I’m fine with the right to collectively act and bargain in some abstract sense.
In practice, I observed that police unions, for example, seem to be too effective at protecting their members’ interests at the expensive of the public’s. They seem more like a mafia.
If tech or game workers or whoever wants to unionize, fine with me.
Police unions are the single example of a union that cannot be allowed to exist unchecked, because their primary purpose is to remove restrictions on the power of the police.
Given that the police are already the group charged with enforcing the law, this has the effect of putting them above the law.
Systemically, police unions are completely different than other unions, public or private sector.
I see similar dynamic (though not as extreme) with many public sector unions.
For example, the pensions for public sector in Illinois are crazy generous. People can retire at 55 or 60 (with enough years of service), and get 85% of their final salary, untaxed in perpetuity. I want them to be fairly compensated but those pensions go far beyond that and dominate the state budget. The pensions are funded by taxes, paid by everyone, including lots of ordinary people working much less well paying jobs.
How did they arrange this? Politics. It’s not like with a company where there really is a level of compensation that the company cannot afford and the company just can’t go higher than that. The politicians couldn’t give a shit if they put the state in debt for many generations to come. That’s a future Illinois problem and they’ll be long retired. They want those union votes now and so they say “sure, whatever you want.”
I have no qualms about private sector unions which don’t have these issues.
None of these other public sector unions are for jobs that have the power of life and death over people on a daily basis.
None of these other public sector unions are for people who already get massive deference by the legal system.
None of these other public sector unions actively and regularly protect their members when they murder people.
You may see similar dynamics, but that's because you're ignoring the abuses the police commit on a regular basis, fully supported by their unions.
Other public sector employees getting generous pension packages are not remotely like what police unions do. Indeed, they are very much like what many people could expect from retirement in the latter part of the 20th century. Before we decided that everyone's old age should be at the mercy of Wall Street.
In practice, I observed that police unions, for example, seem to be too effective at protecting their members’ interests at the expensive of the public’s. They seem more like a mafia.
If tech or game workers or whoever wants to unionize, fine with me.