So? The cost of hiring you wouldn’t just be your wage, it would be the loss under contract of every other worker at the plant. Sucks for you, because it makes hiring you a much less attractive prospect, but it’s entirely within the rights of the auto worker’s organization to make contracts with the auto plant. No free market allows you to prevent third parties from entering contracts that don’t work out so well for you.

Suppose, once I got hired I didn’t care to have the union representing me. Am I free not to pay union dues? No.

You can’t enjoy the benefits of union negotiation and not pay union dues. How is that fair?

Yeah, unions are the epitome of the free market in the workforce.

Unions have contracts with employers that enjoin them from certain actions. That’s all. Are you saying that’s illegitimate? That contracts should never enjoin parties? I thought it was the position of libertarians that contracts, in fact, were to be held as inviolable. Funny how that isn’t extended to unions.

After all, the world is a small place and pretty soon companies will find cheaper labor overseas.

And eventually that labor will want the competitive advantages of unionization. It all reaches equilibrium.

But I will grant that unions and Congress share a lot of similarities especially when it comes to their thirst for power.

Lucky for us, there’s all those noble, heroic, multinational conglomerates to stand up for the rights of the enormously wealthy underdogs tragically encumbered by a total lack of thirst for power.

Would that company be able to give me a big raise if they liked my performance and attitude? No.

Suppose, once I got hired I didn’t care to have the union representing me. Am I free not to pay union dues? No.

Supposing I were an auto maker in Michigan and didn’t want to allow the union to use company property to conduct it’s business (which is largely adversarial to my business). Do I have the right to fire them if they do? No.

If the company had to lay off workers, would they be able to get rid of the ones first who were the poorest performers? No.

Yeah, unions are the epitome of the free market in the workforce. It almost brings a tear to my eye to hear how freedom oriented they are. All of the above are result of legislative support given to unions at the expense of business. That’s not to say that government doesn’t do favors for business or that it isn’t wrong when they do. It’s only saying that unions derive much of their power from government support and their function is to artificially inflate wages (etc) by threatening employers.

To take it one step further, artificially inflated wages make products cost more which makes them less competitive on the world market, ultimately affecting job security. After all, the world is a small place and pretty soon companies will find cheaper labor overseas. That, of course, will lead to protectionist legislation. I suppose you’re next going to be telling me how protectionism is really just the free market at work, right?

As for your reference to democracy (choosing to ignore my comment specifically excluding functions best handled by government), I will say unequivocally, that while I have great affection for the democratic style of government, I absolutely do not want a democratic majority (any democratic majority) making all my decisions for me. In case you haven’t noticed, not all things operated under democratic principles function with exemplary integrity and benefit everyone equally. I refer you to the U.S. Congress as sufficient proof of that statement. But I will grant that unions and Congress share a lot of similarities especially when it comes to their thirst for power.

By the way. I really like your comment that “the free market is never free”. I only wish that people would keep that in mind when they’re so busy blaming the free market for everything that goes wrong in the economy.

I just mean a bunch of people pooling their collective effort, as an organization.

I don’t support any collective of anything that partners with government to get the rules slanted in their favor.

That seems to me to be the critical feature of a democracy. Are you saying the very concept of a “political party” is illegitimate?

Free markets are free.

Free markets are never free.

If there’s anything unions don’t support it’s a free market in labor.

As free as anything else. “You can buy our labor from us, at our prices, or you can buy it from whoever you think will provide the same product at the same quality.” Same deal I get from Apple or Mitsubishi, I don’t see the problem with applying competition to labor. Should people simply not be allowed to band together to sell things? I don’t see how you can say that Apple should exist – as a collective formed to sell computers produced not by individual but by joint effort – but a union should not, when the only difference is that Apple sells computer and the union sells its members’ labor.

“Union” doesn’t mean “closed shop.” A union is just an organization that contracts for its members’ labor. I fail to see what’s anti-free market or anti-competitive about that. If you don’t want to negotiate with the union, don’t hire union workers. If everyone you want to hire is in the union, well, tough; Apple is the only company that makes iPhones, so if I want one, I pay what they want. Same with the union.

The fault should be more on the police than on the mother. The police are supposed to be trained in appropriate escalation of force and use of alternative methods. If the first instinct is to pull out the tazer and zap a kid, thats f**ked up.

