[billybek]

Wow.

I can't believe this has lasted so long without going to PARF!

Sincerely, a decent conversation with two views that will never merge.

Skilled trades definitely benefit from unions whether they are unionized are not. The last company I worked for paid us a premium to keep the unions out of our shop. We had some guys in the company that came from a union shop beating the union drum and managed to convince a bunch of the younger guys they were getting screwed.
The reality was that the union guys would not accept the fact that long service with the company paid off incredibly well in the long run.
While the company never went union, the owner saved a pile of dough by making our benefits and holidays the same as the unions offering. The whole company suffered for this decision.
I always looked at the union wage as being minimum wage for a qualified tradesman.
Good tradesmen make more. Excellent tradesmen do better than that.

Unions definitely remove some of the flexibility that companies need to operate effectively.
Companies do not have the employees best interest at hand but their profit seeking owners and stockholders.
There needs to be a balance but what we end up with is swings of the pendulum.