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Google hired union-busting consultants to convince employees “unions suck”

arstechnica.com

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Re: Google hired union-busting consultants to convince employees “unions suck”

#491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but a union rule forces them to pay everyone with that job description the same Why would we advocate for this though? You keep making the claim that unions would advocate for more and more restrictive policies. First it was guidelines, now it's strictly regimented salaries with no room for performance based pay at all. You're generating objections because you keep changing your argument. Yes, paying everyone exact…

I mean, literally the entire point of collective bargaining arrangements is that instead of negotiating salaries individually, the firm agrees to pay everyone a wage schedule agreed with the union. Hence the whole subthread starting with another poster talking about collectively negotiated pay bands for all staff having less scope for large pay rises than a firm's discretionary policy, as the union also has to look a…

A wage schedule that increases minimum salary by x% is more restrictive, but benefits everyone and hurts no one.

Your "by definition" is incorrect. There's no law that requires a collective bargaining agreement to enforce pay maximums (or in fact anything about pay at all!). So please don't tell me that I don't know what I'm talking about.

Re: Google hired union-busting consultants to convince employees “unions suck”

#492
post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Look at examples like when Apple, google, and a few other companies entered into a cartel agreement to suppress engineer wages. Wasn't that already illegal? Did unions help?

The unions didn’t exist so how could they have helped?

That's kinda the point.

How did it get resolved?

Through a class-action lawsuit from 60,000 employees across all of the involved companies.

No union was needed.

Re: Google hired union-busting consultants to convince employees “unions suck”

#493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A union is recognized by the NLRB and has certain statutory entitlements regarding strikes and the ability for employers to fire striking workers. "Labor movements," writ large, do not require those statutory entitlements. Modern unions can be understood in terms of their ability to collectively bargain without fear of direct reprisal in terms of employment. Otherwise, collective bargaining has always been an option…

I feel confident that most people would say a formal organization of workers that engaged in collective bargaining and strikes without legal protections was a union, even if it existed before the NLRB. If what you really want to talk about is "modern legally-recognized unions" then just say that.

Maybe, but when they say union membership is down, they mean NLRB recognized unions. We do not have good stats on labor movements writ large. To the OP’s post, Google’s not tackling a labor movement. They’re tackling “unions” with statutory privileges.
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