Guilds and unions go back well before the 15th century, back to the 3rd century, and really even before that back as far as Ptolemaic Egypt in the 3rd century BC. The early guilds, and those up to more recent times, were confraternities of workers, similar to religious confraternities, where work-related skills were taught and secrets of the trade were kept tightly under wraps from outsiders. They were organized in a manner something between a trade union, a cartel, and a secret society, not unlike the unions of today. They imposed lengthy terms of apprenticeship, and tightly controlled their markets. This made it difficult for those lacking the capital to set up for themselves or without the approval of their peers to gain access to materials or knowledge, or to sell into certain markets. In other words the early unions, just like today, wanted control over the market and the production.
Karl Marx didn't invent the unions,
The statement of, "In a free market system some sort of resistance is required to assure the cogs in the wheel get their fair share," is right out of the Karl Marx handbook, where it abhors private ownership and private appropriation of the surplus product in the form of surplus value (profit), despite and in spite of the fact that someone came up with an idea and made it come to life. Marxism is everybody getting their fair share, even if their share isn't fair or deserved. The mere fact that workers perform a job for which they are paid isn't enough, Marxism says that workers should share in all of the profits above and beyond what they are paid.
Marxism says, actually, that the line haul that the customer pays should be distributed equally between the carrier, broker and the driver. I know a lot of drivers, including current and former union members, who would have a serious problem with that.
I also have to comment on the phrase "concept of negotiate fairness", because it's not at all unlike the invented term of "equal marriage" to redefine "gay marriage" to be the same as traditional marriage, even though it's not the same at all. Negotiated fairness means going on strike if you don't get your way, holding hostage for ransom the business to which you are striking. It means preventing the business from operating. It's like the spurned ex-lover who kills his former lover because, "If I can't have you nobody can". And that's exactly what the unions have done in the recent past, and are continuing to do today. There was a time when unions were necessary and did a lot of good for workers everywhere. But those days are gone, yet they aren't satisfied with their fair share, they have gotten greedy and have become the capitalist bаstards they think they are fighting against. It's no longer about fair, it's about winning.
The unions of Detroit have negotiated themselves, fairly, right out of the market. The free market says those cogs can get all the attention they want, but they're still not working. The teachers of Chicago are demanding more fish out of a barrel that doesn't even contain any water, much less more fish. They've shot all the fish already and have scooped them out. But like little children, they're crying until someone puts in more fish, because they want more fish, and that's that.
Not going to happen though. Too cold in the winter. 
