Unions

I used to think that unions were bureaucratic organizations which mainly existed to get in people’s way. The closed shop seemed particularly dubious in that all employees were required to pay union dues, effectively imposing a tax on working.

My thinking has changed to some degree. While unions are deeply imperfect, they do have a role to play, or at least they could. In modern U.S. capitalism employers have an enormous ability to hire and fire people. Employees of large companies have essentially no control over this at all. In other words, there is a massive power disparity between the executive management of a large company and the employees, a disparity which is clearly reflected in salary.

One sometimes encounters the argument that a company will take appropriate care of its employees because that is good business. However, it is clear that this is not true in many cases. Different companies pursue different strategies, and strategies change over time. Many companies need people to do the work, but there are many people available and willing. Those companies have no incentive to treat their employees above a certain minimum level. This is obvious today in meat-packing plants, for example.

Given the power disparity, and given that some companies have no actual incentive to treat their employees well, what should employees do to improve their standing? The basic strategy is obvious: gain power by banding together and speaking with a single voice. Banding together is only effective if nearly everybody does it. Hence the union and the closed shop.

Unions are obviously subject to corruption, but actually no more so than companies themselves. It’s just more obvious when its the union, because the union is supposed to be on the side of the employees. The company is supposed to be on the side of itself, so few people seriously question the all-too-common self-dealing of executive management.

It’s true that employees in principle can always leave a bad job, but using that as an argument against a union cuts both ways: an employee who does not want to be part of a union is just as able to take a different job. The person who has no choice here is the company itself, but given the power disparity that seems reasonably fair.

This discussion is really only about unions in private enterprise. Government jobs seem different to me, in that the employer really is the people. I don’t have any firm conclusions about unions in government jobs.

It’s true that the most effective tactic that a union can employ is to stop working, and so the main visible effect of a union is a harmful one. But it’s also true that a company that treats its employees well will not have an obstreperous union. The right question to ask about a union is not “why are they stopping everything” but “what is management doing to push them to this position.”

It’s also true that a union in a failing industry can cause a company to collapse faster than it otherwise would, as union members struggle to hold on to their existing benefits. That is harsh, but frankly it’s no harsher than a company making massive layoffs to boost their stock price. Capitalism is sometimes brutal, and unions aren’t panaceas. Don’t blame the whole concept of the union for the fact that it sometimes leads to bad results.