Associations?? Heck yeah - let them form all manner of them, just don't let them buy off politicians.
Last I checked we are a nation of individuals whose Govt's only purpose was the protection of our rights.
We are the voters, not corps and unions who should NOT be able to buy favor for THEIR special interests with their greater ability to influence versus the individual.
I heartily agree that if Govt had remained it's limited constitutional self these issues would not exist.
Instead we have a system of the most perverse incentives imaginable that work directly against growth and free market incentive. Examples: 1) The employer deduction for health insurance - it enriches insurance co's. The employee might rather have the cash, but then will pay the taxes. MSA's solve this and remove the middleman. 2) Allowing illegal alien's babies automatic citizenship (the anchor for the whole family) - it incentivses exactly the opposite of what we want as do mandatory hospital services they get but we pay for. 3) Foreign aid to despots who work against the US. 4) Corporate subsidy 5) Welfare 6) Home mortgage deduction - it hurts renters but helps banks - and on and on.
Freedom is the negation of Govt as the Founders well understood who put the limits in we once enjoyed - on that we surely agree.
History is the big revealer, read up on the ICC, Rockefeller/Std Oil and his kickback scheme with the railroads. The railroad subsidy that led to malinvestment and the inability it created in competing with the fresh crop of small competitors. Which led Big Biz to beg for regulation and prices controls from it's bought Pols to the consumer's detriment.
This is good to know:
http://praxeology.net/RC-BRS.htm
You might want to watch a documentary called "The Corporation". It details how corporations have used the 14th amendment dozens more times than minorities to get rights for a pile of documents sitting in some safe.
The ability of corporate and/or union leaders to milk profits and union dues for their own gain with government certification and support is abominable.