and Federal employment law.

I've seen some of the complaints of workers, and the answer to their problems really comes down to contacting their representatives in Congress and asking for them to push better labor laws. That's about it.

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Blayne Bradley
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But wouldn't that result in Big Gov't Geraine? Wouldn't it be preferable to rely on the laissez faire free market solution which is the entirely natural establishment of unions?

And Walmart *has* been sued, but the legal system makes it difficult to bring class action law suits successfully forward.

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Lyrhawn
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quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
Heh.

I certainly don't think that RTW states are ideal, no. You're right, to an extent (despite what Tom said).

But even private sector unions also get special legal protections that don't make much sense to me. For example: Why should it be illegal to fire striking workers?

I don't have any problem at all with the basic concept of unions, though. Free people associating to try and increase their bargaining power is fine.

The only real negotiating tool that workers have to offer is their labor. If they can't use their labor as a wedge in negotiations, they there's really nothing to negotiate, and there's no point in having a union. Don't like the union? Fire everyone who is a part of it. They want to strike to put some backbone in their demands? Fire them. They mouth off in the media? Fire them.

Labor is all they have, and the strike is the only tool they really have to leverage their only thing of value in negotiations. Without it, it'd still be 1935 as far as labor standards and pay are concerned.

Also, it's amusing to me to see the NLRA described in such harsh terms. I've spent a lot of time researching subsequent labor laws in the 40s and 50s (and somewhat in the 70s) that gutted the NLRA in favor of big business. Corporations won't be happy until they get labor law back to where it was in the 1880s. In other words, they won't be happy until all labor laws are repealed.

Unions are not awesome 100% of the time, but without them, workers would be in a great deal larger world of hurt.

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Lyrhawn
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quote:
Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
quote:
Originally posted by scholarette:
My understanding was that much of what Walmart is accused of doing is a violation of the law and in some cases, people have been able to sue Walmart for lost wages and stuff over the retaliations. However, ability to do that is limited to people who don't live paycheck to paycheck.

Some rich, connected guy should get a job at Walmart so as to secretly film how bad it is for employees and then sue the crap out of them.

Sam, if you're listening, you should totally do this.

If Wal-Mart were doing anything illegal, they would have already been sued. It doesn't matter how much money a company has, they have to follow State and Federal employment law.

I've seen some of the complaints of workers, and the answer to their problems really comes down to contacting their representatives in Congress and asking for them to push better labor laws. That's about it.

Many unfair labor practices complaints have to be made first to the NLRB before they can be referred to the court system for compensation, damages, criminality, etc. At least, those at the federal level, which is the only protection some workers have in states with very low levels of protection at the state level.

The NLRB, in addition to being woefully understaffed and overworked with its caseload, was also functionally inactive for a couple years since Senate Republicans refused to confirm any of Obama's nominees. Work began again earlier this year after Obama filled three seats with recess appointments, over the loud objections of the GOP. Those appointments end soon however, and it seems just as unlikely that the GOP will ratify them or any one else Obama puts forward. Essentially, this renders the Board powerless, which renders a great deal of federal worker protections moot as well.

In practice, many workers have worked around this by seeking protections under different aspects of labor law, but that has led in many cases to a seriously convoluted mess, and a backlog of cases that could take years to fix.

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Rakeesh
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Furthermore, by that reasoning, nothing illegal is going on anywhere, because everyone has to follow state, local, and federal law. They would be sued if they didn't!
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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
The only real negotiating tool that workers have to offer is their labor. If they can't use their labor as a wedge in negotiations, they there's really nothing to negotiate, and there's no point in having a union. Don't like the union? Fire everyone who is a part of it. They want to strike to put some backbone in their demands? Fire them. They mouth off in the media? Fire them.

I may be misunderstanding you, so, to clarify: This is meant to be an argument for why you shouldn't be allowed to fire striking workers, right? If so, I have two thoughts.

One: They can still use their labor as a negotiating tool, it's just that the strength of that tool will actually be tied to the value of their labor. So, a union of striking doctors or computer programmers would be harder and more costly to replace than a union of striking plumbers, which would be harder and more costly to replace than a union of striking retail cashiers.

