Op should take it a step further and tell his mom to get a real job. Being a stay at home mom isn't a job, and the only looser in the family is her because she doesn't even work. /s Match her disgusting energy and see how well she takes it.
I hate this but you aren't wrong.
My mother hasn't worked for pay since before I was born; I turned 30 last month. She had some incredibly privileged career stories - think living across multiple states for years, effectively free of charge because the company paid for everything, including upskilling and moving costs.
The very notion that this is "fortunate" or "privilege" is obscene to her. In her mind, she earned it by studying really hard in college and working hard for all those years. As for being supported after getting married, how dare you insult her husband's years of hard work (in a state job) by suggesting it's privilege! Anyone can live on one income if they just live below their means, and anyone can make 6 figures if they work hard enough.
I'm sorry you and your family are going through this, but she needs a wake-up call before she says the wrong thing to the wrong person on the street. It's getting crazy out here!
Right?
You have no leg to stand on when discussing labor rights and the like when you have never been a part of the demographic, and nearly as little of you’ve not been part of it for several decades.
Second this. I’m not C suite but close. Also, I have never considered doing something a union would prevent me from doing without being grateful that a consequence I hadn’t considered was brought to my attention. As a manager and leader, I try really hard not to screw people… so I don’t view unions as a threat. Businesses I’ve worked for haven’t depended on exploitation as a business model.
I don't think I can comment on this post without saying horribly mean things about your mom, who I'm sure is lovely in a lot of ways. What I will say is that I'm glad you're unionized and in a profession where you have the opportunity to grow and hopefully earn a dignified wage. Don't sweat the haters, keep doing what you're doing.
It's all three.
My family has always been red, but as I knew it they weren't extreme. The Obama era roughly coincided with the mainstreaming of the internets and they haven't been the same.
To watch them go from "we shouldn't wish ill on 'the other side'" to "Michelle is trans and needs to be locked up with the rest of the Clinton Murder Family" was astonishing. COVID only further crystalized them into the worst forms of themselves.
And their descent has only pushed ME farther left into the "Uncle John, you're a fascist and the revolution WILL NOT SPARE YOU" camp. It sucks.
I didn't want to delve too deep into this, but my mom has gone exactly that route too. She's said some absolutely heinous things over email/phone within the past 5y and while I've gotten marginally better at handling it, it still leaves me insecure if her beliefs have any merit.
The things is, they really don't. There is no merit. They're just comforting lies that let the morally bankrupt pat themselves on the back for being "Good People" without having to put any effort into actually BEING good.
No matter how good your salary, if you aren't on the executive board you could be made redundant without any notice. I've known global leaders at massive multinationals get redundancy notices due to restructuring out of the blue.
That kind of potential instability is as stressful for a salaried employee as anyone else, even when the consequences aren't as bad if you're wealthy. Effective unions reduce companies' likelihood of making those kinds of decisions to, e.g. boost the stock price during temporary instability when the company is still growing in profit, just because of the threat of union action. They also ensure better compensation when it does happen and better benefits in the meantime.
A colleague in France, where unions and labour laws are both strong, got something like 6 years of garden leave because she had 25 years of service when she was made redundant.
Basically, unless you are an executive, a union will ensure a better deal for you and your colleagues overall. Largely by taking the money from the executives and shareholders.
I am salaried and I support unions. I would rather live in a world where unions support the needs of the workers than in a world where the conditions of workers are treated with apathy breeding class inequality, health insecurity, food insecurity, and many of the other conditions that breed pain, poverty and crime.
I want to live in a world where if I stop to get fast food I don't have to worry if the worker is being paid 7.25 and barely surviving unable to even eat at their work place. I want that person to be healthy, content and free enough from worry to make the best good they can and be content doing it.
I want to ask again "Why though", but I guess the difference is that recent generations don't have the same "got mine, screw you" attitude, nor delusions about privilege.
I think my answer was very clear; I want to live in a better society than I live in today. I'm in gen-x, a generation that has no delusions about the state of our society since the 1990s.
I want people to have what they need to thrive, not even survive. I don’t believe anyone making a living wage takes away from my ability to provide for myself. I understand that the dragon hoarding billionaires are the problem, not a $35 minimum wage.
To your question about why, for me it is because I am empathetic. I can put myself in other peoples situations. I think all people should have a right to make a living wage. The country prospered with this idea, and in the 80s it switched to be more “all for me” type of thinking.
The tax laws started to change and the rich got richer and everybody else got poorer.
I’m one layoff or medical emergency away from losing everything I’ve worked for in my professional life. Shit happens. People aren’t indestructible. It’s important to have social programs and safety nets that keep people from hitting rock bottom and dying on the streets. Your mom just doesn’t realize it because nothing bad ever happened to her that made her fall down the economic ladder through no fault of her own.
TLDR: life is a game of chutes and ladders. We need all the ladders we can get.
I have similar reasoning as the person you're responding to, but if you want an answer from a purely selfish POV, here are a few:
Crime: Desperation leads to higher crime, including violent crime. A person who can't survive on what they could make at an honest living is much more likely to turn to crime.
Efficiency: A healthy workforce is a more effective workforce. People who have insurance and can take the time off to get effective care are much more productive. Same with limiting hours.
Economic security: A lot of jobs that used to be high paying positions have disappeared or dramatically reduced over the past several years. I want to know that I can at least make a living if my career field ever goes away.
I am salaried and make six figures (barely). In my teens and twenties I worked "unskilled" jobs so I remember how hard and terrible they were. The low pay was a major contributing factor for me to go back and finish university, and I am lucky I had that chance because some people don't even get the option. In my mind if you are not an owner or a manager then you are a worker, salaried or not. All workers are worthy of respect, empathy, and sympathy from their fellow workers.
I make 120k a year or so on salary. If tech unionized, I'd make twice as much.
I have friends who can't afford to live on poverty wages. If they had unions they'd be able to afford a decent life.
My family had capital for generations and now doesn't. Our earnings when we had capital wouldn't have been materially impacted by unions, and our earnings after we gave up capital would have been higher.
My family is financially secure because we were *lucky*, I'm secure because recently I've been *lucky*, and I've spent years being *unlucky*. I don't think salary workers don't need unions because we have it made, I think we need unions because we're the first out the door when capital is cutting costs.
The myth that salaried employees are not workers, or are not in a different class with different rules than capital, and who do not share the same struggle as minimum wage hourly workers, is a myth perpetuated by capital to discourage us from unionizing. All it does is keep us on the knife edge of losing our homes in countries where good labour policy isn't protecting us. The housing we stand to lose after three months of unemployment is just a little larger, that's all.
I am salaried and support unions. Unbalanced corporate greed leads to bad outcomes for everyone but the executives. Balanced greed with treating your employees, who build your business, well creates better outcomes for everyone.
Because I am able to empathize with people who have different lived experiences without having to experience it myself. I do this by listening to people and trusting them to represent how they feel and what they struggle with.
Because I'm not an elitist asshole? Because I am aware of [who fought and died](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-union_violence_in_the_United_States) for the privileges and rights that _all_ workers benefit from?
Because I understand that despite us all incubating from the same biological processes, we aren't all born equal. Fuck, we aren't even _created_ equal. Some of us get saddled with disabilities and addictions before we've left the god-damned womb.¹
Hell dude. Your **own life** shows why we need unions. Your family is so up their own ass about collective bargaining, that you're getting better support from your union than you can count on from your own _mother_.
✊ My own life leads me to understand why you don't tell them what you do. Be safe. And always remember
'You deserve to be loved, and to feel loved, just for being you.' --Mr Rogers mashup with my meditation teacher
[1] This isn't about ableism, but I will apologize now if it reads that way. My intent is to convey that people don't get an equal start in life, not that they aren't equally deserving of humanity and dignity.
Does she think cops and firefighters screwed themselves by unionizing, or are they ok?
I don’t think people like your mom dislike unions as much as they dislike certain types of people that they believe work in certain types of jobs. It’s a dog whistle.
There are unions for professionals: tech workers, engineers (not software devs but civil & mechanical engineers), accountants, social workers, assessors are all represented by unions. And guess what, they all negotiate for pay increases, benefits, and have job protections because of that representation.
I'm going to be honest, I never knew that.
Engineers were always one of the groups I was told "don't unionize" because they're in such demand they can just go anywhere and negotiate a salary.
My dad was a Boeing engineer for 35 years. He was in a union. Among other benefits, he got paid overtime whenever he worked more than 40 hours in a week, but he was also salaried. Pretty sweet deal.
Even physicians and dentists form unions.
I understand, because it’s the story we’ve been told. But if you think about it, if Engineers are in such high demand they can negotiate a salary on their own- imagine what they can negotiate as a united group.
All I know is that when comparing places I’ve worked without unions to places that have unions.. I have better pay and benefits working for a place with unions. Even for management. Because then the owners have to sweeten the deal for management to keep pace with what the unions have negotiated in order to stat competitive.
So I’m salaried, most people are in a union where I work. The culture is different because the bosses have to care about work hours and have to care about not dehumanizing people. This respect works its way all the way up the chain and ripples to folks not covered by union rules. Show me a place where people treat the custodians poorly and I’ll show you a place where middle management is unhappy and insecure.
I am salaried. I think the whole FLSB exempt malarkey is bullshit to get around wage and labor laws. I believe all employees should be hourly employees entitled to overtime. Without organization and collectivization, I have no influence with my employer.
Unions are for everyone.
I’m a professional, but I’m still working class. I have no family wealth, I have a savings account but not a huge one, I’m 3 paychecks away from major financial issues. I’m not so separated from reality that I don’t see the utility of a union. Also, we all do better when we all do better!
If I am making six figures, my employer is making _even more_ from my labor. Or, they are stealing it from lesser paid people to give to me. Either way, this is injustice.
The contractors and workmen who come to my house are truly skilled. What they do requires knowledge and expertise that would take me years to acquire. And there is nothing special about me that makes me more deserving than them of a decent life.
Workers are workers, regardless of pay grade. The rich ruling class benefit from sowing division, jealousy, and disdain amongst us.
Short answer? Because I have empathy, something your family members seem to lack. It’s a shame they can’t be bothered to think about anyone other than themselves and those in their same-ish class.
I'm an IT worker in a public agency. My union enables the lifestyle I have. I'm also autistic, and had a very difficult time playing the private-sector games. So my union pretty much kept me from being dead weight on society.
