Hi Nathan,

You ask:

Unions - are they still relevant in 2024?

Speaking from only a personal point of view - I've never
had the need for union membership. I've worked in both
private and public institutions.

However, it's only fair to remember that the rights many
people enjoy at work were won because workers came together
in trade unions and fought for them.

There are situations where people are not capable of
communicating with management about their working terms and
conditions and they can't argue against bad management
practices.

We should note that things like the minimum wage, equal pay
for work of equal value, paid holidays, hours of work,
anti-discrimination laws, parental leave, health and safety,
and so on, are things unions have fought for. Also, having
someone in your corner helps many.

Whether unions are still relevant today? I guess that the enormous
turnouts that occur when either nurses, teachers, transport workers,
construction workers or any others, turn out and go on strike
answers that question.

Yes they are still relevant today.

And will continue to be.
Workers will continue to come together if they are mis-treated.

"Workers will continue to come together if they are mis-treated."

Well they mustn't be mistreated all that often. A mere 1 in 8 workers feels the need to be protected by a union and that number has been falling for 40 years with little to indicate it won't continue to fall.

If that's true where do all those crowds come from when they
appear on the news and media - pictures of them -
going on strike, like - police officers, nurses, teachers,
health workers, construction workers, transport workers,
et cetera? The crowds are not small

Yes, most unions brought about better conditions & that was good. But as the old saying goes "too much of a good thing is no good" !
That's the point we have reached a few decades ago !
Wars too have made some things better but not all.
My only gripes with unionism is that once they delivered better conditions it resulted in the atrocious imbalance of pays/salaries that are now becoming the number one dilemma for our society ! We've reached the point where unions are needed again, unions that fight for the insanely high & insanely unjustified salaries for bureaucrats with such an obvious lack of merit !
We literally need Anti Union unions !

"Australia's union laws are restrictive by historical
standards. This has caused major problems across the
labour market."

"Legislative changes in the 1990s imposed significant
limits on union access to workplaces, which drove a
sharp fall in the proportion of workers who are union
members from 33% in 1995 to 12.5% in 2023."

"Legal restrictions on unions' workplace access have
directly contributed to the significant rise of wage
theft where employees pay workers less than what they
are legally entitled to."

There's more at:

http://sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/07/17/stronger-union-rights-can-mean-more-productive--sustainable-work.html#:

Hi Nathan,

Just a bit more information:

"Research conducted by Prof. Alex Bryson at the University
College London and colleagues have found that unions can
improve worker engagement which can help companies
to innovate and adopt more productive practices. Collective
voices provide workers with power to negotiate fair wages
and conditions."

"Workers who feel they are treated fairly are more likely
to be satisfied and less likely to leave their company.
According to the OECD by giving workers a collective voice
unions can contribute to " lower turnover and longer tenure
which can reduce hiring and training costs and increase
productivity."

Of course as stated earlier" Australia's laws are restrictive
by historical standards - which have caused problems across
the labour market."

There's more at:

http://sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/07/17/stronger-union-rights-can-mean-more-productive--sustaniable-work.html#: