Union households tend to have $100k more in wealth than nonunion families • Hacker News Board

Re: Union households tend to have $100k more in wealth than nonunion families

#91

Post by MichaelZuo » Sun, Mar 31, 2024, 1:08 PM UTC

CapstanRoller wrote: post #89

MichaelZuo wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>… yet a Big Mac costs the same of just a few pennies more. What? Do you not know how to check Big mac prices online in other countries?

Don't you know how to check? Danish McD's workers earn $20/hr+ but their Big Mac costs just 80 cents more. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/28/business/international/li...

You linked an article from 2014…

Plus it doesn’t pass the smell test, there are plenty of photos online of danish mcdonalds menus going back to at least 2018, that I could find in two minutes of searching. That clearly shows a standard Big Mac meal is 60 Danish Krone. Which was 9 USD to 10 USD depending on when you pick the exchange rate in 2018.

In the US, depending on location, the same meal would have been 5.5 USD to 7 USD in 2018. Maybe a bit more in Hawaii.

Maybe there were a few places in Denmark selling it for much cheaper, and it was being compared to Hawaii prices, hence why this notion came about, but that’s a ridiculous stretch.

Re: Union households tend to have $100k more in wealth than nonunion families

#92

Post by phatskat » Sun, Mar 31, 2024, 9:52 PM UTC

constantcrying wrote: post #37

bluefirebrand wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone would have to be incredibly full of themselves to think they have more bargaining power than an entire union would. Unless you are literally one of a kind, there's always someone out there who could replace you. Replacing all of the workers that an entire union represents is a way more difficult proposition

The overall bargaining power is greater, sure. But the relative power isn't. They can always just leave and work somewhere else, a union literally does not have that option. As an individual it is far easier to negotiate of you have an in demand skill. Which is obvious if you look at the study in the OP. College educated people benefit far less from unionization, they can negotiate for their own.

It’s been a hot minute since I watched this episode[1] so the points aren’t fresh on my mind, but unions are good for everyone even if you aren’t in one.

And yes, in demand skills do make it easier to bargain as an individual, however, that’s assuming those skills are needed at the level which you posses. In my field (web development) I’ve seen much less money go to far more people of a similar but lesser skill than my colleagues because you can throw a handful of people at a fairly decent project and get the desired immediate result. Long-term that code probably won’t stand, but that’s not really important for things like agency work where there’s some incentive to continue having work to do anyways.

[1] https://youtu.be/rFDP4hS7j98 - Unions Make Things Better (Even If You’re Not In One)

Re: Union households tend to have $100k more in wealth than nonunion families

#93

Post by nobodyandproud » Sun, Mar 31, 2024, 11:00 PM UTC

throwaway11460 wrote: post #85

nobodyandproud wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm happy being expendable. > It means I can just pick up my things and go somewhere else whenever I please. You are conflating expendability with redundancy.

Two sides of the same coin, IMHO

Oh my that’s a skewed perspective. That lack of perspective—specialty of the long-gone Jack Welch—-is what’s led us to the rapid fall and third-tier engineering of Boeing today.

They are definitely not the two sides of the same coin.

Re: Union households tend to have $100k more in wealth than nonunion families

#94

Post by bwestergard » Mon, Apr 01, 2024, 1:14 PM UTC

willcipriano wrote: post #34

bwestergard wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At some point, higher individual compensation doesn't matter much if everyone else in your community is overworked and underpaid. I think many Dutch or French software developers are living better lives than developers in California, all things considered.

All individual compensation is a delta over what a low skill worker would get. Pay fast food workers 80k a year and software engineers would start at 300k.

This is not true even as a rule of thumb, because it neglects that aggregate wages can increase at the expense of returns to capital (i.e. profits).

But more to the point, it neglects elasticities of demand.