alt Hacker News> It goes both ways.
That's the point. We should prevent management from destroying productive companies and prevent unions from doing it, instead of saying "what about those other guys" to justify the bad behavior of either of them.
> In the US some work is primarily done by unions (such as trade work).
You're referring to some of the least efficient industries in the US with high levels of regulatory capture. The fact that there is no test-based path to occupational licensing in many trades, only multi-year "apprenticeship" (i.e. permission from an incumbent), is one of the big reasons construction costs so much, people can't afford housing and government construction projects consistently blow the budget.
> If you wanted to convince me to get rid of unions, you'd do it by setting up robust workers rights nationally which unions provide.
Most "worker protections" are nothing better than highly inefficient alternatives to unemployment insurance. If you have competitive markets then you don't need regulatory protections because companies are subject to competitive pressure. If you don't have competitive markets then you're unconditionally screwed and the first thing you need is to fix that.
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> We should prevent management from destroying productive companies and prevent unions from doing it
I'll agree to that. But I'd point out that it's far more the case that management destroys a business, not a union. The US has fairly weak union protections and few unions at the moment. The place where change needs to happen is in management. But also we need to start talking about what it means for a business to be productive.
> You're referring to some of the least efficient
Least efficient how? Because it's expensive?
> high levels of regulatory capture.
No. Regulatory capture is when a business keeps out competitors through hard to fulfill regulations. It's not when the standard for employees is high making it hard for new employees to enter the market. The acid test for regulatory capture is "is there an oligopoly here" and the answer for trade work is a clear "no". There's a billion different companies in any given city that do trade work.
> The fact that there is no test-based path to occupational licensing in many trades, only multi-year "apprenticeship"
For very good reason. Tradework done poorly gets people killed. Taking a one time test is a very bad way to ensure that quality is high. There's a reason places without unions also use the apprenticeship method of licensing (doctors for example).
> If you have competitive markets then you don't need regulatory protections because companies are subject to competitive pressure.
That's wishful thinking assuming that a competitive market can't also be exclusive, hard to enter, or oversaturated. There are things that naturally can't be competitive, usually involving high levels of skill or knowledge. For example, microchip fabrication. It's simply too expensive to buy the equipment to make a computer chip and that can't be solved by anti-trust enforcement.
> We should prevent management from destroying productive companies and prevent unions from doing it, instead of saying "what about those other guys" to justify the bad behavior of either of them.
Im not justifying anyone, I'm suggesting a pragmatic, imperfect solution to a clear power imbalance. There's only one way to treat a counterpart who repeatedly defects on the iterated prisoners dilemma, and its not waiting for them to unilaterally start cooperating.