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Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#91
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming all other factors are almost identical, how would you want to prioritise amongst similarly qualified staff members?

By using a market? ie. allowing people to bid on slots directly. I know that the context for this is "non-economic proposals" so market based solutions doesn't count, but I'm not sure why you wouldn't want a market based proposal in this case.

I think this has been studied and tested in real work places. It’s been a minute since I had a peek in the literature of workplace psychology (not since my B.S. degree in 2011) so I might be misremembering, but I think I remember the results are not in favor of market based solutions.

I encourage you browse the web and see for your self, workplace psychology is an interesting study.

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#92

Does the NLRB have any teeth? Can they impose fines? I’ve yet to see any of these rulings result in any meaningful changes.

Their orders have the same force as a court order, so there are penalties if you actively ignore an order. However the board is very limited in what they can order.

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#93
post #69

Its funny to watch "progressive" mega corporations like Starbucks, Apple, Amazon + more skirt around unions. Essentially they use PR to say we are all for these corporate safe progressive topics... but any topics of worker rights, unions.. nope.

Starbucks and Amazon are hardly "progressive". Most folks I know would describe them as pretty much bog standard big capitalist companies. Sure, they slap a rainbow logo on their twitter during June, but so does Raytheon. I'm less sure about Apple, which might actually have more of a progressive streak in it (I'm simply not knowledgable), but the other two are pretty much standard exploitative mega corps.

Apple is absolutely ruthless toward employees. For example, they were the ringleader behind an illegal anti-poaching conspiracy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#94

Companies shouldn't forced to permit the creation of unions. Unions are a tumor and it only makes sense for a company to remove it. If employees want to be able to threaten to quit employers should be able to threaten to fire them. The negotiation power should go both ways.

Please explain why they are a tumor?

Seriously, I’m interested to know why you think that. I am a member of a union and without it I would be significantly less well off. Am I a bad person because I want to be treated like a human instead of a replaceable cog in a machine?

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#95

Companies shouldn't forced to permit the creation of unions. Unions are a tumor and it only makes sense for a company to remove it. If employees want to be able to threaten to quit employers should be able to threaten to fire them. The negotiation power should go both ways.

Governments shouldn't be forced to permit the creation of political parties. If citizens want the right to kick out the government, the government should have the right to kick citizens out of the country.

See the flaw in both of these arguments is that governments and corporations aren't people and only exist to provide some societal benefit. the measure of what we should allow governments and companies to do is what makes for the best functioning society, not some random principal of symmetry.

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The courts can't compel a company to hire someone out of the blue, but they can compel a company to not-fire someone in retaliation for unionization efforts. Similarly, if the court so desired, they couldn't compel someone to start a business out of the blue, but they could definitely compel a company to not shut down an operating business in retaliation for unionization efforts. This court? Never happen. But this is…

I think that would open a whole new can of worms. It would set a precedent that a business cannot stop operating in response to a law, which would mean the business may have to run itself into the ground rather than close if a law made the business unviable.

Shutting down one store out of thousands is not equivalent to a business ceasing operations.

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#97

This article made me curious, has any business tried to defend antiunion activities through a desire for free association? As in the business does not want to associate with unions. It made me curious because I've not seen that argument before, in the function of a union seems like it wants to force the company to associate with it whether the company wants to or not.

Ok, but the people in the union are actual people. The company is a abstract entity we invented to facilitate business. The right of assembly of real humans is surely more important than the right of assembly of a legal fiction.

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#98
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Starbucks and Amazon are hardly "progressive". Most folks I know would describe them as pretty much bog standard big capitalist companies. Sure, they slap a rainbow logo on their twitter during June, but so does Raytheon. I'm less sure about Apple, which might actually have more of a progressive streak in it (I'm simply not knowledgable), but the other two are pretty much standard exploitative mega corps.

Apple is absolutely ruthless toward employees. For example, they were the ringleader behind an illegal anti-poaching conspiracy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...

Oh totally, I was more remarking on whether they were progressive at all. That's the part I'm not sure about.

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#99
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An employee whose store closes goes from $n income to 0, while Starbucks goes from $x to (34999/35000)x.

During the worst recession of the US at one point I was changing shit retail jobs at like 1 a week trivially for the hell of it. To do it now you practically only need a pulse. You don't need to lose income to change jobs, you just don't show up to one and show up to the next. Starbucks would be crushed if they had to close all their stores but the laborer can close up all their labor to a company and change jobs muc…

If it was so universally easy, why aren't more people doing it?

Re: Starbucks illegally fired US workers over union, judge rules

#100
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming all other factors are almost identical, how would you want to prioritise amongst similarly qualified staff members?

By using a market? ie. allowing people to bid on slots directly. I know that the context for this is "non-economic proposals" so market based solutions doesn't count, but I'm not sure why you wouldn't want a market based proposal in this case.

Exactly. They union is trying to prevent a race to the bottom!
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