<story><title>Swedish unions strike: Blocks mail and package deliveries for Tesla</title><url>https://www.seko.se/press-och-aktuellt/nyheter/2023/seko-stoppar-brev-och-paket-till-tesla/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nabla9</author><text>Good point. Sweden has better institutions and labor laws to reduce friction and enable cooperation.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Enterprise bargaining&lt;/i&gt; in the US is more zero sum game between companies and workers. Everything you give to workers, reduces competitive edge against non-union competitors. It&amp;#x27;s in company interest to fight unions as much as possible.&lt;p&gt;In &lt;i&gt;sectoral bargaining&lt;/i&gt;, unions negotiate same deal with their counterparts representing corporations. When nobody gets competitive edge over others, there is less downside for agreeing.</text></item><item><author>Ekaros</author><text>Also they forget that on average they are pretty benign. At least in my field they  ask for quite tame things. And them being same union for everyone means that you don&amp;#x27;t really lose much to competitors. As they will have same rules in place...</text></item><item><author>nabla9</author><text>American companies often think that European unions are just stronger than unions in Europe. They don&amp;#x27;t realize that labor and union laws are different.&lt;p&gt;Toys R Us tried the same in Sweden. They initially refused agreement and hired only non-union workers. But transport and logistics workers union and finance union started sympathy strike.  Toys R Us didn&amp;#x27;t get deliveries and bank workers refused work related to company.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>s1artibartfast</author><text>I would also add that many (most?) European countries allow multiple unions in the same shop, with worker choice. Inter-union competition is important to keep unions honest and aligned with their workers. I think this more than anything else is responsible for the anti-union sentiment in the US.</text></comment>
<story><title>Swedish unions strike: Blocks mail and package deliveries for Tesla</title><url>https://www.seko.se/press-och-aktuellt/nyheter/2023/seko-stoppar-brev-och-paket-till-tesla/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nabla9</author><text>Good point. Sweden has better institutions and labor laws to reduce friction and enable cooperation.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;Enterprise bargaining&lt;/i&gt; in the US is more zero sum game between companies and workers. Everything you give to workers, reduces competitive edge against non-union competitors. It&amp;#x27;s in company interest to fight unions as much as possible.&lt;p&gt;In &lt;i&gt;sectoral bargaining&lt;/i&gt;, unions negotiate same deal with their counterparts representing corporations. When nobody gets competitive edge over others, there is less downside for agreeing.</text></item><item><author>Ekaros</author><text>Also they forget that on average they are pretty benign. At least in my field they  ask for quite tame things. And them being same union for everyone means that you don&amp;#x27;t really lose much to competitors. As they will have same rules in place...</text></item><item><author>nabla9</author><text>American companies often think that European unions are just stronger than unions in Europe. They don&amp;#x27;t realize that labor and union laws are different.&lt;p&gt;Toys R Us tried the same in Sweden. They initially refused agreement and hired only non-union workers. But transport and logistics workers union and finance union started sympathy strike.  Toys R Us didn&amp;#x27;t get deliveries and bank workers refused work related to company.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>avgcorrection</author><text>&amp;gt; Enterprise bargaining in the US is more zero sum game between companies and workers. Everything you give to workers, reduces competitive edge against non-union competitors. It&amp;#x27;s in company interest to fight unions as much as possible.&lt;p&gt;I suppose they will always hide behind “competitive” edge. The more naked truth seems to be that between the stakeholders of the CEO+board of directors v.s. workers—avoiding the nebolous “company interest”—there is always inherently a zero sum game. Like one of the automative CEOs in the US who boasted about how she was paid according to her performance—her performance being, among other things, directly related to how low she could keep wages for the rank and file.</text></comment>