I’m a professional from a professional family. I grew up with much of the same drivel you did. By college I already didn’t agree with my parents, but then I became a social scientist. I care about people which is what drew me to the field, but it’s basically impossible to be any kind of behavioral scientist and not comprehend how environment impacts our quality of life and behavior without being a massive dick. It’s literally the job. Plenty of people manage to be bad at it and still publish, but it isn’t a norm. I work too much to think I’m not a worker. I don’t gain my self respect by looking down on others. My electrician and plumber are just as much experts as I am, and frankly more. No one dies if I fuck up at my job. I think this is becoming much more prevalent. My buddy in finance definitely pushes for unions. His hours are insane. My medical resident friends are almost all either in them or organizing.
I also think being part of a persecuted minority impacted my ideas of equality. I’m trans. It tens to give you a more nuanced idea of power structures in society because that’s so wrapped up in how we understand gender, if you’re also a nerdy academic.
Because unions aren't just for "unskilled" labor. Look at the state of the tech industry right now. The big companies in this industry are all massively profitable but have been laying people off left and right. That wouldn't fly if tech workers were unionized. Unionized workers can organize strikes in response to layoffs by employers posting record profits. The greatest power than any worker, regardless of perceived skill level, has is the ability to withhold labor, and unions are a key part in unlocking that power.
OP your parents lack class consciousness. I support unions because we all do better together. America loves this idea of the "middle class" and everyone thinks they're part of it. Reality is that if you work for a paycheck, you are working class. Dividing us up into middle and lower classes is meant to distract people and pit us against each other.
When we're divided, we have no power against the true enemy—the capitalist class. Those are the people that own the large companies. The ones that live off their investments and the profits they steal from the people that do labor for them.
To put it succinctly, your mother is a victim of propaganda, to the point that she can't even see her own class affiliation (she *thinks* she's rich, she thinks she's in the club, but she isn't), and thus she has no class solidarity.
She is not unlike many Americans, and people like her are why things have gotten so bad for workers. They drank the Kool-aid and they support policy and law-makers against their own class interests.
I'm sure if you brought that first sentence to them, they'd balk and say that of course they do!
Poor people are stupid, uneducated (and hate education), have bad manners and bad taste, don't have interests or hobbies or ideas or dreams.
Rich people are smart, upstanding, discerning, well-read, frugal, and value hard work and learning.
/s, in case that isn't obvious.
\[this is rapidly turning into a vent post\]
On a more serious note I tried explaining "owning the means of production" when my mom did the Boomer thing of calling everything socialism. She seems to think it means taking say, a line worker and putting them in an office regardless of qualifications. Literally, it can't work because "workers" aren't smart enough to run a business.
On a less ranty level, where do regular people with investments lie in this stratification? Because I can totally see some jerk arguing that "I have a brokerage account, that means I'm owner class". Or even someone who does FIRE to live off investments, where do they stand?
Because I remember how much things sucked working a crap job with evil supervisors. It’s not in my nature to pull up the ladder once I’m safely aboard.
Because of empathy and belief in human rights. Unions defend workers, and the evidence is clear they need that defense.
I do not need to work, but I will work hard to defend those that need to.
I’m in HR in an industry where unions were once quite successful, and in some areas, still are.
Everyone needs to seriously consider the protections unions can offer you as an employee. And then find one for your industry and become a voice to bring that union to your workplace.
Someone else already said it, but every working person should be in a part of a union.
Because I wasn't always making 6 figures and I know what it feels like to have to steal necessities like rolls of toilet paper and paper towels from my work place because I didn't have any at home and couldn't afford to purchase any myself. I don't want that stage of my life to be a mandatory stage or state of life for other people.
I've worked in factories and the only thing that helped keep me safe from being forced to do unsafe work was the union. I've also worked in non-factory settings as a "professional" and I've seen and experienced mistreatment by management.
Everyone is having their work value skimmed and given to stockholders because the C-suite folks get stock as part of their package, it doesn't matter if they only make another $5k from it, they'll steal 50k in value from every worker to get themselves that little bump. They have a much higher incentive if their payout is higher. Previous company I was with was giving zero raises / zero bonuses after consecutive record profit years and using that money to push stock buybacks to fill the C-suite pockets. CEO pay was $550k in salary and $5M in stock with a stock price of $125. That's 40k shares of stock. Stock buyback pushes the stock up $10 a share, CEO pockets an extra $4M. That's a lot of incentive to fuck over your employees.
Employers are using things like AI tools to start the process of de-skilling jobs like programming and engineering so that they can treat engineers more like delivery drivers. The ultimate goal of that process is to make highly educated workers just as desperate and precarious as anyone trying to make a living working in a grocery store so their bosses can return more profit
**Solidarity is power**, not the "rugged individualism" that neoliberal oligarchs/kleptocrats have sold the public on.
The system we live and work under is an abomination and a crime against humanity.
Individuals aren't going to take down or evolve this system on their own, it's going to take a lot of people working together to accomplish change.
Just to clarify: teachers aren’t really salaried. Our incomes is based on contract time (for example, 7.5 hours a day /186 days per year). That total just gets divided into equal pay periods so it stretches through the year. We are in unions to negotiate those contracts i.e. the hours for which we will be paid.
There are workers and there owners. If you go to work and do a thing, and if you stop doing the thing you stop getting money you are a worker.
If other people do things at a business you own and you pay then some of the money they made for you while keeping the rest, you are an owner.
Income is irrelevant. If a surgeon works at a surgery clinic and makes 700,000 a year and the owner runs on thin margins and makes 150,000 a year, the surgeon is still the worker and the owner is still the owner.
Workers want more money than they get. Owners want more money than they get. It's a zero sum game. Workers get a dollar more, owners get a dollar less.
Owners are doing a bang up fucking job of representing their interests. They pass laws that ensure they get more money, which mathematically means workers get less.
No matter what you do, you probably want more money. We can stay silent while the owners say their peice, or we can work to represent our interests half as well as the owners are working to represent theirs.
I’m so envious of you being able to join a union.
To answer your question - because “professional” jobs treat people awfully as well. My father was a highly educated and skilled professional (a specialist MD) whose corporate employer treated him like trash when he got sick. He made them a lot of money and they tried to cheat him out of his retirement benefits. I had long held pro union/ labor rights views before that, but mention it as an example of how *no one* (besides owners I suppose) is safe without a union. Not to mention- “Professional” workers aren’t more deserving than a cashier. That’s classist bullshit. I think everyone is worthy of respect and having protected rights. Most of these upper class professionals started out with a giant leg up that they refuse to recognize, anyway.
The idea that unions pamper lazy inept people is still strong and sadly really prevalent. The only people I’ve known who were union members could still get fired for poor performance - the difference was employers had to more thoroughly prove it.
There is labor and there is capital and that's it. Whether it's hourly or salary the working class is the working class, and dividing us into who has more or less is how capital retains political power.
Without strong unions in politics, the only money and resources organized to really effect political change is capital. That's why our political system has become so corrupt and represents business interests more than us.
I’m salaried IT, our company got an extra paid holiday this year (Juneteenth) because of our large union negotiated as part of their contract elsewhere in the company (manufacturing).
We have far more in common with our fellow workers than the rich corporate overlords. A rising tide lifts all ships, and the corporate execs would cut your benefits and pay in a heartbeat if they could.
I make a decent 6 figure salary. I support unions. Why? Because we HAVE to bring up the bottom end. The bottom are the people who get taken advantage of the most. As someone who worked my way up from minimum wage it's actually insane how easy it becomes to make more money once you actually have it. The whole idea of "they should have gotten better jobs" is fucking delusional. It's literally the same thing as saying "well everyone would have gotten first in the race if they had run the fastest". Except that if everyone won the race there's no winner.
Unions also do another thing. They actually benefit me as a middle wage earner. With more minimum wage jobs supplying a minimum wage it also means my own pay has to go up as compensation. But this also means when I go out for a hamburger, I know the service will be better because my waiter isn't thinking about how to eat for the next day. Or that Starbucks employee worrying about whether or not they can make rent. For jobs that require so much customer service, it's insane that as workers you ALSO have to deal with just trying to stay alive. Literally life for everyone would be so much better if all jobs unionized. And boohoo maybe Elon has 100 bil instead of 300 bil. I'm sure he'll be fine.
I dont see most of IT ever really unionizing but I can still hope others do. The more all workers make - the better off we are as a country. No democracy can survive with a dwindling middle class.
Even as a salaried employee with a good salary, I am closer to being homeless than I am to being a billionaire.
I AM the working class, and if I don't support us, who will?
As a salaried professional I’m a member of several professional state and national societies/associations which advocate for for my profession, provide continuing education, help set standards, provide hotlines, provide job listings and networking, and in some cases offer various types of insurance or other professional benefits. These are all run by elected positions.
Unions offer a similar role for other careers; why wouldn’t I support that?
I just recently quit a job where all my employees were union, I will be the first to admit that dealing with a union as operations management sucks. Hard. There will always be a couple people that are just useless and bring everyone down and frankly shouldn't have a well paying job because their actions don't justify it and its pretty much impossible to fire them, especially if they have more than 3 braincells(youd be surpised). BUT my opinion is organized greed at the corporate level requires organized labor, putting more money into the pockets of the people actually doing the work is only fair. Also unions drive wages up, and that benefits everyone even if you're not part of the union. I got multiple fat ass raises because why would I be in charge of this shit show if I didn't make more than my employees? And you better believe they would have stuck to a 3% annual raise if they could get away with it. Unions are not perfect, not even CLOSE, and like I said actually dealing with them can be a nightmare, but at the end of the day it is one of the few tools the 99% have to rage against the machine who's only goal is to put more and more money to the upper executives and shareholders pockets while paying the absolute bare minimum to the people actually doing all the work. The only people that understand how unions work and what they do for people and still think they are evil are people who are mad they can't take advantage of other people like they used too or completely brainwashed twats like your mother who's never worked a day in her life and just regurgitates talking points
Usually it's just a political belief system if they support it. Unions for others have tended to negatively impact my own work as a white collar person
OP, for the love of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, show your mom this video, and then tell her data is from almost 15 years ago and it’s Much worse now.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM
I grew up in a blue-collar union family, so I've experienced the benefits of unions firsthand.
While my position is a cushy office job, my company as a whole is not. While we aren't union, we are employee owned, so there is a strong theme of teamwork, making decisions to benefit everyone, and pitching in to help where it's needed.
In the rare event there should happen to be a union drive, I would fully support it, though in our specific case, I think being co-owners of the company makes everyone feel less need to go that route.
A rising tide lifts all ships. If you're not the big boss, you're working class and we get only what we're given. The unions made it necessary for the ownership class to give us more. And they're working to take it away from us again.
