Tesla has filed a lawsuit against the Swedish government's Transport Agency over a workers' strike that has blocked the U.S. auto maker's requests for license plates for new vehicles, business daily Dagens Industri reported on Monday.
The Nordic employer-employee dynamic is fascinating. Did you know that there isn’t really a minimum wage in the Nordics? Neither did I! Despite this, workers are paid and treated well. Because of unions. In fact, the system works so well that Denmark has been resisting the EU’s demands to instate a minimum wage. At the behest of unions! Workers in the Nordics generally take matters into their own hands. In some respects it works really well, because the dispute is handled between interested parties. People who have deep working knowledge of the situation. I think it’s much more effective and flexible than getting the government involved, which tends to take ham-fisted action far too slowly. At the heart of it is a very liberal principle: you can’t force someone to work for you. That’s slavery. Everyone has the right to not work. Of course, Tesla has the right to fire those workers. But then the entire workforce is entitled to stop working at the same time. It’s a great example of a company having a bargaining partner with equal bargaining power on the other side. This doesn’t really ever happen in America, or really most other countries, which is why Musk is so confused. He’s about to learn that bullying unions in the Nordics doesn’t work.
Effective negotiations happen when both sides bully each other. It is hard to say whether the car company with revenue 16% the size of the entire nation of Sweden, or a few thousand workers, have more bargaining power. I guess the first one to blink loses.
This doesn’t really ever happen in America, or really most other countries, which is why Musk is so confused.
In fact, sympathy strikes aren’t protected labor organizing activity in the US, precisely because they work. (That is to say, a company can fire someone for sympathy striking. AFAIK the closest thing to sympathy strike activity that’s allowed is, a union worker is protected if they refuse to cross another strike’s picket line and in their refusal fail to perform their job duties, but that mostly affects Teamsters doing delivery work (so, union truckers can refuse to deliver to a company whose workers are striking if doing so would cross the picket line).)
if swedes care so much about unions they should just pass a law, all these sympathy strikes are stupid
Why would a law be needed?
The Nordic employer-employee dynamic is fascinating. Did you know that there isn’t really a minimum wage in the Nordics? Neither did I! Despite this, workers are paid and treated well. Because of unions. In fact, the system works so well that Denmark has been resisting the EU’s demands to instate a minimum wage. At the behest of unions! Workers in the Nordics generally take matters into their own hands. In some respects it works really well, because the dispute is handled between interested parties. People who have deep working knowledge of the situation. I think it’s much more effective and flexible than getting the government involved, which tends to take ham-fisted action far too slowly. At the heart of it is a very liberal principle: you can’t force someone to work for you. That’s slavery. Everyone has the right to not work. Of course, Tesla has the right to fire those workers. But then the entire workforce is entitled to stop working at the same time. It’s a great example of a company having a bargaining partner with equal bargaining power on the other side. This doesn’t really ever happen in America, or really most other countries, which is why Musk is so confused. He’s about to learn that bullying unions in the Nordics doesn’t work.
As a Dane, I want to say that this was very succinctly put.
Mostly true, but in this case the unions are the bully and they will win. Perhaps not a bad thing as it seems to work well.
The unions will always be the bullies in cases like this. But that is how this system is supposed to work.
And it works quite well, both for employees and employers. I don’t think many employers in Denmark or Sweden would prefer not having unions and CBAs.
Effective negotiations happen when both sides bully each other. It is hard to say whether the car company with revenue 16% the size of the entire nation of Sweden, or a few thousand workers, have more bargaining power. I guess the first one to blink loses.
In fact, sympathy strikes aren’t protected labor organizing activity in the US, precisely because they work. (That is to say, a company can fire someone for sympathy striking. AFAIK the closest thing to sympathy strike activity that’s allowed is, a union worker is protected if they refuse to cross another strike’s picket line and in their refusal fail to perform their job duties, but that mostly affects Teamsters doing delivery work (so, union truckers can refuse to deliver to a company whose workers are striking if doing so would cross the picket line).)
It’s not the government’s authority to dictate what the free market should do :)