Quote:
Originally Posted by Fotzlid
It could also be said that American manufacturers can't compete in a global market due to the extra costs that are associated with unionized shops.
Where are the steel and textile mills and other heavy industry manufacturing jobs? They all went over seas because the operating costs are way too high in the States.
Most of this country's power and wealth was our ability to build things. Now it is centered on manufacturing wealth.
Unions are not the sole reason, but they are a major culprit.
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Data - Swivel
Most of the economically competitive nations, as well as most of the nations with the highest percentage of manufacturing jobs, have stronger unions than the US. And while the Chinese unions basically rubberstamp whatever the state does, the unions in Sweden, Honk Kong and so on are not only bigger, but more powerful than the American versions.
In fact, go ahead and compare the numbers above with the table below:
IMF Staff Papers - Table 2 for article: Global Rebalancing with Gravity: Measuring the Burden of Adjustment
the first column is manufacturing as a share of GDP. You will see that most nations where the manufacturing sector is larger actually have more unions.
In the US the proportion of workers who are unionized in manufacturing is smaller than the proportion of workers who are unionized in other sectors of the economy. To think that they are the "major culprit" in jobs going overseas is to believe in unfounded myths.