I think this is a good thing, because I don't see the point in artificially inflating the value of low-skill/interchangeable jobs. If the union members are sufficiently costly to replace, firing will be a less desirable option than simply giving in to their demands.

Two: I think that keeping the firing option on the table is the only way to create win/win scenarios where everyone gets the best possible outcome that they can achieve without exerting force on someone else.

Here's a simple concrete example of what I mean: Joe and his comrades are striking because he thinks his current job at X Industries pays too little. But X Industries doesn't want to pay any higher wages for the job Joe and his fellows are doing. They also think they can hire other people to do the job for the price they want to pay, to the level of competence that they need.

So, they fire Joe and the striking workers. They hire Fred and some other folks who were unemployed and are happy to make the wages that Joe and his other union members were not happy with.

So Fred and his peers get paid a wage they're happy with, X Industries pays a wage they're willing to pay, and Joe doesn't have to work at a job that pays him less than he is worth. Since he's higher value than that, he can now go on to find a job that pays him properly for his value. Or, failing that, he can re-evaluate how much he thinks his labor is worth, and change his preferences.

I know it might seem weird to that I would call a scenario in which someone loses their job "win/win," but it's predicated on the idea that one should have rational expectations, and using force to make other people give you what you want is wrong.

It's fundamentally the same way that it would be irrational for me to want Bill Gates to give me a billion dollars... just writ much, much smaller, and couched in sufficiently mild language that it seems more "reasonable."

But just saying "I want someone else to give me X thing, and if they don't, I lose," is an irrational position. You need to build your own life and take responsibility for it. If you want something you can't get on your own, you need to allow for the possibility that you will fail to find anyone to help you.

In light of that, by striking, Joe was creating two possible outcomes for himself, with either outcome preferable to his current situation. Those outcomes were: get better conditions at this job, or find a new job.

He might have preferred the former the most, but we don't always get our top preference, especially when that relies on someone else.

If he actually had only one preference, "Get better conditions at this job," then his preference wasn't qualitatively different than "Get Bill Gates to give me all his money." Fundamentally, in both cases, one is putting all of their hope in their ability to persuade someone else to do what they want. If they fail, then the only two options remaining become misery and force. That's a terrible way to live.

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Destineer
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I largely agree with your position and reasons here, Dan, other things being equal (which they aren't at present). I would have no problem weakening the power of "labor" if our system had a healthier safety net in place and making use of the safety net wasn't so badly stigmatized.

But I find this idea puzzling:

quote:
I know it might seem weird to that I would call a scenario in which someone loses their job "win/win," but it's predicated on the idea that one should have rational expectations, and using force to make other people give you what you want is wrong.

It's fundamentally the same way that it would be irrational for me to want Bill Gates to give me a billion dollars... just writ much, much smaller, and couched in sufficiently mild language that it seems more "reasonable."

What do you mean by "want"? The way I normally understand that term is synonymous with "desire," and I normally think that I desire X if
I am happier if X happens than I am if X doesn't happen.

By that definition, I absolutely do want Gates to give me $1 billion. You seem to have another definition of wanting in mind. What is it?

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Rakeesh
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quote:
I know it might seem weird to that I would call a scenario in which someone loses their job "win/win," but it's predicated on the idea that one should have rational expectations, and using force to make other people give you what you want is wrong.
But...this use of 'force' (it's not, neither when an employer refuses to grant a raise or when a union threatens to strike) is precisely what you're interested in defending, when the employer is doing it: the employer doesn't wish to raise wages, or doesn't wish to maintain a worker who after decades costs more than a junior worker, and so fires them-an attempt to gain more money for himself, by precisely the same means as the union attempts to use-economic pressure, applied in a different way.

All of this of course is before we even touch on less straightforward but sometimes more important matters, such as workplace conditions, safety, etc.

