Right - and in union-heavy countries like Germany and France, the costs are often much lower than in the US. There could be something to the structure or organization of US unions that impacts things here, but it's clearly not the root cause.
There is very little discussion around this underrated topic. In India, the places where unions have a strong presence have lost a lot of industries. They have become notorious for getting any work done in those places, as some unions have morphed into gangs. This is not to imply anything about the benefit/tradeoff of unions in other countries.
> There could be something to the structure or organization of US unions that impacts things here, but it's clearly not the root cause.
Yes. US unions are very different from European unions. Without getting into the details, US unions can be very destructive, while European unions are far more wholistic or cooperative.
To be clear, this is not about union members. It's about union leadership and the "mafia" how they do business. Union members are along for the ride, are sold entire narratives they have to support and can end-up losing big. Entire industries have been seriously damaged by our unions.
Source: I was in a union for about a decade. In addition to this, I have had this conversation with members of other unions, some of them as post-mortems after years of union damage caused job losses to China and, ultimately, the companies they worked for to shut down.
Solution? I can't think of a single simple idea. These are engrained cultural things. People rarely wake up to the reality of what's going on until the are suffering, take the time to think it through and ultimately realize where the pain came from.
You'd have to replace the companies with something like a co-op: from my experience with EU unions they're much more like what we would call a co-op; they're working with the business and the customer for the best possible solution all-around.
Of course, in the US it's also become a huge political thing.
For the US, there may be historical cultural reasons as well. Some unions were actually run by mafias. These are the same kinds of groups that would go around neighborhoods asking for “protection” money. If you don’t pay, you don’t get protection from their henchmen ruining your store.
Of course, the US also has a history of anti-union forces effectively being armed paramilities who would break up even the lightest of strikes or labor movements with public violence.
In Europe it's generally understood that it has to be a mutually beneficial relationship. Once it becomes parasitic, the parasite risks killing the host (no matter if it's the company having their employees walk out, or the employees/union forcing through demands that make their employer uncompetitive and close down).
That's harder to implement in a more individualistic society like the US, and the history of violent union busting surely didn't help either.
Probably because unions in France and Germany aren't as powerful as US construction unions.
Also in the EU there is internal competition between countries for construction projects that brings costs down overall. Unions in Germany jacking up your costs? Maybe there's a construction company in Poland or Czechia willing to do it for less. In Austria I see many construction sites are full with companies from Slovenia.
US labor laws focuses on all or nothing union control of a workplace. And once they have control, they get a lot of legal power.
Europe has a different model where unions do not have to have any sort of majority vote to be recognized. As such, membership tends to be more fluid. So the unions themselves have less specific control, but the unions can be larger, and be more recognized without as much antagonization.
Also, US unions have a lot of power over healthcare in the US. Usually being a function of the state in Europe, there's a lot less cost at stake when dealing with a European union.
So I think it's largely an apples to oranges comparison.
The number of visible strikes is a sign of union FAILURE,not success. The way unions work in the English speaking world is quite toxic and one of the major reasons they have such a bad reputation with so many people.
Not saying they are all 100% bad but the big anti-union push and negative perception is not some pay-op like some people seem to think it is. It is based on assessing their behaviour and for many deciding it is quite unreasonable.
There's even a German word, "Warnstreik," that refers to a short strike (as short as a few hours) carried out just to send a warning to company management that the union means business.
The unions in the transit sector are extremely active in Germany and France. As we speak, Paris is at standstill because of a massive transit strike.[0]
More strikes indicates the union is less powerful - a powerful union never has to strike, because they always get what they want just through fear of a strike.
Unless the threat is exercised every once in a while, it is not taken seriously.
German and French companies know that unions are capable of and willing to go on strike if their demands are not met. That gives companies a much larger incentive to make concessions.
The Warnstreiks I mentioned earlier are a tool for reminding companies every once in a while that the possibility of a strike exists. They're often used during contract negotiations, when the union doesn't feel the company is giving enough.
Not really. Unions in Germany are like a partnership to the company management, while in the US are like the enemy of the management focused on total control and can get away with a lot more stuff than what they can in Germany. At least in the construction business.
