> If you can get replaced by someone cheaper, then you weren't worth what you were getting.
Spoken as someone with specialist skills that are in sufficient demand and business critical enough.
> I will never hire union labor ever. I would close down a business before I submitted to the extortion of unions.
So in other words, clearly people need contracts - and some will need unions -, since you're making it very clear you have preconceived notions about employee behaviour based on external factors that have nothing to do with their job performance, and you're not the only one.
Unions were formed because people realized their negotiating positions were excessively weak compared to the employer-side who held all the cards. E.g. getting to the 8 hour working day, for example, took American unions many decades of struggle to achieve (and the rest of the world commemorated that struggle by making May 1st the international day for workers demonstrations in direct response to the Haymarket massacre)
> Contracts protect the employees that strive to do the minimal possible under the terms of the contract.
Contracts also protects great employees of employers that strive to do the minimal possible under the terms of the contract.
Somehow you seem to expect that employees should trust you implicitly.
> If you don't like a company, you're free to quit, but in closed-shop states, if you don't like the union, too bad, you have to be a member (or pay the dues) if you want to be employed in that field in your state.
So why are you making your arguments about unions in general when you then go on to describe features of unions in some locations that are by no means universal?
There's no doubt that there are unions that have managed to push things too far, but your argumentation is like saying all companies are bad because some companies have been abusive.