So the unions and corporations do agree on something.

http://zerohedge.blogspot.com/2009/05/observations-on-nyse-program-trading.html

If I’m going to risk my savings in the stock market, I have right to know if the CEO of a company I’m interested in is short selling his own stock thru a numbered account in Switzerland; I want to know about capital movements, such as the movement into oil futures. Oil consumption is still declining but the price is climbing. There is a shitload of capital sloshing around the globe and when it pours into a market it distorts it. The way things are currently, your capital is not safe in dollar denominated investments in american stock exchanges, but because of the size of American stock markets, no where else is safe from their actions.

Here we go, with revisions…

Waitaminnit. A parent can be arrested for child abuse if they spank their child in public, but a cop can shoot electrically charged barbs into a child’s head and cause serious injury… because he ‘had no other choice’… and it’s ok?

Also, what the hell kind of mother takes her child to the police just because they’re arguing?

I’m baffled by the whole thing.

#64 Chet

It’s interesting to me that, as a free marketeer, you’re in favor of individuals forming collectives to sell anything they want, unless it’s their labor.

To call a business a “collective” is a use of the term I admittedly have never heard before.

In any case, you’re not hearing me. I don’t support any collective of anything that partners with government to get the rules slanted in their favor. You apparently missed my reference to corporate welfare which would also be included in that category.

Free markets are free. When the government gets involved to tip the scales, they are not free markets and that applies to any scenario you wish to name (aside from a very limited number of functions arguably best served by government).

If there’s anything unions don’t support it’s a free market in labor. In fact, I don’t know that I’ve ever heard anyone, including union supporters, argue that they do. If you want to suggest a hypothetical, wherein a union might possibly promote a free market in labor, then be my guest, but don’t suggest that a union like that exists today.

It’s interesting to me that, as a free marketeer, you’re in favor of individuals forming collectives to sell anything they want, unless it’s their labor.

SJE nailed it on the head. This should give you an idea of the point I was trying to make… Federal Rule of Evidence 403 reads:

“Although relevant, evidence may be excluded if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury, or by considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless presentation of cumulative evidence.”

Note that the word “prejudice” is modified with the word “unfair.” Did you catch the phrase in the definition you posted: “detriment to one’s legal rights or claims“? If you’re the plaintiff in a case where you claim the defendant’s negligent driving caused you to crash your car, evidence that you were seen doing shots at a bar a half hour before the accident is prejudicial; i.e. it is to the detriment of your legal claim. In such a situation, though, it’s likely admissible because it’s fairly prejudicial–the evidence is damning precisely because it suggests the accident was due to your drunk driving, not the defendant’s behavior. On the flip side, evidence that you were intentionally running over kittens with your car the half hour before the accident would be unfairly prejudicial because it isn’t relevant to the issue before the court. That’s the distinction I was trying to make.

I was j/k. I should have had a sarcasm tag around that. I’m not much for “creative accounting”. I’d rather pay a bit more and not have to ever worry about an audit.

I’m not a tax lawyer, but I’m pretty sure that you can never write off your time, just your actual expenses for business or charitable purposes.

If I’m wrong about that, someone please tell me, because I would love to write off the value of the hundreds of hours I have spent and will spend on Cory Maye’s case.

(In the area of the content of electronic communications, with the notable exception of the post-9/11 NSA activities, there are substantial statutory protections under federal law.)

Now that we’ve gotten off to a good start…..need any pipe work quoted? That way I can write my time on Radleys site off my taxes as “networking”. I can do that, right?

#33 Ben (the other one)

Actually, as far as “old fashioned” is concerned, there is something like nine centuries of common-law and 220 years of American Constitutional precedent to establish that there is no probable cause requirement for investigative subpoenas.

I appreciate your taking the time to explain that. I found it informative, but a bit depressing. My remark about being old fashioned mostly just alluded to my belief in privacy as having become somewhat outdated and I, admittedly was thinking more in terms of the drug war and the war on terror which seemed to have opened innumerable doors to government data mining (investigation in search of a crime).

Also, just for the record, I will probably be supportive of any entity that promotes privacy. I don’t think we currently enjoy all the privacy and freedom that we are entitled to.