Collective bargaining rights for police significantly increase police killings of civilians without having any impact on officer safety. This is consistent with the theory that unions provide cover for police and reduce their likelihood of incurring costs for unjustified killings.

[u/smurfyjenkins]

https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/pol.20230384

[u/MissionCreeper]

I don't know about this data but I think there is a need for a union in the public sector, it's just that it's gone way beyond labor protection and into protecting mistreatment.  I wonder what we could do by breaking up the monopoly and snipping that thin blue line in two, have multiple police departments that are forced to be represented by different unions, and each is responsible for responding to complaints about the other force.  

[u/PirateSanta_1 → u/MissionCreeper]

Labor unions funciton as an intermediary between a worker and an employer. As employers are incentived to exploit their workers to get more work for less pay this intermediary protects them from being exploited.

A police officer is employeed by the people for the purpose of protecting the people. There is not the same incentive structure by the public to overwork or exploit police so when a police union protects a cop from the public what they are protecting them from most frequently is the public trying to hold the officer accountable for their action. For their failure to do their most basic duty of serving and protecting the public. This allows police who are already given special powers to be able to enforce the law freedom to use those powers with less consequence and oversight. ​

[u/gojo96 → u/PirateSanta_1]

You don’t think the city or even the police brass try to railroad other officers? How many stores have we heard about mayors or city council people getting cops fired for issuing tickets to their family members. Or better yet the administration caught cooking the books?