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Geraine
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quote:
Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
quote:
Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
quote:
Originally posted by scholarette:
My understanding was that much of what Walmart is accused of doing is a violation of the law and in some cases, people have been able to sue Walmart for lost wages and stuff over the retaliations. However, ability to do that is limited to people who don't live paycheck to paycheck.

Some rich, connected guy should get a job at Walmart so as to secretly film how bad it is for employees and then sue the crap out of them.

Sam, if you're listening, you should totally do this.

If Wal-Mart were doing anything illegal, they would have already been sued. It doesn't matter how much money a company has, they have to follow State and Federal employment law.

I've seen some of the complaints of workers, and the answer to their problems really comes down to contacting their representatives in Congress and asking for them to push better labor laws. That's about it.

Many unfair labor practices complaints have to be made first to the NLRB before they can be referred to the court system for compensation, damages, criminality, etc. At least, those at the federal level, which is the only protection some workers have in states with very low levels of protection at the state level.

The NLRB, in addition to being woefully understaffed and overworked with its caseload, was also functionally inactive for a couple years since Senate Republicans refused to confirm any of Obama's nominees. Work began again earlier this year after Obama filled three seats with recess appointments, over the loud objections of the GOP. Those appointments end soon however, and it seems just as unlikely that the GOP will ratify them or any one else Obama puts forward. Essentially, this renders the Board powerless, which renders a great deal of federal worker protections moot as well.

In practice, many workers have worked around this by seeking protections under different aspects of labor law, but that has led in many cases to a seriously convoluted mess, and a backlog of cases that could take years to fix.

What specific negative labor practices would you accuse Wal-Mart of committing on a regular basis? Paying minimum wage? Putting too many people on part time status? Predatory pricing?

I'm curious.

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Destineer
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And a lot of these mechanisms are in place because things like changing careers and moving to another town are typically really hard for people. If we were better at these things, I would have an easier time seeing things in a way more like Dan does.

Although I think bringing up the "use of force" in these cases is almost always unhelpful. The things other people do create incentives or disincentives for us to act in certain ways, and when these incentives militate strongly against doing something we would otherwise want to do, we feel like we are "forced" not to do it. There's nothing more to it than that. Thus when libertarian types suggest that true freedom is freedom from aggression, the only grain of truth to that statement lies in the fact that we don't want our actions to have bad consequences, and sometimes other people can arrange for our actions to have very bad consequences.

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Lyrhawn
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quote:
Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:
Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
quote:
Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
quote:
Originally posted by scholarette:
My understanding was that much of what Walmart is accused of doing is a violation of the law and in some cases, people have been able to sue Walmart for lost wages and stuff over the retaliations. However, ability to do that is limited to people who don't live paycheck to paycheck.

Some rich, connected guy should get a job at Walmart so as to secretly film how bad it is for employees and then sue the crap out of them.

Sam, if you're listening, you should totally do this.

If Wal-Mart were doing anything illegal, they would have already been sued. It doesn't matter how much money a company has, they have to follow State and Federal employment law.

I've seen some of the complaints of workers, and the answer to their problems really comes down to contacting their representatives in Congress and asking for them to push better labor laws. That's about it.

Many unfair labor practices complaints have to be made first to the NLRB before they can be referred to the court system for compensation, damages, criminality, etc. At least, those at the federal level, which is the only protection some workers have in states with very low levels of protection at the state level.

The NLRB, in addition to being woefully understaffed and overworked with its caseload, was also functionally inactive for a couple years since Senate Republicans refused to confirm any of Obama's nominees. Work began again earlier this year after Obama filled three seats with recess appointments, over the loud objections of the GOP. Those appointments end soon however, and it seems just as unlikely that the GOP will ratify them or any one else Obama puts forward. Essentially, this renders the Board powerless, which renders a great deal of federal worker protections moot as well.

In practice, many workers have worked around this by seeking protections under different aspects of labor law, but that has led in many cases to a seriously convoluted mess, and a backlog of cases that could take years to fix.

What specific negative labor practices would you accuse Wal-Mart of committing on a regular basis? Paying minimum wage? Putting too many people on part time status? Predatory pricing?

I'm curious.

