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Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

nytimes.com

11–20 of 785 posts

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#12
post #5

I have some family members that work at Amazon, my understanding is that the conditions at Amazon are hard to pin down because some warehouses are run just fine and others are abusive. That said, everyone working a job has a right to a union. Whether there's workplace abuse going on or not. All human endeavors are corrupt, including gov't, business, and occasionally unions. Collective bargaining is something I wish I…

Everyone should have the right to collective bargaining. The US is a closed shop country, which means that, once a union is in place, it has an effective monopoly for the workers that work for one of its companies. If we switched to open shop, then unions would have to compete for membership. Of course, the existing unions are strongly against this. As an end result, everyone I know that's been a union member in the…

Isn't open-shop effectively "no union" in practice? What threat does a union have when the company can just hire non-union workers?

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#13

okay this is amazing. but wtf is this sentence? "No union victory is bigger than the first win in the United States at Amazon, which many union leaders regard as an existential threat to labor standards across the economy because it touches so many industries and frequently dominates them."

That's a textbook run-on sentence.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#15
post #12
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone should have the right to collective bargaining. The US is a closed shop country, which means that, once a union is in place, it has an effective monopoly for the workers that work for one of its companies. If we switched to open shop, then unions would have to compete for membership. Of course, the existing unions are strongly against this. As an end result, everyone I know that's been a union member in the…

Isn't open-shop effectively "no union" in practice? What threat does a union have when the company can just hire non-union workers?

Unions often train their members and self-enforce safety standards. Both of these things provide a higher quality labor pool for the employer.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#16

okay this is amazing. but wtf is this sentence? "No union victory is bigger than the first win in the United States at Amazon, which many union leaders regard as an existential threat to labor standards across the economy because it touches so many industries and frequently dominates them."

The NY Times prides itself on its 5th grade reading level.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#17
post #12
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone should have the right to collective bargaining. The US is a closed shop country, which means that, once a union is in place, it has an effective monopoly for the workers that work for one of its companies. If we switched to open shop, then unions would have to compete for membership. Of course, the existing unions are strongly against this. As an end result, everyone I know that's been a union member in the…

Isn't open-shop effectively "no union" in practice? What threat does a union have when the company can just hire non-union workers?

I was a union rep when working in Norway, I guess it was open-shop since we had two different unions. In practice we cooperated a lot, and the largest benefit was the it gave us access to lawyers that could answer questions quickly so the members were more willing to push back on unreasonable requests. We were never close to going to a lawsuit against the company, it was more "hey this is breaking the law, how do we work together to fix it".

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#18
post #5

I have some family members that work at Amazon, my understanding is that the conditions at Amazon are hard to pin down because some warehouses are run just fine and others are abusive. That said, everyone working a job has a right to a union. Whether there's workplace abuse going on or not. All human endeavors are corrupt, including gov't, business, and occasionally unions. Collective bargaining is something I wish I…

Everyone should have the right to collective bargaining. The US is a closed shop country, which means that, once a union is in place, it has an effective monopoly for the workers that work for one of its companies. If we switched to open shop, then unions would have to compete for membership. Of course, the existing unions are strongly against this. As an end result, everyone I know that's been a union member in the…

>As an end result, everyone I know that's been a union member in the last twenty years strongly dislikes unions.

Hi! Union member from ~2005-2011. Appreciated being in mine and strongly support a more unionized workforce.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#20
post #9

It's great that people are standing up against the abusive power of big companies. When will Apple (App Store) developers unionize?

Why should developers unionize? I love not being in a union. If my company starts dicking me around I'll quit and find another job.

Besides, if I do something so bad my boss wants to fire me, fine then I'll go work somewhere where people want me. I don't want to have to bring in my union rep to argue about it since going somewhere else means losing my tenure and taking a 30% pay cut.

The only time unions make sense is when you're doing labor that could be done by anyone and your bus factor is basically infinite. It doesn't make sense for skilled labor

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