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Auedar t1_j21pbvd wrote

Reply to comment by Arkenos8118 in Activision's Boston studio workers announce unionization by No-Drawing-6975

Unions are run by humans, which are elected to their position. So yeah, like any social construct run by humans, it can either good or bad. On the whole though, most industries/states that have heavy unionization have significantly better "real wage" income and healthcare benefits.

Businesses exist to create profit, with labor costs being the highest cost for businesses in pretty much any industry. A business wouldn't spend millions of dollars to fight a unionization effort if it wasn't going to lose them profit over having to pay higher wages or better benefits.

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Arkenos8118 t1_j21u557 wrote

In the non union shop I work in we are above average across the industry in everything but life insurance, which we are average in. Locally, we are guaranteed to earn 5% more than any competitor. Why do people think unions are the best thing to exist? In the industry I work for, they only allow for all the shit I talked about, plus added distress from the actual hiring process and keeping your spot thereafter.

I did not say unions aren't great for some, but most certainly, as the comment I replied to was saying, they are not needed nor wanted in every workplace.

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Auedar t1_j2a1z6u wrote

Solid response, and I get it. I have family in unionized and non-unionized shops. And yes, you are correct, they are not for everyone and not the right answer for every situation. I don't like the fact that you were downvoted for a completely reasonable response, and I'm sorry that you were.

But keep in mind, there are benefits to a union that benefit the industry/area as a whole.

For example, say a shop in Michigan pays $25/hr for an apprentice, with benefits, and around $35/hr for a journeyman of 5 years. Because of that, other shops competing for that same labor have to adjust compensation to compete. They can't pay $20/hr and have shitty raises if the unionized shop is hiring, since it will just snipe all of their workers. So even if you are not directly in a unionized location, if your INDUSTRY is heavily unionized (working trades, auto, etc.) it tends to benefit everyone within the industry. Also, because you can get compensated fairly well in trades, other industries in the area have to raise wages to compete for the same labor pool. You can see this really recently with the pandemic, since most businesses had to raise wages in order to get people to come work for them (they were competing with the governments unemployment of around $15/hr). Another great example was South Dakota during the shale boom, where places like McDonalds had to offer $15-$17 an hour for entry level workers in boom towns where the average was $7.25 elsewhere.

Pretty much all of my friends and colleagues who are not a fan of unions still deeply appreciate the protections to workers that they themselves have benefited from. Very few advocate for things like free labor movement so that any company can hire someone from anywhere, like South America, and move them here and pay them significantly lower wages. Very few advocate for child labor, which would again reduce wages. Very few advocate for companies being able to ship entire plants abroad, which crazy, reduces wages. Most people I've talked to are not pro-business or pro-free market when it stops benefiting them.

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