this post was submitted on 02 Oct 2023
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Socialism

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Being in a union,” Schrager complains, “costs money.” Even beyond membership dues, “unions work by compressing wages (and often the terms of advancement) in negotiations on behalf of all employees.” This, she says, hurts more “productive” workers by dragging their wages down to a level closer to that of their “unproductive” fellow workers.

Ceilings for thee but not for me. Libertarian ideology insists that there are select, exceptional people--extraordinarily innovative or productive Randian heroes--who must be rewarded limitlessly at the expense of the plebeians. Unfortunately for them, you really have to believe yourself to be one of those exceptional people to buy into that belief system, and unions by their nature are a repudiation of it.

This type of commentary is frustrating, but the labor momentum despite this "traditional wisdom" and other factors detailed in the article is a sight to behold.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

The reward for exceptional hard work...is more work. Maybe you'll get an extra half a percent raise at the end of the year, but the increase in wages never matches inflation, even if you max out most corporate performance review scales.

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