There are plenty of reasons the professional-managerial class should be interested in unions—it’s always been the plan that the bosses will come for you guys next, after they crush the working class—but over the past decade or so it’s struck me that culture is one of the things creating the gap between highly educated professional workers and unions. And I don’t mean culture in the hackneyed sense of “union workers drink six-packs and professionals drink fine wines.” I mean that the products made by union workers are all too often themselves seen as inferior—mass-produced, not interesting, not cool.

There are lots of great union-made products out there, but because of the patterns of unionization in recent U.S. history, it tends to be the case that the newer a product is, the less likely it is to be made by union workers. Budweiser yes, craft beer no.

Which is why it feels really significant that to see Anchor brewery workers unionize this week, with a 31 to 16 vote, and with workers at the affiliated Anchor Public Taps still to vote separately. Worker pay at Anchor not only hasn’t kept up with inflation, but was cut at one point, among other cuts including to health care, paid lunch breaks, sick leave, and 401Ks.

Don’t get me wrong. There are lots of great ways to get your union-made drink on, and you can pair that with Boar’s Head, the best of all the deli meats. Want your sandwich grilled? Do it in an All-Clad pan and serve it up on some retro-cook Fiestaware. But nonetheless, it is good to see unions making headway in the craft beer world, and may other bastions of semi-hipness follow.

This blog was originally published at Daily Kos on March 16, 2019. Reprinted with permission.