Factory Jobs Disappear; Workers Lack Options [NYTimes]

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, Al Globus wrote:
> No. But they locked the doors from the outside to prevent the
staff
> from leaving the factory floor -- for whatever reason. When the
fire
> started, that became a problem. There are lots of ways to make
money
> by risking other people's lives or damaging their health. There
needs
> to be some incentive for profit-seeking entities to avoid that
> behavior. Liability law and unions are two approaches that have
worked.

Liability law is indeed a viable solution. It holds specific
companies responsible for specific safety violations on a case-by-
case basis.

Unions, OTOH, penalize EVERYBODY -- workers and their families who
are forced to join & pay dues but are no better (and often worse) off
for it, workers who can't get jobs AT ALL because the high cost of
union labor compels manufacturers to utilize less labor-intensive
production methods, and of course the manufacturers themselves whao
cannot price their products competetively due to labor costs out of
all proportion to actual worker productivity.

Applying Occam's Razor here, there's nothing unions do for workers
that consistently enforced libability law (one of the VERY few
legitimate functions of even the most minimalist "night watchman
State") can't. The alternative mechanism, unions, cause more problems
than they solve. Which makes more sense to YOU?

spike