If that’s what you learned in economics class you should ask for a refund.
“The market” is just a euphemism for the employers looked at as a group. And before anyone tries to chime in about employees holding out for better wages it doesn’t work 99% of the time because the employer will just pass you over and take one of the other 500 applicants that will work for what they want to pay.
All the negotiating power right now is in the court of the employers. Thank you for that union bashers.
I don’t agree. And the snarkiness was uncalled for.
Your wage is a cost, one of many, that must come out of the sale of the good or service. I sell HVAC services. I can’t pay employees more than what I can sell them for on the open market, minus their other associated costs. The market for their services is what sets their wage. Employees don’t understand this, but that’s how it is. Wages go up when your services help the company make more money; not because you have worked another year, have worked hard, or whatever other inane reason people come up with.
I’m not sure why you think union-bashers are responsible for employers having some “upper hand”.
Union bashing only works if workers agree that the unions suck. And that is a problem caused by the unions looking out for their own existance, and spending all their money on political conquests, rather than working to actually help workers.
Meanwhile, workers are much more hurt by all the things that happen because unions get democrats elected.
I work three jobs, none of them union. One is my full-time employment, I am paid what I am worth, few people could step in and do what I do, both because I am very good at it with years of experience, and because I’m intimately familiar with the products we produce, and spend time and effort keeping it that way.
But if they could hire some out-of-work college dropout to do my job, that is exactly what the company should do. Companies are not welfare states. Of course, the consumer wins if the products are cheaper, except if the consumer loses their job because of cheap labor, they can’t afford the cheaper products.
My second job is a $10-an-hour part-time job I have one month a year, as a haunt monster at a theme park. They can’t fill all the positions at that price, but my guess is they don’t think the problem with hiring is the salary. It is a weird job, and physically demanding. In california, applicants line up ahead of time for the chance at getting auditions for this kind of job, but here in the east, even with unemployment high among young people, it just isn’t the job people are clamoring for.
For me that’s just a really fun job, and I can afford the time for one month a year.
My 3rd job is a freelance writer, and I get paid peanuts, more or less depending on how long it takes me to write 750 words. I’m losing that job because the paper is going out of business. But I am not aware that anybody was clamoring to take my job.