Hello listeners! Today's discussion revolves around forced unions and government efficiency. Are government workers lazy or incompetent? Are conservatives just out to break democrat campaign donations? Find out inside!
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I'm all in favor of voluntary unionism, but the government swooping in and invalidating major clauses of existing union contracts seems heavy-handed to me. Aren't conservatives generally in favor of wide freedom of contract for businesses, including exclusivity contracts of various sorts? It's hard not to view it as a transparent anti-union effort, and cloaking it in largely unrelated human rights terminology is aggravating, too. I don't see a big difference between a union being paid by a company per employee and the union requiring that empolyees join the union and pay dues. It's all part of your net compensation package (negotiated, in this case, by the union!).
ReplyDelete(Side question: Do existing right-to-work laws prohibit unions from negotiating contracts where the employer pays them directly (possibly per-employee)? Maybe that's viewed as a conflict of interest, but I don't see how it's any less of a conflict of interest than when the employer writes a "union dues" number on your paycheck before also handing it to the union directly.)
On forcing parents taking care of disabled children to join a union: Stories about that all seem to originate from one Illinois program which allowed people to hire home healthcare workers using Medicaid funds. As a result, many hired themselves or others who weren't healthcare professionals. The union requirement seems to have been an attempt to outsource (privatize!) regulatory oversight of the program. However, the Supreme Court found that requirement unconstitutional on First Amendment grounds. Even if the government is paying, they can't force individuals to hire union workers (and it was the individuals, not the government, who had hiring and firing power in this program).
On USPS: Matt is wrong, private corporations don't have to fund their pensions (many don't). They can pay pension obligations out of their normal operating revenues. Not that it's bad to set aside assets for that purpose (it protects your employees against calamity), but the problem wasn't that the USPS was required to fund their pension, it's that the details were totally crazy.
On voting restrictions: There's an important distinction to be made between animus and bias. People are biased against applying maximum intellect and empathy to analyzing the downsides of potential changes electoral policy that would favor "their side".
On minimum wage: Matt is right that minimum wage increases will cause some jobs to be eliminated, outsourced, or automated. But minimum wage increases would also cause a large number of people to get a substantial raise, which would almost immediately be spent on goods and services. Many people in minimum wage jobs are in profitable indistries where labor (even at the higher rates) is a low portion of overall costs. Many of them are taking low wages not because their work is only worth $7.26/hr to their employer but becuase it's a low-skilled job and competition has driven down the price. Demand for labor is driven by demand for goods and services, not supply of labor at a low price. Thus, I'd expect many communities with a high proportion of minimum-wage jobs to see a decrease in unemployment. To some extent it's just a first-mover problem, as a business raising wages is painful, but having many of your customers suddenly have several times their previous disposable income is really great for business.