It may sound simplistic but its the truth and there are plenty of other examples and history around this - Starbucks recently. 30 employees unionizing may not have any significant impact on their profits, but if they let that union grow it would have a lot more members demanding better working hours or wages over time. A strong union also generally leads to a loss of control by management where they have to negotiate more with workers which they don't like. Why do you think they were fired?
Firings in this case were for union busting. Illegal union busting is profitable - that's why business owners do it. Because it's illegal, they will make up a different excuse for why the workers were fired. They will never admit to illegal union busting. So you should not take their statements as good faith.
Firings reduce expenses, the equation above explains the rest. Of course, that's only in the short term, but that's what exec bonuses are given out on!
This is also true if humans in general, at all stations in life, including union members and union leaders. Is there any offer a union would refuse on the grounds that’s too much?
People like getting more money, but they don't die without it. You can get a job that pays just enough to pay your bills and work at it until you die. Companies can't do that under capitalism. They take on debt and require growth to pay back their investors, or they don't take on debt and get undercut by a competitor who does.
I imagine the GP was referring to the fact that Costco experiences that kind of growth while giving their employees excellent pay and benefits. Even low-level store employees typically make $20-30 an hour.
It’s because they don’t sell everything, and the things they do sell, they sell to the top 50%.
They also did have benevolent dictators who spent decades building up good will, but supposedly the new bosses as of a few years ago are not so benevolent anymore.
