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It doesn't affect the wage of the individual postal worker.

What is interesting is how long can the main participant of the unions, in this case IF Metall, hold out. According to them, based on that the strike only affects around hundred workers, the strike fund lasts for approximately 500 years...




Only around 13 Tesla workers are actully on strike. The other 100+ are still going to work and still being paid by Tesla.


> It doesn't affect the wage of the individual postal worker.

Is it really the case? There must be a cost to refusing to do part of your job. It might not be paid directly by them but by the union (in turn with the contributions of all affiliated workers) but it should be more than zero.


Yes, that really is the case.

You're American, are you? The country where CEOs either do their job or get a golden handshake, as the cliché has it. In what sense do they have to do their job?

Life in Scandinavia is different from the US. There are expectations you have to live up to, and those you have to live up to, but they're not everything. Some expectations are less serious.


No, I'm European, from a country with strong unions. I always thought that the right to strike makes sense if both sides need to invest in the struggle- if one of the parties can inflict damage on the other with no cost for itself, what prevents it from advancing completely unreasonable demands? "Their innate reasonableness and common sense" is not a satisfying answer, as any power that can be abused will eventually be abused.


The golden handshake is usually less than they would otherwise get.

So even while being fired does earn them a large sum, succeeding would earn them a greater one. Failure is docked.


In other words, failure to conform to some expectations leave them well off. Not begging on the streets.

Failure to deliver parcels to Tesla won't leave any Swedish postal workers on the street. A tut-tut from the manager, yes, serious consequences no. If the manager has read Tesla's recent job posting for a lobbyist to help subvert Swedish democracy, the tut-tut may well be delivered with a smile and a wink.


> There must be a cost...

A zero cost of such actions may be a part of a collective agreement. What the postal service could do? Cut salaries and risk to become a next target for a strike?

From other standpoint employers and employees are all depend on the system to work. So it makes perfect sense to combine efforts to preserve the system.




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