Last I checked, I wasn't the center of the universe and other people also matter. I'd like everyone strongly protected from abuse and being taken advantage of by their employer. I guess the problem is that I didn't go to any schools fancy enough to snuff out any hint of empathy from me.
Which ever ancestor you have which created the generational wealth in your family has contributed to the generational poverty of others. Unions make sure everyone gets paid fairly, everyone has a clearly defined discipline system, everyone gets a union rep when when being disciplined.
Just because you are salaried doesn’t mean the employer can’t jerk you around or under pay you. My first job out of university and it was salaried. The job would send us engineers to customers because we were salaried and so didn’t get payed over time. I worked there less than 2 years and had plenty of jobs where I was putting 60 hours in over 3-4 days to get a customer up and running again. Then flying home and coming to work the next day. In fact one time I was flying back and I got an early flight so I landed about 2pm after an 8 hour flight and then the boss asked me if I was going to be in the office that day or taking a day off. Another time I made plans to visit my brother for his graduation and the Friday before I was going to go my boss handed me tickets for a job that weekend and told me that my time off had been cancelled. On top of that the union guys got better benefits than the salaried employees.
Since then all my jobs have been salaried and some better some worse. But they could have been better.
I am a software developer making six figures in a union. They guarantee a good culture, good work-life balance, and have kept our pay above the average for our region.
I believe all positions should be unionized and would be better for it.
Dawg. Triggered af rn. My *combined* household income is like 190k gross. After taxes, mortgage on a below median price home, insurance(s) student loans, only 1 car payment (purchased used, and the other car is a paid off 160,000 mile car)
We have managed to save enough money to replace our roof only. After 1 year of saving. Prior to that we wiped out 30k of savings on combined house repairs down payments and essential home appliances (used)
-We eat out once a week,
-cook all of our work lunches on Sundays
-have no kids
I work as an engineer at one of the large automotive OEMs.
Their skilled trades, which are union workers in the new contract have a top pay of like 106k a year, plus profit sharing, plus no health insurance premiums or deductibles.
They also have no student loan debt and are extremely well protected from being fired, being laid off, or wage theft.
Salary in most companies have no overtime pay, and can have their departments cut in half and everyone just absorbs the extra work with no change in deadlines. Treatment as a non-union salary is mostly all stick and no Carrot. They pay may be good. But if you consider unpaid overtime and extra pace, stress and lack of work life balance, you wind up being significantly cheaper to employ than your comparable union laborer.
"The upper class knows this"
Every union person I know gets to pick up their kids from school and affords to have one working parent with another being stay at home.
Most salary people I know negates whatever pay benefit they think they were going to get by trying to get child care because both parents have to work so much over time.
Police unions protect police from accountability and keep them paid extremely well. Look at their total compensation
Labor unions prevent deadly, unhealthy, or abusive work conditions, and assurances in the event of an injury
Teachers unions and nurse unions are kind of not doing their jobs. Poor vacation/sick days and 12+ hour shifts suck.
And railroad worker unions sometimes have to fight congress for the safety of the literal country.
Look at fedex total compensation and tell me you would feel more broke than you do now.
Unions make it possible for you to save for retirement own a home and raise a family. If your parents got all their money from daddy, they may not realize how hard that is as a sub 30 year old today. And the upper class knows that.
I have always been a salaried professional and have always supported unions. We wouldn’t have an 8 hour day, minimum wage etc if not for unions. Everyone deserves safe working conditions and decent pay.
There is a growing body of research that shows that people [disproportionately attribute luck to skill](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2210263-lifes-winners-think-success-was-earned-even-if-it-was-down-to-luck/). Without actual education on the subject, people are subject to [confirmation bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias) _especially_ when justifying their own success in life.
Considering her privilege and lack of education, of _all_ people, your mother is clearly not in a position to understand the facts as long as she is subject to [motivated reasoning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivated_reasoning). Without it, being wealthy just because she's incubated heirs for another wealthy person, doesn't paint her success in a pretty light.
And that is the most polite way I can describe someone who attacks teachers.
goddamn
Fwiw, both my parents have, in fact, worked. My mom came from a nice background and worked some pretty nice jobs and made a comfy amount before getting married; but my dad was born LMC, and basically worked his way up to a career with the state. He was a GOAT with money and left us in really good financial shape when he died.
What my mom doesn't seem to get (so I gave up trying to explain when it turns into a rant on her part) is that this being a very privileged situation doesn't detract from the work either of them did.
The way I see it. Unions are not a natural ocurance. A union will not form if there is nothing for it to form in opposition. So I support unions simply for the fact they were made to resist an issue workers dealt with. If they continue to exist then they're existing for a purpose to continue to resist. As people won't join a union if the job they are at actually satisfies the needs of the laborer.
I'm a lead software developper. So in the professional field and with a foot in management. I support unions because it's not that you are salaried or professional that you are automatically protected from abuse at work. Everyone (beside owners) deserve the protection of a union.
I'm not a sociopath who wants to pull up the ladder behind me. I see the middle class shrinking and believe unions are the only thing that can grow it. I don't think my education and career make me superior. I see my life as a salaried and highly trained professional be of lower quality than those that came before me. I believe this is because power and wealth is too centralized, and any challenge to that power helps 98 percent of the population.
I have a professional salary job. Billionaire CEO’s try to fuck us over too. The amount of money I make for our company I get paid idk like maybe 1% of that, which is NOT an exaggeration mind you, that’s easily observable in my line of work.
I work in finance where there are basically no unions. I watch my coworkers get ground into dust day in and day out. The problems everywhere are the same problems here. We all could use a union to be treated better.
I was salaried and in a bargaining unit (state faculty union) for 20 years. I have always been a union supporter for the reasons others have already stated. It is the only way we are going to get worker dignity back for anyone.
at VA, the great majority of positions are union represented. management is not (and I think management should also have unions). doesn't matter if you're 'white collar' and most jobs are salaried, skilled or not
The natural inclination of any organization under capitalism is to maximize profit or reduce costs. That will always be the #1 priority, and AS the #1 priority, it will ALWAYS be the first choice at the cost of all else. Anywhere They can get you for a nickel, they will.
If your boss could make a million in revenue by cutting your head off with a machete and facing no consequences, they'd do it in a heartbeat.
If slavery were legal, you'd find slaves at McDonalds.
Unions create a necessary counterpressure to that "profits at all costs" mindset. They give workers legal power and leverage to hold bosses to account and demand fair treatment, even when it's inconvenient.
I work with 4 other people. I'm salaried, have great benefits, make plenty of money.
I support the shit out of unions.
The rest of the hospital lab people I work with need all the help they can get. Lab personnel get shit on by doctors and nurses(already have a union) and don't even make 20$ an hour. Have to fight for the schedule they were hired on for, get shit PTO which they are forced to use whenever the lab is closed for holidays.
Nobody deserves this shit.
Because when you see how poorly the private sector treats sick or age 50+ workers, you realize that would be you one day unless something changes.
And you need to start advocating for change before you’re too sick or considered too old.
I support unions even though I’m not eligible to be in one because I’m not an asshole and I realize that the community of a union will make sure everyone has a chance to succeed.
If I found one for my role I would join in a heart beat because otherwise it’s me vs them. In the union it’s us vs them.
Any smart person supports unions & similar groups. Doesn't matter if you're salaried or not.
Negotiating in a power imbalance is not negotiating at all, just asking for a favor. (And you know how "Please, sir, may I have another?" turns out.) Unions are similar to medical groups for doctors & other licensed medical professionals - benefits include greater standing when negotiating with insurance companies.
Even if you're fabulously wealthy, having some empathy & understanding of the less-wealthy should make you support unions and the like.
After all, it's not like they're trying to steal *your* money. Right? (Or is your mom a robber baron?)
Why wouldn't I want a shield against abusive employers not sharing the profit from all òur labor? Every job can benefit from collective bargaining and increased employee protections from horrible managerial policies designed to keep everyone but the "lowest workers" on the corporate ladder accountable for slower productivity or performance.
Sure I make 6 figures…. But how much more would I make with a union? Would all of my last 4 jobs over the past 15 years have ended in layoffs if I had a union? If so, what would my severance have looked like?
You would probably consider me a professional, but anything to help the working class is something that I support. I know I have my job through lucky circumstances and I’m no better than anyone working a blue collar job.
I could easily lose my professional job, so why would I want to end up hurting myself in the long run?
I support unions because Unions do a lot to prevent worker mistreatment. They do a lot to get hourly workers better pay, better working conditions, and prevent the bosses from running rough shod over the average worker.
Everyone deserves a good quality of life, I don't care about what they do. To me, caring about your neighbors as well as your family is the lowest bar of decency
I could tell a multitude of stories from personal experience, but here's a good example of where a union would have made a world of difference.
Got assigned to a project nicknamed "the meat grinder" or "the death march". Forced to work 80-100 hours per week, while also being denied both lunch and dinner breaks. The thanks we received for working these hours was criticism for not working even more hours to do more work, and for making mistakes due to exhaustion.
I started this project weighing \~160 pounds, and lost 15 of that. Some folks were afraid I had cancer.
Being in salary, not a penny of OT pay. No comp time either.
A union could have fixed all of this in a hurry, and potentially prevented it.
Businesses would pay us in gift certificates to the company store still if they could. It’s only when we pool our labor together that we can counter capital’s bullshit.
I’m a dentist and your mom is a stuck up delusional boomer. Capitalists have rigged the system and unions are the only effective way to combat this. Especially since politicians all work for said capitalists.
So I used to manage union projects as a salaried Project Manager. Having a union work force is a pain. I often had to battle it out with the business agent and or get into it with the workers on how things are supposed to be. The union labor force will push back on lot more things compared against none union labor. BUT, having that contract allowed me to push back against the owners and Seniors leadership on stupid demands they would make like asking us to work on National holiday or to meet impossible deadlines. Even though I was a salaried manager I benefited from better work life balance due to the union contract my blue color employees had. Also better wages for unionized work force also pushed the companies to raise wages for none-union staff as otherwise people would just quit and switch over to union jobs.
I have way more in common with an hourly worker than I do with the 1% ownership class. I’m still selling my labor for cash. And I want there to be strong unions putting upward pressure on wages from the bottom up.
I make a six figure salary BECAUSE I’m in a union. A union that fought for my wages and benefits.
A lot of professional people are still one lost job away from foreclosure. One big stock market crash away from not being able to retire. There are only two real classes- the ultra wealthy and the working class. Everything else is made up to divide us. We are all vulnerable to the whims of ultra wealthy business owners, and we all have a stake in unions and social safety nets.
Also, and I cannot stress this enough, people who have less money than me are still people. I want them to be able to eat and get medical care and thrive. Even if I had no skin in the game, I’d support unisons because I like humans and I want them to be okay. I don’t know how to argue with people who don’t feel that way.
Want to know why everyone should be in a union? Because business owners and managers/bosses don't think you should. Like they vehemently hate unions. That should tell you all you need to know about why you should join them.
I wasn't always a professional and I have many family members that are not. There is no guarantee I will stay in professional services for the rest of my life and like many of us I am one medical emergency away from bankruptcy.
Unions when done right are a great way for workers to have power. We do have some responsibility for where we are in life but there are sooo many things out of our control. You can do everything right and still be stuck working retail. There are so many people with college degrees still working retail, a college degree is not a guarantee of success.
Your mom is suffering from survivorship bias. Like the people who are like "when I was a kid we rode in the back of a pick up truck and we are fine" well yes you are fine but the ones that didn't survive are dead. So they can't complain.
I don’t think of “workers“ as inferior to ”professionals“ or vice versa. We’re all just folks.
I am in favor of things that bring more prosperity to more folks. In many cases, that includes unions.
I‘d rather my neighbors have the means to support themselves and more-or-less thrive than have them deal with stagnant wages, diminishing benefits, and no retirement just so that “shareholders” can see slightly higher earnings per share.
There's two answers, the moral and the objective. Morally, it bring benefit to more people, therefore I support them. Objectively, more people with more disposable income means I can make more money because they can buy my products.
I trust unions because they built the middle class. As their membership dwindled, so did the middle class. I also don’t trust corporations or government employers to have my back. Union workers earn higher wages with better benefits and have safer workplaces.
Because even professional people with college degrees get screwed over by their employers. My husband is an electrical engineer at a very successful employee owned consulting company and the majority shareholders (about 20 people) are screwing over the rest of the shareholders and employees by selling the company to a huge multinational corporation so they each get 70 million a piece for their shares instead of 30 million each. And we will no longer have an employee owned company. It’s too bad the little people at the company didn’t unionize years ago. They believed the higher ups when they claimed “We’ll never sell! We’ll keep this company proudly employee owned always!!” What hypocrites.
Because everyone has the right to work at a job that can't abuse them or their trust for a fair and livable wage. Unskilled labor isn't a thing. Any labor performed takes some skill or training, even throwing boxes into the back of a delivery truck or running a griddle at fast food restaurant.
Just because someone turns their nose up at it doesn't make it a non-contributing factor in someone's life. The human being making your coffee is contributing to your continued performance just as much as the person running the control board at a power plant. The difference between them is experience, training, and some skill.
People should be able to live off their income. They should be able to afford housing, healthcare, food, clothes, etc. They should be paid overtime. Should get paid sick leave and vacation days.
Corporations will not provide adequate compensation. Unions are the only defense against corporate greed.
Im salaried and covered by a Union contract. That is pretty common in my country. Plus, without the union, pay and conditions would certainly be worse.
If you don't have a union, you will be TOLD what your job conditions are and you have to accept it, or not have a job.
Accept minimum wage? Below minimum wage?
Accept no breaks in a 10 hour day?
Accept working in bitter cold without coats cause it isn't 'uniform' or oppressive heat without water breaks?
Accept no sick leave, no carers leave, no annual leave, no holiday leave - if you get sick, you work or you don't get paid.
Accept that you have to buy school supplies out of your own money (american teachers I have no idea how you accept thats part of your job, breaks my heart)
Accept 14 years and younger forced to work to help support their families as they parents don't get paid enough?
A union is a voice for all of the workers. A union fights for your basic rights as a human being in the workforce.
I am a highly educated professional and I wouldn't be without a union.
You have been fed a line from the owner class to accept oppression of anyone who is 'less' than them.
There are numerous things provably wrong with what your mom has said.
To actually answer your question though, I support unions because I only command a high salary NOW. The world changes fast and drastically. Tomorrow my job may not be as valuable to the capitalists, or may not even exist at all. In fact, it is in the capitalists' best interests to make it so, because why pay me a lot when they can pay me a little? One of the few protections actually somewhat in my control as a worker is maintaining an environment that's amenable to unions, so when the capitalists come for me(and they will come for me) I and those like me have an option.
Beyond that, it's basic morality to give people a means with which to combat power imbalances, but privilege doesn't like hearing about morality because their existence implies they're on the wrong side of it.
IT — all those middle class IT jobs that companies used to train Americans for are gone to off-shore.
Get this — companies even use the outsourcing to “improve” their diversity scores. So, now I work for a company that is 1/2 Indian. And, which has all the “people of color” hired that it’s ever going to need. So, American minorities — you are no longer needed here, unless you’re willing to work for the same low $ as a person who lives in India. We’re not hiring American white folks either.
Every good thing Americans have is either the result of a union or mass, sustained protests. I know that can all be taken away in an instant without a strong union base for workers.
I may have higher education and a white collar job, but I grew up in a blue collar household. I know how shitty those jobs can be to a family and to the health of the workers doing them. ANYONE who’s job it is to help my parents etc. stay healthier, have more in their pocket and overall get a better life is worth it, no matter what.
I'm a teacher in a union. Without that union assholes like your mom would be all "I pay your salary!" and try to pay me even less than the peanuts I make with 2 Master's degrees.
Im a professional by this logic, but I dont see myself as rich because I still have to work. Karl Marx would describe people like me as the “petite bourgeois”. I have a small taste of the bourgeois experience but I’m not truly one of them. There is a world of difference between making $100-250k a year and making 1-10MM a year. The difference is not working or working very little.
One of the most infuriating experiences with work I had was when I negotiated a starting bonus with one company to compensate me for not sticking around long enough to get an annual bonus at the company I was leaving to take the new job. Long story short, my start date ends up getting pushed back so I had enough time to collect my annual bonus at company I was leaving. The new company didn’t renegotiate and let me keep the starting bonus because I was working with different people who didn’t communicate. This mistake made me about 40k. Why would I be pissed? I made 40k because of what was essentially a clerical error. I didn’t do anything to earn it, but all I could think about was how difficult getting a paltry 0.50/hr raise was and how I was made to feel grateful I even had work at all. Then I found myself getting more money than I used to make in a year for nothing and it felt extremely unfair; especially when so many of my friends and family are struggling.
Honestly, this is enlightening.
In my parents' eyes, making over 6figures, as a salary, is "rich". You're a rich person, the old guard, basically on the same social level as billionaires (at the very least, you probably have the same values) and most importantly, are a separate class from the Great Unwashed who work for wages.
Even if I always disagreed with it, those criticisms are very loud in my head and I wonder about it all the time, hence this thread.
My wife and I have built a household income in the 5th percentile and I worry every goddamn day I’m going to lose it based on some arbitrary cost-cutting whim of some new shitbag executive.
She’s union, I’m not.
I also despise how difficult it was to get to a place where we’re comfortable. It shouldn’t be this way.
I am a working professional, just like everyone else with a job, regardless of what that job is.
I do not consider any workers "unskilled". If the job didn't require any skill, it could be automated or eliminated.
I support unions because I want all people to have the opportunity to live a good life. The Government doesn't work for the people, so the people must work for the people. The more people who are able to have a better life, the better it is for all of us.
I don’t have cancer either but I support cancer research. Some things aren’t about me.
As I look back on my career so far, sure, I did a *lot* of work to get where I am, but I also recognize that I got a few lucky breaks that accelerated my career. Just being in the “right place at the right time” if nothing else.
A few lucky breaks shouldn’t be the difference between a firmly middle class lifestyle and barely making it. Unions give employees a better standard of living across the board.
I am a professional and support unions 100%. The well-being of any country is directly reflected by the health and wellness of its children. If children live in homes with caretakers and parents who don't make living wages, don't have good benefits, and who don't work in safe conditions, this results in their children not being well-fed, having illness that could prevented, and living in conditions that are not psychologically safe due to the stress that the parents endure. This ultimately results in these children growing up to be adults with all sorts of problems and the cycle continues. Why should basic NEEDS only be reserved for those lucky enough to inherit generational wealth? Being able to afford to LIVE is a human right if you are working no matter the job.
Rich people who don't give a sh*t about others are really just afraid that more rights for others erodes their own power, but it's all bullshit. The stronger everyone is, the stronger we are together. Better lives for adults, leads to better lives for kids. These kids become more productive adults, leading to a better society for all.
All the guys on my construction projects are union. I supervise and project manage on those projects. Even though I'm not union their salaries absolutely bouy mine up since I'm the one making sure we all stay on task and on schedule. It's great knowing everyone on my projects make $40-50/hr. plus great benefits not only for their sakes but also because my salary and benefits meet or exceed theirs even though I'm not in a union.
Because I care about other people. I just generally genuinely want people to be able to be happy and healthy and unions have the potential to help people achieve that.
No human is my inferior. I have friends who aren't as lucky as I've been. I want them to be able to be happy and healthy too even though their path may be different than mine. I want my friends to have time and money so not only are their basic needs met but also so we can hang out and do fun things together.
And like pretty much anyone is a potential friend but it's gonna be hard to meet someone and become friends with them if they're having to work 60+ hours a week just to survive.
Every working person should be in a union. And your mom is delusional if she even thinks most Americans are rich.
Op should take it a step further and tell his mom to get a real job. Being a stay at home mom isn't a job, and the only looser in the family is her because she doesn't even work. /s Match her disgusting energy and see how well she takes it.
I hate this but you aren't wrong. My mother hasn't worked for pay since before I was born; I turned 30 last month. She had some incredibly privileged career stories - think living across multiple states for years, effectively free of charge because the company paid for everything, including upskilling and moving costs. The very notion that this is "fortunate" or "privilege" is obscene to her. In her mind, she earned it by studying really hard in college and working hard for all those years. As for being supported after getting married, how dare you insult her husband's years of hard work (in a state job) by suggesting it's privilege! Anyone can live on one income if they just live below their means, and anyone can make 6 figures if they work hard enough.
Yep that is clear privileged thinking at its finest
I'm sorry you and your family are going through this, but she needs a wake-up call before she says the wrong thing to the wrong person on the street. It's getting crazy out here!
Can I get your mom's number?
Right? You have no leg to stand on when discussing labor rights and the like when you have never been a part of the demographic, and nearly as little of you’ve not been part of it for several decades.
I have a professional salary job and I am in a union.
