These actions are likely to be challenged by employee unions if they are in place, or they may prompt previously non-union employees to join a union.
Unions cannot prevent outsourcing, and they cannot one-sidedly require that companies neither increase costs for health insurance nor reduce the benefits gained for the same amount of money. However, a union can negotiate for a group of employees in the way that individual employees could not.
But perhaps the best way to view whether or not unions are still relevant, that is, whether they bring anything useful or productive regarding their jobs to their members, one might look at whether publishers will spend money to print books about unions. Quorum Books made that decision in 1998 with its book Managing Tomorrow's High-Performance Unions. This book specifically provides advice to union officials regarding ways to act effectively on the behalf of their members (Roberts, 1998).
In fact, from some workers'...
For laborers as well as such employees as customer service representatives, outsourcing is a continual concern. Most people have had the experience of calling a customer support line to be greeted by someone who, it turns out, is working in another country. At the time unions were fighting for basic work issues such as salary, a manufacturing job could mean job security all of the worker's life and into retirement. The pressure of outsourcing on large companies is something that employees cannot combat by themselves. Even unions may not be able to prevent outsourcing, but job security is once again an important issue for lower level worker, and such core issues keep unions relevant to workers.
Bibliography
Bonoir, David. 1997. "Unions in the Twenty-First Century." Challenge, Vol. 40.
Roberts, Markley. 1998. "Managing Tomorrow's High-Performance Unions." Monthly Labor Review, Vol. 122.
