Bumped for visibility, because IMO this is indeed the salient question of the thread, and I’d be very interested in hearing those questions answered as well.
Happy to give my take on the answer to that. What would happen is that the rich would get very slightly richer, in most cases negligibly so. The less privileged classes would suffer existential crises affecting their health, their families, and their entire lives. In the US plutocracy in particular, where the gap between rich and poor is one of the biggest in the civilized world and growing ever larger, the widening gap would create suffering and social instability, driving up crime of all kinds, both violent and non-violent. Racists would come out of the woodwork and blame the social unrest on immigration and brown people.
So, much as I’ve been pointing out many of the issues with unions, on balance they’re a good thing and generally essential. But like government itself, which is essential and generally beneficial, unions are problematic when they get out of control and become unchecked self-serving powers.
Gap between rich and poor, and recent trends (the higher the Gini coefficient, the greater the inequality gap):
On this I agree 100 percent. The working class would experience existential hardship while the rich merely solidify their gains. I guess my previous statement was more rhetorical in that I too ( in a addition to ‘Miller’ ) was and am curious as to why another poster would think that outcome would be desirable, and if so, why?
One clue might be William Jennings Bryan’s observation that “It is useless to argue with a man whose opinion is based upon a personal or pecuniary interest; the only way to deal with him is to outvote him.”
Upton Sinclair was a little less wordy: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”
I have to respond to the suggestion that some unions, especially public service unions, run unchecked. Labour relations codes, even in Canada, have systematically made it harder to strike and have a real impact, from the Trade Union Act of 1872 through the Industrial Disputes Act of 1906 and Privy Council Order 1003 in 1944, to the huge expansion of “essential services” and legislated ends to strikes since the 1970s. Workers had much more ability to unionize, negotiate contracts, and strike in the 1970s than they do now.
Sounds sketchy to me. CUPE – the public service union in question here – only came into existence in 1963 through the merger of two smaller national public service unions, and over the years has been growing ever larger and ever more militant, acquiring a reputation as one of the most vicious, militant, law-flouting unions in existence. Today, says Wikipedia, it is the largest union in Canada – not just the largest public service union, but the largest union of any kind, period, “representing some 700,000 workers in health care, education, municipalities, libraries, universities, social services, public utilities, transportation, emergency services and airlines.” It has expanded its reach even beyond the public sector and now unionizes various non-profits and other NGAs.
They’re bigger and more powerful now than they were in the 70s. Limits on the right to strike mean nothing to them. In 1992 a blatantly illegal 8-day CUPE strike in New Brunswick forced the government to capitulate on contract negotiations. Also in 1992 (I think) two CUPE leaders were jailed for six months for defying a Quebec government law giving municipalities more control of wages. Just last year in Ontario, they took 55,000 education workers out on strike, a strike that threatened to be so long and destructive that the government passed special back-to-work legislation. This caused such an uproar that the government had to entice them back to work by backing down, causing the union to crow as follows: “ ‘(Workers) took on the Ford government and the government blinked,’ said CUPE national president Mark Hancock."
Does any of that sound like a union that has lost a lot of power since the 70s?
Your evidence against the claim that the law in Canada has become less union friendly is the fact that a union has broken the law?
If you read more carefully, the point I’m making is that CUPE is militantly radical and growing ever more powerful, now even unionizing workers outside their stated sphere of influence, and that they don’t give a shit about legal restrictions either existing or newly imposed by special legislation. They’re powerful enough to threaten and stare down governments and defy laws, not to mention creating mayhem within the bounds of law that threatens the well-being of ordinary citizens. I’ve hated those extremist bastards for a long time. It didn’t help when these goons disrupted my son’s education by shutting down an entire university campus because some teaching assistants were CUPE members.
So I repeat my question, do any of the things I described sound like a union that has lost a lot of power since the 70s?
It should tell you something about the legal position of unions if the one that is gaining power is the one most willing to break the law.
