Live data from Hacker News

Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

nytimes.com

151–160 of 181 posts

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And also negotiates on his behalf for better working conditions and pay. Sounds like he doesn't believe that they do, and would prefer to be left out of the bargaining unit. > At the end of the day, that person wants all the benefits of being in the union (enhanced negotiating power, benefits, etc), without any of the cost There's literally no evidence that he wants the union to provide any of that.

"Sounds like he doesn't believe that they do, and would prefer to be left out of the bargaining unit." If that were true, then he would be suing to be left out of the bargaining unit.

Forgive my ignorance, but is that even possible?

If so, could you point to such lawsuits, especially successful ones?

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#152
post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sounds like he doesn't believe that they do, and would prefer to be left out of the bargaining unit." If that were true, then he would be suing to be left out of the bargaining unit.

Forgive my ignorance, but is that even possible? If so, could you point to such lawsuits, especially successful ones?

> Forgive my ignorance, but is that even possible?

It's not. The suit Janus actually filed is the closest thing to that.

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#153
post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is it that conservatives, when discussing any other aspect of a job (pay, working conditions, abuse, etc) will say that "you have a choice; you don't have to take the job," but when it comes to unions, suddenly everyone is forced? Why are you asking me? Go find some conservatives and ask them.

OK, so you are not a conservative. The essence of the question remains. Perhaps answering it would be helpful instead of the response you gave.

> OK, so you are not a conservative. The essence of the question remains. Perhaps answering it would be helpful instead of the response you gave.

Perhaps asking someone who has actually made both those statements would be more helpful than asking me.

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the question though: is it the worker's money? If so, shouldn't they be able to do whatever they want with it, instead of giving it to the union? It is a little disturbing when there is a chain of force exerted by government all the way from the original funds back to some kind of political activism. The individual workers never have a chance to intervene in that chain. They have a collective right through the…

If the worker doesn't want to join the union, they don't have to take the job. The main issue here is that the union is required to negotiate on behalf of everyone at the job, not just it's members.

That's a disturbing job requirement for a non-political public sector job.

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#155
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent comment was a bit excited, but there are major differences between money you use for groceries and money used for union dues. The most relevant one to Janus is the fact that you can't choose which union your dues go to - but you have a number of choices about how to feed yourself with your dollars. You can go to a restaurant; go to Smart & Final; go to Whole Foods; in general, those dollars are fungible an…

The supermarket analogy I used was solely to point out that unions are not publicly financed. It is the law that union members can get a refund on their portion of dues used for political purposes. I think you may not be aware of that.

I didn't know there was a law about a refund - do you have a link to that?

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#156
post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is definitely something to be said for requiring broad consensus. I think many would argue that the systems were intentionally designed to be slow and convoluted because it meant that only the most important things would survive and get implemented, at least at the federal level. I don't necessarily disagree with that in principle, but "slow and convoluted" by 19th century standards is "worthless and disastrous…

I don't think that this is a technology problem - it's a polarization problem. No amount of technology traveling at the speed of light will solve the simple problem that you belong to an ideological sub-group that ferociously disagrees with another sub-group about how things should be run. Indeed, we're a nation of 330 million people, this is to be expected. I'm amazed we've been able to get away with this level of c…

> No amount of technology traveling at the speed of light will solve the simple problem that you belong to an ideological sub-group that ferociously disagrees with another sub-group about how things should be run.

Yeah, I'm not claiming that technology solves things. I'm claiming the opposite, at least as far as our current government processes are concerned. Those processes have effectively been "broken" by changes in communication and movement.

This is an example. Liberals are aghast that the court didn't overstep their constitutional function here. Conservatives are happy that the process was followed, but they're not really happy that companies can effectively force employees into kangaroo court.

From a state's rights perspective, there's no reason that the federal government should be dealing with any of this really, states should be plenty capable of handling employment law. The federal government exists to set tariffs, administer borders and national defense, and ratify treaties. But because people and information can now move so freely, we've spent the last 100 years, more or less, ignoring the on-paper purview of federal and state governments.

You can say "Get Congress to pass a law" all you want but it's little consolation (in part because Congress is paralyzed in this environment). I would guess that most Americans on both sides of aisle want employees to be able to sue their employers in these cases -- hardly an instance of "virulent polarization" -- but that message is getting obscured by pedantry and partisanship on the boundaries of judicial interpretation. There are many similar issues, where most people don't really disagree per se, but the media and politicians still make sure things are arranged for maximum loyalty exploitation.

> Any American that argues "each state will handle things on its own" is just making the same argument that a European might make

Yeah, I'm a conservative, I understand and support the argument for state's rights, and I know how it's supposed to work theoretically. And before you point at the EU too enthusiastically, ask yourself how a similar situation would've played out there.

> Federalism was never about the logistics of walking to state lines.

I mean, it may not have been about it, but it was much more practical in a pre-telecommunication, pre-automobile, pre-airplane world.

Because I support state's rights, I recognize that we need to be realistic about things and make reasonable adaptations. It's not reasonable to pretend that the massive changes in movement and communication don't impact the way our republic functions.

Dogmatically grasping to processes established 200 years ago is only convincing everyone else that conservatism and governance by ruthless, cold pedantry are inextricable. That's bad. Maintaining conservative principles is not necessarily the same as enslaving oneself to the heartless rehearsal of dead scripts.

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's pretty spurious reasoning. Do I not have the right to do what I want with my money because I have to give part of it to my landlord? If your rent is automatically withheld from your paycheck as terms of your employment and given directly to your landlord, then yes, that logic might hold. However, I'm betting that's not the case.

Yet, it was still my choice to live there. And, and this is the most important part, I still earned that money through my work. Having it auto deducted from the paycheck isn't any different than having auto pay set up on my bank account.

That's the difference - you choose to live there. You can't choose to not be part of a public union, for state jobs that have one. Support for political causes should not be a requirement for employment by the state.

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#158
post #150
post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A public employee union is not the government. With limited exceptions being a public employee does not mean you forfeit your rights. There should not be distinction between public employee union and private employee unions. If workers come together to bargain as a unit then they should be allowed to do so wether they are public employees or not. Unions do not circumvent the normal political process. They are not sei…

This response strikes me as mainly "truth through repeated assertion", without any refutation. > A public employee union is not the government. I'm not suggesting it is, as such. It is, however, made up of the people who operate the "machinery" of government, and it's the government witholding the dues from the paycheck that funds this union, so, again, of Constitutional significance. > There should not be distinctio…

We assert different things. I claim your view that unions circumvent the political process is a bit extreme. Workers should be able to band together to advance their cause without regard to whether or not they are public employees. Working for the government should not necessarily mean that your rights get limited. There are exceptions. Like for the military.

Of course this is just my opinion. I can’t claim it’s objectively correct.

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#159
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The supermarket analogy I used was solely to point out that unions are not publicly financed. It is the law that union members can get a refund on their portion of dues used for political purposes. I think you may not be aware of that.

I didn't know there was a law about a refund - do you have a link to that?

You could Google it. Here’s a link:

https://www.unionfacts.com/article/political-money/

Re: Supreme Court Upholds Workplace Arbitration Contracts

#160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the worker doesn't want to join the union, they don't have to take the job. The main issue here is that the union is required to negotiate on behalf of everyone at the job, not just it's members.

That's a disturbing job requirement for a non-political public sector job.

No one is required to join the union. They are required to help pay for collective bargaining, grievances, contract enforcement etc. Those who are in the union are entitled to a refund of the portion of their dues that go toward political activities. This is all the current law without Janus.
Post reply on HN