Unions aren't very common in the south, so I don't really have a horse in this race, but regarding:
Folks I have seen men who worked for less than they were worth because they were one and could not stand against business.
Labor is simply a service. Simple economics teaches us that goods and services follow the laws of supply and demand. If the man in the above quote really was worth more, then there would have been demand from other employers and he could command a higher price for his services. If there is no demand, then the reality is you're not getting less than you're WORTH, just less than you want. The two are not the same.
Now, unions essentially try to cheat the system. Through collusion they assure that the supply of labor will drop to zero (in which case price climbs skyward) unless certain demands are met. And for a time, that worked. Most jobs were production/manufacturing during the early part of the 20th century (computers really skyrocketed the "information economy" where no physical goods are produced). With international shipping still expensive at that time, often times it was still cheaper to just cave to a union than to import stuff.
In modern times, that has changed. Efficiency in shipping methods has made international import cheap as dirt (I can get a small package - just ONE - directly from China for less than a dollar - just imagine how cheap bulk shipments are), making outsourcing of manufacturing completely feasible. At the same time a lot of work has moved digital. Programming, design work, etc are all skilled professions that produce digital - rather than physical - goods. These jobs can be done anywhere in the world with the results quickly sent via the Internet to anywhere else in the world in mere milliseconds.
What we're truly seeing is things balancing out. Our population density was traditionally low - human labor was worth a bit more as it was rarer. That only works in a vacuum though (which we more or less had while the rest of the world caught up technologically). With the entire population of the globe becoming available for work, the market is simply reflecting a simple truth: human labor is worth a LOT less than it previously was. It sucks, and a lot of people are going to either starve or have to start taking MUCH lower paying jobs, but that's economics for you.
As I once heard, in order for each person on the planet to live to the same standard as the average American does, we'd need THREE planets. We obviously don't have that, so as the economy becomes more global we're going to see our average standard of living decline (while other people around the world in places like India and China see theirs go up). It's unavoidable. Eventually we'll strike some sort of balance, and I'm not sure exactly where that is, but I know that we haven't reached it yet.
In the future we're going to have to offset this with gains in efficiency. Resources are the only true currency in the world. The less fuel we burn, the less electricity we use, the less wasteful packaging we employ, the farther we can stretch our resources. I don't say that as a greenie or an eco-nut, but rather just from a position that wise management of your resources will yield better results than wasteful squandering, be we talking about money or any other resources.
