Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

351–360 of 1001 posts

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#351

Post by splintercell »

baron816 wrote: post #71
prepend wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think reasons will vary, and I didn’t vote in this event. But in previous situations I’ve not supported unionization due to how it favored existing workers in ways I thought were unfair in that all layoffs were due to seniority not performance so older workers would be kept and younger workers laid off, no matter what. It also established more rigid pay levels that were better on average but not as good for high pe…

> it was good if you were in the union and employed, but was much harder to get work and join the union. This is my fundamental problem with unions—it helps the insiders and hurts everyone else. Amazon’s working condition are rough (and I really hope that changes), but there are plenty of jobs out there that are much worse and don’t pay nearly as well. They just get all the attention because of their size and impact.

> This is my fundamental problem with unions—it helps the insiders and hurts everyone else.

Misesean analysis showed that unions cannot benefit everyone, they always benefit the sr workers at the expense of the jr workers.

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#352

Post by [deleted] »

rmah wrote: post #92

Am I the only one who thinks $500/mo seems excessive for union dues? That's $60k/yr in dues for every 10 workers. Does a union really need a full time rep for every 10 or 20 members? If, perhaps, half of that goes to "strike insurance", that would mean $15k/member over 5 years. Which would be enough replace wages(at $15/hr) for six months. Do they really anticipate a six month strike every 5 years?

[deleted]

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#353

Post by qeternity »

specialist wrote: post #310
saas_sam wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My anti-union sentiment arrived from my experience working with a large established union in an industrial plant. The union protected some of the worst, laziest, most unsafe workers I had ever witnessed in any job before or sense. It blew my mind how difficult it was to remove obvious bad apples, and how the best workers were forced to wait in years-long "seniority" queues before they could get promoted. I would get…

Which organizations have figured out how to handle their bad apples?

It’s not a binary outcome. Of course all large organizations will have people of varying types. But it’s an order of magnitude easier to clean house outside of government and union shops.

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#354

Post by marcinzm »

specialist wrote: post #298
parliament32 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, it came from working for a massive union (government, not US) for many years. The downsides are real: hard to fire bad performers, your merits don't matter at all (the guy doing the bare minimum job description gets the same raises as you), wayyy too much focus on seniority (for promotions, vacation selection, etc), and overall just too many rules (for example, "unlimited vacation" works great with my cur…

> the downsides are real: hard to fire bad performers, your merits don't matter at all Which work environments are merit based? Which employers fire bad performers?

I've found all the companies I worked at rewarded merit and fired bad performers. Of course the systems were imperfect but on average both happened.

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#355

Post by christophilus »

Someone1234 wrote: post #132

HN is very consistently anti-union. My question is this: Where did you get information about unions? Because people keep mentioning their "bad reputation" and then start listing off a bunch of "facts" that read like they're bullets straight out of one of those anti-union videos during onboard at several major employers (Walmart, Target, Amazon, etc). So anti-union people exactly where does your information come from?…

For me, it is all anecdotes from my dad (some of which I observed first hand). He worked for unions for half of his career and then intentionally uprooted us to move to a right to work state purely to escape the unions. He moved up the ranks and ended his career as the general manager of a manufacturing facility. The next county over was heavily unionized. The contrast in the two counties was notable. The industry in the unionized county was run-down, falling apart, constantly in and out of bankruptcy.

The industry in the non-unionized county was literally some of the best in the world in what it does. The plants were clean and well run. Early on in the management-part of his career, my dad hired some formerly unionized workers who had moved up from the unionized county in order to find work (jobs were disappearing in that county due to the bankruptcies). They were fired in a few months because they wouldn't show up on time, were constantly dropping the ball, etc. In his opinion, their work ethic had been ruined.

I'm actually not anti-union, but I'm mostly anti US union. I think if we adopted a non-antagonistic model similar to Germany, it'd be alright.

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#356

Post by regextegrity »

conanbatt wrote: post #225
fergie wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading the replies here I’m pretty shocked by the lack of good arguments against unionisation. Its sad.

Empirical argument: The biggest unions in america are for the most poorly run and corrupt organizations. Teachers, Police, Firemen, Government workers, Health, public transportation. All with massive costs to the consumer, corruption, service disruption, closed shops, etc. Microeconomics argument: The only meaningful way unions increase employees wages is by artificially restricting supply. They can only move the poi…

Meanwhile the Teachers, Police, Firemen, Government workers, Health, public transportation workers do not live in a state of wage slavery where the best job they can get doesn't even give bathroom breaks (i.e Amazon)

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#357

Post by genericone »

vb6sp6 wrote: post #189
zarkov99 wrote: post #88

Good. I have lived in 3 continents and 4 different countries and I have yet to see a union that is not run by and for the lazy and incompetent, ultimately to the ruin of all involved. I hear Germany cracked the code on that one, but in the US unions seem to be pretty much like everywhere.

I have a few German customers and I also get the impression that their unions seem to work. It seems to be a result of multiple factors: 1. "Mitbestimmung" or co-determination. German workers elect the board of directors. 2. Labor reps vote alongside shareholders 3. Laborers in the same strata form "work councils" and choose reps to bring issues to managers or higher up the chain 4. "Betriebsverfassungsgesetz" federa…

Yeah, give the employees some skin in the business, not just in the labor negotiations... Incentivize good union behavior, not adversarial behavior.

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#358

Post by function_seven »

objclxt wrote: post #274
Someone1234 wrote: post #132

HN is very consistently anti-union. My question is this: Where did you get information about unions? Because people keep mentioning their "bad reputation" and then start listing off a bunch of "facts" that read like they're bullets straight out of one of those anti-union videos during onboard at several major employers (Walmart, Target, Amazon, etc). So anti-union people exactly where does your information come from?…

From what I can tell, a lot of people in tech are anti blue collar union, but mistakenly assume that blue-collar unions are all unions. For example, just in the replies to your comment people are saying they dislike unions because they protect the incompetent, stifle progression, give preferential treatment purely on seniority, etc. But then go look at Hollywood, with the Screen Actors Guild, the Writers Guild, the P…

The union Amazon warehouse voted against (the RWDSU) is a blue collar union.

Your point is a good one when we see the backlash against unions in software engineering and related fields. I just wanted to bring it back around to why anti-union comments on this story specifically would be right to cite their problems you listed in the 2nd sentence.

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#359

Post by wernercd »

hrktb wrote: post #257
brightball wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was similar to the Boeing situation in Charleston, SC. Boeing came in and brought great jobs with them. Then the union reps came in and started acting like everybody was being wronged somehow.

Why can't it be both ?

Because crying victimhood over every perceived slight becomes the boy who cried wolf - sooner or later everyone realizes that the only way a union can justify itself is by creating problems where none existed. Otherwise, why waste money on union dues for something that isn't needed?

It CAN be both... but generally it isn't.

Re: Amazon workers vote against unionizing in Alabama

#360

Post by brianwawok »

specialist wrote: post #298
parliament32 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally, it came from working for a massive union (government, not US) for many years. The downsides are real: hard to fire bad performers, your merits don't matter at all (the guy doing the bare minimum job description gets the same raises as you), wayyy too much focus on seniority (for promotions, vacation selection, etc), and overall just too many rules (for example, "unlimited vacation" works great with my cur…

> the downsides are real: hard to fire bad performers, your merits don't matter at all Which work environments are merit based? Which employers fire bad performers?

Most smaller startups, because it's literally do awesome work or shut down.

Trading/finance, because it's either outsmart the rival trading firms, or lose your entire stack in 1 day.

Post reply on HN