Present day Unions are a victim of modern times. Back when the industrial revolution was getting going and most industry was domestic, unions were needed to battle the robber barons and secure a decent wage and working conditions for labor. Times change. Not only did unions become powerful, they also became corrupt. (Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.) Then came the digital & computer revolution. As I have written before (The Coming Age Of The Borg) there is far more American jobs (labor) lost to computerized automation and industrial robots than all of illegal immigration, and moving factories overseas combined. In other words, the basic feed stock of unions (labor) is decreasing at an ever increasing rate resulting in less and less membership. So union corruption, industrial automation and globalization has delivered domestic unions a triple whammy.
So unions must do something in order to survive. Viola, become international to address globalization and organize the only remaining American labor pool that is still growing, i.e., Service Industry labor and Government Service labor. Organizing Government labor is the best for domestic unions because there is no labor competition and wages are guaranteed by taxes with no competition for wages either. This situation is corruption nirvana, i.e., make law requiring Government to withhold union dues and then use union dues to fund professional politicians and make them beholding to organized labor: Corruption Nirvana. By going international, unions can not only address globalization, they can become a political force to be reckoned with, as we are now seeing.
I know, not a pretty picture.
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