The 700,000 number is misleading; CUPE is divided into national, provincial, municipal, regional, and isolated jobsite organizations, all CUPE, yes, but not organized so CUPE National can call out people across the country. It’s not One Big Union in any meaningful sense. And they have very different aims, ideologies, etc. Few can accurately be characterized as militant or radical, as those terms are defined in the labour literature.
That union leaders boast they won one isn’t proof of much, I’m afraid. You don’t get re-elected by telling members, gosh, we went on strike and all we got was this lousy tshirt. Nor is winning once in a while a sign of strength. Most unionized public sector workers have not had wages keep up with inflation for many years, and I’d call that a sign of weakness.
Unions have long organized outside of their traditional jobs and occupations. Heck, in the 1870s, the Knights of Labor would organize anyone; an 1887 article in the Quarterly Journal of Economics noted the two kinds of unions, those that organized by trade or craft and those who organized everyone. The merger movement you describe is the result of small unions being unable to stand up to larger and larger employers and then sought “economies of scale.”
That workers are ordered back to work and leaders are sometimes arrested, and sometimes disrupt people’s lives through strikes are not, in themselves, proof of militancy or radicalism or even strength.
Fun fact: in terms of numbers of workers (as a % of the labour force), days lost to strikes, and number of strikes (again, as % of work force and person-hours) 1919 still holds the record.
It tells me something about your perspective on how democracy is supposed to work versus how militant special interest lobbies like some public service unions work.
Fun fact #2: Working conditions were often horrible in 1919. They were even worse in the early days of the Industrial Revolution overseas. Unions gradually became a major force in ensuring workers’ rights, and that continued on this continent for a very long time, for which all workers should be grateful. I am not opposed to unions, whether public service unions or any other kind. I am pro-democracy, not anti-union. I support the rights of everyday people to peaceful lives and well-being and I support the powers of elected governments that ensure those things, and that oppose the forceful interference of special interests. That much should have been clear from all my earlier posts.
It was clear. It’s also clear from many of the posts that the issue of public sector workers and the right to strike is a contentious one, and we won’t resolve it or even shed much light in a forum like this, so it’s over and out from me.
The 1992 CUPE workers strike occurred after the government reneged on the terms of previously signed contracts and prohibited the union from further collective bargaining. The governments actions were appealed to the UN international labour organization, which ruled in favor of the union. So the government capitulated by, you know, actually honoring their commitments and not violating the constitutionally guaranteed rights of the workers to collective bargaining.
In 2022 the union was willing to illegally strike in Ontario over the passage of Bill 28, an act that the government itself tacitly admitted was violating the rights and freedoms of workers, as guaranteed in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, by invoking the notwithstanding clause of the Constitution. Support for CUPE was more or less universal amongst labor unions, and public back-lash was so severe that the government withdrew the bill. The up-shot of that negotiation, by the way, was a 3.59% increase in wages with no increased staffing levels, at a time when inflation was reaching 7%. Hardly a massive win.
So your two examples are basically the union announcing that it was willing to strike illegally if governments pass laws that are in violation of previously signed contracts and the constitutionally guaranteed rights of their workers. I would expect nothing less, and strongly support their right to strike in both cases, even if it was illegal.
Apparently your stance leads to an anti-civil-disobedience stance. Illegal strikes are an excellent example of what civil disobedience can look like.
A strike can be good or bad, but its legality doesn’t determine that.
Sure, the second sentence is true, but your conclusion in the first one is not. It would be foolish to deny that in the course of history, some illegal strikes have been morally justified and have helped to solidify workers’ rights. But sometimes strikes and other union tactics are just reprehensible and radical attacks on the rights of others, and it would be foolish to deny that, too.
To get down to specifics, for example, you asked for cites for some of the union thuggery I was complaining about related to the garbage strike. I gave you three, and you have yet to comment on them. Specifically:
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The unconscionable (though not necessarily illegal) harassment of the general public for engaging in the essential activity of disposing of their own garbage
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The illegal blocking of a company engaged in industrial waste disposal from accessing transfer stations – something that has absolutely nothing to do with the union’s legitimate interests. This was so egregious that not only was an injunction issued against the union, but they were required to pay legal costs to the plaintiff.
