First of all: If you are going to resort to ad-hominem attacks you are not going to get very far. I resent you characterizing me as "ignorant" and clue-less. It is uncalled for and without justification. You don't know anything about me.
I was not going to comment beyond that until I saw this:
"Unions- and yes, even those in California- they are one of the few things holding the economy up"
Really? How so? I think this is, again, utter nonsense. How are unions holding-up the US economy? You are joking, right?
You really should learn what an ad hominem attack is. If I say you're ignorant and clueless on the topics of labor in economies, based upon what you've said about labor in economies, that's not ad-hominem. That's just resorting to insulting you. However, I shouldn't have done it in the first place, and for that I apologize.
Currently, America has an estimated 11.4% of it's workers in a Union. These are people who universally are working jobs where they are getting better benefits/pay/work conditions than if there were not a Union. Now, considering that the majority of Union jobs are for positions not requiring college degrees, you're looking at a situation of helping the most vulnerable members of society still afford to live on a year to year basis- those who are least valuable to the economic system. To take away Unions, in the vast majority of cases, would cause a few basic results-
* Lowering of hourly pay
* Removal of benefits
* Worsening of work conditions
Now, I could take the reasonable argument that the first and third options would probably stay static in over half of the cases if Unions were to be removed. But without a Union, I don't think that suddenly these companies are going to decide to pick up paying for benefits. While some companies involved with unions pay for their employees' benefits, once again, the majority are given benefits by the union, including health and life insurance at the least, and many include more than that. So you're looking at the very least, with more people unable to afford healthcare.
In the end, yes, the members of the union don't pay out that money to dues- but this won't be enough to afford the benefits they have otherwise. And that means they won't be able to afford many of the other things in their lives, such as houses, cars, or most luxury items. You could make the argument, 'Their job isn't worth that much, they shouldn't be able to do that.', but remember- Unions are largely made up of those who couldn't afford to go back to college in the first place. Less and less young people are joining Unions because most of the newer, more modern industries don't have them. Essentially, unless you're going into government work or healthcare, you'll most likely be outside of the union system.
And this is all avoiding the basic point, that once again- there are a lot of jobs out there right now, that would be wholeheartedly unsafe without a Union pushing back at the employer. And not just unsafe because of simple things like railings, or dangerous locations- but things like overworking employees, dangerous weather conditions, etc. And many companies, even those under Unions, are still able to keep many of these conditions on their employees because the Union is either too new or just doesn't have enough leverage.
I was not going to comment beyond that until I saw this:
"Unions- and yes, even those in California- they are one of the few things holding the economy up"
Really? How so? I think this is, again, utter nonsense. How are unions holding-up the US economy? You are joking, right?