Starbucks workers at a store in Buffalo, New York, voted to unionize on Thursday, over the company’s objections, marking a first for the 50-year-old coffee giant and pointing the way to a new labor model for the company.
The National Labor Relations Board said Thursday that workers voted 19-8 in favor of a union at one of three locations in Buffalo. A second store rejected the union in a vote of 12-8. The results of a third store could not be determined because of several challenged votes.
If the labor board certifies the vote — a process expected to take about a week — it would be the first for any Starbucks-owned store in the US to unionize. Starbucks has actively fought unionization at its stores for decades, saying its stores function best when it works directly with employees.
Not sure what type of statements they put out but they’re as capitalist of a company as possible. They don’t even franchise. If they were true liberals they would at least franchise and share the ability to create wealth with their workers.
Who are you asking this question to? Keep tilting those windmills Don.
I’ve only skimmed the thread but I haven’t seeing anyone say workers shouldn’t be able to collectively bargain in this thread.
I’ve seen people pointing out that it might not have been the smartest move by the workers, but no one has said they shouldn’t have the right to unionize.
Smart collective bargaining is an important part of free trade…this might not be been the smartest move by these employees. Time will tell and I hope the best for them.
It won’t be easy to bargain when you don’t have the collective as a whole bargaining with you. I’ve worked in mixed work environments before and they weren’t as good as just non-union or just union.
I don’t know what you mean when you say free trade… I feel like you mean free markets… not free trade. Free trade is a term used to describe import/export relationship between countries where they don’t restrict trade… so no tariffs or restrictions (although they typically will claim free trade agreement and still restrict trade a bit).
Free market is probably what you meant which is where buyers and sellers are able to negotiate a price depending on supply and demand with minimal (ideally none but of course this doesn’t exist anywhere) interference from outside sources.
In the freest of markets you would absolutely have collective bargaining and unions but you would also have employers who are able to fire those people if they wanted to. They would have no employment protections.
Of course we don’t operate in environments with 100% free markets or 100% free trade.
It’s a small store. It’s not a large collective of workers. Starbucks owns the store, so they can close up shop and leave the workers to have their unionized coffee shop while Starbucks opens a new location a block over.
It won’t be easy for them and chances are they won’t be unionized Starbucks employees a year from now.
Unions can be really great but if you think whatever restaurant workers inion or whatever that is going to swallow them up cares about much more than their dues you’re dreaming. The union won’t put a whole lot into fighting Starbucks unless they think they can pull off a mass flip.