> But that's just pointless because there are a thousand other reasons they might want to close the store and there is no way to prove it
That's the exact point where your argument breaks down. It is possible, sometimes, to prove that a company closed a store because of a union. See the recent Starbucks trial. In the end, they were only saved by the SCOTUS, who isn't exactly uncontroversial at the moment.
> It is possible, sometimes, to prove that a company closed a store because of a union.
The "sometimes" is doing all the work there. Sure, if the company writes an email that says "we decided to close this store because the employees unionized and we're trying to deter that in other stores" then you could prove it, but then they could just... not do that, and close the store anyway.
Which is kind of the other problem. You end up trying to mind read the intent behind some possible innuendo with an ambiguous meaning, because the outcome isn't determined by what they do, it's determined by what they write down.
> And note I'm replying to someone claiming it's impossible to charge companies with union busting at all.
If it's impossible to charge companies that have better lawyers but still use the same tactics, you still have the same problem with the law, because then those companies will have a competitive advantage and the others would either learn to do the same or lose their market position.
I believe in labor disputes the standard is a preponderance of guilt. You don't need proof at all, just the inclination they could have had bad motives.
Beyond a certain size, it becomes hard to pretend you're doing it for one reason while actually doing it for another. Especially if it becomes a pattern.
> Luckily, executives have a habit of occasionally putting their blatantly illegal deals in writing
This is the weirdest way to have laws though. It strongly implies that the person putting it in writing didn't know it was illegal, because otherwise they wouldn't have put it in writing. But then you're never enforcing the law against people knowingly breaking the law, you can only ever enforce it against people who didn't realize it was illegal.
That seems like a bad design. In particular, it rewards a corporation the more evil it is, because the ones who know they're breaking the law are the ones who get away with it.
> Beyond a certain size, it becomes hard to pretend you're doing it for one reason while actually doing it for another. Especially if it becomes a pattern.
The pattern thing also doesn't really work.
Suppose some of your stores are in high crime areas and keep getting knocked off. The employees in those stores don't like the risk and form a union so they can demand bulletproof glass and hazard pay. The company looks at those stores and the insurance cost is getting out of hand and shrinkage is high and the stores just aren't profitable. So they close the stores.
Now you have a strong correlation between the stores that form a union and the stores that close, but it's because union formation and store closures are both caused by high crime, not because the company is purposely closing the stores that form a union.
> It strongly implies that the person putting it in writing didn't know it was illegal, because otherwise they wouldn't have put it in writing.
Just because someone created evidence that didn’t have to exist doesn’t mean they didn’t know their actions were illegal.
On Chris Hansen’s latest predator sting show the suspects frequently acknowledge, in writing, the age of the decoy and the sex acts they want to perform. They also take steps to create alibis, suss out if it is a sting, or otherwise avoid getting caught, which indicates clearly that they know what they are doing is illegal.
The sting show is obviously setting up a situation in which the suspects who know they're breaking the law think the evidence is only in the hands of their co-conspirators who have the same incentive to conceal it as they do.
Major corporations know that their emails etc. are discoverable regardless of whether the recipient is trusted. It's also not even necessary to disclose the true intention to anyone else in the company, unlike a situation where they're trying to enter into an intrinsically illegal transaction with a third party. The manager can just come up with a rationale for closing the store all on her own and then tell everyone else that it's happening.
> But that's just pointless because there are a thousand other reasons they might want to close the store and there is no way to prove it
That's the exact point where your argument breaks down. It is possible, sometimes, to prove that a company closed a store because of a union. See the recent Starbucks trial. In the end, they were only saved by the SCOTUS, who isn't exactly uncontroversial at the moment.
> It is possible, sometimes, to prove that a company closed a store because of a union.
The "sometimes" is doing all the work there. Sure, if the company writes an email that says "we decided to close this store because the employees unionized and we're trying to deter that in other stores" then you could prove it, but then they could just... not do that, and close the store anyway.
Maybe read up on recent union busting cases. Starbucks, Tesla, Walmart, Amazon... It's a lot more nuanced than that.
And note I'm replying to someone claiming it's impossible to charge companies with union busting at all.
> It's a lot more nuanced than that.
Which is kind of the other problem. You end up trying to mind read the intent behind some possible innuendo with an ambiguous meaning, because the outcome isn't determined by what they do, it's determined by what they write down.
> And note I'm replying to someone claiming it's impossible to charge companies with union busting at all.
If it's impossible to charge companies that have better lawyers but still use the same tactics, you still have the same problem with the law, because then those companies will have a competitive advantage and the others would either learn to do the same or lose their market position.
I believe in labor disputes the standard is a preponderance of guilt. You don't need proof at all, just the inclination they could have had bad motives.
Luckily, executives have a habit of occasionally putting their blatantly illegal deals in writing (e.g. the recruiting cartel, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...).
Beyond a certain size, it becomes hard to pretend you're doing it for one reason while actually doing it for another. Especially if it becomes a pattern.
> Luckily, executives have a habit of occasionally putting their blatantly illegal deals in writing
This is the weirdest way to have laws though. It strongly implies that the person putting it in writing didn't know it was illegal, because otherwise they wouldn't have put it in writing. But then you're never enforcing the law against people knowingly breaking the law, you can only ever enforce it against people who didn't realize it was illegal.
That seems like a bad design. In particular, it rewards a corporation the more evil it is, because the ones who know they're breaking the law are the ones who get away with it.
> Beyond a certain size, it becomes hard to pretend you're doing it for one reason while actually doing it for another. Especially if it becomes a pattern.
The pattern thing also doesn't really work.
Suppose some of your stores are in high crime areas and keep getting knocked off. The employees in those stores don't like the risk and form a union so they can demand bulletproof glass and hazard pay. The company looks at those stores and the insurance cost is getting out of hand and shrinkage is high and the stores just aren't profitable. So they close the stores.
Now you have a strong correlation between the stores that form a union and the stores that close, but it's because union formation and store closures are both caused by high crime, not because the company is purposely closing the stores that form a union.
> It strongly implies that the person putting it in writing didn't know it was illegal, because otherwise they wouldn't have put it in writing.
Just because someone created evidence that didn’t have to exist doesn’t mean they didn’t know their actions were illegal.
On Chris Hansen’s latest predator sting show the suspects frequently acknowledge, in writing, the age of the decoy and the sex acts they want to perform. They also take steps to create alibis, suss out if it is a sting, or otherwise avoid getting caught, which indicates clearly that they know what they are doing is illegal.
The sting show is obviously setting up a situation in which the suspects who know they're breaking the law think the evidence is only in the hands of their co-conspirators who have the same incentive to conceal it as they do.
Major corporations know that their emails etc. are discoverable regardless of whether the recipient is trusted. It's also not even necessary to disclose the true intention to anyone else in the company, unlike a situation where they're trying to enter into an intrinsically illegal transaction with a third party. The manager can just come up with a rationale for closing the store all on her own and then tell everyone else that it's happening.