I used to work for a very large, American company that had a significant % of employees in a union. However, every year the # of union employees would shrink.
One way the company did this was by turning these positions into “managers”. They would switch the people from hourly to salary and call them managers – even though they didn’t supervise anyone.
By doing this, their benefits decreased, and their overall pay decreased – cause they were expected to work over 40 hours per week with no overtime. Also they couldn’t collectively bargain for better pay, benefits, or hours.
2 questions:
-Is this legal?
-Why can’t low-level managers in the US unionize? I understand why they can’t join the same union as their subordinates, but shouldn’t they be able to start their own union for the same reason as everyone else?