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The illegal blocking of pesticide services from the temporary dump sites that the city was forced to create because of the garbage strike. Which union action endangered public health, and again required a court order and police enforcement to get the union to back down.
Do any of those sound like morally justified civil disobedience of the kind advocated, say, by Mahatma Gandhi? Because to me, it sounds more like union thuggery.
Yeah, because I’m not nearly as invested in the case as you are. I didn’t ask you for cites, I told you the lack of them was the reason I wasn’t opining.
Now that you’ve given me cites, I think you’re way overstating the case. As just one example: the article about the injunction neither interviews the union nor explicitly states that they were blocking spraying. Given the high levels of hostility between the city and its workers, it’s possible the union was blocking spraying, but it’s also possible the city was taking out a preemptive injunction as a way to make the union look bad. Your cites don’t say.
As an aside, I really appreciate how you repeatedly remind us that you’re not anti-union. Because
otherwise
we might
get the
wrong
impression
from the rhetoric you use.
Fortunately, I’m able to determine whether you’re pro-union or anti-union without your assurances. You don’t need to reassure us as to your own impression of your stance, because all of us can draw our own conclusions. If you want to focus on the arguments and substance, that’d be fine by me!
Just as a side note, but one that is highly relevant, my disparaging comments were inspired by, or specifically directed at, the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) who have long been widely detested for their militancy and extremist actions and going far beyond their legitimate mandates. For instance, in 2016 the Ontario government overwhelmingly passed a motion declaring CUPE’s “boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign” (BDS) against Israel and in support of Palestinians to be a hate movement and called it "the new face of anti-Semitism”. It’s astounding that a public service labour union would insert itself into international affairs which are the sole purview of the federal government, and poison that government’s standing in the international community, but this is the sort of thing that CUPE habitually does.
I make no bones about the fact that I hate CUPE with a passion. I have also explicitly said several times that unions are often necessary and have done a great deal of good in securing workers’ rights. You appear to have missed it each and every time, or for some reason don’t feel it’s worth acknowledging. People can indeed make their own judgments about my stance regarding unions, and hopefully can understand that having major issues with one specific militant union with a long history of trouble-making does not equate to hating all unions.
FWIW, I might add that many of my family members have belonged to unions, even my brother who was a university professor because they have faculty unions, and another close and very sweet family member is a labour lawyer employed by a union. Implying that I’m a union-hater is not just wrong but, frankly, offensive in its implication that I know nothing of labour history.
“I’m not racist. Hey, I’ve got a lot of black friends! But you have to admit…”
Not a very productive or insightful comment, and the superficial snark is disappointing. Maybe you should try responding to actual substance. My last paragraph was admittedly not substantive, and I had a bit of hesitation about adding it at all, but I thought on this board most of us could at least tell the difference between “one of my beloved family members is a labour lawyer for a union” (and I’ve had many discussions with her about labour issues in this country) and the stereotypical racist trope about “black friends”. But I guess not. 
ETA: This is getting more heated than I had ever intended, so I’m bowing out, unless someones has some objective fact-based arguments.
Dude, when you say “I’m pro union” and then start railing about “goons” and “thugs” and all the other stuff @Left_Hand_of_Dorkness quoted, I can’t be the only one who is a little skeptical of your pro-union self identification.
- I’m not obligated to acknowledge everything.
- The substance of your posts has been overwhelmingly about two specific unions, and your negative feelings toward them. I’ve been responding to that substance. If you’d prefer people respond differently to the substance of your posts, you may find that changing that substance is effective.
- Given that you’ve used similar rhetoric about CUPE and WGA, and given the wholly justifiable and unremarkable circumstances of the WGA picket you so vociferously condemned, and given the paucity of actual malfeasance in your cites about CUPE, I’m inclined to take your remembered complaints and insinuations about CUPE with a grain of salt.