Was going to note that too. I suspect workers are not willing to participate in unions because unions are less able to deliver higher pay (which is a big disincentive for participation). This could be a result of changing labour laws which reduce the fundamental efficacy of unions but regardless the outcome is lower willingness to participate.
Other countries finally starting to pull out of the rubble of ww2.
The massive influx of the baby boomers into the workforce devaluing labor. Couple this with boomer women demanding jobs instead of being house wives, further adding to supply of available labor.
Come 1980 we add in trickle down economics which encourages the hoarding of wealth.
Then there’s computerization, automation and globalization that have been rapidly bringing up per capital productivity. Weirdly this devalues labor, because you need fewer people.
That’s just off the top of my head.
Unions are important and can be a force for good, but the data doesn’t fully support the claim.
Simple solutions to complex problems are usually being sold as a way to manipulate people… Don’t buy in to simple solutions.
Looks like turnaround was in the 1950s, start of the cold war and the rise of anticommunism as organizing principle domestically as well as abroad, combined with free trade policies that let us exploit foreign workers- by suppressing their own unions with tactics that to put it mildly wouldn’t fly in the United States (aka imperialism)
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Yay, correlation ≠ causation gang!
Especially since membership falls after pay.
If this graph showed anything, it would be that unions members got paid less, and then they quit the union.
Especially given that union memberships mirrors but lags a few years behind the fall in income share.
Was going to note that too. I suspect workers are not willing to participate in unions because unions are less able to deliver higher pay (which is a big disincentive for participation). This could be a result of changing labour laws which reduce the fundamental efficacy of unions but regardless the outcome is lower willingness to participate.
IDK let’s see.
Other countries finally starting to pull out of the rubble of ww2.
The massive influx of the baby boomers into the workforce devaluing labor. Couple this with boomer women demanding jobs instead of being house wives, further adding to supply of available labor.
Come 1980 we add in trickle down economics which encourages the hoarding of wealth.
Then there’s computerization, automation and globalization that have been rapidly bringing up per capital productivity. Weirdly this devalues labor, because you need fewer people.
That’s just off the top of my head.
Unions are important and can be a force for good, but the data doesn’t fully support the claim.
Simple solutions to complex problems are usually being sold as a way to manipulate people… Don’t buy in to simple solutions.
Removed by mod
Looks like turnaround was in the 1950s, start of the cold war and the rise of anticommunism as organizing principle domestically as well as abroad, combined with free trade policies that let us exploit foreign workers- by suppressing their own unions with tactics that to put it mildly wouldn’t fly in the United States (aka imperialism)
https://www.epi.org/publication/unions-decline-inequality-rises/
I just got my second cola this year from my union.