Lots of companies work without collective agreements in Sweden though. Under law it's completely free if you want to do so or not. You could as well say that the unions are threatening the Swedish model due to taking this to such extreme levels. Especially as it doesn't seem most employees at Tesla want the unions involved.

The way unions work in scandinavia is that they are decentralized but supportive of each other.

IE as long as the workers don't form an local chapter everything is fine the problem if that when such a chapter forms and the company ignores it every other union chapter is allowed to refuse to deliver work in support of an company that choose to refuse/fight unionization.

So for there to be an conflict there have to be an meaningful chapter formed within tesla's employee base that tesla refuses to acknowledge.

Now again remember that this system is core to the "flexsecurity" systems employed by all of the nordic countries which is generally based on fair negotiations between equal parties(union and company) if Tesla manage to break that model they force the bureaucracy and state to take over and set highly rules without any concerns for local details they way it typically happens in France which is going to hit their profitability far harder then allowing unionization.

I work for a US company and I can tell that US management doesn't give a rat's ass on local customs until it bites them. You can raise and escalate and whatnot, they will still push the locals to implement the illegal/unacceptable stuff if not immediately then boiling the frog - anything goes until some agency or legal suit says whoa stop.

They are engaging lawyers and engaging with some of Sweden's most popular and powerful NGO's that's not doing nothing that's actively throwing money into a fight that's both hard to win and where the worst outcome might actually be for Tesla to "win".

Again the "laizes faire" no labor protections of America just don't exist in Europe the question is weather you negotiate with an equal partner made up from your own employee's or have the state bureaucracy micromanage local details.

They do while conditions are ok, it seems like conditions are not ok for these workers hence they pushing for a CBA.

And while lots of companies work without a CBA here in Sweden, 90% of employees are covered by CBAs, so the vast majority are covered by one and Tesla fighting this by bringing scabs (a huge, huge no-no in here) is quite stupid. If they thought a CBA would be bad for business then strikes are even worse, it's their choice now to sign one or not with all the costs associated on not having one.

Most employees don't seem to be in support of the unions at this point though? It's a bit hard to tell as there are no official numbers, but from what I've seen it seems like ~90% or so of employees at Tesla remain at work. And there is a high demand for their services, so they could easily go to other companies for work if conditions are bad.

Not all workers have joined the union and wouldn't get paid by the union to strike. But unions use sympathy strikes against companies that might retaliate against their workers if they strike, Tesla has already made threats. So going by how many of the workers at Tesla are striking or not is not a good measurement.

The union is offering free memberships and 130% of normal pay. Tesla employees still don’t want to strike [1]. This is why the unions are using these extreme tactics.

1. https://teknikensvarld.expressen.se/nyheter/bilbranschen/tes...

Tesla threatened to remove their stocks if they strikes so not surprised as it's supposedly a large part of their compensation.

> It's not crazy when you understand the Swedish model

the only thing i’m questioning is the idea that the postal company is allowed to not deliver mail. it just looks very wrong to me.

Think of it this way instead, the people working there have their own rights to refuse to do so. They the people aren't "Postnord" the company, they are individuals who are free to act on their own, they aren't slaves to their company.

valid point, but at the same time people should be free to resign and employers should be free to fire their employees.

Yet you think tying people's hands and forcing them into furthering the interests of a foreign business venture's goals at the expense of the locality is okay?

Ask yourself, why is that okay? Why is it more wrong for a locality to refuse to cooperate with an uncooperative outsider than for an uncooperative outsider to act in a highly disruptive manner to the sensibilities of a foreign locale in the first place?

What would you do if it was you in their position?

> Yet you think tying people's hands and forcing them into furthering the interests of a foreign business venture's goals at the expense of the locality is okay?

i did not write that.

my point was that as long as there are laws enacted by the state that mandate using a specific intermediary and then that intermediary refuses service to a 3rd party, that means that the law needs changing as that intermediary now has unintended power over both the 3rd party and the state. double so when it comes to something as mundane as postal services.

Striking is one thing, but targeting an individual company is another. They are not striking, they are selectively denying a critical service to force submission.

It is not hard to imagine scenarios where this is weaponized with horrifying outcomes.

Anything can be weaponised with horrifying outcomes. (Your kitchen knife, radio, rats, automatic rifles, democracy)

The thing to look at: actual track record (positives vs negatives).

How many tragic events happened due to Swedish sympathy strikes targeting a company?

"It is not hard to imagine scenarios where this is weaponized with horrifying outcomes."

Well, it is for me to imagine - could you expand on "horrifying"? The Mirriam W definitions don't seem to make sense when used in your particular context.

“I’m a fireman. I don’t like you, so I’ll stand here while the fire burns you and your house.”

WE are firemen. Plural. It's not the decision of a single employee.

Interesting to compare the Swedish model to the UK's. Here, employers can do whatever they like, unions need a full postal ballot to fart.

What I don't get is: a strike is a protest in which workers refuse to work but also pay by renouncing their salary for the days they didn't work. If post employees selectively decide to not deliver to a specific client or address, what cost are they sustaining? Is their salary impacted?

Nordic unions underwrite the cost of strike action and pay workers any lost wages that result.

There's a statement by IF Metals (the central metalworking union whose ~130 odd members are being refused a collective agreement by Tesla) that they'll support their workers through this. I would image that postal and dockworkers see similar support from their unions (although they are working on every item save those that go to/fro Tesla and are not affected to the same degree).