I'm not accusing them of anything. I'm speaking generally about a broken enforcement mechanism.
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Lyrhawn
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quote:
Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:
Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
The only real negotiating tool that workers have to offer is their labor. If they can't use their labor as a wedge in negotiations, they there's really nothing to negotiate, and there's no point in having a union. Don't like the union? Fire everyone who is a part of it. They want to strike to put some backbone in their demands? Fire them. They mouth off in the media? Fire them.

I may be misunderstanding you, so, to clarify: This is meant to be an argument for why you shouldn't be allowed to fire striking workers, right? If so, I have two thoughts.

One: They can still use their labor as a negotiating tool, it's just that the strength of that tool will actually be tied to the value of their labor. So, a union of striking doctors or computer programmers would be harder and more costly to replace than a union of striking plumbers, which would be harder and more costly to replace than a union of striking retail cashiers.

I think this is a good thing, because I don't see the point in artificially inflating the value of low-skill/interchangeable jobs. If the union members are sufficiently costly to replace, firing will be a less desirable option than simply giving in to their demands.

Two: I think that keeping the firing option on the table is the only way to create win/win scenarios where everyone gets the best possible outcome that they can achieve without exerting force on someone else.

Here's a simple concrete example of what I mean: Joe and his comrades are striking because he thinks his current job at X Industries pays too little. But X Industries doesn't want to pay any higher wages for the job Joe and his fellows are doing. They also think they can hire other people to do the job for the price they want to pay, to the level of competence that they need.

So, they fire Joe and the striking workers. They hire Fred and some other folks who were unemployed and are happy to make the wages that Joe and his other union members were not happy with.

So Fred and his peers get paid a wage they're happy with, X Industries pays a wage they're willing to pay, and Joe doesn't have to work at a job that pays him less than he is worth. Since he's higher value than that, he can now go on to find a job that pays him properly for his value. Or, failing that, he can re-evaluate how much he thinks his labor is worth, and change his preferences.

I know it might seem weird to that I would call a scenario in which someone loses their job "win/win," but it's predicated on the idea that one should have rational expectations, and using force to make other people give you what you want is wrong.

It's fundamentally the same way that it would be irrational for me to want Bill Gates to give me a billion dollars... just writ much, much smaller, and couched in sufficiently mild language that it seems more "reasonable."

But just saying "I want someone else to give me X thing, and if they don't, I lose," is an irrational position. You need to build your own life and take responsibility for it. If you want something you can't get on your own, you need to allow for the possibility that you will fail to find anyone to help you.

In light of that, by striking, Joe was creating two possible outcomes for himself, with either outcome preferable to his current situation. Those outcomes were: get better conditions at this job, or find a new job.

He might have preferred the former the most, but we don't always get our top preference, especially when that relies on someone else.

If he actually had only one preference, "Get better conditions at this job," then his preference wasn't qualitatively different than "Get Bill Gates to give me all his money." Fundamentally, in both cases, one is putting all of their hope in their ability to persuade someone else to do what they want. If they fail, then the only two options remaining become misery and force. That's a terrible way to live.

I'm not sure there's much point in refuting you point by point.

But suffice to say I fundamentally disagree with most of this. You could turn just about every one of those arguments around and put it on corporations, but for some reason, you and many others don't see the problem on the other foot.

I've simply seen too much evidence of what society looks like, especially for the working poor, without protections in place. Their lives and standards of living have gotten considerably better over the past several decades, and corporations have only become richer during that same period, despite increased wages and labor standards, so their cries fall a bit on deaf ears. Without laws protecting workers, corporations would waste no time in destroying those gains made, because all they care about is cheap labor. And in a labor market where there are always more hands willing to do the labor for a crust of bread and a hovel to sleep in, they'll pay the lowest possible wage.

You know during slavery, the South spent most of their propaganda time not so much defending slavery as attacking the north's "wage slavery." It's something that largely went away by the 1940s or so, but to an Irishman living in a New York slum, the difference wasn't all that appreciable. Corporations would like nothing better than to return us to that.

