Pretty simple….Unions are dinosaurs. They protect seniority rather than advocate for meritocracy. And the world is now much more merit-based than ever before. See my previous post about unions failing their members here. In fact many regulatory agencies (National Futures Association www.nfa.futures.org) are killing their member base too, but that is a story for another time.
As for this round of unions being dinosaurs, its simple. Look at two stories from the NYT in the last week. The first article discusses the plans for a national cabbie union. At present each city and even each dispatcher have de-facto union structures to their workplace. Seniority rules, close association with regulators benefit company owners, and oligopolies are the norm. This is the model that Uber is murdering. Yet the workers in this industry seem to think that a national, more formal version of their current paradigm will save their jobs.
The second story is an analysis of Uber’s recent valuation and the opportunities Uber can unlock with their distributed “call and retrieve” paradigm. Flexible work hours, outsourced labor, very low fixed costs are hallmarks of Uber’s business model. There is no room for unions here as the workforce have the flexibility they need to work for themselves.
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/06/09/how-uber-pulls-in-billions-all-via-iphone/?ref=business
Maybe I will finally short the technology sector when tech employees start looking to unionize.
ARHAIK 