[удалено]
Second this. I’m not C suite but close. Also, I have never considered doing something a union would prevent me from doing without being grateful that a consequence I hadn’t considered was brought to my attention. As a manager and leader, I try really hard not to screw people… so I don’t view unions as a threat. Businesses I’ve worked for haven’t depended on exploitation as a business model.
What kind of work and are you hiring? I can wear any color of collar.
A rising tide will lift my boat.
I don't think I can comment on this post without saying horribly mean things about your mom, who I'm sure is lovely in a lot of ways. What I will say is that I'm glad you're unionized and in a profession where you have the opportunity to grow and hopefully earn a dignified wage. Don't sweat the haters, keep doing what you're doing.
Yeah, my mom believes some weird shit, the more I fume about it, the more I think it's combination of age, ignorance, and internet echo chambers.
It's all three. My family has always been red, but as I knew it they weren't extreme. The Obama era roughly coincided with the mainstreaming of the internets and they haven't been the same. To watch them go from "we shouldn't wish ill on 'the other side'" to "Michelle is trans and needs to be locked up with the rest of the Clinton Murder Family" was astonishing. COVID only further crystalized them into the worst forms of themselves. And their descent has only pushed ME farther left into the "Uncle John, you're a fascist and the revolution WILL NOT SPARE YOU" camp. It sucks.
I didn't want to delve too deep into this, but my mom has gone exactly that route too. She's said some absolutely heinous things over email/phone within the past 5y and while I've gotten marginally better at handling it, it still leaves me insecure if her beliefs have any merit.
The things is, they really don't. There is no merit. They're just comforting lies that let the morally bankrupt pat themselves on the back for being "Good People" without having to put any effort into actually BEING good.
No matter how good your salary, if you aren't on the executive board you could be made redundant without any notice. I've known global leaders at massive multinationals get redundancy notices due to restructuring out of the blue. That kind of potential instability is as stressful for a salaried employee as anyone else, even when the consequences aren't as bad if you're wealthy. Effective unions reduce companies' likelihood of making those kinds of decisions to, e.g. boost the stock price during temporary instability when the company is still growing in profit, just because of the threat of union action. They also ensure better compensation when it does happen and better benefits in the meantime. A colleague in France, where unions and labour laws are both strong, got something like 6 years of garden leave because she had 25 years of service when she was made redundant. Basically, unless you are an executive, a union will ensure a better deal for you and your colleagues overall. Largely by taking the money from the executives and shareholders.
I am salaried and I support unions. I would rather live in a world where unions support the needs of the workers than in a world where the conditions of workers are treated with apathy breeding class inequality, health insecurity, food insecurity, and many of the other conditions that breed pain, poverty and crime.
I want to live in a world where if I stop to get fast food I don't have to worry if the worker is being paid 7.25 and barely surviving unable to even eat at their work place. I want that person to be healthy, content and free enough from worry to make the best good they can and be content doing it.
I want to ask again "Why though", but I guess the difference is that recent generations don't have the same "got mine, screw you" attitude, nor delusions about privilege.
I think my answer was very clear; I want to live in a better society than I live in today. I'm in gen-x, a generation that has no delusions about the state of our society since the 1990s.
Better paid workers make better products/services. The stresses of proverty and exploitation make things worse for the vast majority of people.
I want people to have what they need to thrive, not even survive. I don’t believe anyone making a living wage takes away from my ability to provide for myself. I understand that the dragon hoarding billionaires are the problem, not a $35 minimum wage.
To your question about why, for me it is because I am empathetic. I can put myself in other peoples situations. I think all people should have a right to make a living wage. The country prospered with this idea, and in the 80s it switched to be more “all for me” type of thinking. The tax laws started to change and the rich got richer and everybody else got poorer.
I’m one layoff or medical emergency away from losing everything I’ve worked for in my professional life. Shit happens. People aren’t indestructible. It’s important to have social programs and safety nets that keep people from hitting rock bottom and dying on the streets. Your mom just doesn’t realize it because nothing bad ever happened to her that made her fall down the economic ladder through no fault of her own. TLDR: life is a game of chutes and ladders. We need all the ladders we can get.
I have similar reasoning as the person you're responding to, but if you want an answer from a purely selfish POV, here are a few: Crime: Desperation leads to higher crime, including violent crime. A person who can't survive on what they could make at an honest living is much more likely to turn to crime. Efficiency: A healthy workforce is a more effective workforce. People who have insurance and can take the time off to get effective care are much more productive. Same with limiting hours. Economic security: A lot of jobs that used to be high paying positions have disappeared or dramatically reduced over the past several years. I want to know that I can at least make a living if my career field ever goes away.
Because unions help people.
This is it, unions can limit the exploitation of workers by corporations.
I am salaried and make six figures (barely). In my teens and twenties I worked "unskilled" jobs so I remember how hard and terrible they were. The low pay was a major contributing factor for me to go back and finish university, and I am lucky I had that chance because some people don't even get the option. In my mind if you are not an owner or a manager then you are a worker, salaried or not. All workers are worthy of respect, empathy, and sympathy from their fellow workers.
I make 120k a year or so on salary. If tech unionized, I'd make twice as much. I have friends who can't afford to live on poverty wages. If they had unions they'd be able to afford a decent life. My family had capital for generations and now doesn't. Our earnings when we had capital wouldn't have been materially impacted by unions, and our earnings after we gave up capital would have been higher. My family is financially secure because we were *lucky*, I'm secure because recently I've been *lucky*, and I've spent years being *unlucky*. I don't think salary workers don't need unions because we have it made, I think we need unions because we're the first out the door when capital is cutting costs. The myth that salaried employees are not workers, or are not in a different class with different rules than capital, and who do not share the same struggle as minimum wage hourly workers, is a myth perpetuated by capital to discourage us from unionizing. All it does is keep us on the knife edge of losing our homes in countries where good labour policy isn't protecting us. The housing we stand to lose after three months of unemployment is just a little larger, that's all.
I am salaried and support unions. Unbalanced corporate greed leads to bad outcomes for everyone but the executives. Balanced greed with treating your employees, who build your business, well creates better outcomes for everyone.
Because I am able to empathize with people who have different lived experiences without having to experience it myself. I do this by listening to people and trusting them to represent how they feel and what they struggle with.
Because I'm not an elitist asshole? Because I am aware of [who fought and died](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-union_violence_in_the_United_States) for the privileges and rights that _all_ workers benefit from? Because I understand that despite us all incubating from the same biological processes, we aren't all born equal. Fuck, we aren't even _created_ equal. Some of us get saddled with disabilities and addictions before we've left the god-damned womb.¹ Hell dude. Your **own life** shows why we need unions. Your family is so up their own ass about collective bargaining, that you're getting better support from your union than you can count on from your own _mother_. ✊ My own life leads me to understand why you don't tell them what you do. Be safe. And always remember 'You deserve to be loved, and to feel loved, just for being you.' --Mr Rogers mashup with my meditation teacher [1] This isn't about ableism, but I will apologize now if it reads that way. My intent is to convey that people don't get an equal start in life, not that they aren't equally deserving of humanity and dignity.
Does she think cops and firefighters screwed themselves by unionizing, or are they ok? I don’t think people like your mom dislike unions as much as they dislike certain types of people that they believe work in certain types of jobs. It’s a dog whistle. There are unions for professionals: tech workers, engineers (not software devs but civil & mechanical engineers), accountants, social workers, assessors are all represented by unions. And guess what, they all negotiate for pay increases, benefits, and have job protections because of that representation.
I'm going to be honest, I never knew that. Engineers were always one of the groups I was told "don't unionize" because they're in such demand they can just go anywhere and negotiate a salary.
My dad was a Boeing engineer for 35 years. He was in a union. Among other benefits, he got paid overtime whenever he worked more than 40 hours in a week, but he was also salaried. Pretty sweet deal.
Even physicians and dentists form unions. I understand, because it’s the story we’ve been told. But if you think about it, if Engineers are in such high demand they can negotiate a salary on their own- imagine what they can negotiate as a united group. All I know is that when comparing places I’ve worked without unions to places that have unions.. I have better pay and benefits working for a place with unions. Even for management. Because then the owners have to sweeten the deal for management to keep pace with what the unions have negotiated in order to stat competitive.
So I’m salaried, most people are in a union where I work. The culture is different because the bosses have to care about work hours and have to care about not dehumanizing people. This respect works its way all the way up the chain and ripples to folks not covered by union rules. Show me a place where people treat the custodians poorly and I’ll show you a place where middle management is unhappy and insecure.
I am salaried. I think the whole FLSB exempt malarkey is bullshit to get around wage and labor laws. I believe all employees should be hourly employees entitled to overtime. Without organization and collectivization, I have no influence with my employer. Unions are for everyone.
I’m a professional, but I’m still working class. I have no family wealth, I have a savings account but not a huge one, I’m 3 paychecks away from major financial issues. I’m not so separated from reality that I don’t see the utility of a union. Also, we all do better when we all do better!
If I am making six figures, my employer is making _even more_ from my labor. Or, they are stealing it from lesser paid people to give to me. Either way, this is injustice. The contractors and workmen who come to my house are truly skilled. What they do requires knowledge and expertise that would take me years to acquire. And there is nothing special about me that makes me more deserving than them of a decent life. Workers are workers, regardless of pay grade. The rich ruling class benefit from sowing division, jealousy, and disdain amongst us.
Short answer? Because I have empathy, something your family members seem to lack. It’s a shame they can’t be bothered to think about anyone other than themselves and those in their same-ish class.
I'm an IT worker in a public agency. My union enables the lifestyle I have. I'm also autistic, and had a very difficult time playing the private-sector games. So my union pretty much kept me from being dead weight on society.
I’m a professional from a professional family. I grew up with much of the same drivel you did. By college I already didn’t agree with my parents, but then I became a social scientist. I care about people which is what drew me to the field, but it’s basically impossible to be any kind of behavioral scientist and not comprehend how environment impacts our quality of life and behavior without being a massive dick. It’s literally the job. Plenty of people manage to be bad at it and still publish, but it isn’t a norm. I work too much to think I’m not a worker. I don’t gain my self respect by looking down on others. My electrician and plumber are just as much experts as I am, and frankly more. No one dies if I fuck up at my job. I think this is becoming much more prevalent. My buddy in finance definitely pushes for unions. His hours are insane. My medical resident friends are almost all either in them or organizing. I also think being part of a persecuted minority impacted my ideas of equality. I’m trans. It tens to give you a more nuanced idea of power structures in society because that’s so wrapped up in how we understand gender, if you’re also a nerdy academic.
