Unions

KIM BOBO writes about unions and labor:

Fifth, support the fundamental rights of all workers to organize into unions of their choice. Although Perkins wasn’t the first choice of labor unions for secretary, she overcame their hesitations with her steadfast support for workers’ rights to organize in the workplace. Elaine Chao, in contrast, has used her public voice to attack the Employee Free Choice Act, the most significant labor law reform to come along in decades.

When the economy is in shambles, it is America’s workers who take the biggest hit. Perhaps in the coming weeks and months, we will all understand better what has happened to our economy. But as we move forward as a nation in addressing the crisis, we need a secretary of labor who knows workers, cares for their concerns, and speaks up for them. Our current secretary of labor is missing in action. We need to put the “labor” back in secretary of labor.

I'm going to admit that I understand little of what was written in Bobo's commentary. Perhaps this is because I understand unions in a much different way than she does.

Unions are legal monopolies, and most of them would not exist without government using it's power to force employers to hire union employees.

Workers have always had "fundamental rights" to form and join unions. At the same time, employers used to have the right to employ who they wanted, and this included the right to not employ a member of a union.

But unions are classic examples of organizations that are subject to the logic of collective action. As such, most unions of any size would simply not exist without the use of force.

Today unions are able to use the force of government. The force of government, under certain conditions, is used to (1) force employers to employ union members and (2) force some, probably many employees, to be members of a union when they would otherwise choose not to be. In addition, government's force is also behind many instances of union's spending money on political causes and political candidates, and the money comes from some union members who would personally not support such spending because they believe it is against their own personal best interests.

It seems to me that a government that forces an employer to hire certain employees, that forces employees to be union members when they do not want to, and that forces employees to support political causes and politicians they believe are antithetical to their interests, is a government that is unjust.

I am hard pressed to understand how a Christian can support the use of force in such ways in the lives of others.

But, there is even more that concerns me. Because unions are monopolies there are two important economic implications that result from unions.

(1) Unions cause higher wages, and higher wages mean higher costs for businesses who are forced to hire employees who are union members. The higher costs of producing and supplying goods and services mean that we all pay higher prices for goods and services. Many of these goods and services are considered by many to be needs, and therefore, unions mean that people with little income find it harder to meet their consumption needs. It doesn't make sense to me for everyone to pay higher prices so that a monopoly union can gain higher wages for it's employees.

(2) Unions reduce the number of people who are employed, which of course is the same as saying that unions lead to a higher number of unemployed than would otherwise be the case. Of course, the surest way for a person to get out of poverty is to have and keep a job. Unions, by adding to the number of unemployed, mean people in poverty will find it much more difficult to escape poverty. But, there is more on this concern as well. Future prosperity and success for our country as a whole is determined by how resources are utilized today. When we have public policies that reduce the number of policies, such as using government's force to create and maintain monopolies (unions), we will have less prosperity and less economic advance in the future that we would otherwise have. And, of course, less prosperity and less economic advance in the future means fewer people are able to escape poverty in this country than would otherwise be the case.

In contrast to the assertion that when the economy is in shambles we should help unions, I would say that this is exactly the wrong policy to support, assuming of course that we are interested in seeing more people employed and fewer people in poverty.