Trump’s choice of Oregon’s U.S. Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer as labor secretary got me thinking about organized Labor. The prospective Secretary voted for the highly favorable organized Labor PRO Act. This wide-ranging labor law would rein in the so-called gig economy and boost workers’ organizing rights. Along with Donald Trump inviting the Teamster union’s president to speak at the Republican convention, you have a picture of a party looking to wear the “union label.”

This turn of events made me wonder if unions are a force for good or politized entities that do more harm than good. I grew up in organized Labor’s heyday, the 1940s and ’50s, when 1 in 3 belonged. Unions enjoyed their highest favorability. One not so happy with organized Labor was my father, a part owner in a Chicago manufacturing company; he had to deal with wage demands, work rules, and strikes in his industry and those in the supply chain.

A successful furniture company listed on the American Stock Exchange was in an industry that had it with unions and moving to “right-to-work” states. My father felt the company should follow and head south, but his partners refused. Fearing the worst, he sold out his shares and comfortably retired. A decade later, the company was bankrupt. It could not compete against lower labor costs and looser work rules that allowed automation.

The migration from the unionized north had already been underway long before China opened up, so they’re not to blame. Once the class of the world, our most heavily unionized industries lost out. We used to think of U.S. steel and General Motors the way we think of Apple and Microsoft today. The government baled out G.M. and U.S. Steel for sale, maybe to a Japanese company.