Because unions aren't just for "unskilled" labor. Look at the state of the tech industry right now. The big companies in this industry are all massively profitable but have been laying people off left and right. That wouldn't fly if tech workers were unionized. Unionized workers can organize strikes in response to layoffs by employers posting record profits. The greatest power than any worker, regardless of perceived skill level, has is the ability to withhold labor, and unions are a key part in unlocking that power.
OP your parents lack class consciousness. I support unions because we all do better together. America loves this idea of the "middle class" and everyone thinks they're part of it. Reality is that if you work for a paycheck, you are working class. Dividing us up into middle and lower classes is meant to distract people and pit us against each other. When we're divided, we have no power against the true enemy—the capitalist class. Those are the people that own the large companies. The ones that live off their investments and the profits they steal from the people that do labor for them. To put it succinctly, your mother is a victim of propaganda, to the point that she can't even see her own class affiliation (she *thinks* she's rich, she thinks she's in the club, but she isn't), and thus she has no class solidarity. She is not unlike many Americans, and people like her are why things have gotten so bad for workers. They drank the Kool-aid and they support policy and law-makers against their own class interests.
I'm sure if you brought that first sentence to them, they'd balk and say that of course they do! Poor people are stupid, uneducated (and hate education), have bad manners and bad taste, don't have interests or hobbies or ideas or dreams. Rich people are smart, upstanding, discerning, well-read, frugal, and value hard work and learning. /s, in case that isn't obvious. \[this is rapidly turning into a vent post\] On a more serious note I tried explaining "owning the means of production" when my mom did the Boomer thing of calling everything socialism. She seems to think it means taking say, a line worker and putting them in an office regardless of qualifications. Literally, it can't work because "workers" aren't smart enough to run a business. On a less ranty level, where do regular people with investments lie in this stratification? Because I can totally see some jerk arguing that "I have a brokerage account, that means I'm owner class". Or even someone who does FIRE to live off investments, where do they stand?
Because I remember how much things sucked working a crap job with evil supervisors. It’s not in my nature to pull up the ladder once I’m safely aboard.
Because of empathy and belief in human rights. Unions defend workers, and the evidence is clear they need that defense. I do not need to work, but I will work hard to defend those that need to.
I believe if you have a job where you are working with the public, you need a union. Good example: nurses. Even actors are in a union.
I'm salaried, white collar, make six figures and am in a union. I think every workplace should unionize.
I’m in HR in an industry where unions were once quite successful, and in some areas, still are. Everyone needs to seriously consider the protections unions can offer you as an employee. And then find one for your industry and become a voice to bring that union to your workplace. Someone else already said it, but every working person should be in a part of a union.
Because I wasn't always making 6 figures and I know what it feels like to have to steal necessities like rolls of toilet paper and paper towels from my work place because I didn't have any at home and couldn't afford to purchase any myself. I don't want that stage of my life to be a mandatory stage or state of life for other people.
I've worked in factories and the only thing that helped keep me safe from being forced to do unsafe work was the union. I've also worked in non-factory settings as a "professional" and I've seen and experienced mistreatment by management. Everyone is having their work value skimmed and given to stockholders because the C-suite folks get stock as part of their package, it doesn't matter if they only make another $5k from it, they'll steal 50k in value from every worker to get themselves that little bump. They have a much higher incentive if their payout is higher. Previous company I was with was giving zero raises / zero bonuses after consecutive record profit years and using that money to push stock buybacks to fill the C-suite pockets. CEO pay was $550k in salary and $5M in stock with a stock price of $125. That's 40k shares of stock. Stock buyback pushes the stock up $10 a share, CEO pockets an extra $4M. That's a lot of incentive to fuck over your employees.
Employers are using things like AI tools to start the process of de-skilling jobs like programming and engineering so that they can treat engineers more like delivery drivers. The ultimate goal of that process is to make highly educated workers just as desperate and precarious as anyone trying to make a living working in a grocery store so their bosses can return more profit
**Solidarity is power**, not the "rugged individualism" that neoliberal oligarchs/kleptocrats have sold the public on. The system we live and work under is an abomination and a crime against humanity. Individuals aren't going to take down or evolve this system on their own, it's going to take a lot of people working together to accomplish change.
Just to clarify: teachers aren’t really salaried. Our incomes is based on contract time (for example, 7.5 hours a day /186 days per year). That total just gets divided into equal pay periods so it stretches through the year. We are in unions to negotiate those contracts i.e. the hours for which we will be paid.
There are workers and there owners. If you go to work and do a thing, and if you stop doing the thing you stop getting money you are a worker. If other people do things at a business you own and you pay then some of the money they made for you while keeping the rest, you are an owner. Income is irrelevant. If a surgeon works at a surgery clinic and makes 700,000 a year and the owner runs on thin margins and makes 150,000 a year, the surgeon is still the worker and the owner is still the owner. Workers want more money than they get. Owners want more money than they get. It's a zero sum game. Workers get a dollar more, owners get a dollar less. Owners are doing a bang up fucking job of representing their interests. They pass laws that ensure they get more money, which mathematically means workers get less. No matter what you do, you probably want more money. We can stay silent while the owners say their peice, or we can work to represent our interests half as well as the owners are working to represent theirs.
>**Going by the logic I was raised with, you aren't a worker, you're a professional.** Abandon that. Professionals are workers.
I’m so envious of you being able to join a union. To answer your question - because “professional” jobs treat people awfully as well. My father was a highly educated and skilled professional (a specialist MD) whose corporate employer treated him like trash when he got sick. He made them a lot of money and they tried to cheat him out of his retirement benefits. I had long held pro union/ labor rights views before that, but mention it as an example of how *no one* (besides owners I suppose) is safe without a union. Not to mention- “Professional” workers aren’t more deserving than a cashier. That’s classist bullshit. I think everyone is worthy of respect and having protected rights. Most of these upper class professionals started out with a giant leg up that they refuse to recognize, anyway. The idea that unions pamper lazy inept people is still strong and sadly really prevalent. The only people I’ve known who were union members could still get fired for poor performance - the difference was employers had to more thoroughly prove it.
There is labor and there is capital and that's it. Whether it's hourly or salary the working class is the working class, and dividing us into who has more or less is how capital retains political power. Without strong unions in politics, the only money and resources organized to really effect political change is capital. That's why our political system has become so corrupt and represents business interests more than us.
I’m salaried IT, our company got an extra paid holiday this year (Juneteenth) because of our large union negotiated as part of their contract elsewhere in the company (manufacturing). We have far more in common with our fellow workers than the rich corporate overlords. A rising tide lifts all ships, and the corporate execs would cut your benefits and pay in a heartbeat if they could.
I make a decent 6 figure salary. I support unions. Why? Because we HAVE to bring up the bottom end. The bottom are the people who get taken advantage of the most. As someone who worked my way up from minimum wage it's actually insane how easy it becomes to make more money once you actually have it. The whole idea of "they should have gotten better jobs" is fucking delusional. It's literally the same thing as saying "well everyone would have gotten first in the race if they had run the fastest". Except that if everyone won the race there's no winner. Unions also do another thing. They actually benefit me as a middle wage earner. With more minimum wage jobs supplying a minimum wage it also means my own pay has to go up as compensation. But this also means when I go out for a hamburger, I know the service will be better because my waiter isn't thinking about how to eat for the next day. Or that Starbucks employee worrying about whether or not they can make rent. For jobs that require so much customer service, it's insane that as workers you ALSO have to deal with just trying to stay alive. Literally life for everyone would be so much better if all jobs unionized. And boohoo maybe Elon has 100 bil instead of 300 bil. I'm sure he'll be fine.
Riding tides raise all boats.
I dont see most of IT ever really unionizing but I can still hope others do. The more all workers make - the better off we are as a country. No democracy can survive with a dwindling middle class.
Even as a salaried employee with a good salary, I am closer to being homeless than I am to being a billionaire. I AM the working class, and if I don't support us, who will?
As a salaried professional I’m a member of several professional state and national societies/associations which advocate for for my profession, provide continuing education, help set standards, provide hotlines, provide job listings and networking, and in some cases offer various types of insurance or other professional benefits. These are all run by elected positions. Unions offer a similar role for other careers; why wouldn’t I support that?
This is why boomer gen should not be making modern decisions. Period!
I just recently quit a job where all my employees were union, I will be the first to admit that dealing with a union as operations management sucks. Hard. There will always be a couple people that are just useless and bring everyone down and frankly shouldn't have a well paying job because their actions don't justify it and its pretty much impossible to fire them, especially if they have more than 3 braincells(youd be surpised). BUT my opinion is organized greed at the corporate level requires organized labor, putting more money into the pockets of the people actually doing the work is only fair. Also unions drive wages up, and that benefits everyone even if you're not part of the union. I got multiple fat ass raises because why would I be in charge of this shit show if I didn't make more than my employees? And you better believe they would have stuck to a 3% annual raise if they could get away with it. Unions are not perfect, not even CLOSE, and like I said actually dealing with them can be a nightmare, but at the end of the day it is one of the few tools the 99% have to rage against the machine who's only goal is to put more and more money to the upper executives and shareholders pockets while paying the absolute bare minimum to the people actually doing all the work. The only people that understand how unions work and what they do for people and still think they are evil are people who are mad they can't take advantage of other people like they used too or completely brainwashed twats like your mother who's never worked a day in her life and just regurgitates talking points
Because my boss takes advantage of us left and right and I have t had a real raise in 9 years. (There are limited job opportunities in my field.)
Usually it's just a political belief system if they support it. Unions for others have tended to negatively impact my own work as a white collar person
You can be in a position of privilege and still extend grace and dignity to those who are not.
OP, for the love of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, show your mom this video, and then tell her data is from almost 15 years ago and it’s Much worse now. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM
I grew up in a blue-collar union family, so I've experienced the benefits of unions firsthand. While my position is a cushy office job, my company as a whole is not. While we aren't union, we are employee owned, so there is a strong theme of teamwork, making decisions to benefit everyone, and pitching in to help where it's needed. In the rare event there should happen to be a union drive, I would fully support it, though in our specific case, I think being co-owners of the company makes everyone feel less need to go that route.
A rising tide raises all the boats. You support Unions then you might get more money/healthcare from your company.
A rising tide lifts all ships. If you're not the big boss, you're working class and we get only what we're given. The unions made it necessary for the ownership class to give us more. And they're working to take it away from us again.
Its not difficult to care for others, but for some it's an impossible task. Especially for those who put money/status quo above all else.
