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Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

reuters.com

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Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#451

Post by dzhiurgis »

1nverseMtx wrote: post #433
Nimitz14 wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know what they also all of in common? Zero innovation since decades. And German car engineering is mostly known for being overly complicated, I say that as a German.

Agree. Close to zero progress in electrifying European produced cars. I would say unions are the cause for the delay resisting any change away from skills their members have, but obsoleted by electric cars with 1/10 the number of parts required.

VW group has twice the EVs in pipeline than Tesla. Sales are probably gonna overtake Tesla this or next year. They are not as fun as Teslas but they are solid products that people seem to prefer over fart mode that cost them extra $10k.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#452

Post by fastball »

neolog wrote: post #402
fastball wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The negotiating power only exists because of my participation. I am not destroying something that would exist anyway by my lack of participation.

Workers are weaker when scabs undermine their collective bargaining power.

Yes, when someone doesn't join your cause, you are generally going to be weaker. That's kinda how it works. Doesn't make it a tragedy of the commons though.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#453

Post by garyfirestorm »

markdown wrote: post #87
garyfirestorm wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment unfortunately doesn’t match reality. The uaw people literally avoid any kind of work. I wouldn’t say all of them, but majority of them do. There is zero accountability. They behave with almost no regard to professional rules, they treat foreign nationals as hostile people. No concept of teamwork. First hand experience btw. They have turned simplest of the simple tasks into bureaucratic nightmare, need a…

Be glad you aren't slaving from 6am to 6pm. Unions fought for the privileges you enjoy now, whether or not you are yourself in a Union. Further, if more people joined and supported Unions, Americans might one day get to enjoy the work/life balance that most of the rest of the world enjoys, with sufficient vacation time, paternity and maternity leave, etc.

I do admit we got some labor rights out of the union movement. But there has to be a balance between rights and duties. I am only talking about accountability. Also I work in R&D and hence my situation is a little different from manufacturing. Also FYI I do slave from 8am to 8pm on most of the days.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#454

Post by sjwright »

cycomanic wrote: post #259
sjwright wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He’s only the near-richest man in theory. If he tried to convert all of his company ownership into cash, the company value would crash so fast that he would probably be lucky to actually recover one fifth of his theoretical wealth.

That's a stupid argument, because none of the people on the richest people lists have any significant portion of wealth in liquid assets. Wealth for good reason is not defined as amount of cash you own.

It’s not an argument, just an observation that you can’t eat Tesla shares.

You seem to be replying as though I’m saying he’s not wealthy? Obviously he’s extremely wealthy by any definition. But most ultra-wealthy people are a LOT more diversified in their portfolio than Musk is. Someone with a diverse portfolio stands more chance of being able to functionally realise their wealth—if, say, they wanted to donate a large chunk of it to some charitable cause.

An argument could be made that Buffet is far and away the richest person (in terms of realisable wealth) due to his highly diverse holdings.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#455

Post by SyzygistSix »

junippor wrote: post #405
clcaev wrote: post #314

The entire concept of unionization seems unnecessarily confrontational. It does not need to be this way. Corporations are creations of the state. There is nothing preventing the state to require significant representation of employees in every board of directors. This board representation could support management that better reflects employee participation, e.g. Sociocracy. In this way, labour and capital could work…

Isn't the relationship between unions and corporations NECESSARILY confrontational? A corporation would like to pay its employees as little as possible. The employees would like the opposite. What am I missing? - genuine question.

In Germany, for instance, companies are required to have union members on the board. From what I understand about the structure of unions there, it allows unions to advocate on behalf of employees while being less confrontational. It's ostensibly a more effective way for the two parties to collaborate effectively to everyone's benefit.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#456

Post by wott »

aborsy wrote: post #376
r0p3 wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was your job in france that gave you this experience?

It was at a university and the union is called in France CGT. The basic problem is, if we have such powerful semi-paralegal entity (considering its scope and power), it protects people in need, but what mechanisms do we have in place to prevent it from evolving into an entity protecting itself (or to a mixed state), attracting those with perverse incentives in addition to those in need? I agree with comments above. I…

> It was at a university and the union is called in France CGT.

As a mostly labourer union, CGT is a minority in universities, especially among teachers and researchers (less so in administrative and maintenance departments).

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#457

Post by DeonPenny »

kepler1 wrote: post #409
door100 wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The horrors of... a 35 hour workweek, 5 weeks paid vacation, 16 weeks paid maternity leave, universal healthcare, and no at-will employment?

Ah, classic selection bias blinders on. Sure, great benefits for those who have jobs. What about for the people who can't get employed due to the conditions on labor? The young, poor, already jobless? Not so much concern for them, you got yours.

This part. People point to things like wealth inequality but not point to median incomes or employment rates, or marriage rates or birth rates. its extreme selection bias. If france was a country its median income with be comparable with alabama.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#458

Post by andagainagain »

karaterobot wrote: post #368
hrktb wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going through all of your point, it felt like every “unions” mention could be replaced with “management”. Protecting themselves ? check. Politicized the work environment ? check. Abusive practices ? check. Skewed view of the world and cronyism ? check. I think what you are seeing is just a reflection of who succeeds in French companies. Some chose unions, some management, some find other niches, but none of these see…

You're right about that, but I want to support the original commenter a bit and point out that management isn't going away, and adding unions on top of that is not an improvement if they share the same flaws.

This seems like the equivalent of saying "prosecutors aren't going away, and adding defence attorneys on top of that is not an improvement if they share the same flaws".

Lawyers are famously hated around the world. But it's almost universally better to fight one if you have one on your side. Same with unions and companies. Having worked in two companies in the last few years in the same market, in the same area, one union and one not... The difference is night and day in favor of the unionized shop.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#459

Post by andagainagain »

L_226 wrote: post #412
aborsy wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had this naive image in mind that unions are labor activists mobilizing against exploitative corporate practices. What I witnessed opened my eyes to the realities on ground, that seemed like almost opposite. As usual, life is more complicated! * The objective of trade unions is not to protect workers and improve their conditions (at least directly). It’s to protect themselves. * In every organization, there exists…

There is a solution to this; the union has become a parasitic entity between the labour pool and the employers right, so you can just legislate their ostensible raison d'être out of existence. That is, enforce fair conditions upon employers at a government level. Then encourage every person to leave their union, because they have no need anymore. Obviously, requires a high integrity government, actual fair enforcemen…

Also requires knowing what those employees actually want.

Re: Elon Musk’s anti-union tweet from 2018 must be deleted: U.S. labor board

#460

Post by mattkrause »

DeonPenny wrote: post #457
kepler1 wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, classic selection bias blinders on. Sure, great benefits for those who have jobs. What about for the people who can't get employed due to the conditions on labor? The young, poor, already jobless? Not so much concern for them, you got yours.

This part. People point to things like wealth inequality but not point to median incomes or employment rates, or marriage rates or birth rates. its extreme selection bias. If france was a country its median income with be comparable with alabama.

This is not a particularly useful statistic unless you include the varying levels of public services.

I just did a similar analysis for a job in the US vs one in Canada. The actual salary in the US was much higher, but including healthcare expenses closed a lot of the gap. In some cases (e.g., chronic illness or young kids), the lower Canadian salary was a better "deal" overall.

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