Thett3 Tournament: Labor Unions are a net benefit to humanity

I apologize if I am brief again. Classes just started.1) Income InequalityCon points to the voluntary nature of trade to say that businesses cannot take wealth from people. What Con doesn't mention is effective force. On paper, everything is voluntary, but it may not be so in practice. To give an example, a person who is working a minimum wage job at McDonalds and supporting his family cannot "voluntarily" quit his job unless he has or is expecting to get another job. On paper, the contract will be voluntary enabling the employee to quit anytime he likes. In reality, the employee and his family would likely starve to death if such a decision were made and the employee cannot get a new job quickly. There is a huge imbalance in bargaining power which allows corporations to wield much higher influence on an individual than the individual can wield on a corporation. Labor Unions reduce the effect of this. Since the majority of people are individuals working for a corporation rather than business owners, what is good for individuals is good for humanity.Cheaper goods and services are beneficial assuming that the wages of the working-class employees remain the same. Con's theory of companies being able to increase wealth by providing cheaper goods and services is negated by the fact that lower wages for the working class will make it more difficult for them to purchase these "cheaper goods and services." Unions help increase the wages of the lowest paid workers so even if the goods are more expensive, the higher wages will enable them to purchase those goods. Con says that Rockefeller figured out to use kerosene oil and that the prices became lower because of that. Unions will certainly not prevent him from coming to the same revelation - only it will be more expensive because Union workers need to be paid more. In this case, the prices are lowered anyways but the lowest paid workers have more money and the highest paid workers have less. While the primary goal of a Union is to increase the income for its own members, there is always the options for workers to unionize or work in a job where there exists unions. Further Con has not addressed my argument about the Union Threat effect where companies pay more to non-union workers than they otherwise would because of the existence of Unions.2) Top-down economics doesn't workCon does indeed seem to believe that businesses would use additional money to hire additional workers. He says "If for example, laborers state that their wage should be $20 instead of the market rate of $15, then a business cannot hire more of these workers, who want to work at a $15 wage. These workers either become unemployed..." This assumes that the businesses would in fact hire more of these workers. Con further uses the potential of these workers being unemployed as an argument against unions. Unemployment isn't outside of the scope of this debate.Furthermore, less number of unemployed people is a benefit to humanity by itself. Con's focus on what is beneficial to humantity is very narrow. He merely assumes that an increase in GDP is beneficial to humanity while considering all other factors like unemployment irrelavant. But that doesn't really work as I have pointed out in my table and subsequent explanation in round 2. A society where the majority of its population have well-paying jobs is more beneficial to humanity than one where only a select few hold all the wealth regardless of the overall GDP in the economy.To address the point about costs increasing: If a company increases the price of a product because Unions demand that they pay their working-class employees more, the extra money being paid by consumers is being passed onto the working-class employees and not upper management. This is beneficial since the higher prices are offset by higher wages for the working class but the same wages for upper management which is essentially a wage cut for them since the higher prices makes it more difficult for them to obtain the same product. My source doesn't contradict my argument. It was a separate point. Con says that higher prices affect the poor the most without any justification. However, if profits from higher prices are being passed onto Union workers, the only people who are affected are the rich and upper management. Con further assumes that I am proposing to cut the wage of a single CEO and distribute it to the lower workers. What I am proposing is a wage decrease on the managers and higher level workers and a wage increase for the lowest level. 3) Public Labor UnionsCon claims that "Taxing the rich does not generate revenues." This statement defies logic. For instance if you have 5 bananas and I take two bananas from you, then I will have two bananas. To say that I won't is illogical. If revenues haven't increased because of increased taxes, then extraneous factors have played into the equation. What Pro shows is a simple corelation which does not take into account, causing agents.Management does not need Labor Unions. In arguing that Labor Unions are benefical, I am making a clear distinction between the working class employees and upper management while arguing that the interests of the working class should be represented. Pro claims that the workers "are" the government and not some "mystical entity." This supposed "mystical entity" is nothing other than the higher management in the government. Workers need to be protected from the management because of the tremendous difference in bargaining power and Unions further this end by representing the interests of these workers.Con says that test scores remained the same despite increased funding. Firstly, his source takes me to a dead link so I'd appreciate it if he reposts his source 4. Once I get the source, we can discuss whether funding was used to increase test scores in particular because most of the time, funding is done to increase the overall student experience such as laboratories, field trips, better facilities, better chairs etc and may not be directed towards test scores. Also, I'd like to know what test scores Con is talking about in particular i.e. standardized tests? I didn't argue that teachers should be "protected" from firings. I argued that the difficulty in firing a teacher should corelate to the difficulty a teacher has in order to find a new job. This balances the scales and puts the individual and the corporation on a level playing field. Con has also not responded to the fact that teachers can be fired before they are offered tenure. If only competent teachers are given tenure, this eliminates the problem of incompetent teachers having tenure. The responsibility to ensure this lies with the corporation and not the Unions.