> If you think that the union isn't demonstrably an effective tool for having achieved huge increases in salaries for players across the board at both the highest and lowest skill levels, I'd argue the burden of proof is on you, because you'd be arguing against the obvious interpretation of the history in the decades following the establishment of the union.

The burden is on anyone to make a claim in either direction because you don’t have a control. How do you know the salaries wouldn’t have increased just due to baseball popularity and demand for good players?

The salaries for top players would have increased, sure! But there’s no reason to think the minimums would have, and an obvious supporting point is that there have been several strikes that occurred during the contract negotiations

Also, we forget the price fixing scandal in big tech. Programmers should probably all be making over 1M+ (thorough there probably would be fewer jobs).