<story><title>Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives and Why We Don&apos;t Talk about It</title><url>https://ndpr.nd.edu/news/private-government-how-employers-rule-our-lives-and-why-we-dont-talk-about-it/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Animats</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s a paper on classic union issues written with no reference to labor history.&lt;p&gt;There have been companies which really acted like governments to their employees. Ford.[1] Pullman.[2] The US labor movement arose partly as a counter to that. And, for a long time, from about 1930 to 1980, companies backed off on that out of fear of unions and government.&lt;p&gt;That fear has been lost, and companies are more assertive in employee control. Abuse of non-compete agreements to make low-level workers indentured servants would never have been accepted prior to 1990 or so.&lt;p&gt;US labor history has been erased from public dialogue in the US almost as thoroughly as Tienanmen Square has been erased from public dialogue in China.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.autonews.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;20030602&amp;#x2F;SUB&amp;#x2F;306020843&amp;#x2F;the-rise-and-fall-of-harry-bennett&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.autonews.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;20030602&amp;#x2F;SUB&amp;#x2F;306020843&amp;#x2F;the-...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Pullman_Strike&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Pullman_Strike&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>marmaduke</author><text>&amp;gt; US labor history has been erased from public dialogue&lt;p&gt;Or inverted? When I hear people talk of unions in the US, it&amp;#x27;s about how shitty theyve made everything.</text></comment>
<story><title>Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives and Why We Don&apos;t Talk about It</title><url>https://ndpr.nd.edu/news/private-government-how-employers-rule-our-lives-and-why-we-dont-talk-about-it/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Animats</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s a paper on classic union issues written with no reference to labor history.&lt;p&gt;There have been companies which really acted like governments to their employees. Ford.[1] Pullman.[2] The US labor movement arose partly as a counter to that. And, for a long time, from about 1930 to 1980, companies backed off on that out of fear of unions and government.&lt;p&gt;That fear has been lost, and companies are more assertive in employee control. Abuse of non-compete agreements to make low-level workers indentured servants would never have been accepted prior to 1990 or so.&lt;p&gt;US labor history has been erased from public dialogue in the US almost as thoroughly as Tienanmen Square has been erased from public dialogue in China.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.autonews.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;20030602&amp;#x2F;SUB&amp;#x2F;306020843&amp;#x2F;the-rise-and-fall-of-harry-bennett&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.autonews.com&amp;#x2F;article&amp;#x2F;20030602&amp;#x2F;SUB&amp;#x2F;306020843&amp;#x2F;the-...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Pullman_Strike&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Pullman_Strike&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>debatem1</author><text>The book does have some discussion of labor, but essentially alleges that the US labor movement is dead and new ways of thinking about the problem will be needed to wrestle with the problems of labor in the modern environment. I tend to agree, although the effort to recast employers as governments feels like a pretty transparent play to engage small-government advocates with the problems labor wants to talk about.</text></comment>