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Rakeesh
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quote:
I've simply seen too much evidence of what society looks like, especially for the working poor, without protections in place. Their lives and standards of living have gotten considerably better over the past several decades, and corporations have only become richer during that same period, despite increased wages and labor standards, so their cries fall a bit on deaf ears. Without laws protecting workers, corporations would waste no time in destroying those gains made, because all they care about is cheap labor. And in a labor market where there are always more hands willing to do the labor for a crust of bread and a hovel to sleep in, they'll pay the lowest possible wage.
I would've tried to speak to the same point less precisely by explaining how, when I look at the passage of time and history, I see plenty of reason to be *extremely* skeptical to trusting the welfare of the broader society-on any area, economic, social, political-to the wealthiest and most powerful. I don't trust them-or anyone-to work towards or improve the lots of anyone, as a class, except for people like themselves.
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scholarette
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Geraine, this strike is over the idea that when an employee complains, te company retaliates against them. So, a worker reports unsafe conditions and their hours are cut to 39 so the company doesn't have to pay health insurance as not a full time worker. Whether the laws exist, if people are too scared to use them, they are meaningless. Just something to keep in mind- the strike isn't about wages or working conditions, it is about retaliation, the right to complain about those other issues.
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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Rakeesh:
quote:
I know it might seem weird to that I would call a scenario in which someone loses their job "win/win," but it's predicated on the idea that one should have rational expectations, and using force to make other people give you what you want is wrong.
But...this use of 'force' (it's not, neither when an employer refuses to grant a raise or when a union threatens to strike)

A little busy, but I just wanted to reply quickly to this: that's not what I was equating to force. None of that. The force I alluded to was, e.g. Companies being banned from firing striking workers. That ban, the illegality it creates, involves some measure of force.

The relationship between workers and employers doesn't inherently involve force on either side, and I didn't intend to imply different. Only when one side or the other is literally being forced to do/not do something.

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Blayne Bradley
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Corporations being not allowed to fire people who dare complain about unsafe or exploitative working conditions? Clearly this is a social injustice that the army must be deployed to help alleviate.

You know the US had a history of when essential workers went on strike and simply couldn't be fired. The army was sent to shoot them and force them back to work.

Walmart will fire you simply for daring to suggest the idea of a union, many companies can and will fire you without probable cause in many RTW states; if you go on strike and your fired your barred from seeking unemployment insurance and can be left destitute and forced into wage slavery.

By making it illegal to fire strikers you can best give them enough of an equal negotiating position to force a concession. The only way a worker can successfully bargain for better conditions is collectively, the imbalance of power heavily favors the corporation here, especially when it comes to expensive lawsuits. This is what unions are for, to even the playing field.

Are you against the idea of an even playing field or do you believe that even without unions that the playing field is sufficiently equal?

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Parkour
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Making it illegal to fire striking workers is level playing field?

Anyway, dan, if you remove the federal protections for unions, would you insist that right to work laws be completely abolished as well? You are pretty caught on how you are arguing against a right to free association if you support right to work.

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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Parkour:
Making it illegal to fire striking workers is level playing field?

Anyway, dan, if you remove the federal protections for unions, would you insist that right to work laws be completely abolished as well? You are pretty caught on how you are arguing against a right to free association if you support right to work.

Oh sure, I think RTW is basically a flawed stopgap solution to an existent problem. If that problem (fed special privileges for unions) went away, RTW wouldn't have any legitimate reason to exist as far as I can tell.
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Rakeesh
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Would you then have a solution, if these special privileges were done away with, for the problem that abruptly workers would have much, much less ability to negotiate with their employers (except for the often very difficult, inaccessible 'quit and find another job if you don't like it)?
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Parkour
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To him, that IS the solution.

Pullman Towns forever!

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Lyrhawn
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quote:
Originally posted by Rakeesh:
Would you then have a solution, if these special privileges were done away with, for the problem that abruptly workers would have much, much less ability to negotiate with their employers (except for the often very difficult, inaccessible 'quit and find another job if you don't like it)?

They would have no power to negotiate. Quitting isn't negotiating.