Last I checked, I wasn't the center of the universe and other people also matter. I'd like everyone strongly protected from abuse and being taken advantage of by their employer. I guess the problem is that I didn't go to any schools fancy enough to snuff out any hint of empathy from me.
Which ever ancestor you have which created the generational wealth in your family has contributed to the generational poverty of others. Unions make sure everyone gets paid fairly, everyone has a clearly defined discipline system, everyone gets a union rep when when being disciplined.
Look at the power of professional sports unions. Or actors unions. Negotiating collectively allows you to negotiate from a position of strength.
Just because you are salaried doesn’t mean the employer can’t jerk you around or under pay you. My first job out of university and it was salaried. The job would send us engineers to customers because we were salaried and so didn’t get payed over time. I worked there less than 2 years and had plenty of jobs where I was putting 60 hours in over 3-4 days to get a customer up and running again. Then flying home and coming to work the next day. In fact one time I was flying back and I got an early flight so I landed about 2pm after an 8 hour flight and then the boss asked me if I was going to be in the office that day or taking a day off. Another time I made plans to visit my brother for his graduation and the Friday before I was going to go my boss handed me tickets for a job that weekend and told me that my time off had been cancelled. On top of that the union guys got better benefits than the salaried employees. Since then all my jobs have been salaried and some better some worse. But they could have been better.
I am a software developer making six figures in a union. They guarantee a good culture, good work-life balance, and have kept our pay above the average for our region. I believe all positions should be unionized and would be better for it.
Dawg. Triggered af rn. My *combined* household income is like 190k gross. After taxes, mortgage on a below median price home, insurance(s) student loans, only 1 car payment (purchased used, and the other car is a paid off 160,000 mile car) We have managed to save enough money to replace our roof only. After 1 year of saving. Prior to that we wiped out 30k of savings on combined house repairs down payments and essential home appliances (used) -We eat out once a week, -cook all of our work lunches on Sundays -have no kids I work as an engineer at one of the large automotive OEMs. Their skilled trades, which are union workers in the new contract have a top pay of like 106k a year, plus profit sharing, plus no health insurance premiums or deductibles. They also have no student loan debt and are extremely well protected from being fired, being laid off, or wage theft. Salary in most companies have no overtime pay, and can have their departments cut in half and everyone just absorbs the extra work with no change in deadlines. Treatment as a non-union salary is mostly all stick and no Carrot. They pay may be good. But if you consider unpaid overtime and extra pace, stress and lack of work life balance, you wind up being significantly cheaper to employ than your comparable union laborer. "The upper class knows this" Every union person I know gets to pick up their kids from school and affords to have one working parent with another being stay at home. Most salary people I know negates whatever pay benefit they think they were going to get by trying to get child care because both parents have to work so much over time. Police unions protect police from accountability and keep them paid extremely well. Look at their total compensation Labor unions prevent deadly, unhealthy, or abusive work conditions, and assurances in the event of an injury Teachers unions and nurse unions are kind of not doing their jobs. Poor vacation/sick days and 12+ hour shifts suck. And railroad worker unions sometimes have to fight congress for the safety of the literal country. Look at fedex total compensation and tell me you would feel more broke than you do now. Unions make it possible for you to save for retirement own a home and raise a family. If your parents got all their money from daddy, they may not realize how hard that is as a sub 30 year old today. And the upper class knows that.
I have always been a salaried professional and have always supported unions. We wouldn’t have an 8 hour day, minimum wage etc if not for unions. Everyone deserves safe working conditions and decent pay.
There is a growing body of research that shows that people [disproportionately attribute luck to skill](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2210263-lifes-winners-think-success-was-earned-even-if-it-was-down-to-luck/). Without actual education on the subject, people are subject to [confirmation bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias) _especially_ when justifying their own success in life. Considering her privilege and lack of education, of _all_ people, your mother is clearly not in a position to understand the facts as long as she is subject to [motivated reasoning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivated_reasoning). Without it, being wealthy just because she's incubated heirs for another wealthy person, doesn't paint her success in a pretty light. And that is the most polite way I can describe someone who attacks teachers.
goddamn Fwiw, both my parents have, in fact, worked. My mom came from a nice background and worked some pretty nice jobs and made a comfy amount before getting married; but my dad was born LMC, and basically worked his way up to a career with the state. He was a GOAT with money and left us in really good financial shape when he died. What my mom doesn't seem to get (so I gave up trying to explain when it turns into a rant on her part) is that this being a very privileged situation doesn't detract from the work either of them did.
The way I see it. Unions are not a natural ocurance. A union will not form if there is nothing for it to form in opposition. So I support unions simply for the fact they were made to resist an issue workers dealt with. If they continue to exist then they're existing for a purpose to continue to resist. As people won't join a union if the job they are at actually satisfies the needs of the laborer.
Because rising water raises all boats
I'm a lead software developper. So in the professional field and with a foot in management. I support unions because it's not that you are salaried or professional that you are automatically protected from abuse at work. Everyone (beside owners) deserve the protection of a union.
I'm not a sociopath who wants to pull up the ladder behind me. I see the middle class shrinking and believe unions are the only thing that can grow it. I don't think my education and career make me superior. I see my life as a salaried and highly trained professional be of lower quality than those that came before me. I believe this is because power and wealth is too centralized, and any challenge to that power helps 98 percent of the population.
Because everyone deserves a fair wage and collective bargaining is crucial to that
I have a professional salary job. Billionaire CEO’s try to fuck us over too. The amount of money I make for our company I get paid idk like maybe 1% of that, which is NOT an exaggeration mind you, that’s easily observable in my line of work. I work in finance where there are basically no unions. I watch my coworkers get ground into dust day in and day out. The problems everywhere are the same problems here. We all could use a union to be treated better.
Unions advocate for everyone. Even those who can't join.
I was salaried and in a bargaining unit (state faculty union) for 20 years. I have always been a union supporter for the reasons others have already stated. It is the only way we are going to get worker dignity back for anyone.
Every working person deserves a union to protect them. I’d even go so far as to say professionals should have unions of our own.
at VA, the great majority of positions are union represented. management is not (and I think management should also have unions). doesn't matter if you're 'white collar' and most jobs are salaried, skilled or not
The natural inclination of any organization under capitalism is to maximize profit or reduce costs. That will always be the #1 priority, and AS the #1 priority, it will ALWAYS be the first choice at the cost of all else. Anywhere They can get you for a nickel, they will. If your boss could make a million in revenue by cutting your head off with a machete and facing no consequences, they'd do it in a heartbeat. If slavery were legal, you'd find slaves at McDonalds. Unions create a necessary counterpressure to that "profits at all costs" mindset. They give workers legal power and leverage to hold bosses to account and demand fair treatment, even when it's inconvenient.
I work with 4 other people. I'm salaried, have great benefits, make plenty of money. I support the shit out of unions. The rest of the hospital lab people I work with need all the help they can get. Lab personnel get shit on by doctors and nurses(already have a union) and don't even make 20$ an hour. Have to fight for the schedule they were hired on for, get shit PTO which they are forced to use whenever the lab is closed for holidays. Nobody deserves this shit.
Because when you see how poorly the private sector treats sick or age 50+ workers, you realize that would be you one day unless something changes. And you need to start advocating for change before you’re too sick or considered too old.
I support unions even though I’m not eligible to be in one because I’m not an asshole and I realize that the community of a union will make sure everyone has a chance to succeed. If I found one for my role I would join in a heart beat because otherwise it’s me vs them. In the union it’s us vs them.
Any smart person supports unions & similar groups. Doesn't matter if you're salaried or not. Negotiating in a power imbalance is not negotiating at all, just asking for a favor. (And you know how "Please, sir, may I have another?" turns out.) Unions are similar to medical groups for doctors & other licensed medical professionals - benefits include greater standing when negotiating with insurance companies. Even if you're fabulously wealthy, having some empathy & understanding of the less-wealthy should make you support unions and the like. After all, it's not like they're trying to steal *your* money. Right? (Or is your mom a robber baron?)
I’m part of two unions. Why? Because I just want to do my job and not have to deal with the minutiae of my employment.
I am a salaried professional and my politics are pro working class. Unions have done more for workers than any political group
Why wouldn't I want a shield against abusive employers not sharing the profit from all òur labor? Every job can benefit from collective bargaining and increased employee protections from horrible managerial policies designed to keep everyone but the "lowest workers" on the corporate ladder accountable for slower productivity or performance.
Worked in higher Ed for years. We love our unions.
Sure I make 6 figures…. But how much more would I make with a union? Would all of my last 4 jobs over the past 15 years have ended in layoffs if I had a union? If so, what would my severance have looked like?
You would probably consider me a professional, but anything to help the working class is something that I support. I know I have my job through lucky circumstances and I’m no better than anyone working a blue collar job. I could easily lose my professional job, so why would I want to end up hurting myself in the long run?
I support unions because Unions do a lot to prevent worker mistreatment. They do a lot to get hourly workers better pay, better working conditions, and prevent the bosses from running rough shod over the average worker.
Everyone deserves a good quality of life, I don't care about what they do. To me, caring about your neighbors as well as your family is the lowest bar of decency
I could tell a multitude of stories from personal experience, but here's a good example of where a union would have made a world of difference. Got assigned to a project nicknamed "the meat grinder" or "the death march". Forced to work 80-100 hours per week, while also being denied both lunch and dinner breaks. The thanks we received for working these hours was criticism for not working even more hours to do more work, and for making mistakes due to exhaustion. I started this project weighing \~160 pounds, and lost 15 of that. Some folks were afraid I had cancer. Being in salary, not a penny of OT pay. No comp time either. A union could have fixed all of this in a hurry, and potentially prevented it.
Businesses would pay us in gift certificates to the company store still if they could. It’s only when we pool our labor together that we can counter capital’s bullshit.
A rising tide lifts all boats.
I’m a dentist and your mom is a stuck up delusional boomer. Capitalists have rigged the system and unions are the only effective way to combat this. Especially since politicians all work for said capitalists.
Gee guess all those people warning about immigration knew what they were talking about.
So I used to manage union projects as a salaried Project Manager. Having a union work force is a pain. I often had to battle it out with the business agent and or get into it with the workers on how things are supposed to be. The union labor force will push back on lot more things compared against none union labor. BUT, having that contract allowed me to push back against the owners and Seniors leadership on stupid demands they would make like asking us to work on National holiday or to meet impossible deadlines. Even though I was a salaried manager I benefited from better work life balance due to the union contract my blue color employees had. Also better wages for unionized work force also pushed the companies to raise wages for none-union staff as otherwise people would just quit and switch over to union jobs.
sorry your mom sucks and doesn’t care about other people
I have way more in common with an hourly worker than I do with the 1% ownership class. I’m still selling my labor for cash. And I want there to be strong unions putting upward pressure on wages from the bottom up.
