A NYT Op-Ed piece,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/01/opinion/a-civil-right-to-unionize.html?_r=1, elaborates on the authors' beliefs on why the ability to Unionize, should be a Civil Right.
Unions stifle economic growth. It's a simple truth. It doesn't take a Mensa member to understand the logic.
Widget A retails for $Z. Widget A costs $Y to produce. The price to produce Widget A increases if unionization occurs. Therefore increasing the retail price for Widget A. Less consumers purchase Widget A because of the increase. The company's profit share decreases as does its stock price. Investors sell their shares.
Take that and multiply it by hundreds, in reality thousands, of companies. Unions increase the cost of doing business. It's a simple "This follows That" scenario.
I also notice that this piece uses Germany as an example of a "heavily" unionized country that is successful. Heavy? 33.8% of Germany is unionized, and that number includes Public Unions. That number also is shrinking, as are practically all European countries union percantages, as they struggle to compete in the modern global economy.
I write all of this and then also add this: I believe in the right to unionize. However, I also believe in the right of a company to fire anyone, at any time, for any reason, up to and including a worker trying to unionize a company. If you're going to play with fire, prepare to get burned. Forcing a company to retain workers who are striking and draining a company's profit is illogical.
Unions are dinosaurs in modern, "first-world" countries. They need to be thanked and appreciated for what they have done in the past and then put in a museum.
Developing countries though, they are are different story. I say inflict more unions upon them. It will drive up their "cost of doing business" rates to where they are more in line with the first-world countries and put us on a more equal footing.
Of course then inflation increases, even more. But that's another story.