If workers can't use their labor as a negotiating tool, the only thing they have to rely on is the generosity and largesse of their employers.

Good luck with that.

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Orincoro
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quote:
Originally posted by Destineer:
He probably means, for the same reason that your vote doesn't make a difference. And I'd say he's probably correct. If one person's purchases made a difference in the big scheme of things, I'd feel a very strong obligation to become a vegetarian.

Well, he should be aware that this type of thinking is what is fallacious. An individual's actions have an effect. And choosing not to act according to conscience is to abandon responsibility for society's ills.
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twinky
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In a country where loss of employment also results in loss of subsidized health insurance, I don't think one can reasonably assert that labour is mobile in a meaningful way.

Fix the first problem, and then maybe we can talk about unions and making it easier to fire people.

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Destineer
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If you have a good solution to the voter paradox, lay it on me.

I mean the Downs "paradox," not the Condorcet one. Although it's really not a paradox. It's just a valid argument to the conclusion that voting doesn't have an effect on the outcome of an election. There are other reasons to vote, besides affecting the outcome, which is why I usually vote. But I don't see any reason to participate in a boycott except to affect the behavior of the entity I'm boycotting, and my participation won't matter to that one way or another.

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Blayne Bradley
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quote:
Originally posted by Parkour:
Making it illegal to fire striking workers is level playing field?

Anyway, dan, if you remove the federal protections for unions, would you insist that right to work laws be completely abolished as well? You are pretty caught on how you are arguing against a right to free association if you support right to work.

You know what I mean.
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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by twinky:
In a country where loss of employment also results in loss of subsidized health insurance, I don't think one can reasonably assert that labour is mobile in a meaningful way.

Fix the first problem, and then maybe we can talk about unions and making it easier to fire people.

Yep. In case there was any confusion, I agree with this completely. Well, mayb not completely... I think some jobs are still mobile, to varying extents. But the core point here is totally true.
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Samprimary
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Wait, ... what is your proposal for fixing the loss of health insurance when you leave your job?
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Dan_Frank
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Are you asking in what circumstances i think twinky is wrong and jobs are still mobile?

Or are you asking how I would solve the problem twinky discussed and I largely agreed is a problem?

Edited for snack cakes.

[ November 26, 2012, 06:07 PM: Message edited by: Dan_Frank ]

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rivka
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Think snackcake, not star-like.
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Dan_Frank
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Dammit.

Posting from my phone, didn't notice the autocorrect. I knew that! Sorry twinky. Will fix when I have time.

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Geraine
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quote:
Originally posted by scholarette:
Geraine, this strike is over the idea that when an employee complains, te company retaliates against them. So, a worker reports unsafe conditions and their hours are cut to 39 so the company doesn't have to pay health insurance as not a full time worker. Whether the laws exist, if people are too scared to use them, they are meaningless. Just something to keep in mind- the strike isn't about wages or working conditions, it is about retaliation, the right to complain about those other issues.

Retaliation IS against he law. Not only that, but the burden of proof falls on the employer, not the employee, to prove that no retaliation took place.

I am an HR consultant and I deal with this sort of thing every day. If an employee reports unsafe working conditions, harassment, or workplace violence, and the employee is retaliated against, the company has broken the law.

If the employee is retaliated against, they can file an OSHA complaint, and they take care of the rest. If OSHA finds that it is a valid complaint and that retaliation took place, the employee can be awarded compensation, and the company can be fined for each incident.

I think employees need to be educated on what their rights as employees are. Every business is required by law to have posters in their break rooms letting employees know who to contact in case something happens. This includes portions regarding OSHA and the EEOC. Both of them talk about retaliation and how to report instances.

I don't think Wal-Mart is a perfect employer or company by any means. I know there are some valid complaints. But let's be honest. The unions want into Wal-Mart because they see a gigantic paycheck in it for them. The average rate for union dues is 3%. You tell me how much the unions stand to make off of 2.2 million employees.

