During the 21st century, some opinions have emerged from those who think that “the best union is the one that doesn’t exist”, either from the government sectors of all stripes or from the private sector in the economy, they dare to advance the premonition. that The end of history has come for unions, perhaps paraphrasing Fukuyama who predicted the same thing for humanity in the heat of the neoliberal delirium of the last decade of the 20th century.
These reflections arise from the current state of the world economy that has been shaken by a series of circumstances, affecting its structure to its roots in the third decade of this century, from events that are not considered by laws in the market like those that happened consecutively from 2020 until now.
First, the COVID 19 pandemic has thrown out hundreds of millions of jobs, more than 6 million human lives, collapsed the health systems of the planet and paralyzed the economic development of countries, among others disaster that created poverty. In the midst of recovery from the effects of the terrible virus, a second alarming phenomenon has arisen, such as the war unleashed from the Russian Federation against Ukraine from February 2022 until now by the dictator Putin, the Stalin -Hitler in the 21st century, whose impact has been brutal on the global economy.
This explosive cocktail of misfortunes determined a devastating effect on the prices of all goods and especially food, creating the uncontrollable inflation that we have suffered since 2022 despite the efforts of the FED, which is multiplied by the impact of the cost of energy due to the replacement of the market of gas and oil, affected by the sanctions of the West against the aggressor Russia, its allies and the increase in the cost of transportation in the world trade.
Likewise, these events have greatly influenced the organization of the world of work, such as the expansion of remote work as a measure to protect health against the pandemic, a situation that has seen approximately 40% of the public and private payrolls working from their homes, In this context we promote the proposal to use Artificial Intelligence in jobs.
In this thorny scenario, workers in the main economies of the planet are demanding a greater role for their traditional organizations, their unions, as an instrument to defend the living conditions damaged by the devastating disasters. in the population of the east and west of the planet.
In this way, we observe as relevant cases the struggles that have developed since 2022 and 2023 in the unions of the United Kingdom, the sixth economy of the G7, and the United States, the first power in the world, where they continue to leading role in the search to raise their standard of living affected by the events that have been produced.
In the United Kingdom, strikes in the Health sector, including nurses, administrative employees and doctors, those in the train and Metro transport sector, and teachers, led to the signing of collective contracts with salary increases which is very important, reviving the role of traditional trade unions, pioneer union organizations of European unionism since the 19th century.
The case of the United States is more unusual, in an economically active population of 150 million workers, about 14 million of whom belong to unions, which constitute the most representative labor force in the continent organized by the AFL-CIO headquarters and other non-confederated unions. Well, since 2022, the unions of the railways, teachers, clinics and hospitals, Hotel, the most recent of Screenwriters and actors in the film industry, concluded collective agreements with marked resonance in the country, as well the recent formation of unions at Amazon, Starbucks, despite the repression of the employer
In this scenario of labor disputes, the strike of the workers of the automakers Ford, General Motors, Stellantis, grouped by the United Auto Workers (UAW), appeared, who for 12 days until now held a an indefinite general strike was carried out. in 20 states, Their requests are a 40% increase, social security for retirees, a 4-day work week, among other demands.
What is the attitude of the US executive branch to labor disputes? We can see that the time is changing, the last national strike was that of air traffic controllers. What was the result of the Patco air traffic controllers strike in 1981? On August 5, 1981, Reagan fired PATCO members who remained on strike and barred them from rehiring. It began replacing them with a combination of about 3,000 supervisors, 2,000 non-striking air traffic controllers and 900 military controllers.
Now in 2023 the nature of the presidency is different, the labor conflict in the car companies has brought an acting president, Joe, who is in Michigan for the first time in history to support the picket strike, because he knows the his support position. unions and to improve the living conditions of workers in North America. And on the other hand, a former president, Donald Trump of the Republican Party, attended the strike site in Detroit for electoral reasons.
The truth of the matter is that behind the scenes it is reported that the revenue of automotive companies has reached $200 billion in the last two years, in the way that the GDP of some more developed countries in South America, while labor costs represent only 5% of production costs.
The results of these labor disputes and the aforementioned involving automotive companies have a short-term effect on labor relations not only in the United States, but also in the West where there is social dialogue and freedom of association, because it is a demonstration of the dictatorships of the world that Democracy also exists in the world of work.
Finally, it shows that in countries where the free development of unions, private and public companies is allowed, decent and permanent work is created, the opposite of what happens in dictatorships like Venezuela where the ruler persecutes the unions, raises false files and condemns them. .in decades of imprisonment.
