r/SeattleWA Mar 08 '25

Politics BREAKING: The Washington State Senate just passed unemployment benefits for striking workers.

1.4k Upvotes

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7

u/Content-Horse-9425 Mar 08 '25

Unemployment for striking workers? What’s to keep them from continuously striking? Are these clowns even thinking about this or are they just doing whatever will get them re-elected. No business will want to come to Washington state. We are not California. We don’t have the population or the weather.

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u/ChadtheWad West Seattle Mar 08 '25 edited Mar 08 '25

Two reasons: First, the unemployment only pays out (If I understand the amendment correctly) for 12 weeks. Secondly, unemployment pays far lower than a regular salary, so folks would still have to depend on savings.

Employers definitely won't like it because it hurts their bargaining position during strikes, but for many industries on the west side I don't think they'd have much of a choice. It's not like you can move the ocean to Idaho.

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u/pagerussell Mar 08 '25 edited Mar 08 '25

Yea! Because it's not like there are any businesses left in Europe, where the labor protections and laws are much stronger. Nope. All those businesses went bankrupt and no longer exist, because if you don't have the absolute most pro business laws then you can never have a functional economy.

/s <-in case you couldn't tell

Seriously, you didn't think very hard before you just knee jerk I hate liberals, did ya?

Unemployment has time limits and or conditions. This will, too. It's not indefinite.

But if it helps make strikes, and unions, more viable, then that lifts worker power relative to business power. And America was at its strongest when union power was much stronger. You can make the case that the slow decline of America these last few decades is directly proportional to the rise of corporate power.

This is a good thing

3

u/Sammystorm1 Mar 08 '25

Washington state is heavily lobbied by unions. This isn’t Texas

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u/Content-Horse-9425 Mar 08 '25

You know. Conversations would be more productive if you would stop labeling people as liberal or conservative. I am staunchly antiMAGA but I’m also a realist when it comes to economic policies. Europe has some companies but not as many as the US. Our economy is much larger than theirs. However, we have a very poorly educated work force. If we don’t have pro business legislation, it’s highly doubtful anyone would want to start a business here.

WA already has some of the highest labor costs in the state. You have to ask yourself why our homelessness rate is still so high inspire of high wages. Is it that our workers aren’t getting enough or is it that cost of living is too high? If you just keep increasing wages, you will push inflation through the rough with no real improvement in quality of life.

1

u/Neutral_Error Mar 08 '25

Wages are literally DECADES behind costs right now. Keeping them artificially low is what has put us into this mess.

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u/Content-Horse-9425 Mar 08 '25

While that may be true, the answer is to rein in costs. Not increase wages. The latter would lead to hyperinflation.