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Rakeesh
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quote:
I don't think Wal-Mart is a perfect employer or company by any means. I know there are some valid complaints. But let's be honest. The unions want into Wal-Mart because they see a gigantic paycheck in it for them. The average rate for union dues is 3%. You tell me how much the unions stand to make off of 2.2 million employees.
While we're throwing around all of this specific honesty, let's be honest about why exactly various Powers That Be in WM want unions kept out of their company. Or is all this greed you're talking about just on the side of organized labor? Corporate leadership wants them out for...what, good citizenship?
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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Blayne Bradley:
But wouldn't that result in Big Gov't Geraine? Wouldn't it be preferable to rely on the laissez faire free market solution which is the entirely natural establishment of unions?

And Walmart *has* been sued, but the legal system makes it difficult to bring class action law suits successfully forward.

quote:
Originally posted by Rakeesh:
quote:
I don't think Wal-Mart is a perfect employer or company by any means. I know there are some valid complaints. But let's be honest. The unions want into Wal-Mart because they see a gigantic paycheck in it for them. The average rate for union dues is 3%. You tell me how much the unions stand to make off of 2.2 million employees.
While we're throwing around all of this specific honesty, let's be honest about why exactly various Powers That Be in WM want unions kept out of their company. Or is all this greed you're talking about just on the side of organized labor? Corporate leadership wants them out for...what, good citizenship?
Guys, looks to me like you're poking (a bit sarcastically, no less) at Geraine as if he's a hardcore free market/right wing advocate. And yet as far as I've seen he's, at most, a mixed economy advocate who leans further right than you do.

I dunno, just seems especially weird to me to see him getting, if anything, more flack and less benefit of the doubt than I do. Counterintuitive, I guess, considering I'm substantially more hardcore in my views than he is.

But maybe I'm reading too much into your replies to him. If so, let me offer a preemptive apology for calling you out over nothing.

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Blayne Bradley
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He seems pretty hardcore to me when he says flat out that unions are "unnecessary" despite overwhelming historical evidence.
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Samprimary
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the issue in the second one is that geraine is completely and totally inferring the motive for the unions on behalf of them, absent any other particular pressures or motivators that lead to unions being a ubiquitous part of freely assembled labor. rakeesh is noting that even if we make the giiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiaaaaaaaaant leap to conclusively deciding that unions are motivated primarily from profit motive, does that make them less worthy of having the right to act on that profit motive versus other entities which obviously work on profit motive straightforwardly.
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Samprimary
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i mean we all know that the profit motive is something we should just basically let do whatever it wants because that works out the best for eve

quote:
A company that makes clothes for Sean Combs' clothing brand ENYCE and other U.S. labels reassured investors that a factory fire that killed 112 people over the weekend would not harm its balance sheet, and also pledged to pay the families of the dead $1,200 per victim.

In an announcement Monday, Li & Fung Ltd., a middleman company that supplies clothes from Bangladesh factories to U.S. brands, said "it wishes to clarify" that the deadly Saturday night blaze at the high-rise Tazreen Fashions factory outside Dhaka "will not have any material impact on the financial performance" of the firm.

... ryone
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Lyrhawn
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Disgusting.
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kmbboots
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quote:
"I would be a traitor to these poor burned bodies if I came here to talk good fellowship. We have tried you good people of the public and we have found you wanting.... We have tried you citizens; we are trying you now, and you have a couple of dollars for the sorrowing mothers, brothers and sisters by way of a charity gift. But every time the workers come out in the only way they know to protest against conditions which are unbearable the strong hand of the law is allowed to press down heavily upon us.

Public officials have only words of warning to us—warning that we must be intensely peaceable, and they have the workhouse just back of all their warnings. The strong hand of the law beats us back, when we rise, into the conditions that make life unbearable.

I can't talk fellowship to you who are gathered here. Too much blood has been spilled. I know from my experience it is up to the working people to save themselves. The only way they can save themselves is by a strong working-class movement."