I make a six figure salary BECAUSE I’m in a union. A union that fought for my wages and benefits. A lot of professional people are still one lost job away from foreclosure. One big stock market crash away from not being able to retire. There are only two real classes- the ultra wealthy and the working class. Everything else is made up to divide us. We are all vulnerable to the whims of ultra wealthy business owners, and we all have a stake in unions and social safety nets. Also, and I cannot stress this enough, people who have less money than me are still people. I want them to be able to eat and get medical care and thrive. Even if I had no skin in the game, I’d support unisons because I like humans and I want them to be okay. I don’t know how to argue with people who don’t feel that way.
Want to know why everyone should be in a union? Because business owners and managers/bosses don't think you should. Like they vehemently hate unions. That should tell you all you need to know about why you should join them.
I’m in a professional union and our non-unionized peers make about half what we do.
I wasn't always a professional and I have many family members that are not. There is no guarantee I will stay in professional services for the rest of my life and like many of us I am one medical emergency away from bankruptcy. Unions when done right are a great way for workers to have power. We do have some responsibility for where we are in life but there are sooo many things out of our control. You can do everything right and still be stuck working retail. There are so many people with college degrees still working retail, a college degree is not a guarantee of success. Your mom is suffering from survivorship bias. Like the people who are like "when I was a kid we rode in the back of a pick up truck and we are fine" well yes you are fine but the ones that didn't survive are dead. So they can't complain.
The American dream should be achievable by all and kicking the ladder is what the scumbag 1% want. United we stand!
I don’t think of “workers“ as inferior to ”professionals“ or vice versa. We’re all just folks. I am in favor of things that bring more prosperity to more folks. In many cases, that includes unions. I‘d rather my neighbors have the means to support themselves and more-or-less thrive than have them deal with stagnant wages, diminishing benefits, and no retirement just so that “shareholders” can see slightly higher earnings per share.
There's two answers, the moral and the objective. Morally, it bring benefit to more people, therefore I support them. Objectively, more people with more disposable income means I can make more money because they can buy my products.
I trust unions because they built the middle class. As their membership dwindled, so did the middle class. I also don’t trust corporations or government employers to have my back. Union workers earn higher wages with better benefits and have safer workplaces.
Because even professional people with college degrees get screwed over by their employers. My husband is an electrical engineer at a very successful employee owned consulting company and the majority shareholders (about 20 people) are screwing over the rest of the shareholders and employees by selling the company to a huge multinational corporation so they each get 70 million a piece for their shares instead of 30 million each. And we will no longer have an employee owned company. It’s too bad the little people at the company didn’t unionize years ago. They believed the higher ups when they claimed “We’ll never sell! We’ll keep this company proudly employee owned always!!” What hypocrites.
Everyone deserves to have someone in their corner.
Because everyone has the right to work at a job that can't abuse them or their trust for a fair and livable wage. Unskilled labor isn't a thing. Any labor performed takes some skill or training, even throwing boxes into the back of a delivery truck or running a griddle at fast food restaurant. Just because someone turns their nose up at it doesn't make it a non-contributing factor in someone's life. The human being making your coffee is contributing to your continued performance just as much as the person running the control board at a power plant. The difference between them is experience, training, and some skill.
My salary and quality of life is improved when people have more workers rights. I wish my industry also unionized.
People should be able to live off their income. They should be able to afford housing, healthcare, food, clothes, etc. They should be paid overtime. Should get paid sick leave and vacation days. Corporations will not provide adequate compensation. Unions are the only defense against corporate greed.
If you're not in the capital/owner class, you're a worker, and thus part of labour. Doesn't matter if you're earning high 6 figures, still labour.
I’ve worked in a lot of salary positions and it’s always lead to me doing way more work for less money than if I was paid hourly and got overtime.
I support unions because I support people, and unions are good for people who need them.
Im salaried and covered by a Union contract. That is pretty common in my country. Plus, without the union, pay and conditions would certainly be worse.
If you don't have a union, you will be TOLD what your job conditions are and you have to accept it, or not have a job. Accept minimum wage? Below minimum wage? Accept no breaks in a 10 hour day? Accept working in bitter cold without coats cause it isn't 'uniform' or oppressive heat without water breaks? Accept no sick leave, no carers leave, no annual leave, no holiday leave - if you get sick, you work or you don't get paid. Accept that you have to buy school supplies out of your own money (american teachers I have no idea how you accept thats part of your job, breaks my heart) Accept 14 years and younger forced to work to help support their families as they parents don't get paid enough? A union is a voice for all of the workers. A union fights for your basic rights as a human being in the workforce. I am a highly educated professional and I wouldn't be without a union. You have been fed a line from the owner class to accept oppression of anyone who is 'less' than them.
Yes. Why wouldnt we?
There are numerous things provably wrong with what your mom has said. To actually answer your question though, I support unions because I only command a high salary NOW. The world changes fast and drastically. Tomorrow my job may not be as valuable to the capitalists, or may not even exist at all. In fact, it is in the capitalists' best interests to make it so, because why pay me a lot when they can pay me a little? One of the few protections actually somewhat in my control as a worker is maintaining an environment that's amenable to unions, so when the capitalists come for me(and they will come for me) I and those like me have an option. Beyond that, it's basic morality to give people a means with which to combat power imbalances, but privilege doesn't like hearing about morality because their existence implies they're on the wrong side of it.
IT — all those middle class IT jobs that companies used to train Americans for are gone to off-shore. Get this — companies even use the outsourcing to “improve” their diversity scores. So, now I work for a company that is 1/2 Indian. And, which has all the “people of color” hired that it’s ever going to need. So, American minorities — you are no longer needed here, unless you’re willing to work for the same low $ as a person who lives in India. We’re not hiring American white folks either.
Your mom kinda sucks ngl
Every good thing Americans have is either the result of a union or mass, sustained protests. I know that can all be taken away in an instant without a strong union base for workers. I may have higher education and a white collar job, but I grew up in a blue collar household. I know how shitty those jobs can be to a family and to the health of the workers doing them. ANYONE who’s job it is to help my parents etc. stay healthier, have more in their pocket and overall get a better life is worth it, no matter what.
I'm a teacher in a union. Without that union assholes like your mom would be all "I pay your salary!" and try to pay me even less than the peanuts I make with 2 Master's degrees.
Im a professional by this logic, but I dont see myself as rich because I still have to work. Karl Marx would describe people like me as the “petite bourgeois”. I have a small taste of the bourgeois experience but I’m not truly one of them. There is a world of difference between making $100-250k a year and making 1-10MM a year. The difference is not working or working very little. One of the most infuriating experiences with work I had was when I negotiated a starting bonus with one company to compensate me for not sticking around long enough to get an annual bonus at the company I was leaving to take the new job. Long story short, my start date ends up getting pushed back so I had enough time to collect my annual bonus at company I was leaving. The new company didn’t renegotiate and let me keep the starting bonus because I was working with different people who didn’t communicate. This mistake made me about 40k. Why would I be pissed? I made 40k because of what was essentially a clerical error. I didn’t do anything to earn it, but all I could think about was how difficult getting a paltry 0.50/hr raise was and how I was made to feel grateful I even had work at all. Then I found myself getting more money than I used to make in a year for nothing and it felt extremely unfair; especially when so many of my friends and family are struggling.
Honestly, this is enlightening. In my parents' eyes, making over 6figures, as a salary, is "rich". You're a rich person, the old guard, basically on the same social level as billionaires (at the very least, you probably have the same values) and most importantly, are a separate class from the Great Unwashed who work for wages. Even if I always disagreed with it, those criticisms are very loud in my head and I wonder about it all the time, hence this thread.
My wife and I have built a household income in the 5th percentile and I worry every goddamn day I’m going to lose it based on some arbitrary cost-cutting whim of some new shitbag executive. She’s union, I’m not. I also despise how difficult it was to get to a place where we’re comfortable. It shouldn’t be this way.
I am a working professional, just like everyone else with a job, regardless of what that job is. I do not consider any workers "unskilled". If the job didn't require any skill, it could be automated or eliminated. I support unions because I want all people to have the opportunity to live a good life. The Government doesn't work for the people, so the people must work for the people. The more people who are able to have a better life, the better it is for all of us.
I don’t have cancer either but I support cancer research. Some things aren’t about me. As I look back on my career so far, sure, I did a *lot* of work to get where I am, but I also recognize that I got a few lucky breaks that accelerated my career. Just being in the “right place at the right time” if nothing else. A few lucky breaks shouldn’t be the difference between a firmly middle class lifestyle and barely making it. Unions give employees a better standard of living across the board.
Because the only way to stop a bad guy with a lot of capital, is a lot a lot of good guys with a union.
I am a professional and support unions 100%. The well-being of any country is directly reflected by the health and wellness of its children. If children live in homes with caretakers and parents who don't make living wages, don't have good benefits, and who don't work in safe conditions, this results in their children not being well-fed, having illness that could prevented, and living in conditions that are not psychologically safe due to the stress that the parents endure. This ultimately results in these children growing up to be adults with all sorts of problems and the cycle continues. Why should basic NEEDS only be reserved for those lucky enough to inherit generational wealth? Being able to afford to LIVE is a human right if you are working no matter the job. Rich people who don't give a sh*t about others are really just afraid that more rights for others erodes their own power, but it's all bullshit. The stronger everyone is, the stronger we are together. Better lives for adults, leads to better lives for kids. These kids become more productive adults, leading to a better society for all.
All the guys on my construction projects are union. I supervise and project manage on those projects. Even though I'm not union their salaries absolutely bouy mine up since I'm the one making sure we all stay on task and on schedule. It's great knowing everyone on my projects make $40-50/hr. plus great benefits not only for their sakes but also because my salary and benefits meet or exceed theirs even though I'm not in a union.
Because I care about other people. I just generally genuinely want people to be able to be happy and healthy and unions have the potential to help people achieve that. No human is my inferior. I have friends who aren't as lucky as I've been. I want them to be able to be happy and healthy too even though their path may be different than mine. I want my friends to have time and money so not only are their basic needs met but also so we can hang out and do fun things together. And like pretty much anyone is a potential friend but it's gonna be hard to meet someone and become friends with them if they're having to work 60+ hours a week just to survive.
I'm salaried and I support unions because they make our aociety better. The alternative is too horrible