More like it guarantees a minimum wage. Not sure how it works in the US, but where I'm from you still negotiate your pay even if you're a member of a union.
this post was submitted on 13 Aug 2024
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No.
Price fixing is a problem because of the power imbalance between businesses selling products, and individual consumers that need to buy them.
Worker unions are a solution to that power imbalance.
Price fixing omits the consumer from the table. It is a way to strip the consumer of the power of choice with their dollar, to avoid competition in the market AND price gouge at the same time, and done so in secret to boot.
Union negotiating includes company representation/owners. They are part of the conversation and agreement. They are a way to more evenly share power with their employers and have a say that they are otherwise not given.
I know people like to think that a consumer spending their dollars is the same as them agreeing to the price. But when the things that they are spending their dollars on are food, Healthcare, housing, education, fuel, utilities and other basic necessities that consumers do not easily get to abstain from... that is not consent, that it coercion.
Shut up.
Price fixing doesn’t mean setting a fair or reasonable price for your product. Price fixing is the - usually - illegal practice of artificially raising your product’s price by means of market manipulation or similar. Union wage negotiations are more a form of collective bargaining.
Let me put it in business terms.
It is a contract. A labour agreement between an employer and a group of employees who have every right to democratically agree on some things like pay.
It lays out expectations with responsibilities and ramifications for both sides and provides a stable term once an agreement is made.
It prevents price fixing by an employer in the sense that a lone employee can have their ‘price’ fixed by the employer and their roles ‘fixed’ by the employer with no power to fight back as a lone person against at least a company lawyer. An employee in a union with a collective agreement has counterweight to abuse because they too can pool resources, they too can cause harm to the other side and fight back, and it works - because it’s a contract.
Found the scab.