Rose Schneiderman, a union activist after the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire.
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Darth_Mauve
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You know, there are no Unions in Bangladesh. Workers are given a choice of subsistence wages or starvation. Works well there--except for the 100+ recently killed in a factory fire, because the unsafe working conditions the management insisted on--such as no fire exits because that might lead to employee theft. Such unsafe working conditions are one of the main things Unions fight against.

What we have is a monopoly of jobs by the company vs a monopoly of labor by the unions. The company insists that a monopoly doesn't exist because people are free to find employment elsewhere. The problem is that if you are caught looking for another job you can get fired.

When an employer and a union work together, you get a real win/win. Example is airlines. In the past unions at many airlines have asked for more money, better conditions, etc. The airlines worked with the unions and provided them. Then when hard times hit, many of the airlines asked the unions to take less money and fewer benefits. The unions agreed. Then you have American Airlines, who asked the unions to "take one for the team" and take a pay cut. The unions agreed. Then the owners said, "yay. We saved a load of money. We did such a good job we deserve a big bonus and raise." The result of this lopsided turn of events has been disaster for American.

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kmbboots
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I think that people forget (or never knew) that the reason we have - and continue to have - laws that protect workers from unsafe conditions is not because benevolent bosses gave them to us. It is because unions fought for them.
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Geraine
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quote:
Originally posted by Samprimary:
the issue in the second one is that geraine is completely and totally inferring the motive for the unions on behalf of them, absent any other particular pressures or motivators that lead to unions being a ubiquitous part of freely assembled labor. rakeesh is noting that even if we make the giiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiaaaaaaaaant leap to conclusively deciding that unions are motivated primarily from profit motive, does that make them less worthy of having the right to act on that profit motive versus other entities which obviously work on profit motive straightforwardly.

SO you are making the giiiiiiiiiiiiiiiaaaaaaant leap in saying that the money unions stand to make has nothing to do with wanting in Walmart? Even with some unions going as far as setting up their own separate organizations and websites, with brand new Fed-ID numbers, in order to try to sway public opinion while hiding the fact that they are funded by unions?

Yeah, I'm sure money has NOTHING to do with it. Why pick on Walmart then? There are numerous other stores that pay their employees the same average rate as Walmart. According to the BLS, Walmart is smack dab in the middle in pay for hourly retail sales people.

I understand that you want employees everywhere to have the right to unionize. Should the company have no choice in the matter? Why should a company be dragged through the gutter because they do not want to unionize?

I've work with companies that have union employees all the time. Most companies on the Strip here in Vegas work with the Culinary and Bartender's Union. I've found the Bartender's Union a lot more enjoyable to work. The leadership is pretty good and they tend to work towards resolutions rather than fines. The Culinary union on the other hand has a history of bad negotiations, dragging their feet, and always taking the side of the employee without gathering facts first. That isn't to say I haven't met some good reps at some of the businesses I work with, but they are few and far between. The bad ones only talk in monetary threats instead of trying to find an agreeable resolution between the employee and the company.

Back to the protests, it looks like less than 50 Walmart associates nationwide protested on Black Friday. Walmart then reported that "
roughly the same number of associates missed their scheduled shift as last year."

Interesting, I thought Walmart employees wanted to unionize so much they were willing to do anything. [Dont Know]

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Blayne Bradley
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Oh all those poor companies, being forced to be "dragged through the gutter" so their employees don't have to be subsidized by the federal government.

If their profit model depends on government intervention then maybe they shouldn't be in business?

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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Darth_Mauve:
You know, there are no unions in Bangladesh.

Know what else they don't have in Bangladesh? A robust court system with a longstanding tradition of common law precedents and a strong respect for the property rights of all individuals.

Just as a random example of stuff they don't have in Bangladesh.

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Dan_Frank
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quote:
Originally posted by Blayne Bradley:

You know the US had a history of when essential workers went on strike and simply couldn't be fired. The army was sent to shoot them and force them back to work.

Blayne, we've discussed issues like this a lot, so I want to try a thought exercise here, if you're game.

What would you guess my thoughts on this sort of occurrence are? Sincerely, without sarcastic misrepresentation. What do you think I think about this?

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Orincoro
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Being reasonable ruins the fun.
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