Unions can't (always) make an unprofitable company profitable, but they can prevent fake layoffs that aren't actually warranted by the company's economic condition, like the kind the article is talking about.
> Unions can't (always) make an unprofitable company profitable
Indeed, I think their major trick (in America, anyway) is to make a profitable company unprofitable. Much like the bad forms of private equity from above, they bleed a business dry from below.
Like every other stakeholder, workers and their representatives have their own interests, and sometimes those are in tension with other stakeholders. But while it's very easy for workers and management to end up blaming each other in the aftermath of a failed company, in my experience the failure is usually for more fundamental reasons. When the business is sustainable and growing, the pie is growing for everyone and the conflicts are manageable, and when it's shrinking you're probably doomed anyway. But then I tend to feel the same about most cases of private equity.
