The Growth of Labor Unions
The Growth of Labor Unions
The growth of labor unions around the world have provided a more secure work environment for many workers. This was not always the case. Still today many workers are not receiving the proper payment or working conditions.
Labor Union is an association of workers that seeks to improve the economic and social well being of its members through group action. A labor union represents its member negotiations with an employer over all aspects of an employment contract, including wages and working conditions. By giving workers a united voice, a union can try to negotiate higher wages, shorter hours, and better benefits. Benefits such as insurance and retirement plans. When an employer and union cannot reach a mutual decisions through a bargaining the union may conduct a strike. A strike is an organized work stoppage.
In many countries, labor unions have official affiliations with political partie and seek to bring about social change through legislative and political action. The United States has a tradition of so called business unionism, In which the main goal of the labor union is to improve wages and working conditions. Unions in the United States often engage in political activities. These political activities include lobbying for legislation that furthers the aims of the labor movement and providing financial support candidate that are friendly to union causes.
The first association of workers, merchant associations and craft associations, formed during the Middle Ages in Europe. Merchant associations, which arose in the 11th century consisted of the merchants and traders in a city who banded together. Craft associations, first formed in the 12th century, that included people who were engaged in particular craft, ad they gradually deprived merchant associations of their power. In time the members of the crafts unions organized their own associations to seek higher wages and improved working conditions. These associations are considered the forerunners of labor unions because of their emphasis on wages and the working conditions.
The earliest actual “labor unions” arose in Western Europe and the United States at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century. They were formed be skilled crafts workers in reaction to the rapid changes in the economic environment brought about by industrialization. The concentration of work in large factories left workers increasingly dependent upon their employers.
The early labor...